"How do politics enter into your classroom?"

A while back, I had the opportunity to write to some concerned parties who saw my public Facebook page and were concerned that I might let my classroom be too strongly influenced by politics. Here's that letter minus their context, which is a story I don't know. I'm posting this here because it's worth reading, and because I don't want to fall silent if it matters. It's so easy to live thoughtlessly, I partly want this here to remind myself of what matters to me, and how politics should and should not enter into my classroom.

Dear ---,

Many thanks for the invitation to express myself more fully, in light of my more politically-framed posts online. I like to share in writing and I believe it’s one of the most thoughtful ways to convey ideas for posterity, so I wish to thoughtfully address how my politics, as it were, affect my teaching.

I believe a classroom is a sacred space for discovery. I do not see it as a place to clutter with my opinions; nor would I condone practices that discourage discussion. The podium at the front is no pulpit, and I would not presume to educate on my particular views of justice in the world. It is enough for me to present the sources and allow students time and space to talk together, to talk with you, to think, to pray, and then to write, when appropriate.

When research and argument are part of the middle school ELA curriculum, what I hope my students learn is the value of all sides of an issue. In a Language Arts class, our focus is not which side of the argument to take, but rather how to do justice to all sides, how to interpret texts and scan for bias, how to mediate multiple ideas. Instead of seeing an argument as warfare (gaining and losing ground, defeating or winning, enemies and allies, etc.), I would prefer that we treat it as a dance in which the participants must respect and keep in step with others to accomplish a greater thing.

On a more personal level, my ideas as to what makes a Christian an obedient Christian are constantly changing. I have never interpreted my Christian walk through the lens of a political party, and am even now registered as “Independent,” for better or for worse, because no party represents the incarnate Kingdom of God: that’s the work and the joy of the global Church!

I affirm the Anabaptist conclusion that we belong to no empire of the world before we belong to the Kingdom of God. As our forebears in faith, I have a strong suspicion of all things relating to the military, to nationalism, to charismatic dogma, and to any attempts at polarizing discourse on complicated issues. I cherish all life, and hope to be ever more loving. I cherish the poor and under-served of our society, people in prison, people without work, people who are sick; and I hope to be ever more cherishing.

My hope is that any participation I may have in discussions of politics will always be with the immeasurable grace with which God has dealt with me. Furthermore, I understand discussions of politics in the classroom require extra restraint from me (and all teachers, to be sure) to avoid taking advantage of the incredible power a teacher has to influence young minds. I’m humbled by the challenge.

I invite discussion, accountability, and correction within a diverse community of people trying to figure out how to love God without standing still. That’s how I will know Jesus better, and that’s what matters to me most.

All My Best,
Carolyn McKalips

Recitation

Assignment: Memorize and recite 20 lines of a poem; use appropriate pace, tone, gestures; connect with your audience. You have one week, ready, Go!

As I assigned it, I knew I would be terrified if I were they, so I decided to do it myself. Always model what you want your students to do and be.

I stood in front of the class as if it were the first day I had ever stood in front of a class instead of the 3,000th. My hands shook, and my voice caught in my throat. I was momentarily Anne Shirley when she stood before all of her friends of Avonlea at the White Sands Hotel, prepared to recite "The Highwayman," while being seized with fear.

It's still a fresh feeling, the muscles and everything in me saying that it is a bad idea to speak words not my own. Then, to speak with spark is even more impossible. What evolutionary trait resulted in this fear? What am I preserving when I fear performance?

But then I began. Why was my voice suddenly so small? It was a hollow, tin whisper at the bottom of a well. I tried to draw myself up, speak from the diaphragm, banish signs of fear. All of that is rather a lot to do at once.

I recited Emily Dickinson's "Because I could not stop for Death" to a group of 11th-graders. I knew the poem cold, and still I floundered. It almost undid me. I continued to shake for minutes afterward, still teaching. I have no idea what it is about reciting something I have memorized. When my students ask me why I am not an actor, I know that this is why. 

Scenes from H Period

On Thursday, students in my last class of the day were begging me to "do the dance you do! Do the dance! It's like this!" They did some strange version of Beyonce's "Single Ladies" march. I was dumbfounded.

