Just Plain Bill

“If I knew I was going to live this long…”

While doing some yard work the other day, my right shoulder was giving me some pain, especially as I was digging holes while planting some climbing roses and raking the surrounding soil in our high desert acreage. That’s work that I really enjoy doing, a contrast to the primarily mental gymnastics in which I’ve been engaged most of my working life.

At the moment I paused and took stock of my physical condition, I was reminded of a quote by Mickey Mantle:

If I knew I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of myself.

I’ve been in relatively good health throughout the years (now in my seventh decade), in spite of being what’s been described as hyperactive. I’ve had my fair share of accidents and incidents – often falling from heights and tripping as a youth, breaking my arm while wrestling at age 16 (which healed crooked and could have gotten me classified as “4F” in my military exam), separating my ribs from my sternum in a collegiate match during a three-year wrestling career (I still completed the match), and other assorted maladies.

While in the military in my early 20s and stationed in Japan, I had yet a third wrestling calamity while competing against a larger opponent. He got me in a hammerlock (arm up behind my back) trying to turn me over, and proceeded to take my arm up over my head in a way that my arm and shoulder were not intended to go.

Long story short: this has led to a rotator cuff injury that has gradually gotten worse over time, adding the common addition of arthritis that often comes with advancing age, which has brought me to a point where my orthopedic surgeon says the only solution to my increasing discomfort is to replace my shoulder joint. Not really interested in doing that.

Back to The Mick’s quote. I guess I could have taken care of the shoulder injury at a much earlier age, in a procedure that the doctor would have “scoped”, a relatively minor and now quite common event. But, I didn’t, and at this time I sure wish I had.

Thinking philosophically, I imagine we all experience a few of those “wish I had” events. Overall, I am really blessed that there have been few of them in my life and that I’m able to remain engaged in the first love of my life – teaching – which I can do just fine regardless of my shoulder discomfort!

Just Plain Bill

If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his next again, I shall not live in vain.

I was reminded the other day, of this verse from one of my favorite poets, Emily Dickinson, as a bird that had been nesting in a planter hanging on our porch had fallen and died.

Except for keeping that Christmas planter up quite long beyond the season, making sure our birdbath was always full of water, and filling our birdfeeder daily, I’m not sure what else we could have done to save the bird, but I still had a feeling I could have… a wishing I would have… done “more.”

For many months, we’ve been observing and enjoying the mommy bird’s process of preparing the nest amongst the plastic decorations of holly, leaves, and branches (as well as the lights whose battery had long ago expired). We were delighted when she started sitting on her eggs a few months ago.

Then we watched faithfully...just like the daddy bird worked bringing food and water from our decorative birdbath through the stormy winter months… to when we could hear the little peeps of what we believed to be three or four baby birds.

Three baby birds did recently fly away, and, we’re noticing three new little mouths being fed by both mommy and daddy bird. Exciting!

We did give our fallen bird a formal resting place, where we were reminded about the fragility, as well as the perfect circle, of life.

We are truly blessed!

Just Plain Bill

A Great Ride

I’ve now come to the end of my first tour as a substitute teacher for the Santa Fe Public Schools. Over the past eight school weeks, I spent 34 days in a variety of classrooms, serving one or more days in all grades from pre-K through high school, in 10 different schools. I’m still fortunate to also be working as an adjunct faculty member, teaching online business courses at a California community college, providing the opportunity to compare the writing challenges of my public school students with those of my college students. Added together, this has been one of the most rewarding years of my career. It’s been a remarkable year of balance and contrast.

Overall, I’ve found the students to be energetic (yes, some a little too much so), interested, and fun. They provided me with a wide variety of learning and behavioral challenges to add to my experiences during a long career as a learning and development professional. I’ve been fortunate to work with learners at all levels, in a great variety of settings.

My major takeaways include the following:

·     I had to work with less-than adequate lesson plans, which required a large amount of spontaneous, creative learning activities.

·     In general, I found the discipline level to be a little lower since my last public school teaching experience over 30 years ago. Some might say this is to be expected, as the level of permissiveness over that period has “deteriorated”, and our public schools would naturally be a general reflection of today’s societal norms.

