Are you and your students anxious about the future of life on earth? The term eco-anxiety applies to those of us whose feelings of dread, anxiety, and depression are associated with climate change, mass extinction, pollution, plastic islands, depletion of the earth’s resources, the water crisis, and other ecological issues. We can help ourselves and our students to cope with these feelings in several ways.
Part 1 of this blog examines appreciating nature and getting outside to learn.
Go Outside and Observe
Plan a variety of teaching opportunities outdoors. Fresh air, sunshine, snow, mud, and rain give us exercise and vitamin D with the bonus of the chance to observe the seasonal cycles, the water cycle, habitats, plants, and all sorts of animals, including insects. You will need to prepare for the weather, but I believe this will reduce student anxiety about the natural world just by spending time outside appreciating the gifts of this planet. Specific learning expectations in every grade from K-8 require students to be outside. When it’s part of the class routine to take a walk together or adopt a nearby tree, plant, or garden, students will likely gain more respect and understanding of the natural world. Bring cameras outside to create media. Take time to write, draw, paint, and create drama or music outdoors. The outdoor setting is a beautiful place to let the artistic side emerge. Respectfully using natural materials is a fantastic way to work together and be creative.
Go Outside and Learn
Your schoolyard is a habitat, no matter where it is located. It’s in a weather zone; it’s on a waterway; it’s a food source for something, even if you are in a concrete jungle! Explore the nooks and crannies of cracks in the pavement. Watch the skies for birds and other insects. You will find many opportunities to cover the curriculum right outside your door. Any subject for grades 1-8 and any of the four frames in the kindergarten program has components that you can cover outdoors. If your school does not have an outdoor classroom, that’s ok! You can do plenty of teaching with students using cameras or clipboards for making observations, calculations, mapping, or art. You can set up a nature-based inquiry by asking students to compare the characteristics of trees and animal habitats or make detailed weather observations. Always ensure outdoor learning is accessible to all students, and have fun!
I have a habit of saying, “fine” whenever asked how things are going. Whether it is symptomatic of a half century plus of social conditioning or simply learned ambivalence is still to be determined. It could be a combo of the two as well. I am a big fan of “fine”.
It has the insouciant distance and indifference that propels me past and through the issues of the day. After all, who wants to be a burden to others when so many are already maxed out with their own lives. Isn’t it the North American expectation to steadfastly power through the day with stoic determination. In many ways that’s what happens to people who stay in the safety of their silos.
It is not beyond a single educator to utter this answer all the while knowing that behind the scenes, in our heads, or in full view of all to see that there is a lot of meaning to “fine”. It is a societal expectation that we respond “fine” because our polite programming provides the same answer each time even when it is not true.
It’s not a lie if you believe it. – George Costanza
I love the quote above and it rings a little too true with this topic. Although it was intended for a different context in the show Seinfeld, it definitely applies when considering the mental health and well being of all who work in education. When will we have time to unpack the emotional baggage covered by “fine”? How do we get to a place of trust to provide the support that is necessary for us to listen as well as be heard?
Breathe in, breathe out. I’m fine. You are fine. Everything is fine. Thank you very much for asking and not burdening either of us with a truth that we verily have little time to acknowledge or attend to if it turned out to be false. Now, let’s get about our days. Sound familiar?
As a profession, there are few others to rival the frenetic paces that educators face over the entirety of a school year. Imagine each classroom along the lines of a corporate model where each grade occupies an important floor of a tall tower. On each of these floors there are numerous cubicles filled with team leaders and workers all charged with annually accumulating, accruing, and retaining the knowledge and the skills to find, climb, and remain on the next floor above them.
With each September ‘new year’ comes the mysteries, highs, lows, and unexpected life events of a newly gathered group. Buckle up because it could be a bumpy ride. What surprises me, over most of my 14 years in education, is that the ride is nearly 3/4s finished before I realize where the heck I am. This explains the timing of this post in March with the realization that there is much work to be done.