"I don't dance in class! That would be so inappropriate!"

Thursday night, as I was explaining something to my roommate, with growing animation, I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the window and saw the dance. I dance to make a point. I apologized to those seventh-graders on Friday, partly for not owning up to dancing, partly for acting unprofessional by my very own definition. I said I could in no way guarantee that a relapse would not occur.

I laugh and laugh in that class. I try so hard to be serious, even giving detentions and subtracting points. It's probably unfair, when I cannot seem to keep myself under control.

Friday, I sat down at a desk during silent reading. The student next to me, I mean it, just his breathing made me laugh and I had to move.

During silent reading, with some regularity, I look up to find Adam doing something other than reading. I fix my glare on him. He shoots back a funny glare, and I realize I'm disarmed. I almost laugh and disrupt the class myself.

Adam: 1

McKalips: 0

November Dedications

Wednesday, 1 
Today is dedicated to having enough.

Thursday, 2
Today is dedicated to Thor and the refugee Asgardians.

Friday, 3
Today is dedicated to that group of women who prays for me and laughs at my jokes. I thank my God every time I remember you.

Saturday, 4
Today is dedicated to the Enneagram.

Sunday, 5
Today is dedicated to Hay Hassani's thrift clothes. You are so reasonably priced. Thank you.

Monday, 6
Today is dedicated to Monica, who sees the Kingdom of God.

Tuesday, 7
Today is dedicated to the Apostle Paul, who preserved the Gospel from extra conditions.

Wednesday, 8
Today is dedicated to every bank everywhere that actually does their job. So, that would exclude my bank in Morocco, just to be clear.

Thursday, 9
Today is dedicated to Tyler, who sympathized with me at odd hours while I was grading instead of sleeping.

Friday, 10
Today is dedicated to "The Crucible" movie, which saved me from actually teaching.

Saturday, 11
Today is dedicated to the book Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson

Sunday, 12
Today is dedicated to the taxi driver who spoke beautiful French, and encouraged me to keep learning.

Monday, 13
Today is dedicated to this carpet next to me. It witnessed my attempts to create two unit plans in one hour, and it remained beautiful.

Tuesday, 14
Today is dedicated to the parents of my students. Thank you for trusting me so much.

Wednesday, 15
Today is dedicated to the English department. During high-grading weeks, I sometimes feel like we go through war together... separately.

Thursday, 16
Today is dedicated to the "Time Until" app. Five days.

Friday, 17
Today is dedicated to naps. Naps on the way to work. Naps on buses. Naps on couches. Naps that save first my life, and others by extension.

Saturday, 18
Today is dedicated to Amicitia American School, Fes, who knows how to host graciously.

Sunday, 19 
Today is dedicated to Luke D., who made me laugh until I cried.

Monday, 20
Today is dedicated to the substitute who will have the joy or sorrow of my classes tomorrow.

Tuesday, 21
Today is dedicated to Tyler, who flew across an ocean to hang out for a few days.

Wednesday, 22 
Today is dedicated to couches, windows, and sunshine, and anywhere the three meet.

Thursday, 23 
Today is dedicated to you, Lord, who graciously gives us good things.

Friday, 24
Today is dedicated to a pair of cat earrings; to my brother and sister-in-law; to Tyler; and to the little girl selling tissues next to the train station.

Saturday, 25
Today is dedicated to "Stranger Things" and leftovers.

Sunday, 26
Today is dedicated to comings and goings; may God watch over them all.

Monday, 27
Today is dedicated to the working printers.

Tuesday, 28
Today is dedicated to sentence diagramming; I wish I had known how fun you were when I was in seventh grade, myself!

Wednesday, 29
Today is dedicated to G period. I look older because of you. But I love you, and will keep forgiving you right before class, at 1:40 PM every weekday, and right after class, at 2:30 PM every weekday.

Thursday, 30
Today is dedicated to Shanti and Nissa, who listened without judgment, and kept my phone through the night.

