Small Ways to Make a Splash and Smile at the Beginning of the Year

 

The first week of school can feel overwhelming. Emotions run high as students and staff learn new rules, set goals for the year, and meet new people. A prevailing feeling of exhaustion and vocal fatigue flood the faculty office as teachers help students to transition back to a school year pace. 

I transitioned to a new role and school in the same district this year. Navigating this change has presented considerable challenges. Even though many faces are familiar and routines are the same, I am not quite at home in my new surroundings. Several students are also feeling out of place during this uncharted school year. How do we help our students feel acclimated to their surroundings? How do we support staff in connecting with their students, schedules, and school-year pace? 

Regardless of our role in the school system, we must remember that we communicate a great deal with our actions and words. Our messaging becomes our mantra as we establish a culture in our classrooms and across the school. As we work to build a positive school culture, it's important to reflect on what we can tangibly do to improve the culture and climate of our school. 

On day two of the new school year, I co-led a breakout session on belonging with my principal, who is also new. Of course, the two fresh faces in the faculty are the ones talking about what it means to belong to our community. I showed a video of the ultimate pool slam dunk to hook my colleagues into the conversation. Nearly a dozen teens working together to create an epic trick shot reinforces the power of collaboration and the importance of making any experience exciting. Teens will spend hours perfecting a basketball pass. Why? Because it is fun. The experience brings them together to complete an incredible feat. We can capture that same energy by challenging our students to see the possibilities in their experiences within our walls.  

It all starts with time and space to adjust. 

At the beginning of the year, to-do lists are long. Adjusting syllabi, refining the curriculum, and preparing for students takes careful thought and effort. Several of these to-do list items help a teacher feel ready to start the year. As such, teachers need time to work. They also need time to reconnect with colleagues who may have gone in different directions over the summer. That time to reconnect holds even more value than the preparation for class - at least for veteran teachers. I am fortunate to have an incredibly experienced crew of teachers, and creating space to share about their summer reenergizes the team and makes coming back to school enjoyable. 

That energy then translates to students who are also given time and space to adjust to a new schedule in the first few days. 

As someone new to my school, I have taken the time to walk the halls, be visible, and meet one-on-one with staff. Time with them helps me recalibrate to my new space and feel like part of their team. These connections help people feel important and seen. Showing genuine interest in others establishes a sense of trust and camaraderie. 

With our students, we must build the same sense of camaraderie by promoting a sense of belonging. Creative icebreakers involving collaboration and problem-solving help everyone feel like a team member. Carefully planned low-risk activities have a lasting impact and unite groups of students. Early in my career, I was worried about teaching content immediately. Now, giving space for students to adapt to their new surroundings pays off in dividends throughout the semester. There is time for content, but first, we make connections. 

How do we make those connections? Show up.

Being present in a given moment is the greatest way to create meaningful connections. When we genuinely stop to listen to others - teachers or students - they feel valued and seen. When we are visible, we show that we are invested in the people and the community to which we all belong. 

While it is easy to become caught up in to-do lists and the bustle of a brand new semester, it is important that when with people, we slow down. When someone enters my office or starts a conversation, my to-do list is immediately out of my mind. The most important person in my purview is the person standing in front of me. The to-do list isn't going anywhere! Allow yourself to stop and cherish moments with others because those bonds will make tough days better and the best days unforgettable. 

Even in the toughest moments or when we feel pulled in multiple directions. Another way to make a splash is to be real.

Being present in the moment is powerful, and so is being authentic. Not every day is great, or experience the most exciting one around. It is absolutely acceptable to wear your heart on your sleeve and share your story. When we tell our story, we create space for others to do the same. We all have different strengths to bring to a school community. When we can identify and share our strengths with others, we promote a collaborative community that recognizes and values each person. 

Transitioning to a new school brings challenges. Even when moments are difficult, I am finding ways to be authentic and embrace my strengths. From discussing blended learning to troubleshooting projectors, I have discovered numerous reasons to smile. I have much to learn from my new people and surroundings, and I'm ready to plunge into the deep end of the 23-24 school year. 

