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As I write this blog, there are two school days left. It is that strange time of year when I feel like I can finally, finally start to come up for breath — just a little bit — after a frenetic month of deadlines and demands. 

This June seemed particularly busy … then again, I think I always say that. At any rate, it is inevitably four weeks of non-stop final assessments, transition tours, summer camp sign-ups, parent interviews, presentations, and report cards. By the end of the month, exhaustion makes itself known.

Early this morning, as the sun was just starting to colour the sky, I sat with my coffee at the kitchen table and flipped open my laptop. Weak bluish light from my calendar illuminated the still-dark room, and as I stared at the familiar daily schedules I realized that, all of a sudden, the seemingly endless list of items to complete had dwindled to just a few. The monumental tasks that had stared me down at the beginning of the month, that kept me awake at night and charging full throttle during the day, had all but been taken care of. 

In that moment, I felt that first small calm before summer. And that feeling stayed with me through the day, as I went about finishing off the final errands of the year. After school, as I walked into the sunny afternoon, I could feel the warmth slowly start to pull at the the tangle of deadlines that had matted in my thoughts, unravelling them to complete. Calm.

With school ending for another year, I am looking forward to welcoming more of that calm this summer. Whether it is spending time with my family, meeting with friends, walking in the woods, or simply taking time to listen to myself, to what I need … those are the wonderful beginnings I want to focus on now.

May you also find beautiful beginnings this summer, that the months ahead bring you what you need to rest and restore. 

I have this pink schlumbergera plant.  You may have heard it commonly referred to as the ‘Christmas cactus’.  The funny thing about mine is that it blooms in June.  I know they are supposed to be in full splendour in the winter – that’s how it got its common name.  But this one is on its own time schedule. How that happened, I have no idea.  

I brought it home one spring and I’ve had it so long I can’t remember from where.   We’ve had some ups and downs together.  It took me a long while to figure out what kind of sun and watering schedule it needed to thrive.  I had to do some research and tap on the expertise of  my fellow plant friends for ideas on how to get it to bloom at all!  It took a lot more effort than my pothos plants that seem to grow in spite of my steep learning curve as an indoor gardener.  

As we just completed report card writing season, I think a lot about this little schlumbergera and not just because it always tends to bloom near my kitchen table around the time I am sitting and writing reports. Rather, I think about the journey we’ve gone through together.  Much like the students we work with, some of them will ‘bloom’ at different times than others.  Some of them might require extra time and effort; they might need us to tap on our professional colleagues for advice and resources that will help us to grow in our own professional learning. They might work really hard at different stages of growth and some of that work isn’t always visible in a final product, but in small progressive steps toward their goals. 

It’s hard to convey all of this in a single document, like a report card or a final mark.  It can be challenging to find the right words that honour a child’s learning journey and leave space to communicate how proud I am when they ‘bloom’.  I spend a lot of time thinking about how to give them the message that shows I genuinely care about who they are becoming and how hard they’ve worked to get there. 

That’s one of the beautiful things about teaching.  Learning together is really a process of getting to know students and helping them to know themselves.  And in this way, we also learn about our own selves as educators; we learn and grow right alongside them.

I’ve gone through quite a few schlumbergera plants over the years.  They typically go on to live their best lives at my mom’s house where they thrive and in her front window; growing and blooming all at the right time – but this little pink one is staying right here in my own window.  We’ve worked hard together to find our own rhythm and while we aren’t doing things at all the “right” times, we’ve found a way to bloom that works for us.

I love a good quote. And quotes are ubiquitous in the education world, thankfully. They pop up on email signatures, inspirational posters, and in scholarly articles. Many deal with how an educator’s impact can flow through generations, reaching ahead into time beyond what we now see, and how we will never know the ways in which our teaching today shapes the lives of tomorrow. Such musings often centre on how teachers can impact the lives of students. But in this blog, I want to discuss the impact educators can have on other educators.

I have been fortunate to work with amazing colleagues over the years. And the educators I work closely with now seem a concentrated microcosm of all that is good about collaboration in education. The free flow of ideas. The dialogue. The trust in one another. The courage to say, I don’t know. The humility, and sometimes bravery, it takes to try something new. Where would I be without these conversations? These gifts? My practice and approach has changed over the years, shifting in response to new information, new needs, and inspiration from colleagues. Like any practice, teaching is one that cannot remain stagnant. We always search for the best ways to educate, to affirm. 

So, with another year nearly at the close, this blog is a thank you note to all the teachers and educators that I work with. Thank you for sharing your ideas with me. Thank you for listening when I have been stumped by a challenge. Thank you for supporting me when I set out on new waters, and for having my back when the seas are a little rough. Thank you for your dedication and excellence, the passion with which you support students every day. Thank you for challenging me to see what I previously could not. Thank you for making me a better teacher. 