Thoughts on the End of a Quarter

Teaching for me is making a bunch of decisions while maintaining a steady stream of interaction on a certain topic. It's creating problems in the moment to be solved when the students leave the room.

Here's an example of this problem-making/problem-solving cycle. While grading papers, I realize that my students have serious issues with certain homophones. I decide to do a quick warm-up with homophones the next morning.

They ask if they should take notes.

I say, "Yeah... if you want to make sense in your writing." Oh no, here it comes...

"Will there be a test?" they ask.

I pause. Here's what's happening in my brain: Well, crap. Then I have to make a test, don't I? And do a review beforehand? Or maybe I assess them in some other way. One more column in their writing rubrics? Or maybe they make posters. There is literally no more room for posters on my walls. Or maybe I need to think of some new means of assessing that I've never thought of before. Time to research. Why didn't I think of assessment before I thought of this activity? Oh, right. Because I was grading their papers. Does every, little tiny minutia have to have a grade? Why isn't knowing the right thing enough of a gift? Why the grades why all the grades forever?

Here is what comes out. "I will tell you tomorrow how you'll be graded. But today, take notes."

The more you think ahead of time, the less stressful that moment has to be. But I can't plan ahead all the time. When? If I'm in a heavy grading cycle, then anything the students get to learn in class while I am spending evenings grading essays is a freebie. Learn it or don't. I can't grade everything.

That is problematic in my current setting, though, because if things aren't attached to a grade, students very often feel that they do not need to be attentive or even civil in class.

So what's the solution? What do you do when you can't grade everything?

Here's what I do: I lie about it.

Okay, it's not exactly a lie. It might be on the test. But it might not be. I might grade it after I collect it. But I just as easily might get to the end of the quarter and throw it away.

This week, my trash can was *full* of stacks of ungraded papers every afternoon.

"Mustapha at the Bat"

Let's talk about D period seventh grade. 

Try getting these kids to all be quiet at the same moment! I spend about 20 out of our 50 minutes together quieting them. But in the remaining 30 minutes, we somehow manage to cover more ground than any other class. I just finished inputting preparation grades, and these kids are statistically an absolute mess. Fifteen out of 22 kids forgot some essential piece of their supplies this week. 

I have never had to strain my voice to be heard as I have done with them. But I have also never seen such unexpected cooperation as I saw today. 

Youssef is the jewel of the class. The dragon and the jewel. He has an extraordinary aptitude for most things, and a lack of self-control that is just as extraordinary. I told him before we began today that we would be reviewing a story from last week. When that started, he was welcome to find an alternative activity: drawing or reading. 

"Here's the book you can read, here's the paper you can use; stay within this area."

I noticed him getting paper occasionally, as I began our review of "Casey at the Bat." They had read it last week, but their comprehension was still low. As I set the scene, I found that we were more than re-telling the story; we were re-reading. So I embraced the moment. I asked for a student to be Casey at the bat. 

"Hold your arms like this," I explained to Mustapha as I held an imaginary bat. Haytham insisted on being the pitcher. Mohamed insisted on being the catcher. Three umpires were suddenly named. We had an outstanding out-fielding complement. The audience, like all of Mudville, was riveted.

The pitcher found a wad of paper that at first I rejected as unnecessary until Youssef the Off-Task brought over a long, rolled paper bat he had been improvising since the beginning of class and handed it to our much-obliged Casey. Youssef somehow anticipated that we would be acting out the whole story. He had made a bat for the occasion. He had also nearly memorized the entire poem, and was able to fill in all the blanks I left. He became my dramatic reading partner. 

Every second I feared this thing turning into a gruesome riot. And every second this nutso seventh grade group surprised me. 

They acted out the entire poem in cooperation, then put away the bat and ball, retired their imaginary gloves, and sat down to answer all the forthcoming questions with perfect comprehension.

Later, maybe Youssef stole someone's phone. And maybe he didn't do that. I cannot say. But I can say that our class today was such fun.

Caesura

After the senior class graduated on Saturday, June 3, I finally turned my attention to my languishing ninth grade class. They were languishing in part because it was the curriculum I developed the least, and in part because they are fasting from water and food during daylight for Ramadan.