Caring Beyond Fear: A Caregiver's Path to Healing

Attending a CF clinic involves a revolving door of doctors, including the pulmonologist, nurses, geneticists, nutritionists, social workers, and more. While we don’t need those specialists for every quarterly appointment, their presence offers essential ongoing support for Jordan’s care.

For the first two and a half years of Jordan’s life, we made it a point to be present at every appointment. Whether monthly or quarterly, we tag-teamed these experiences to support each other, learn everything about Jordan’s disease, and present as a united front. For years, Josh and I have attempted to keep in the giggles when the social worker, who mostly helps us with insurance and advocacy, attempted to therapize us while playing with Jordan during appointments. Our strong bond and willingness to openly express our emotions made us feel ready to handle any challenge we faced with Jordan’s health. When times have been tough, we have never shied away from embracing our feelings and felt ready to cope with what came next.

However, the onset of COVID introduced an unexpected plot twist. Hospital restrictions and the general fear for the health and safety of our family meant that only one of us could attend Jordan’s appointments. Suddenly our confidence in navigating Jordan’s health wavered. We stopped seeing close family and shut ourselves up from the world long after isolation restrictions were lifted. Masked and distanced, we stopped hugging people and set boundaries that involved not eating in a restaurant or traveling until halfway through 2023.

My solace during this time was pouring ourselves into work and our community. While I couldn’t physically be with friends, family, and colleagues, I could show up for each and every person by supporting their technology needs, researching and sharing best teaching practices, and giving small gifts and cards at every opportunity. I became so entrenched in serving others that I quieted my fear by giving more.

Reflecting on the aftermath of the pandemic, I still find myself unpacking the trauma that COVID left behind. Jordan began taking Trikafta - the miracle drug that means his life expectancy tripled and then some. The fears and anxieties that held me captive for three years and three months started to release because I no longer had to jump after coughing or sniffling. The end of the school year meant I could find peace and fully reenter a world I had kept my family from for years out of necessity. Despite the progress of the world around me and the medication that finally meant that Jordan would be able to handle a cold - or COVID - with some normalcy, my head and my heart began to find conflict.

Serving and supporting others is a worthy and honorable pursuit, but when it is used to quell fear and anxiety, it becomes a stopgap in coping with trauma and fear. I moved the goalpost to process the grief and loss I felt during 2020 and the years that followed, in which my family still had to follow careful COVID protocols as we waited for Jordan to become old enough to take Trikafta.

These last few years, I have worked to be the best mom by compensating for what my children missed out on by making elaborate virtual birthday parties and by filling their every second with activities and action. I worked on being the best teacher, coach, and colleague by making sure that I could anticipate every person’s needs and provide them with every bit of support they could possibly need. I wrote over a thousand cards and baked my body weight in chocolate chip cookies. These actions gave me purpose and direction but did not calm my anxiety or help me move forward from pandemic life.

 
While I started moving about the school like normal and engaged with others for work purposes only, I still felt uneasy about the germs I was exposing myself to daily. I worried constantly and made sure that I didn’t get sick. We still haven’t tested positive for COVID, although I am pretty sure we had COVID in May - when I had the most significant panic attack of my life. Still, these flashes of fear continue to hit me - when I smell smoke or hear accessive coughing. I am still worried that I will make my immunocompromised child sick if I get sick. Now I get it. I understand why caretakers are often carefully watched by medical professionals. I know that I must rediscover the balance between what my head logically knows to be true and the pain my body feels from the pandemic living to the present.

The journey toward healing remains ongoing. Being a caretaker of a young child with health concerns that could escalate from zero to 100 in minutes. I will continue to navigate what this new sense of normalcy means for my family and the peace that it promises to bring.

The journey of a far-too-caring caregiver is one of constant adaptation. It is a challenging path, and it is sometimes hard to find balance. I am starting a new journey, one that is pushing me out of my safe space. As I start this school year, I hope to authentically be myself to open myself up to new people and new experiences. While I still am trying to shake off the fears I internalized during the past three-plus years, I hope to redirect my anxieties with purpose and find new people to pour into - not because I’m trying to survive but because I genuinely want to learn, grow, and make a difference. COVID amplified the challenges of many and certainly magnified my fears. While healing is not a linear process, I aim to move forward stronger and more resilient. I am no longer in survival mode. I can finally step forward and reclaim a little bit of peace as I start a promising school year.