Of course, the values and tolerance would have morphed into what we would call a more “permissive” society, quite different than what I experienced when I was last in a public school classroom over 25 years ago. More liberal dress, language, and culture… surviving the Vietnam War, the fall of President Nixon through Watergate, the scandals experienced by the organized church, the rise and fall of a great number of familial institutions giving rise to Generation X - latch-key children, etc., which most likely make up the generation in which the parents of my students grew up. No wonder…

The remuneration for my substituting was equal to one nice dinner for my wife and me for each day I worked, but well beyond any financial reward was my recommitment to, and increased belief in the goodness of all children. I reconfirmed that all children respond well to being listened to, validated, and respected. It was also reassuring to discover that I had not lost my “touch” as an educator for this emerging generation, insuring that learning was taking place regardless of the students or setting.

As a sub, I have both the benefit and the liability of only being with the students for a few days at the most. This can be a benefit, as I am a contrast to their regular teacher who is responsible for their long-term progress. This can be a liability, in that the students don’t get to really “know” me, and I don’t have the privilege of building anything but a short-term relationship. A long-term relationship is something upon which I firmly believe all meaningful learning is based.  In my 10 years of classroom teaching starting in the late 60s, I made home calls to all my students before school started. That provided an invaluable foundation upon which the trusting, long-term relationship I refer to is built. I literally had no discipline problems in any one of my classes.

Finally, it was humbling and gratifying to receive a number of appreciative comments from many students in classes where I substituted. Several notes, pictures, and one origami flower from a high school student now adorn my refrigerator.

Just Plain Bill

A Gift of Learning

from the Learning Challenged

The other day, I had the privilege of substituting in a primary class consisting of six boys, all with various forms of autism. I had some knowledge of the effects of this condition, but this was my first experience helping provide for their educational needs, up close and personal, on a one-on-one basis.

According to Wikipedia, "About a third to a half of individuals with autism do not develop enough natural speech to meet their daily communication needs.  …Children with autism are less likely to make requests or share experiences, and are more likely to simply repeat others' words (echolalia) or reverse pronouns…Children with autism may have difficulty with imaginative play and with developing symbols into language."

Fortunately, I was able to work with two patient and highly sensitive aides who had an established relationship with these boys.

As an admitted "wordsmith", I'm blessed with the ability to communicate with ease. Yet when faced with the challenge of helping young children learn, I can only imagine the frustration, confusion and challenge my six students live with daily, as their needs and interests pose challenges in understanding and fulfillment – being unable to do much of what I take for granted without even a second thought.

One portion of my day included working with two of the students, one who is nonverbal, and the other who occasionally repeats words he likes. We went to the gym and played with hula-hoops, while listening to music through the PA system. The student with limited vocabulary quickly learned how to operate the

PA system, a task I myself found challenging. He enjoyed turning the system on and off, while repeating “musica” and while dancing to the rhythm of the exercise music. The other boy entertained himself while spinning the hula-hoop around in circles for over 10 minutes (much faster than I could without getting dizzy), wearing the biggest smile on his face, and looking up at the sky.

As the day progressed, I was reminded of a presentation by Temple Grandin at the college where I also teach. Ms. Grandin, a noted professor, has made incredible contributions to the understanding of autism as she has overcome some of the limitations that her own autism creates.

"Based on personal experience, Grandin advocates early intervention to address autism, and supportive teachers who can direct fixations of the child with autism in fruitful directions. She has described her hypersensitivity to noise and other sensory stimuli. She claims she is a primarily visual thinker and has said that words are her second language. Temple attributes her success as a humane livestock facility designer to her ability to recall detail, which is a characteristic of her visual memory. Grandin compares her memory to full-length movies in her head, which may be replayed at will, allowing her to notice small details. She also is able to view her memories using slightly different contexts by changing the positions of the lighting and shadows."

I am grateful that after all my years of teaching, I had a meaningful experience that allowed me to catch but a glimpse of the challenges that lay ahead unlocking the autism puzzle. While my contact with the six boys was limited to one day, I’m interested in learning more about educational opportunities in this field and look forward to additional substitute opportunities of this type in the coming school year.