For the last two months, I have felt as though I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel when it comes to creativity. Though my stores of energy were bolstered by my love for my students and an obscene amount of caffeine, the year gets harder; that's all there is to it.

Today in the teacher's lounge, after the morning's finals, I found myself with two of my closest high school teachers, all of us grading. We commiserated a bit, but we all sensed that it wasn't helping anyone, and we were too tired to be angry or frustrated. Slowly, the conversation shifted, and that's why I'm telling you this. The complaints and the small talk were all the slow introduction to this miraculous moment where we started to talk about what we were going to change for next year.

We hadn't even finished grading our finals, and we were already on to the next batch of classes. We shared ways we would change our systems. We had new phrases, new activities, and new focuses. "That is just the very best part about teaching, guys," said Marie. "We get to change what doesn't work for the next year." (She teaches science, so I guess she knows all about variables and affecting outcomes.)

I know I would not have felt so hopeful if a few months' rest were not ahead of me. But when June 21 comes, and I close my classroom, full of boxes and empty walls, I'll know it's just temporary. Summer is not a full stop to my job, but a caesura. (I teach literature, so I know that caesuras are breaths in poetry; pregnant pauses between two phrases; time for the musician to arrange his lyre and form the next phrase; ... time to see his family and friends, and eat pork products, and sleep for days on end.)

So Angry

If I were you, there's no reason I would read this. We get enough complaining without searching for it.

This week, here's what makes me angry.

1. People defining themselves by traveling. Collecting friends like souvenirs. I see my hypocrisy. It will take years to remedy.

2. Dudes hollering at me on the street. Yesterday, as I was walking past Beausejour on a main road, I had just passed two young men when I heard that kissy noise every woman knows. I turned around, walked the few steps back to them, and shouted in English, "DON'T DO THAT. DON'T EVER DO THAT AGAIN!" I was livid. Jaw set hard, lips pinched, eyes wide and fixed; I curled my upper lip in disgust. They don't speak English, but the words didn't matter. They nodded, ashamed and uncomfortable.

I have been told to not make any eye contact, to keep my eyes down so as not to draw attention to myself in any way. It doesn't seem to matter. Men here (and in Pennsylvania, and lots of places) think a woman walking on the street is an easy target for their libidinous guffaws. Usually, I walk on for my own safety. But yesterday I had it in my head that I really could, and would, fight. 

3. Students who put forth an extraordinary effort in making excuses and arguing while their work remains incomplete or not begun. In the same category, a senior who shows up at their final and doesn't have a pen.  

I've Been Almost This Lonely Before

I remember the last time I was this lonely. It was my first year of teaching and being a dorm adviser at LMH.

• I never had enough sleep.
• I didn't hang out with people regularly.
• I always had grading hanging over my head. 
• I was responsible in part for the well-being of so many kids, and the job just never seemed to end. 
• I had no idea where to make boundaries. Of course I had to move all those boundaries over the next two years. 

It was all a bear of a task. What I remember, though, was feeling so lonely. I remember kneeling in child's pose that winter, crying out to God about how damn uncertain and tiring the whole thing was. Was I in the right place? Was I doing this right? How would I know if I was doing it right? Why do I feel so alone, God?It was the loneliest I had been up to that point.

This is a harder life in so many ways, but the fact that I have that experience as part of me makes this one easier. It's a lot of the same, but at least I've done some of it before:

• I never have enough sleep.
• I don't hang out with people regularly.
• I always have grading hanging over my head.
• I'm responsible for my own well-being, and I don't know what that looks like.
• I have no idea where to make boundaries.

Why not just solve one problem, and at least hang out with people more regularly?

It's partly because I need to make new friends to hang out with, and that is a slow process. Deep friendships take time, and shallow ones take energy.

I'm afraid of hanging out with only Americans, because, as I've already seen, they come and go so quickly. I've only been here for nine months, and already I've seen people leave who came here with me. That leaves local friends: Moroccan and other African friends who are likely to stick around. But there's the problem of the language barrier. And there's the problem of my disillusionment with Morocco stemming from the students I teach. It's not been a conscious decision, but if all Moroccans are like my students, how can I ever trust anyone? They lie to me like it's their job.