Coping with the Changes: Fostering Resilience in and Out of the Classroom

Today, I learned that Jordan may be the oldest child in the United States on Trikafta in granular form, the miracle drug that will improve the quality and longevity of life for people with cystic fibrosis. At the age of six (88 days), he will begin taking Trikafta in pill format.

Currently, Jordan takes this medicine twice daily. We've been dissolving the crystals in water and Gatorade and also learned that he can take them in yogurt instead of drinking a salty-tasting liquid. He's a trooper and continues to show his resilience. He never complains about the medication, treatments, or doctor visits. While his health is still closely monitored (especially for bowel obstructions), there is hope that this school year will be relatively normal for him.

Observing Jordan's strength as a parent inspires me as I navigate challenges and life changes. We cannot control everything that happens to us, but we can control how we respond to these situations. Jordan is rarely phased by treatments, medicine, and being poked and prodded by doctors. How do we handle challenges and life changes like Jordan? How can we help foster resilience in our students?

Take stressful situations and times day by day.

Life is full of surprises, and unfortunately, not all surprises are positive. We will all face adversity that stretches our mindset and choices. My son is and appears to be an incredibly healthy child. The quality of his health can go from perfectly healthy to a potential hospital visit instantly. His bowel obstruction seems unexpected and can derail any plan our family follows at a given time. Because his health might become a concern without much warning, I have learned that I cannot worry about stressors that might come. I have to live in the moment, taking each day as it comes.

As an educator, I like many teachers, am a planner. I realize, however, that we cannot plan every moment of the entire school year at once. Should we still have overarching goals and long-term plans in place? Absolutely. But in difficult times, having short-term goals makes a negative experience feel more like a drizzle than a downpour.

Short-term goals allow us to feel the success of accomplishing a task or overcoming a small hurdle. The positive feelings from achieving a small goal begets future, long-term success. Teaching our students to create short-term SMART goals can also empower them to navigate their challenges and obstacles.

Be okay with being uncomfortable.

We can do anything for a short time. Embracing short-term discomfort can be informative and lead to unexpected lessons learned. As a parent and educator, my instinct is to clear the path and reduce the obstacles that my children and students face. Still, by doing that, I am robbing them of the learning opportunities that come from failure. When we accept discomfort and live in that space, we also become more confident. We start to identify our values and priorities and shift our thinking toward growth.

When we help students accept their discomfort, we allow them to stretch themselves, innovate, and reflect. If they feel safe to fail, they are more likely to grow. Creating an environment where failure is okay comes from frequent reflection and class conversation about what it means to be successful learners. These conversations must be ongoing as we constantly cycle through the learning process together.

Describe your feelings and model vulnerability for others.

Living in discomfort comes with many emotions that are likely to shift. Describing those feelings and putting words to how we are processing challenges fosters critical thinking. It also creates a space in which students feel safe to share their feelings. We cannot learn in silos, and working in isolation often wastes time and resources. As educators, we need to be able to talk through what we are experiencing and also problem-solve with other educators. No one is perfect, and even the best teachers have tough days. When we are open to discussing circumstances and working collaboratively with others, we can leverage our vulnerability to grow together.

We have to be intentional with helping students put their discomfort to words, too. Making it seem like we have life perfectly mapped out ourselves creates unrealistic expectations and exacerbates their insecurities if they aren't living up to a specific standard. When we show our vulnerabilities, students are more likely to self-disclose what they think, feel, and learn. This mutual sharing of feelings and ideas only leads to a stronger learning community.

Read, research, and reach out.

As stated in the book, Recipes for Resilience: Nurturing Perseverance in Students and Educators, "Learning is for everyone. Make a commitment to yourself to expand your knowledge and expertise, and in turn, your environment will flourish" (Robert Martinez). We are always learning about ourselves, our relationships, and our practices. To better serve students, we must be active learners ourselves.

I am working on being okay with not having all the answers and moving slower and with more intentionality. I am learning that to serve others, I cannot just give them all the answers; I have to empower them to discover more about themselves and their professional practice. We do not know what tomorrow brings, but when we embrace the learning journey, we are better prepared to face and learn from it. True success does not come from knowing all the correct answers ourselves; it comes from helping others to find their version of success.

