Lesson Learned: Don't panic

I have a student named Nick. He is a cutie and one of my favorites. (Yes, it is true. Teachers have favorites.) He is super funny and a good helper and has total lightbulb moments when he finally understands something. He has funny dance moves when we're getting our wiggles out and he always messes up the punch line when he tells me a joke.

So while I love Nick and I'm glad he's in my class, there is one thing he does that just drives me bonkers. The second something gets too hard for him, he will theatrically throw his pencil on his desk, put his hands over his eyes or up in the air, and exclaim in frustration, "I can't do it!" Ahh! It makes me crazy when he does this. First of all, he didn't even give it a chance. Second of all, maybe I wasn't done explaining the whole thing yet so I'm not expecting him to completely get it. Third of all, I totally 100% know that he can do it.

This especially happens with our timed addition tests. There's a voice recording that goes along with the test where a voice reads the math problems aloud to the kids. I've told them that if they get stuck or behind, they can just skip up ahead to the one we're on and leave the others blank. Nick hates not being able to fill in the answer to every question. He's pretty good at math so he usually does okay but, every once in a while, he'll get caught up on a tricky one, realize he's behind, panic frantically for a second trying to catch up, and then immediately do his little throwing-his-hands-in-the-air-and-exclaiming bit.

It's the panic that gets him. 

If he could stay calm for just a few extra seconds, he would be able to find where we are and catch up. He would probably only miss one or two problems at most. Instead he goes into freak out mode and gives up.

While this process drives me crazy, I can totally sympathize with him. I am the queen of freaking out. When something seems like it's getting too hard or when it doesn't seem to be going right, I panic, throw my metaphorical pencil down on my metaphorical desk, and want to give up.

Some lose their faith the moment they are diagnosed with cancer. Some decide that prayers aren't answered because they didn't immediately feel a warm fuzzy after their prayer. Others may be quick to label themselves as a bad mom, a bad student, a bad athlete, or a bad member of the church when they momentarily don't match up to some arbitrary standard that's been set. Some quickly decide that they'll never get married because their date last night tanked. Some give up on New Years resolutions because they missed one day or ate the ice cream.

Whatever form it takes, a lot of us are probably guilty of being quick to panic and lose the trust or faith we once had in someone or something. I am grateful we have a patient Heavenly Father who, just as I view Nick, sees the potential we have and knows we are still in the middle of a big learning process. When we have a moment of weakness, failure, stupidity, forgetfulness, or ignorance, we just need to stay calm, realize that it's okay to miss a few problems on the test, figure out where we're supposed to be, move forward, and get back on track.

That quote is from an excerpt from one of my favorite Mormon Messages. This was already one of my favorite talks so I was super excited when they made it into a Mormon Message! You should watch it. It will make you happy. And Elder Holland is always inspiring.

Just something to apply now or save for later.

Lesson Learned: Remember the ups during the downs

So this is actually a lesson I learned over the weekend as I was watching my little cousins for a few days. But it's about children, so I feel like it applies. First of all, my hat goes off to every mother out there. Holy moly. It is so much work. Especially one year olds. And three year olds.

Anyways, so I went into this weekend feeling like it wouldn't be that bad. I mean, I'm a first grade teacher. A cool first grade teacher. I turn on music from Frozen while we work at our desks. I let them have dance parties after a test. I call them bud. I'm fun.

But babysitting kids all day is a completely different story. 

There were moments when I felt like I was rocking it. The baby was napping, the older kids were reading, I was drawing with the younger kids, the dishes were done, the three year old told me she wanted me to stay forever, and everyone was happy. At other moments, I was tanking. Like when I didn't have a firm grip on his legs when changing his diaper and his foot (and my hand trying to stop his foot) went in the poop. Or when I slightly dropped him in the crib because my arms aren't long enough to reach over the side of the crib completely. Or when I made promises that I didn't follow through on, didn't monitor how much cookie dough was being consumed rather than made into cookies, or kept feeding the youngest Life cereal because that's all he would eat. 

This kind of up and down roller coaster seems to happen in all areas of my life. It happens in my teaching, it happens with my efforts to make and follow through with new goals, it happens with my testimony, it happens with my exercising, it happens with my self-esteem, it happened on my mission, it happens in my dating life...

Why is that? Why can't we always be up?

I don't think I really know the answer to this, but something I have learned is that, since ups and downs seem to inevitably happen, it is so crucial that we pay attention and notice when the ups are happening. Whether that means writing it down, putting it as a note in your phone, saying a quick prayer thanking Heavenly Father, telling someone about it, or something else, I feel like if we can take note of the fact that we are up, it will make all the difference when we are down. It will help us to remember that we were once up and that we can be up yet again. And be kind to yourself when you're down. Give yourself some credit, look to the past for when you were up, and push through.

Just something to digest.

Lesson Learned: We all have our own timeline

When most people think of Valentine’s Day, they think of significant others and love and hearts and roses and those conversation hearts that taste like Tums. Valentine’s Day looks quite different in first grade. There's lots of candy and doilies, but there’s not much mention of love or hearts or flowers. If I even hint at anything lovey dovey, all hope is lost and there are 20 six year olds giggling uncontrollably. 