So, I'm lonely. But I'm not ashamed of it. It's like Jessica and the Reverend Mother, talking together in Dune... 

"I've been so lonely."
"It should be one of the tests," said the old woman. "Humans are almost always lonely."

Troubled Sleep

Remind me what you say about peace

and all will be well.

Remind me what you say about fear

and all will be well.

Remind me what you say about never leaving

and all will be well.

Give rest to those you love. 

There's this sweet sea breeze over the hill that pastures simpler beasts. 

Today I found myself wishing I could join them there. 

Give rest to those you love.

It would be trudging on if not for love.

It would be entirely will that trained my course, 

but it's yours.

Give rest to those you love.

Ah, it's these sweet smiles of discovery. 

Ah, it's those broken hearts that have begun to know too much. 

Give rest to those you love.

Everyday Lesson Planning With Miss McKalips

7:15 AM

I walk into the classroom. Chairs are on desks; the cleaning lady has been through, and the room is ready. She has faith that what we do in here is important, and she works to make our space worth learning in every day.

I know we have to learn something today, but we need to start a new unit. What was our last unit about? Short stories. The test was yesterday. I stayed up late grading them, and I went to bed telling myself I would figure something out in the morning. Here I am. It is morning. What do I teach?

I go to the curriculum map. I'm not ready for any of these units. Okay, I'm good at teaching writing: I'll teach a paper. Whooaaaaa... Am I ready to grade 53 seventh-grade papers when it's so close to the end of the quarter? When is it ever convenient to teach writing?

I open up a book by one of my favorite (one of my only) writing pedagogy authors. I look at where he begins, and how much work he pours into every paper, every lesson. What? Every time he teaches Polonius' speech in Hamlet, he does this incredible amount of studying. At night. After he's left school, he reads the act again, reads his research again, listens to the play on his way to work. I want to kill him. I will never be able to do that. I can't do this.

7:40 AM.

What am I going to teach today?

7:45 AM.

Hall duty. Good thing I have first period planning to think through this.

8:05 AM.

What am I going to teach today? It's a really good thing I haven't been called to cover anyone's class.

8:10 AM.

Forget teaching writing today. Take that book home and read it, and do it all perfectly the first time; but the first time won't be today. Actually, no, just throw that book into one of these drawers with other people's perfect ideas.

8:20 AM.

Open the textbook and figure out what is next. Poetry. Oh my gosh. I love poetry.

8:30 AM.

We can't just read poems on day one! How are we going to read them!? What will this unit even be about?

8:40 AM.

The students come in ten minutes! FIGURE THIS OUT RIGHT NOW.

8:45 AM.

Okay. I'm going to make a decision. Decision made. We'll make a chart on the board of different kinds of art. And then we'll choose one kind of art, and talk about what the different tools are that that artist uses. I'm only barely qualified to talk about the art of painting... good enough: we'll talk about the tools a painter uses. Then we'll talk about how a poet is an artist, and list off the tools a poet can use. We'll create a vocabulary list that way, and we'll be sure to include rhythm, rhyme, allusion, form, stanza, assonance, alliteration...

8:50 AM. [Bell]

Guess that'll work. [Open the door. Kids come in.]

With All Due Respect to Billy Collins

This poem is a response to Billy Collins' "Introduction to Poetry." 

---

I know a poem has died when I have to dissect it
to show my students how it used to work.

Gently I make my incision,
pull the skin apart,
reveal the muscle and tissue.

The class is somewhat horrified
as I remove each organ for their inspection,
lining these up like conquered chess pieces.

They fall back to sleep as I try to explain
that once, not very long ago in the language,
this creature was alive.

I replace each part and posit a theory on
how the complete organism may have functioned,
even how it may have interacted with others
in its day.

It is no use, by then.
Their phones are in their hands
or on their minds.

Oh hell, so is mine.

We all reach for our pockets
a minute before we should,
eager to know if anyone loves us.