 

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From Competition to Collaboration: Unleashing the Benefits of Cooperative Learning

A few days ago, my children and I walked over to our neighborhood park. They were ready to play woodchips (tag) and began generating a list of rules and protocols for the game. Whoever was it first would start at the park's tallest point, which is difficult for my son to reach. His sisters promised to help him reach the balcony -- even if he would soon be chasing them. Despite the game's competitive nature, they were still ready to support him. Regardless of who was chasing whom, they would ensure they could participate. 

As I watched them begin to play, I was moved by how naturally they collaborated and cheered each other on. The game was more fun when everyone could contribute. How do we replicate this productive and positive rivalry in our own classrooms? How can we encourage students to recognize the value in playfully pushing each other to learn, grow, and in this case, reach the peak of the park? 

Bring positive competition to the classroom. 

"We're all winners when we all learn" is a phrase met with eye-rolling and groans in my classroom, but it's true. I love incorporating friendly, low-stakes competition into my classroom. Sometimes we compete for bragging rights or a chance to choose a desired place in the speaking order. Other times, the winners of these competitive experiences earn stickers or candy. The reward is never significant, but the learning process can be an enjoyable way to practice essential classroom skills. Whether we play a review game such as Kahoot, deliver impromptu speeches, or complete a puzzle, these gamified experiences challenge students to apply content knowledge to an often collaborative activity. The motivation to succeed pushes students to test their skills and measure what they need to improve before a summative assessment. 

Positive competition also encourages students to challenge each other and recognize where they are in mastering a concept or skill related to others. With this knowledge, they can identify what they still need to work on. If we are playing a review game, I share the materials and games for asynchronous play so that students can revisit skills and resources as needed. By establishing that everyone succeeds when we all achieve mastery, students can begin to self-reflect on their own skills and find ways to support others in the learning process.  

Remind students that we achieve more when we work together. 

Collaboration and communication are critical skills employers in any field seek. Soft skills are essential for our academic, professional, and personal success. As instructors, we can facilitate the development of these skills through collaborative games and experiences in which students work together to achieve an end goal - whether it be a presentation, a score on a review game, or a solution to a puzzle. 

When we create a collaborative environment, we also prepare students to navigate real-world challenges. They develop problem-solving skills and recognize the power of leveraging everyone's skillset to innovate and create. When students can value the strengths of their peers, the collaborative spirit extends beyond the classroom into their personal and professional lives. 

• Socratic seminars and group discussions are wonderful ways to encourage students to use active listening skills and develop empathy. 

• Problem-solving scenarios can also provide real-world applications. I love challenging students to create public service announcements. PSAs encourage students to formulate a message for a specific audience and narrow the focus of the situation. Students then consider how to craft an impactful message while working together to create a final product. 

• Creative writing assignments open the door for collaboration. Whether students are writing a short story or generating RAFT assignments, they can work together to build a common narrative that can impact a much wider audience than a single teacher or reader. I love letter writing and using the RAFT writing format to encourage students to assume another person's perspective and use empathy to recognize the experiences of others who differ from them.

 

These assignments are playful in nature. They involve creative thought and engagement with others. While infusing our classroom with these tasks, challenges, and collaborative experiences, we must also encourage them to provide constructive feedback to their peers. This feedback allows them to stretch their thinking and adjust their approach to a given task as needed. While students are collaborating, we need to help them understand that they need to collaborate peacefully and find value in the strengths of others. 

Foster a cheering section. 

On the first day of any course, I use a meme of vegetables holding hands, saying that "We're rooting for you." I remind them that when they enter my classroom, I am rooting for their success and will partner with them to help them master the skills our class will focus on this term. I also remind them that we want to be successful, so we must understand and recognize that we significantly impact each other. Our actions directly lead to the success and growth of the people beside us. 

The best learning occurs when we make mistakes or fall short of our goals. When we collaborate with others, we must shift and redirect our thinking. We won't always win the review game or solve the problem the fastest, but we will develop soft skills that will make us better professionally and personally in ways that we won't recognize immediately. Even when we are competing for first place in a Kahoot, we can take the time to lift each other up. There's room for everyone at the top, especially when we take the time to help each other along the way. 