With increasing demands placed on teachers and educators everywhere, finding those colleagues, those mutually-supportive communities, is more important than ever. I wish you all the most wonderful luck in finding those safe harbours, those adventurous journeys, and the unifying strength that comes from it all.

 

June has arrived, bringing the promise of summer and a sudden shift toward optimism in our daily routines. While I will eventually write a post about some of my favourite recommended teacher reads for the summer, I am going to encourage all of my fellow ETFO members to do something really important: take a long break from teaching.

I remember my first few teaching years rather vividly: the stress, the endless classroom management, planning endlessly, and the never-ending pile of marking that only seemed to grow. It is hard to describe the feeling of absolute relief, joy and freedom that comes on that last day of school when the bell rings. Within days, I would pack my giant backpack and head on a flight to South America, where I would gleefully spend my days exploring new cities, trying new foods, and meeting people from all over the world in the hostels I would stay in. Nothing puts distance between yourself and your daily routines like immersing yourself fully in another country, especially if  you are somewhere radically different from the place you are from. Spending long weeks simply exploring was like living another life, and I relished every moment until the inevitable day I would return home and be in the same place I had left – but utterly refreshed and ready to start a new school year.

While my life has changed radically since those carefree days – it’s a little harder to live out the backpacker lifestyle with two kids in tow – I still feel it is critical to distance myself from work for as long as possible when summer arrives. Teaching is intense, and this school year was perhaps one of the most challenging. As the recent ETFO member survey points out, violence in schools is pervasive, behaviour in schools is escalating, and understaffing persists. The challenges faced by students re-entering schools after years of pandemic disruption added a whole new dimension to the work of classroom management. Self-care is absolutely critical to stay healthy in the teaching profession today.

As educators, we continue to teach and support students, even in difficult circumstances: but to keep going, it is essential to take the time to distance, decompress, and refresh.

This summer – if it is possible – create as much space as you can between your personal and professional life. Get lost in a new country, the woods, the desert, a new town, a new park, or new neighbourhood. Read books or watch movies that that activate your imagination and take you to another world. When you see your teacher friends, try not to talk about work! Try it for a few days, a week, a month, or more.

Of course, professional development over the summer is important, but going into a learning session when you are burnt out or frustrated may hinder you from getting an optimal learning experience. Take the time you need before pushing yourself again in your professional practice. Your body and mind will thank you for it!

Each spring, many classrooms across Ontario work hard on their heritage fair projects. If you’ve never had the opportunity to participate in the Ontario Heritage Fair, it’s a great opportunity to have students invested in learning, researching parts of Canadian history and heritage. What I love about Heritage Fair Projects is that they are Canadian focussed and can provide a real opportunity for students to critically think about what events or people are an important part of Canada.

I remember doing a similar project when I was in grade eight history class. There was a long list of men, all British or French, who were the ‘influential founders’ of Canada. My project was on Sir Wilfrid Laurier. I think I chose him because he was on the five dollar bill and that bill was the one I saw most often at 12 years old. I can’t remember learning much more about him except that he also had a university named after him in Waterloo. Perhaps I was not as invested in the assignment as I should have been.

This year, there were so many different submissions! Noteworthy Canadians, including Viola Desmond and Terry Fox, begin to really show the changing view of what makes someone influential in Canadian culture. Twelve year old me would have been excited to see a Black woman or a teenage boy with an amputated leg as people who changed Canada for the better. These activists who were visible and worked to change a challenging system of inequality are nothing short of inspirational.

It was so fascinating to see some students chose whole organizations as responsible for changing the face of Canada. Organizations such as the Toronto Raptors or Sick Kids Hospitals that have had such influence on changing the landscape of Canada, bringing people together or providing life changing services for so many children and youth. You can imagine how personal these project submissions were for the youth who chose to highlight these organizations as a defining part of Canadian Heritage.

As I start to think more about pedagogy being culturally and historically responsive, I think about how students see themselves and other identities in Canada’s heritage. I wonder how we can encourage and develop learning opportunities that are culturally sustaining – allowing students not only to celebrate and learn about their culture, but to find joy in sharing history and a place for belonging. As the daughter of a Filipina immigrant, I wonder how I could have found my heritage represented in Canada as influential and important here. Could I have learned about my own culture and found space for it to be celebrated in school? What would I have said? What story would I have told?

