Stop me if you’ve heard this one.  A child wakes up in the morning.  Upon seeing the soft orange light cresting over each slightly cracked window blind he closes his eyes tightly in the hopes that sleep will wash over him once again.  It doesn’t.  The switch has been flipped.  Thoughts are now racing through his mind.  He closes his eyes more tightly.  He squeezes them shut and purses his lips in a surge of extra effort.  Blurry spots of resonant light float across what would otherwise be his scope of vision.  Sharp, bright, sparkles jump around in the periphery.  His eyeballs flitter frantically behind clenched lids in a futile effort to target the sparkles.  He tries to focus; he’s desperate to distract himself.  The darkness is strange and jumbled with nonsensical images that he can’t make out.  The odd and disconcerting images invade his entire being.  Worry consumes him.  He’s gripped by anxiety.  No amount of blanket coverage can shelter him now; no pillow squeeze is tight enough to dissuade the angst.  A single tear slides down his cheek.  An audible sigh escapes without his knowledge.  He’s desperate to avoid the next several hours.

These thoughts persist:  I’m not good enough.  I’m not smart enough.  People don’t like me.  I can’t do it.  I don’t know how to do it.  I’m a disappointment.  I have no friends.  I hate myself.  Perception is reality.  The child is thoroughly convinced that danger is approaching.  A monster in the form of this new day is waiting on the other side of his bedroom door.  It looms indifferent to his dismay.  It will not be denied.  It is allied with his parents who are waiting to thrust him into the belly of the beast.  They do it with love and good intentions, but also with mounting frustration presenting as what feels like diminished compassion.  Again, perception is reality.  Rolling their eyes while the forthcoming day glares at him from over their shoulders, an evil smirk of shrewd satisfaction across its hungry face, they facilitate his inevitable daily trek.  Resistance is futile.  He hasn’t learned to cope, to reflect, to process, to forgive, or to persist with courage through the pain of this otherwise workable childhood challenge that he faces.  He’s afraid.  He’s terrified.  The next hour or so is a blur.

Finally, with a lump in his throat, a heavy heart, racing breath, and a swiftly beating heart, he hesitantly steps across the threshold of the school entryway.  He wants nothing more than to turn and run.  He knows that he can’t.  He isn’t thinking about the morning minute in math, or how Maniac Magee will survive in Two Mills without his parents, or whether or not the crickets in his terrarium have lived through the night.  He’s not focused on school at all.  He’s not concerned about learning.  He’s not feeling safe.  He’s homesick, flustered, angry, and deeply distracted by the reality that is his world.

Even though she’s standing directly in front of him, he doesn’t notice Miss Zalinsky.  That is, he doesn’t notice her right away.  Miss Zalinsky was a student teacher last year.  Now, she teaches fourth grade Social Studies and Language Arts.  She’s tall and thin with bouncy hair.  She wears old-fashioned, black-rimmed glasses that curve up at the ends like gravity defying, pointy, sideways teardrops.  She switches between purple and brown, white-souled, canvas tennis shoes each day.  She always wears kaki pants, and she rotates through an array of solid-colored button down shirts ranging from pink to black.  She wears her ID badge on a necklace made from a combination of colorful plastic and metal beads.

Along with the badge, she wears a tiny metal clip that dangles from the end of the necklace.  Every day before school, she inserts a new sticky note into the clip.  She wears the daily note from before the first bell to beyond the last.  Some of the notes say things like, “If you can dream it you can do it,” or “Attitude is everything.”  Others say things like, “Boy am I tired today,” or “I will make the best of things.”  She is always willing to talk about what the notes mean when anyone asks.  Lots of kids ask.  On this day, her note says, “I am so frustrated…life isn’t always fair.”  I don’t know why it says that, but I do know that it’s the first thing the child notices through a tiny clearing in his morning fog.  The words drive into him like a warrior’s spear.  They are the only things that distract him now.  He doesn’t realize it, but his heart is no loner racing.

He looks up at Miss Zalinsky’s eyes.  Through her teardrop glasses he can see that she is frustrated; she’s frustrated like he is.  Or maybe she’s sad, he can’t exactly tell, but he can tell something very important about this generally happy person.  This teacher who is always excited to learn, this adult who is ever encouraging, supportive, and kind…this educator, who even now, through whatever she’s feeling, seems strangely ready to go for a day of collaborative exploration and growth, is something like what he is.  Moreover, even though her sticky note refers to frustration and the occasionally unfair nature of life, Miss Zalinsky’s hair is still bouncy.

She sees the child looking at her.  She smiles at the child.  Not so much with her mouth, but more with her eyes.  She puts her hand on his shoulder and offers a consolatory wink.  It doesn’t make him forget his troubles, it doesn’t make everything all right, it doesn’t address all of the very real and persistent challenges of his complicated world, but it does something extremely important; it makes him not so much alone.

Be real.  Be human.  Connect with those you serve through the undeniable humanity we all share.  Demonstrate that courage isn’t about denying fear, confusion, anger, or frustration, but that it’s about redirecting and diminishing such distractions through a focus on strength, and a persistent enthusiasm for learning and growth.  Help your students develop the tools and understandings that as adults we so often take for granted.  Communicate with compassion.  Exude caring.  You might never witness the effects of your efforts.  We say of students that they don’t always blossom on our watch because they don’t.  However, they do always blossom.  Know that your contributions are impactful.  Help your students know that are valid and valued, and maybe most importantly, show them that they are not alone.

 

Dream Big. Work Hard. Be Well.