Love is Like Clothes

One event in a speech meet is the impromptu speech. A student chooses one of three random topics, and has seven minutes to think through and perform on the topic. They can divide the preparation with the speaking however they choose, but they are advised to stay on topic, be organized, and say something meaningful.

Mohammed was a roly-poly, bespectacled sixth-grader from another school. I can't even remember which topic he chose, because he prepared for all of 30 seconds, then spoke for 30 more seconds, somehow managing to find time to chew on the edge of a folder in his hand and stare at me uncomfortably for several seconds. When he was finished, my mouth was agape with his disregard for convention and his absolute failure to say anything of value.

Later in the day I conferred with another judge who had also had a round of impromptu that included little Mohammed. His topic was "love." I wasn't even there to see this sub-par performance. The presiding judge told me about it, and I could just imagine the rest.

Mohammed prepared for perhaps a minute or less, then got up with his wide eyes behind his wide glasses and said, "Love is... like clothes. You put it on... it keeps you warm."

He may have said a few other lines before his reserves were exhausted, his eyes grew fearful, and he quietly ended with, "that's all. That's it," and made a quick exit.

The impromptu speakers were notable, many of them, but this little guy... he was the only one to say something truly worth remembering. Love is like clothes. Love is like clothes. Love is like clothes.

Love is like... clothes.

A Few More Moments of Grace

It feels like the world as I knew it in the United States, especially, is coming to an end. There are so many emergencies right now... with the promise of more trouble: patriots from Iraq are detained; a white supremacist will now be allowed to assassinate people with impunity. And it's only just begun.

The only peace I can find is in Jesus. Oh, he is precious, and he does not lean left or right: he never changes. We cry out to you, God, let justice roll like mighty waters. 

---

I have been asking God to show me the grace he's provided for the moment. Is it tangible, Lord? Can I feel it and see it, please? Because things look so hopeless.

Here are a few moments from last week that touched my heart:

1. Casablanca cold is different from Pennsylvanian cold. I prefer Casablanca cold, but hear me out. Though the weather bottoms out at 1*C, 34*F, the buildings aren't built to hold heat in. So it's hard to get warm when you do come inside. It's hard to explain how demoralizing that can become. There's no refuge. But we do get this spectacular rainbow over the ocean!

I'm wearing a knit cap beneath my hood, three or four layers on top, and two layers of slacks.
But look at the rainbow!

2. A new friend gave me a gift toward my upcoming vacation to France.

3. At the end of a seventh grade class on Friday, as the students prepared to leave, I thanked them for their attention, as I always do. Two of the girls came over to me and said sincerely, in practiced unison, "thank you for teaching us!" I regret not hugging them!

When All You Actually Want is a Cinnamon Roll

Today was one of those mornings when you're teaching seventh grade about imagery. You're introducing a bit of homework that isn't due for a few days and the thing you really have to do is a lot of end-of-semester grading. A lot. We're talking 80 essays due Sunday night, 46 more due Tuesday night, and a thousand little things you've put off grading until the end... and it's sneaking up on you, and you're pushing it away so you can teach class... but all you really want is a cinnamon roll with raisins. You know? What every teacher really needs is their* vice principal to show up with a cinnamon roll, and be like, "Here you go! Take a break, and I'll cover this class time. Enjoy that cinnamon roll, now!"

I mean, these cinnamon rolls. Everyone talks about them. It's inappropriate how often everyone talks about them. The problem has been that I'm teaching during the time when the cafeteria is selling them. Because of my split schedule, half middle, half high school, I teach through the break time when the rolls are for sale. In yesterday's meeting about a low-performing student, I even told this to the administration, because a whole day had gone by since I had complained about something.

You know that fantasy where someone comes into the room and trades you your class time for a cinnamon roll? That totally happened today. And it was both of my assistant principals who came into class, one to present the cinnamon roll, the other to whip everyone into shape after the oohing and ahhhing had subsided. I'm telling you, I left that room so fast, with my Kindle and my warm, sticky cinnamon roll.

Did I mention that my school is hiring?




*I'm using the form as a third person singular neuter on purpose, so would you cool it, already?