From Passive to Active: Transforming Icebreakers into Engaging Experiences

The 4th of July has blasted past with its usual fanfare and sparklers. While most of us still have the month of July to enjoy our summer schedules, the turn of the calendar often leads to preparing for the start of the school year. In search of fresh ideas for the upcoming school year, 

I stumbled on a Twitter post pleading with educators to reconsider using icebreakers to kick off the beginning of the school year. Why are icebreakers often so dreaded? How might we build rapport with our students and new teams without inciting the awkwardness and anxiety among everyone in the room, often associated with icebreakers?

Building rapport is about focusing on relationships and creating a positive environment. Yes, there are inherently bad icebreakers, and typically I have encountered them in graduate courses, in which the entire classroom knows each other, and the instructor is new. We have to go around and awkwardly share the same information we have already shared with each other, and it takes way longer than it should. When an icebreaker calls for one speaker at a time in a room full of 20+ people, the experience becomes passive and nerve-racking as a spotlight is put on one person at a time. 

Instead of asking every person in the room to share one fun thing about their summer break, icebreakers can become powerful and memorable shared experiences that encourage participants to collaborate, share, and learn how to work together. Instead of making people recite information aloud that they could write down a notecard in two minutes and calling it an “icebreaker,” get creative. Ask the group to actively work together to complete a task or solve a problem. These active icebreakers challenge participants to use communication skills for a purpose. They have the ability to thaw out any chilly or preconceived notion about icebreakers. 

For the last decade, I have hosted a summer camp for speech team that is more focused on team building and leadership than competing in high school forensics. During these camps, I have worked with my coaching team to create experiences that forge friendships, promote critical thinking, and build bonds. These activities were experiences that led to powerful learning experiences that positively pushed students out of their comfort zones and into a space in which they could learn and grow. So what makes an icebreaker work? 

Active participation is important. 

The first day of the school year is exhausting. Students (and teachers) are inundated with information, rules, and expectations. If they are sitting and not actively engaged, they will become passive, and the information being shared with them will not be retained. Instead, they will leave the classroom or the meeting tired and anxious, still wondering what the upcoming school year will bring. Talking at people is not an effective communication strategy (although sometimes necessary).

Instead, start with a challenge. Break people into smaller teams and give them a task to accomplish. I love to start with the spaghetti challenge. Recently a teacher shared math and engineering challenges that encourage people to build and create with me. Scavenger hunts and escape rooms also work nicely. Some of my favorites include:

1. Toxic waste: Students have various materials and have to remove tennis balls from the center of a circle without stepping into the circle. 

2. Toxic river: Students must figure out how to cross a "hazardous river" with limited supplies and work together to navigate obstacles. 

3. Puzzle challenge: Students are divided into teams. They have some of their puzzle pieces, and other pieces are hidden throughout the room. Their pieces are mixed in with other teams' pieces. They have to find their pieces and negotiate for others with other teams. 

4. Magic carpet: Students all stand on a tarp. They have to flip the tarp without stepping off the tarp. 

Note: These activities can be scaled and adjusted to meet any classroom's space and time constraints. Most of these activities can take less than 15 minutes, but the connectivity they foster is an incredible investment in student buy-in and engagement. 

Dave Burgess’s Teach Like a Pirate has a lot of ideas for hooking students with various strategies. I recently led a PD using his book. Check out these slides for more icebreaker ideas and videos that I use with my own students, or check out his book. 

Find a way to encourage students to build something or use creativity to solve problems. In the time they take to create together, they will start talking, laughing, and creating memories. While they may or may not be successful in solving the problem, they will be engaged with others. After connecting with others, they will be more comfortable talking and engaging with a larger group. 

Questions and conversations should extend beyond the surface. 

After working together in smaller groups, participants are more likely to open up and engage in self-disclosure. I still use either a notecard or Google form to gather information from my audience. I want to know the details, and I want to find ways to connect with them individually. 

