I have a heart for teachers... You care. You work long hours in the school building and at home. You became a teacher because you realize that teachers impact the world through every student that comes to your door. You have the unique responsibility and gift of tending minds, bodies, and spirits... and it is good for you to feel tended from time to time, too.
It is so valuable to focus on your joys and successes as a teacher, and to truly recognize the merit of your contributions to each child and our society. It is also valuable to create safe spaces in which teachers may share their professional struggles.
I am available to meet with groups of teachers and with individual teachers who seek support, consultation, and understanding from one who has lived the experience. I believe that as we create spaces that inspire, affirm, and build communities of respect for teachers, we inspire, affirm, and build communities of respect for students and our schools.
Contact me for: Individual consultation, Teacher Support Groups, Book Clubs that focus on the soul of teaching, and Workshops and Retreats fine tuned to encourage and inspire the hearts of teachers. ***************************************************************** B+ (Written March 22,2014) Are you ready for this? Maybe you should sit down. If you are a teacher (or any other caring professional in the field of education), I want to prepare you to hear some words you may never have heard before. First, take two really deep breaths. Next close your eyes for at least 30 seconds and with your hands upon your heart, feel the life that flows through you. If you want to stay here for longer than 30 seconds and appreciate your breath, your dreams, or the birdsongs nearby…please do! When you are ready, when you are quiet and still, you might be closer to hearing my words clearly. Don’t read any further until you have prepared yourself for what comes next.
Okay. I realize that you not only need to be prepared to hear the words that are coming, but I also want to say that they may take some time to sink in. They may fly in the face of everything you have been taught. They may be counter to a life-long way of thinking. They will not be blessed or appreciated by many. They will be hard to accept in the American society and even harder to accept by the educational profession. You may run far away from these words, once read, for you may immediately recognize the courage it will require to incorporate the meaning of these words into your life. You may already be exhausted in mind, body, and spirit, and if so, please feel free to come back to these words later… but truthfully, these words may serve you in the keenest fashion.
Now. Take two more slow breaths in and out, and then let these words in…
You don’t have to be an A+ teacher. You can be B+. You don’t have to work 50-60 hours a week AND be happy about it. You don’t have to give your week-ends to worrying about your students or planning the next car-load of recyclables that you’ll turn into the next lesson they will never forget. You don’t have to deny your family your energy because you gave it all away at work. You don’t have to be ‘teacher of the year’ or have perfect evaluations in your file that will rest forever in a dark, dank file cabinet. You do not have to be an A+ teacher. You can be B+.
Additionally, you are allowed to have many different feelings about your job. Yes, you can love it. You can love the children, your co-workers, and the devotion that so many good-hearted people have towards the cause and ideals of expanding the horizons of our youth. You can believe in the power of good education to change lives and improve the quality of the world at large. BUT… you may also have many other feelings. You may not like every child you teach and you may really dislike some parents. You do not have to agree with policies that are absurd. You may grow some resentment at times that you are not treated as the professional you are. You may also wonder over and over again if you might have been better suited to work with plants or machines rather than children. Or better yet, you may wish you had become a lawyer or doctor so you would at least be paid for all the hours you put into your profession AND still be A+ even when you lose the case or can’t properly diagnose the illness.
What you may need to know before this school year ends and the next one begins is that you do not need to achieve perfection to be a wonderful contributor to the lives of children and the world of education. What you may need to know in order to continue your work in this field is that being multi-faceted, being capable of mistakes, being capable of being a good teacher and incorporating all the other loves into your life is what actually makes you a teacher that draws students into learning. When you know yourself deeply, when you know what makes you tick and what makes you tired, when you know how you work best and what pulls you into misery, and when you honor the entirety of who you are… then you have the potential to truly be a teacher wherever you are.