What I Use Language For

A few weeks ago, I called a gas delivery company to get a refill for our portable, gas heater. I know enough French to express that I don't know French, and was soon connected with someone who speaks English. The delivery guy would be here within the hour.

That hour passed rather nervously for me, and it's because a man I don't know was going to come to my house, and I was going to have to be present while saying almost nothing because I don't know enough words.

When he arrived, he disengaged the empty tank with his wrench, and installed the new tank while I stood around doing nothing, saying nothing. Those are trying times for me, because if we spoke the same language, a few lines of small talk would have filled in that gap very tidily. I would have woven words around myself, covered myself up with them: a dreamy, big scarf.

As it was, I stood, completely present—a person and present—whether or not I wanted to be. I felt both ridiculous and real. So I've thought about it, and I find I have a few main uses for words:

1. I can hide using words. One day, a long time ago, when I first started to hate my body (it's been a love-hate relationship ever since), I began to think that if I just kept talking, no one would see me. I can make a joke, and suddenly it's not that I'm beautiful, but that you see something other than sweatpants-uncombed-Saturday-morning me.

2. I can make peace using words. Because of my high anxiety about Trump being president, I find myself talking about morals rather more often than usual. I find myself answering long messages on Facebook and on WhatsApp from equally anxious people, but anxious from another perspective. (And the perspectives I trust admit to being complicated.) So far, we've disengaged while remaining friends.

3. I can teach you how to use words using words. But only to a point. Teaching is hard, but it's getting better and better.

Riddle Me This...

How do you teach about the separation of church and state without recommending it? I have a certain affinity for it, as a matter of fact.

It becomes necessary to talk about the interference of the church and state when teaching about the Middle Ages. I was an inch away from going off on my usual rant regarding the separation of church and state when I realized... I am living in a Muslim country.

That is to say, this is not a Muslim country in the same way I'm from a "Christian" country, but in a way that has laws that dictate religious observances.

So I stopped abruptly, mid-lecture, and said we'd pick up there tomorrow. Right now it's 8:38 PM, and I'm planning tomorrow. It occurs to me that I spend each school day creating new riddles for myself to work out in the evening.

Teaching New Books

When you're starting new units, especially new books, you sometimes have to give history lessons to provide context for the story.

Both seventh and ninth grade are starting new books next week. So this week was even more academically strenuous than your typical five days, because I had to use my non-strength of teaching history in order to get us off the ground. Not only that, but the books we're reading require extra-special attention to not being a jackass: the Israel-Palestine conflict for seventh grade's book, Habibi; and slavery and racism in the United States for ninth grade's book, To Kill a Mockingbird.

I got home by 5:15 pm, and slept until 7:15 pm.

And now I'm off to bed at 9:35 pm, because tomorrow is another day with lists and classes.

Tomorrow is also Moroccan dress day, and I'll be sporting a piece given to me today by an extraordinarily kind student.

Update:

I'm on the left, roommate Stacey on the right.

Such a Relief

I wish I enjoyed the intensity of a difficult moment, but I don't. The moment after the tension, that's what I like, when we can have peace again.

1. As soon as D period is over, and my ninth graders are about to leave the room, I celebrate that I've gone through my three different classes, and all that's left of the teaching day is a double reprise of seventh grade. It is such a relief.

2. As soon as I finish the allotted studying I have given myself for the night, and I remember that I need to eat and sleep, it is such a relief.

3. Every time President Bartlet entered a room in the show The West Wing, the lights were already on. And when he left it, they remained burning. In season two, an episode ends with him leaving the oval office at the end of the night. An aid comes into the oval office, and extinguishes each light. It is such a relief.

Touchstone

There was a moment last week when I looked around and could not believe how beautiful were the people in my classroom. They were their best selves, and it was stunning. I thought, "This is love."

It was not naiveté; it was one reality. They are lovely and loveable.

I will see them in far worse times, and they'll see me there, too. In fact, I already have. They're capable of being rather unpleasant. But I will keep coming back to that moment, because they are also full of wonder, affection, and so many many more days.