These icebreakers are often ineffective because the information seems to go nowhere. The information written out by the participants is not revisited or referenced. You must close the communication loop if you ask students to provide information. That information needs to be used. Also, if you ask students to self-disclose information, you have to share information, too. Answer your own questions, show students the depth of information you hope to gain from them, and encourage students to share more. Students want to be seen and valued. They do not want to bear their souls to the whole class on day one, but they will share quite a bit with you in a more individual non-threatening way, like a Google form or even a Pear Deck, where they feel more anonymous. (Here's a resource to spark some question ideas).

Here's a mini PD presentation on Questions of the Day.

Initial experiences promote exploration and spark curiosity. 

An icebreaker doesn't have to only occur on day one. These icebreaker activities can build on each other. They can reveal a clue or allude to a puzzle the next day. I love questions of the day (Here's a template). Theming of the questions or using questions to spark even more curiosity about a topic or theme increases student engagement. They will want to return to find the next answer or finish a project they've already started. Digital escape rooms make great teases for future lessons. Finding ways to keep the mystery going and encourage students to wonder about a lesson or idea brings excitement and makes the icebreaker worth doing. 

Group reflection leads to more authentic connections. 

After completing a challenge, debrief. Talk about the experience and encourage students to consider the lessons learned. These tasks have instructional value and classroom connections, but students will only identify them if we discuss what we learned. These conversations are valuable and can lead to group reflection about the learning process, classroom expectations, and being an active citizen. 

Icebreakers don't have to be passive or designed for extroverts only. They can be meaningful and used to foster rapport. If an icebreaker sounds dreadful or awkward to you, skip it. Instead, find an activity or design an experience in which you can be an active participant too. Students will buy in if a teacher is having fun, being silly, and showing the power of self-disclosure. It's okay to have fun in the classroom, and it is certainly okay to be goofy. If you are willing to have students laugh at you, they are far more likely to listen to you. These types of icebreakers are certainly worth our investment. 

References:

Bonnie, Emily. "Ultimate Guide to Team-Building Activities Your Team Will Actually Like." Wrike, 22 Apr. 2022, Ultimate Guide to Team-Building Activities Your Team Will Actually Like. Accessed 8 July 2023.

"Build a Tower, Build a Team." TED, uploaded by TED Conference, Feb. 2010, www.ted.com/talks/tom_wujec_build_a_tower_build_a_team. Accessed 8 July 2023.

Burgess, Dave. Teach like a Pirate: Increase Student Engagement, Boost Your Creativity, and Transform Your Life as an Educator. San Diego, Dave Burgess Consulting, 2012.

Davies, Rebecca. "50+ Questions to Get Kids Talking and Build Community." Differentiated Teaching, 2023, www.differentiatedteaching.com/discussion-questions-to-build-relationships-with-students/. Accessed 8 July 2023.

Garber, Peter R. 50 Communications Activities, Icebreakers, and Exercises. E-book ed., Amherst, HRD Press, 2008.

Stokes, Katie. "15 Engineering Challenges Kids Love." Gift of Curiosity, www.giftofcuriosity.com/engineering-challenges-for-kids-steam/. Accessed 8 July 2023.

Rethinking Success: Shifting the Focus from Achievements to Personal Growth and Development (Part 2)

"Why would you want to be an English teacher?" This was an actual question I was asked when I was in high school. Be anything else BUT an English teacher was the message I received. The concern was that English is a popular subject, and I would need help finding a job. Note: Never let someone convince you not to pursue your dreams and passions.

Why English? I come from a family of math and science teachers, and I am the only humanities teacher. My love for literacy derives from my desire to connect and empathize with others. In the early oughts (2000s), the STEM push consumed the conversation around education. While I love and value STEM, my passion has always been empowering all learners to share their stories, create innovative ideas or projects, and collaborate with others. These soft skills, often considered secondary to other disciplines, are the foundation of academic, professional, and personal success. Regardless of the discipline we teach or pursue, how can we help our students find success?

Students must be encouraged to set goals for personal growth.

Both organizations and individuals write SMART goals in the business world (and in education). However, a Harvard Business Study found that of the top MBA students from their program, only 3% had written down their goals. Of course, the study going that the percentage of individuals who had written down their goals earned 10x more money than the 97% combined.