As if that collaboration and hard work to move on up wasn’t enough, the teams are dismantled, mixed, and reassembled to include other workers from their former floor, but now forming under different leaders just to keep it fresh. Despite the best efforts to make everything seem fine, I can’t help but wonder how students are doing too. The past 3 years have been anything but fine. Yet, as we move them from floor to floor, like the adults who lead them, they are already accepting that the only answer to give is “fine”.
With all of the talk surrounding mental health and community wellness in schools, I am not fine with “fine” being the answer and am working hard to redefine the work I am doing around it.
I’ll leave you with this. I was fortunate enough to be a part of a meeting with student leaders from our school mental health collaborative. This session revealed some extremely important truths that can light a path to somewhere good for students and teachers. Here are my takeaways and echoed thoughts in ( ).
Students are feeling the stress (Teachers are feeling the stress)
Students want to do something about it (Teachers want to do something about it)
Students are looking to work with educators to create and implement solutions (Teachers are looking to work with students to create and implement solutions)
Students need teachers who can listen without feeling that they need to have any or all of the answers (Teachers need others who can listen without feeling that they need to have any or all of the answers)
Students need teachers who will help lead programs that are relevant to their needs rather than those that have been prescribed from outside of the building. (Teachers need others who will help lead programs that are relevant to their needs rather than those that have been prescribed from outside of the building.)
Thank you for reading. Please feel free to add your thoughts in the comment box to keep the conversation going.
After listening to Anjula Gogia speaking about the history of Toronto Women’s Bookstore at ….And Still We Rise in February, I have been doing a lot of reflecting on how the school library can be a place of hands-on learning and community. Sometimes called the learning commons, the library is a gathering space for all students and school staff. As such, the library sets a tone that resonates throughout the entire school.
In elementary schools, the library today is so much different than I can remember. My whole life I have been an avid reader. I can remember being in grade seven and eight and looking for books to read in the school library. We had to all be silent and keep a pen and paper reading log of all the books we read and how long it took us to read them. Given that this was the late 1980s, the majority of my reading log consisted of titles from Sweet Valley High and Sweet Dreams. I recall recognizing a formula to all of those books (mostly pre-teen romance about high school) that told us how to behave and what was going to be important in high school. Everything was very gendered and those were the only ‘girl’ options – and none of them ever applied to me. I never saw a racialized girl at the centre of the story. I cannot recall ever reading about a girl who was interested in the same things I was – books and science and just living a happy life.
Fast forward to today and the library looks very different when I enter a school. There are learning sounds of laughter and talking together. Sometimes there are maker spaces, breaker spaces, robotics, and all kinds of technology being used. The library may also host presentations or be a space for students to be in community with one another. There is a feeling of camaraderie and support for students. However, most noticeable to me is that the teacher librarians that I work with really do their best to honour student identities, experiences, and voices.
When I walk into a school library and the shelves are filled with different experiences and identities, I think of what it means to those students who might not see themselves represented in places outside of school. They see their identities accepted and celebrated; they see many possibilities about who they can become, who they can admire, and who is important. Teacher librarians have the opportunity to provide these spaces for students where they feel and see themselves as welcome without expectation and without judgment. Some teacher librarians even ask the students for recommendations on the books they want to read or identities they want to read about.
The school library can be such a joyful space! Thank you to teacher librarians who are thoughtful professionals, taking time to affirm student identities and intentionally curate materials and books that reflect students. No wonder the students look so excited to get to the library when walking down the hall!
Image – fractions made with a blend of colourful geometric shapes in the style of Picasso and Klimt via Dalle 2 prompts by author
Bumps, bruises, cuts, and scars dot my skin. They serve as little reminders of the life that has been lived on the outside. Whether visible to others or not, I cannot look at them without recalling most of the moments and misadventures that caused them. I see these marks as near misses and continue to add more to my collection whether it is in the kitchen, workshop, or enjoying time with others.
Call this post ‘fractures’?
In my half century plus adventure time, I have not broken many bones along the way. Other than most of my fingers, a couple of ribs (which made baseball and golfing really tough that year), and my nose back in grade 6 playing football on the school team, I have been very fortunate not to ever be fitted with an itchy or cumbersome cast – although there is still time.