I had my students make some decorations for our classroom and as I was explaining to them the idea behind x's and o's, chaos broke out. The room was filled with "eww gross!" "that's disgusting!" "kissing?!" "I'm never going to kiss" (I find that hard to believe) and "that's icky." It took me several minutes to reel them back in and get control again. I decided that next year, I might just go with hearts but the decorations turned out pretty cute... except that I, for some reason, temporarily lost my grip on reality and let them use glitter. I don't know what I was thinking. There was, and still is, and forever will be glitter everywhere.

I was talking to my teacher friends the other day who teach seventh and eighth grade and we were dying as we were comparing the differences between our students. My students can't even say the word "kiss" and my friends have to tell their students to stop making googly eyes at each other all day. 

This reminded me of how all of us are at different place in our lives. As we are growing up, there are certain milestones that we expect everyone to keep up with. We know at about what age kids should start to talk, walk, read, ride a bike, make googly eyes, drive a car, etc. And for some reason, we feel like that timeline should continue on into adulthood. Sometimes I feel like because I am 25, I should be at a certain point in my spiritual, physical, social, and financial development. Thankfully, we have an all-knowing Heavenly Father who knows at what level we really are. He knows what we are ready for and what things we need to wait for. Just like my first graders don't quite get it and think that they will never never ever want to kiss anyone, there may be things that we don't quite understand yet. Heavenly Father can see the whole picture. He knows what we will be like ten, twenty, forty years from now and He knows what is going to be good for us now and what will be good for us then. 

The key, for me, is to remember that Heavenly Father is all-knowing, all-understanding, and has everything under control. It's okay if we are not ready for some things now. That doesn't mean that we won't ever be. It's okay that I have friends who are married and have three kids, a mortgage, two cars, and a dog. I'm not behind. They're not ahead. We just all have our own timeline. As long as we are moving forward and not forever staying in first grade land, then I think we're doing fine. Be patient with yourself as you are learning and growing.

Just something to ponder.

Lesson Learned: Assume that you made a difference

My first year of teaching was rough ... to say the least. The first year is always the hardest, they say, but on top of that, I also had a doozy of a class ... to put it nicely. At the beginning of the year, I had envisioned myself being a mix of Ms. Frizzle, Bill Nye, Mr. Feeny, Mr. Escalante, and Anne Shirley.

I thought teaching would look like this...

Dead Poet's Society

By the end of the year, it felt more like this...

Miss Nelson is Missing

I was seriously deflated, I was considering a career change, and I felt like I had failed my little first graders. Several of them still didn't know how to read, still got addition and subtraction mixed up, and consistently wrote b's instead of d's which meant that their chance of success in life was utterly ruined.

Fast forward to last night... I went to Olive Garden and the hostess said hi to me in a way that I could tell she knew me but I couldn't figure out how I would know her. After we got to our table, the waiter asked if we knew the hostess because apparently she had told him that he was supposed to give our table the highest level of service and be extra nice to us. After sheepishly admitting that I couldn't remember her, he told me that she was the mom of one of my first graders last year. She had told the waiter that I had really made a difference in her son, Elijah's life and that she was so grateful he had been in my class and that he still talks about the time when I had the whole class (including the two class bullies who constantly picked on him) write him notes telling him how great he was and telling him something he was good at.

I was so surprised. Elijah was one of those kids who I thought I had failed. He was academically behind, struggled socially, was almost as tall as me, had zero gross/fine motor skills, and was one of the sweetest, kindest boys I had in my class that year. I felt bad that he was picked on, I felt bad that he couldn't keep up with the other kids who were playing outside, I felt bad that he never knew the right answer, I felt bad that his handwriting was so out of control that I could never read it, I felt bad that I hadn't referred him to special ed even though he probably needed it. I thought that I hadn't made a difference. I felt like he had slipped through the cracks and that I was just passing him on to second grade, hoping that they could help him. I was so surprised last night to find out that maybe I hadn't failed him as much as I had thought.

President Gordon B. Hinckley had a similar experience...

I remember going to a stake conference in the East many years ago. On the plane coming home, I felt that I had been a total failure. I felt I had not touched anyone for good. I was miserable with a sense of inadequacy. 

Then, some years later, I was at another conference in California. At the conclusion of the meeting a man came up to me and said, “You were at a conference a few years ago in such-and-such a place.” 

“Yes,” I said, “I was there, and I remember the occasion.” 

The man said: “You touched my heart. I came to that meeting out of curiosity. I really had no interest. I was on the verge of leaving the Church. But when it was announced that one of the Twelve Apostles would be there, I decided to go. 

“You said something that started me to think. It touched me and stayed with me and stirred me. I decided to alter my course. I turned my life around. I am now living here in California. I have a good job, for which I am grateful. I hope I am a good husband and father. And I am now serving as a counselor in the bishopric of my ward. I am happier than I have ever been at any time in my life.” 

I thanked him, and when I left him I said to myself, shaking my head: “You never know. You never know whether you do any good. You never know how much good you do.” 

(Read the rest of his talk here.)

So I'm starting to learn that we should assume that when we are trying our hardest and doing our best, chances are high that we helped someone and that we made a difference... even if we don't see it immediately, next year, or ever.

Just something to mull over.