At this point, the questions begin to spin, right? How? How on earth can this possibly be accomplished? How… when, on a daily basis, teachers are pressured to be A+ in every subject, and in the ability to manage behaviors and emotional turmoil, not to mention disabilities and poverty and wealth and prestige and entitlement… all for the benefit of each individual student in a class of 30? AND have every student arrive at the success of high test scores and those highly encouraged As on their report cards? Is perfection possible? Will ‘no child be left behind’ with the pressures currently in place not only on them but on those who teach them? What, in the name of all that is holy, are we trying to achieve? Breathe again.
Today, in the spirit of the famous game card “Get out of Jail Free”, I offer you the “Get out of Guilt Free” card. One of the reasons people get lost in the educational field is that they get caught up in guilt. “I didn’t do enough for that student.” “I should have worked later/harder/over the week-end.” “I should have taken more classes on that topic.” “I wasn’t creative enough.” “I didn’t inspire them to work harder.” Worse yet… they are told these things. They are reminded of these things on their professional evaluations. They are reminded every year at the “Teacher of the Year” ceremony. It is pointed out over and over and over again how teachers can improve. You rarely will be offered an A+ and so… today, take the “Get out of Guilt Free”card and enjoy your B+.
Each day, with your hand on your heart, ask yourself these questions: Do I care about those I serve? Do I want to see my students succeed in life …and exactly what is success in my eyes… and is this success something that I live?
All the rest, will have to wait. All the rest, will need to roll off of the back. It’s not going away, granted, but with courage and wisdom, impossible to standardize, the gift of a B+ can set you free. Rest assured, my friends, you are worthy of praise and joy and deep appreciation. Today, let those accolades take root in your own understanding and then serve… with balance, with clarity, with good humor, and great wisdom. Trust that grades don’t tell the entire story… and go from there. *************************************** Transitions and Validations: February 11, 2011 I went into the woods today. They live in my backyard, and are always inviting me to come out and play. So, today, with the on-the-edge-of-spring sunlight chiming in as well, I said... "Yes!" I decided to sweep my trail and make the way a bit clearer for both my feet and my low to the ground dachshund. I easily worked up a good sweat, peeled out of my jacket, and laughed at how a few days ago, I thought about joining a gym! This is my gym, and one that I absolutely love.
After I raked until I was good and tired, I decided push over some trees. My daughter has laughed over this for years. It's great, therapeutic fun for me. I roam around the woods and notice the bark of trees and the tilt of trees and the tops of trees. And I prayerfully and joyfully push over trees that long to bless the ground. I pay attention to those that resist, and I trust their judgement. I pay attention to the cracking and swaying as I push, the connection of my hands on the tree and the tree's fiber in mine, and then as the tree hits the ground, I listen for the sighing. Sometimes, I hear them saying, "Finally." The trees around the one I push down also seem thankful, now untangled from heavy branches and leaning trunks. They are thankful for more light.
I was also thinking about transitions as I worked. I love to witness the seasonal transitions in these woods. I love to learn how to adapt and change by way of their teachings. And then I remembered how important and often testing transition times are in the classroom. It is hard for little ones to let go of their mamas. It is hard to clean up after play time. It is hard to move from one class to another. It is hard to come back to school after warm summers of fun.
And then I remembered how hard transitions were for me as a teacher. Just when I got in a groove with one instructional assistant, they'd leave, and I'd have to begin fresh with someone new. Just when I got my classroom arranged in the perfect, make sense kind of way, I'd be asked to relocate. Just when my body, mind, and spirit finally settled into summer routines, the boot camp of a new school year would begin. Most of all, I remember how hard it was to transition from school to home each afternoon. I could never leave school at school. I rarely mastered the art of separating work from me or from my family. I was a single mom, nurturing aching, at-risk children all day, fighting messed up systems, and multi-tasking like a crazy woman so as not to take too much work home with me... to then arrive home with all of it still stuck on me. My daughter would have greatly benefited from me instituting a transitional component that helped me let go before she got home from school. Just like those trees in the woods who long to let go and transition to the next way of being, I would have benefitted from someone being present to my need. I would have benefitted from someone taking the time to notice my leaning, my tangles, my roots in need of replenishment.