My collection of near misses and minor breaks have taught me quite a bit. I have to take my physical existence seriously when it comes to my actions and inactions. Perhaps my injuries are the products of inattention on my part? Perhaps I let my guard down with what-could-possibly-go-wrong thinking? Perhaps I needed to pay closer attention going forward? Somehow I am sounding like my parents and teachers and it’s bringing me back to the purpose of this post – fractures.
There is not a single one among us who enters the classroom each day without fractures. You see, we have all endured down times, loss, failure, and disappointment at one point in our lives or another. Whether physiologically or psychologically, fractures come along with life’s other certainties such as death, taxes, and dishes(without apologies to Ben Franklin). What we make of our fractures is often where we find our strength and determination.
If a bone breaks, the body begins the healing process immediately. Once something goes snap, the cells organize themselves to start the repair process. Interestingly enough, it is not like your brain is the boss yelling at the workers to do their jobs or go faster. At this point it is along for the ride because the body already knows what to do. The brain just takes the credit. “My what a nice job we did healing that tibia over the past 6 weeks.” Despite attending to the remediating a reconstruction project, the body can still get about other daily cognitive business, but when someone’s mind or spirit becomes fractured, the body is often likely to deteriorate in the process until healing and restoration are complete. So why is this so hard?
Fractures in our personal and thought lives are never usually front and centre though. Adding to this mystique is the elusive nature of mental health in general. Our fractured spirits are not easily seen by untrained minds and are often interpreted as rude behaviour or that maybe you need a time out to gather your thoughts. This is also common in our students. It is also compounded because, many times, they are processing emotions that seem difficult to articulate due to confusion and fear of being judged, cast out, mocked, or all of the above.
The Ontario Grade 6 Health Curriculum gives us some solid teaching and learning points that I have really been trying to build into the life skillsets of students in and out of our class time. Interestingly enough, this teaching really meshes well with the book The Tools by Phil Stutz and Barry Michels which happens to be my current personal read, but that’s a blog for a different site.
So often we are faced with situations that are followed by a barrage of feelings and much more often than not we find ourselves reacting rather than responding. As our lessons have progressed, students have learned to assess the situation, identify their emotions, and then use strategies for resolution. Yet, even with the skills we are implementing into our daily interactions, the struggle to be honest and free of fear about our fractures and feelings is really hard to reckon with one another. This goes for teachers just as much as students.
We need to step outside of our comfort zones which double as camouflaged cages of social media level perfection and problem free happiness. We need to normalize that life is messy at times and that things can be and become broken. If we take time to pick up the pieces and put them back together there is a chance that these fractures can be mended.
In many cases the silence is even more deafening when it comes to issues of mental health in the classroom. Judging by recent news reports in response to the provincial budget causes me to believe we are in for more and more fractured students slipping through the cracks in our schools.
Yes, we can acknowledge it, but more often than not we are still too fractured as a society to truly support each other when there is so much need already. The keys has been and will continue to be in the hands of educators. As we walk through the hallways and curate our classrooms, take time to help the fractured around you by making time to acknowledge them (yourself), listen (talk with someone), and help them (yourself) heal.
I love attending teacher conferences: meeting new people, learning new ideas and strategies, browsing the latest student resources, experimenting with new technology for the classroom. Pre-pandemic, finding a good conference was a ritual I’d perform every school year – Googling endlessly for an event that was just the right location, theme and cost for my professional learning funding for that year. Like many teachers, I love travel – so spending hours comparing accommodations, conference speakers, and transportation fees brings me a very high level of excitement and joy.
Last year I went to my first conference since the pandemic had started, and it fortunately was a virtual one – I was recovering from a bout of COVID-19 as I watched the speakers present through my screen. While I learned a lot about culturally responsive assessment, I found it a little too easy to tune out of the conversation and start researching random topics, or respond to work emails that popped up. All of this is to say that virtual conferences just aren’t the same – while they can be good learning experiences, there are a lot of pieces missing that make conferences a fully immersive professional learning experience.