While money does not buy happiness, having a clear direction and purpose can lead to a more fulfilling life. Teaching our students to write goals down physically is crucial. Where we might miss the boat as educators, however, is that we need to teach students to write smaller, more tangible goals. We want our students to dream big and reach for grandiose ideas. When a goal is set too far in the future, it becomes too much of a reach, and the drive to achieve that goal can fizzle.

I love the image above. Shorter goals and small steps toward a grander goal yield better results. We must show our students how to manage, set, and reset their goals so that they feel the energy to accomplish a task. That seemingly micro feeling of success will yield even more success moving forward.

In Atomic Habits, James Clear reminds us that "Habits are the compound interest of self-improvement." If we teach students to become just a little better each day, before they know it, they will feel transformed in their skill sets and will want to continue to grow.

We must foster a culture that maintains a positive mindset.

To succeed, we must also fail. Feeling like a failure can produce frustration and tension. Students look to us to see how we react to our failures. If we become overwhelmed when technology doesn’t work, for example, we demonstrate that it is acceptable to become angry if something doesn't go our way. Of course, we all have moments of anger and frustration, but as educators, we must be aware that our students are always watching (just like our children). They will react to setbacks in the same way that we do. The "do as I say, not as I do" mentality is a generation or two ago. If we want our students to have a positive mindset, we must start by evaluating our own.

How can we foster a positive mindset in our classroom?

1. Celebrate positive behaviors. Identifying what our students are doing and how those actions are positive can help students to recognize what behaviors will lead to successful outcomes.
2. Embrace struggles and problem-solve together. Discussing how to problem-solve provides students with a framework to refocus and reset after a failure. It is important to learn, reflect, and grow.
3. Identify the lessons learned. Talk through what was gained in a situation and use experiences to move forward.
4. Show gratitude for the people and experiences that have helped us become who we are today and who will continue to support us moving forward.
5. Focus on the word yet. When unpacking a situation, the word yet allows us all to understand that if something doesn't go our way, it means we are still learning and growing. Even though our desired outcome hasn't happened yet, it is still possible, and we can still see the positives in any situation.

I love Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote, "Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year." I often remind my students and myself that even though not every day is exciting or life-changing, every day provides us with an opportunity to learn, grow, and build relationships with others. When we learn to appreciate and embrace those initial steps joyfully, we become stronger and find meaning in everyday experiences.

Preparation is key.

We must prepare our students for the challenges they will inevitably encounter by helping them take a realistic look at the circumstances while finding the nuggets of hope in the face of adversity. We must prepare our students to hear no, receive a rejection, and handle criticism gracefully. They will face rejection in many ways; we all do. What they choose to do in those moments will determine their success. Failure is a gift, but one needs to learn how to handle the package to reap the rewards of the lessons that this gift can teach.

Part of success is recognizing and understanding how to move forward from loss and rejection. Success is about navigating the obstacles and rethinking, recreating, or redirecting our path. I want to continue to empower my students to find meaning in their lives and experiences, accomplish their goals, and, most importantly, experience the joy of living a life that brings them meaning and purpose.

Someone told me boldly that I'd never find joy as an English teacher. While they may have been well-intentioned, I did not allow them to stop me from pursuing my dream. I understood that I might hear no. I recognized that I might not succeed on the first try, and that belief strengthened me.

NOTE: I was hired very early in the job hunt (before spring break), within 24 hours of my interview. My first principal told me not to interview at a neighboring school in the same district, which I was set to do the next day. Post spring break, I received calls for interviews from over a dozen different school districts. I was definitely going to find a job.

Again, don't ever let anyone discourage you from reaching your goals. While the vision of success in my life has shifted over the years, and that definition might shift for others, we can help our students see the steps they need to take to reach their goals. We can empower our students by helping them to shape their understanding of success and take those first steps.

References:

Acton, Annabel. “How to Set Goals (and Why You Should Write Them Down).” Forbes, 3 Nov. 2017, www.forbes.com/sites/annabelacton/2017/11/03/how-to-set-goals-and-why-you-should-do-it/?sh=104307bd162d.

Clear, James. Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones. Cornerstone Press, 2022.