So, teachers, here's the thing. I am willing to be there for you. I am willing to listen. I'm willing to validate your work, your heart, your devotion. Sometimes, all we need is to be heard, to have a safe place to pour out so that we might rise up less burdened. Sometimes we need someone who has walked similar paths to connect to our own and encourage us as we find our way.
Should you like to open up such as space as this in your life, I hope you will contact me. There won't be any pushing involved... just attention and intention. One of the most valuable gifts you can give your students, your co-workers, and your family is to tend your own soul. I'd be honored to walk alongside you as you do. I'm available for monthly or weekly appointments. I hope you will contact me as you feel led at [email protected] *********************************************** Recent Soundoff after State of the Union Address: February, 2011
"Okay... this is what is making me chomp at the bit today. Why do we settle? Why do we accept and promote that which makes us sick? Why must we compete in the very things that bring our demise... wealth, power, greed? Isn't it okay for everyone, every nation, every individual to find their brightest gifts and offer them to the world? Why make a new race when the snow falls so gently begging a slowness of attention? My dear teaching friends are in their classrooms as I type. Their hardest job is to hold the tension between doing what they are instructed to do and honoring what brought them into the world of teaching. To keep their jobs, to maintain some form of connection to what they love... teachers are laying down their ideals and yielding to missions and structures and systems that fly in the face of everything they believe about the beauty of children. It is a feeling of disempowerment. It is a snuffing out of the voices who most need to be heard. Would you ask a politician who knows virtually nothing about medicine to instruct your heart surgeon on the next procedure to keep you alive? Why are we allowing... ALLOWING... everyone but teachers to evoke the necessary changes in the classrooms that our children need?
Of course public education is simply a microcosm of our world. Do we get that? What part of this needs further explanation? Why not START in the classroom? Why not open doors and windows and let the fresh air remind everyone that there is more... that there is life... that we all hold gifts and keys and dreams that can enable health and joy and true prosperity?
Imagine only being on the top, of having all the money anyone could possibly want, of being the smartest, thinest, most popular... then what? You get there... and then what? It's a sad little myth... this dream so many Americans are chasing. We are losing each other. We are losing our children. We are losing... and it has nothing to do with competition and everything to do with love, with appreciation, we companionship.
If you do nothing else today... do these two things... listen to a teacher and remember what it feels like to be a child. Listen. Remember. And tomorrow... make a move that might lend your very light toward deeper callings." Kathy Fuller Guisewite
On all pages, copyrights of all photography, artwork, and writings (unless otherwise noted) belong to Kathy Fuller Guisewite. Please obtain permission before using.
Links
Is teaching making our teachers sick?www.signonsandiego.com
Brene Brown: The power of vulnerabilitywww.youtube.com
http://teachersupport.info
10 Days to Touch 10 Million ~ Our Deepest Fearwww.youtube.com
Recommended Books
Parker Palmer: LET YOUR LIFE SPEAK: LISTENING FOR THE VOICE OF VOCATION Peter H. Reynolds: THE DOT Melvin J. Leavitt: A SNOW STORY David Whyte: THE HEART AROUSED: POETRY AND THE PRESERVATION OF THE SOUL IN CORPORATE AMERICA Intrator, Scribner, Palmer: TEACHING WITH FIRE: POETRY THAT SUSTAINS THE COURAGE TO TEACH Walt Whitman: WHEN I HEARD THE LEARN'D ASTRONOMER Tanya Linch: MY DUCK Dr. Seuss: HOORAY FOR DIFFENDOOFER DAY! *****************************************
Photos to Cheer!
Below are photos taken in Washington, DC at the SAVE OUR SCHOOLS MARCH in July 2011! Thousands of empassioned advocates who long to see public education return to a healthy state, marched in pounding heat to invite others to join the cause. We marched for our students. We marched for our teachers. We marched to say... it's time to put wisdom and compassion back in our school systems.