Attending Reading for the Love of It
What is Reading for the Love of It? This conference is organized by the East York-Scarborough Reading Association, a group of Ontario educators who are passionate about literacy. The event and organization is entirely volunteer run, and the conference has run for 44 years. You can read all about their organization and past conferences at their website.
When an opportunity came up to attend this year’s annual Reading for the Love of It conference in downtown Toronto, I promptly signed up with several of my colleagues. Simply planning to attend was already a different experience from getting a virtual link. We excitedly chose which sessions to attend, organized a lunch meetup, and coordinated meeting points.
Arriving at the venue, a big smile spread across my face: the beautiful lobby of the Sheraton hotel was flooded with teachers carrying conference programs and swag bags, friendly volunteers appeared at every turn to guide us in the right direction. A large exhibitor section filled with booksellers and vendors provided endless browsing possibilities where I could finally thumb through student resources I had been eyeing online for months, like a decodable reader set for older students and a full trove of hi-lo fictional novels.
What was truly wonderful was running into colleagues and ETFO members, some of which I had never met in person. It struck me how easy it was to have interactions that other wise took days of planning: scheduling a zoom meeting, or planning a visit. I remembered how exchanging valuable tidbits of information about projects and sharing resources and insights could happen in the span of second – this is the real value of being at conferences like these.
The Value of Choosing Your Professional Learning Pathways
Experiencing an in person conference again also reminded me of the value of choosing our own professional learning pathways. Just as the students we teach benefit from determining their own inquiries, as educators we may also be more engaged in our learning when we can choose our own way to grow professionally.
Understanding how to access funding is critical to fostering our own growth. There are hundreds of conferences and learning opportunities happening all over Canada, and many new teachers may not be aware that some ETFO locals offer professional development funding to assist with costs. For example, at my local, we can access up to $300 for conferences and $400 for professional learning courses. I will be always grateful for the mentor that showed me this funding was available, since I have used it at every opportunity.
If you are unfamiliar with how to organize and fund your professional learning, contact your local to find out what options are available!
I can remember the first time I went to …And Still We Rise. Imagine, if you will, a room filled with women who are working to empower each other, further their learning, tell their stories, and be mentors for others. I was in awe! I attended workshops and sat in amazement of the educators and the guest speakers. Listening to their experiences and views of the world, I was so inspired to think differently about women and our places as part of society as educators, co-conspirators, and disruptors. Whose voices should we uplift and whose stories should we amplify?
As every year, this one was filled with amazing women at the podium, including Funke Alexandra, who shared her research focussing on the history of Black Canadian women in education. There was Deb St Amant, the Elder-in-Residence at Queen’s University, and whom I remember being a strong advocate and leader in her time with ETFO. ETFO President Karen Brown, whose voice and presence was empowering and inspiring. We also got a chance to hear the story of the Toronto Women’s Bookstore through the eyes of Anjula Gogia. Though I was only in attendance for part of the conference, there were beautiful sentiments of solidarity and wonderful opportunities for learning. It was incredibly empowering to be part of it all.
What I love about …And Still We Rise is the space for women to come together. In life, I wear many different hats and it is hard to carve out time and space in my day to think about myself. I am busy with work, with parenting, with family and at times it feels like every spare moment is allocated to something. A women’s conference like … And Still We Rise is a place where coming together with other women who have similar experiences where we can learn from one another provides a few moments of breath.
There is time to think and connect with one another. There’s actually time to sit and eat a meal together, sharing ideas and conversation with new friends and in community with those who are already a part of our lives.
When I first started my journey with ETFO, everyone told me that going to …And Still We Rise was a must-do experience. I wholeheartedly agree! It’s the space for all women to be heard on issues that they think are important. It’s a place where women can tell women’s history and experiences that are often erased or unvoiced in history books. It’s a time to consider how women can advance social justice, build solidarity between struggles, and contribute to the broader women’s movement. If you have the opportunity to attend …And Still We Rise, I encourage you to take the time to learn, connect, and grow!
… And Still We Rise is ETFO’s signature women’s conference that runs annually in February each year.
“The null curriculum refers to the things students do not have the chance and opportunity to learn. In this regard, learners learn something based on the absence of certain classroom experiences, interactions and discourses” (Kazemi, et. al, 2020).