I am already thinking about next year’s Heritage Fair! It’s beyond exciting to think about co-creating criteria on what makes someone influential or an organization important; to encourage students to critically think and develop their own definitions about what Canada means to them. There will be endless possibilities to plan and create the conditions for students to be invested in their learning, to be excited at seeing themselves reflected in Canadian heritage. I can’t wait to hear their voices!

** The Ontario Heritage Fairs Program (OHFA) is an educational initiative that provides an opportunity for students to explore parts of Canadian history or cultural heritage in a dynamic learning environment. Teachers, community educators, and families encourage students to use a variety of research methods to explore a topic of interest, and medium of choice, to tell their stories – about the land where they live, their personal family history, or their local community stories. For more information visit: https://ohfa.ca/about-ohfa/

Today was a beautiful day. I spent it at a school that sits on a large green field in the middle of the kind of urban vibrancy I grew up in. The expanse of grass is so wide and empty that it almost looks out-of-place compared to the wonderful density that surrounds it. The busy city streets leading to the school are lined with apartments, homes, businesses … an eclectic mix of buildings, some new, some many many decades old. Smack dab in the middle of one of the through-streets is a community garden, a jumble of interesting plants and floppy leaves that pops up out of nowhere, nestled behind a busy intersection, and which I always strain to see as I drive by. The June sun tends to warm this end of the city in a heightened way, and when a breeze blows across the grassy field as I walk up to the school, I can feel summer in its touch. 

This school, like so many I have taught in, is full of amazing students and dedicated teachers. Even in the final days before summer, when the academic year is winding down, the educators here are busily supporting students, and each other. Today, I arrived at classroom doors, taking students for end-of-year conferences and reading celebrations, and at each turn I chatted quickly with teachers, exchanging on-the-spot observations, progress and strengths, hopes for next year, plans to meet in September … all in a matter of seconds. These educators never seem to stop thinking about their students, and with the increasing demands and dwindling timeframes educators everywhere experience, being succinct and supportive is something of a necessary art these days. Teachers across our schools are exceptionally good at it.

Today was a beautiful day, full of engaged students, multilingual books, centres and math and outdoor games … and that quick collaboration between educators that helps hold it all together. It always gives me pause, that we manage to do so much when more and more resources and supports seem to slip away by the day. And I often imagine all that we could do if they were given back …

If we had class sizes that were manageable, that allowed every student an optimal learning environment …

If support programs for students with varying and wonderful and unique needs were properly funded … 

If we had time — real time — to collaborate and communicate with one another to best serve students …

Like that garden so close to the school, lovingly attended by neighbours and community members, I am continually proud of all teachers do to support their students’ growth. And I am also continually proud of our students, who bring so much knowledge and hope and joy to their classrooms, growing stronger, insights expanding throughout the year into new and glorious blooms. 

Summer is a time for dreaming, and this year my summer dreams are for all educators to rest and rejuvenate, knowing they did their absolute best for students. And for students, my dream is that every single one feels loved and celebrated, and proud of all they have accomplished, knowing that next September, their beautiful gardens will continue to grow.

Come with me to my backyard. 

A once unloved, unused space of my home was under transformation. I had a vision for a peaceful oasis for me and my children to “just be” ~ reflect, talk or listen, to feel. Wildflower seeds beginning to sprout where grass once struggled, patio lights strung across the old fence, and an added bird feeder attracting new sounds and visitors, my daily needs began to include at least a few quiet moments in my new, affectionately named swing, Eggy.

One June evening between the chaos of graduations, report card writing, and sports banquets, I was taking my few moments with Eggy, when I was taken by surprise by an unexpected visitor. Mkwa (a bear) appeared from behind the neighbour’s fence. As I laid eyes on him and jumped out of my swing, hurrying for the patio door, he left as peacefully and quietly as he came. Mkwa turned around and sauntered out of sight before I could even get in the house. 

As June returns and my nightly routine with Eggy extends in time, I am reminded of my visitor and continue to reflect on his message. Mkwa represents courage. And he reminded me of this courage. The courage to use my voice, to be vulnerable to share my story and also to inspire and help others find and use their voice. As I shared in my first few posts, writer is not an identity I held.

A few days after Mkwa’s appearance I received an email from ETFO which included a Call for Writer’s to write for Heart and Art. I knew it was time for me to step out of my comfort and respond to Mkwa’s nudge. 

It was very clear to me that my next step required courage; To put some of my energy into sharing my experiences, my knowledge and my passion with educators to foster positive change within our system. And this blog was a great forum, allowing me to share this with you, my valued reader. I hope you have found and continue to find some of my posts helpful to you professionally and/or personally, and you find your outlet to amplify your voice and use your experiences and knowledge to continue strengthening our public education.