The lack of representation of Black culture, history, and accomplishments across all subject areas from K-12 exemplifies the null curriculum. Think about the absence of information about Black Canadians and the histories of Black Canadians in your curriculum. The erasure of Blackness to students devalues and depreciates the validity of the lived experiences of Black people.
For many Black students, school is not an accepting place. It’s where they come face-to-face with the stereotypes and prejudices they face in the larger society. Students have shared their feelings of neglect, heightened surveillance, and arbitrary and often unmerited punishment for any perceived disobedience.
How can you actively address Anti-Black Racism, combating Null curriculum by integrating Black Education into your teaching practice?
It is crucial that there are educators in the classrooms who are intentional about challenging the status quo. It is crucial that there are educators who are willing to better understand cultures they are unfamiliar with to meaningfully connect with their students. Adopt a culturally relevant pedagogical lens – “Culturally relevant pedagogy rests on three criteria or propositions: (a) Students must experience academic success; (b) students must develop and/or maintain cultural competence; and (c) students must develop a critical consciousness through which they challenge the status quo of the current social” (Ladson-Billings, 1995. p. 160)
Ask yourself:
What areas in my teaching & learning styles foster anti-racist teaching?
What areas in my teaching & learning styles require change?
Ontario Black History Society. 2020. Blacked Out History. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKm7wQjpuac&ab_channel=OntarioBlackHistorySociety
Kazemi, S., Hamid, A., Motallebzadeh, K., & Zeraatpishe, M. | Jody S. Piro (Reviewing editor)(2020)Development and validation of a null curriculum questionnaire focusing on 21st-century skills using the Rasch model,Cogent Education,7:1,DOI: 10.1080/2331186X.2020.1736849
There has been much discussion of late about the importance of systematic, explicit phonics instruction in literacy. Decodable readers and phonics programs are popping up on book room shelves, nudging to the side the guided reading bins that have so long reigned supreme. These days, it seems acronyms such as UFLI are uttered more commonly than DRA or LLI.And yes, systematic phonics instruction is an essential component of reading, especially for students struggling with learning disabilities such as dyslexia (there has been more than one beloved learner in my family who needed such explicit and multisensory literacy instruction to learn to read). But what about multilingual learners? Is reading instruction different for them? Should teachers jump right into phonics instruction for a student just learning English, as they would for any other student?
Perhaps the following scenario will highlight some critical considerations in this question.
Imagine you are a multilingual leaner, about to learn a new language. And more than that, you are going to learn to read in that new language. Here is your first phonics lesson:
Just three sounds, and you blend them together. Got it? Now read this:
Could you decode it? Read it out loud? You blended all the letter sounds together? Great! Good for you! You are reading.
Just a couple more questions:
Did you get the joke in the first line? Were you moved by the revelation in the second sentence? Did you see the connection to your science curriculum at the end? Did you gain any ability to communicate in this new language you are trying to learn?
No?
Ah. There is the difference. Native speakers of English already understand the vocabulary they are decoding. When we ask them to sound out c-a-t, they know what the word ‘cat’ means. They can use the word in a sentence for real communication. If they read a story about a cat, they can enjoy it, make connections to it, ask questions about the text. Not so for multilingual learners in the beginning stage of English acquisition.
So is phonics instruction just as important for multilingual learners as for native speakers of English? Yes. But it is not equitable to make a student decode something they cannot understand. That is where we come in as teachers, to front load and embed oral language and vocabulary development in phonics lessons, so that multilingual learners learn the meaning of the words they are about to decode and encode. So that they can use those words for real communication, in multiple authentic situations. So that they have the same access to rich texts, ideas, and learning experiences as native speakers of English. In this sense, teaching phonics in meaningful context, rather than only as an isolated skill, is an issue of both instructional practice and social justice.
There are far more considerations in teaching MLs to read than I have discussed here. For a deeper dive into the complexities and nuances of literacy instruction for multilingual learners, I have found Literacy Foundations for English Learners: A Comprehensive Guide by Cardenas-Hagan to be very helpful. And of course, for free insights and best practices in ML instruction, and mapping out the ways phonics and reading instruction need to be tweaked for multilingual learners, there is always https://www.colorincolorado.org/ which has an entire section devoted to literacy instruction for multilingual learners.
Speaking of which, the Spanish phrase “colorin colorado” might also be a good way to conclude to this blog entry — “happily ever after”is indeed the sentiment I wish for all readers.
In November, I had the opportunity to shadow some wonderful facilitators at a Women In Action workshop. I was so impressed with their ability to connect and uplift the women to see themselves as leaders. While I had already attended Women In Action Part I many years ago as a participant, being a facilitator was a completely new and inspiring experience.
When you attend Women In Action, it is the chance to be part of something special. You get the opportunity to connect with other women in a safe space. Some may be part of your local and some may not be. You will get the chance to really think about the skills and traits that you bring as a leader and recognize the strengths that you already have within you.
Women in Action is designed to inspire attendees to think more broadly about their roles as activists and unionists. Learning and setting goals for yourself is an important part of the time you spend together. As facilitators, we really worked hard to encourage the women to reflect on social justice issues and unionism as they pertained to them and consider themselves as powerful individuals capable of changing the world.
While the food, facilities, and workshop was amazing, I think what I really enjoyed most was the bonding. Hearing the voices of women laughing and chatting and building relationships with one another is a sound unlike any other. I missed that sound over the past three years! Having the space and time together without distraction to focus on professional growth and begin the journey with peers who become friends is unparalleled.
If you have already had the opportunity to attend a Women in Action Part I session, there is also a Part II and a newly developed Part III. Each part provides space to learn more about yourself and to forge relationships that will last a lifetime. In fact, I am still friends with some of the women that I met all those years ago and we are so fortunate to connect annually at Annual Meeting together in Toronto. It’s such a pivotal experience in my work at ETFO that it still influences the way I think about myself today.
If you are able to attend a Women in Action workshop, you will not be disappointed. You will learn a lot about yourself, about issues pertaining to women, and about how to overcome them. You will be reminded of your inner power and your own strength. And you will be changed for the better. This program is organized through your ETFO local and members who identify as women can connect with their local to inquire about the chance to be part of the program.
The words ‘learning gaps’ and ‘gap filling’ always give me a sense of urgency and dread. The word ‘gap’ seems so impossible – I get a visual of the Grand Canyon in my mind and think of how long it would take for me to fill it. It brings memories of rote worksheets and intensive pull out programs which seemed scary to me as a student and overwhelming as an adult. However, most recently in a conversation with a colleague, she gave me an alternative way of thinking about how to connect with student needs. The words “missed experiences” suddenly seemed like something I could do.
Think about the math learning continuum, for example. If students are working with multiplication and are relying solely on skip counting when multiplying, they have missed a few experiences along the way; perhaps they were away due to Covid, perhaps virtual learning was a challenge. Whatever the reason, they have missed a mathematical experience that they need to build their understanding. It might mean working physically with array models or the experience of sharing mental math strategies with peers. It could even be building and scaffolding questions that help to frame their thinking. Whatever the experience looks like, it should be meaningful for everyone.
A missed experience isn’t a deficit in learning. It is a circumstance that can be changed. If I got lost while driving to a new destination, I had strategies to use; I could consult Google Maps, I could stop and ask for directions. I knew how to navigate through the challenge and not just think I had to give up and go home or be stuck there until someone came to get me.
Changing my language from learning gaps to identifying missed experiences was empowering. It meant that I could provide intentional lessons and tasks that helped to meet their needs. It meant that I knew what my actions should be and that I could focus on what the students COULD do and build from there. Keeping an asset based mindset gave me a hopeful feeling and I felt that I could use the tools and knowledge I already had to provide experiences for all students to learn with and from one another.
Is there a space and time for intensive instruction? Of course there is! But that doesn’t begin and end in one session and teachers are a powerful force when it comes to helping students within the classroom, too. We have a great wealth of knowledge, strategies, and expertise. Providing meaningful experiences for students to learn and feel confident is what we all do best.
Go Outside and Observe
