Memories with Steve Martin

Two weeks ago, the day after school let out, I saw Steve Martin joined by Edie Brickell perform with his banjo band at the Bushnell Theatre. Seeing such a talented performer engage the audience with humor to introduce such deep and meaningful beautiful music reminded me of my experience as a teacher and helped me try to explain why I had such a wonderful year at school with such a wonderful group of students to whom it was so hard to say goodbye. Those kids not only liked my jokes, but eventually went on to capture real meaning in their writing.

The peaceful invitation presented by the blue grass music and knowing spirit of Edie Brickell's voice immediately pulled me in and without knowing the words to the verses I interpreted the repetitions in the chorus to fit my own background and life experience. One of the songs, whose chorus repeated the words "Remember Me" reminded me of not only the special people in my life who I have lost, but of my wish that my students not forget me and all they learned in my classroom as they continue on in life. Later on, upon closer inspection, I realized the lyrics really didn't speak to that point exactly, but in the end we all have our own relationships with music and I'm sure Steve Martin won't mind.

I received an email from a student today that I will share unedited:

Dear Mr. Basroon, You are the best teacher I had ever had. Not only I enjoyed your kind heart, empathy for others, your spirit, and care for others in need of help, I enjoyed all the fun we had as a class and spending my year with you was the best year I could ever have. Even leaving this school, I left this school with your help. You will always have a very deep and special place in my heart .I will never forget you. I will make sure that I visit you again.
P.S. hope my brother gets you for 5th grade

Teaching can be a demanding job, with many people along the way with a passionate opinion on exactly what kids need to learn and know how to do, and sometimes may be right. But just as my experience with the "misinterpretation" of the song, the concepts, ideas, and strategies I teach are also understood in many different shades and variations and may take time to fully mature. What matters most is that we build trust and teach from the heart. That part is never misunderstood.

Memory Narrative Lesson

Lead with sounds….Whish!   Plump!  Thud!  As each volleyball rolled in the sand in front of me, the other team won points and now they were taking the lead in a tight match all because of my mistakes.

Notice I now move to a quote to add to my lead  “Shake it off partner!  You can do this!  Don’t be afraid to move up on that ball and let it reflect off those strong arms of yours” offered Matt, doing his best to convey positive thoughts to me with positive facial expressions, even though his eyes were hidden behind sunglasses.  Another serve that I was prepared to return seemingly dived into the sand just in front of me and my three person team was on the verge of losing because of me.

Setting and description of event   It was early April, and Matt had just opened his new beach volleyball court tucked away in the woods behind his house.  Matt and his friends had been playing volleyball throughout the winter in local gyms across the Greater Hartford area, and I had not touched a ball since last September before the leaves and cold started to overtake the packed sand he had trucked onto the backyard of his dreams.  Clearly I was rusty, unprepared to face the enormous volleyball talent his friends so wickedly possessed. Thoughts taking reader inside the head of the character  I worried I didn’t belong in this game, that I was going to ruin it for everybody.   It was like they were volleyball genies, whose serves came in like airplanes (simile) and whose spikes hit the ground with the force of weighted hammers (metaphor).  My last mistake made me feel helpless, (simile) like a plastic bag drifting through the wind, unable to respond with any force to the balls that were purposely being hit to me by the other team in an effort to win an easy game.

Slowing the plot down. Not rushing from event to event.  I asked for a quick time out and took a quick swig of my Orange Gatorade, followed by my traditional gulp of iced water in an attempt to balance out the loads of sugar and chemicals found in sports drinks.  Just then I had the idea to free myself of my sweaty t-shirt that was limiting my movement without being noticed, but the combination of new sweat with sand made the shirt heavy and inflexible.  It became stuck around my neck, and as I was unable to retrieve my left arm from it, I heard laughter from the court.  “Quit trying to delay your loss!”  Joked the other team as my face turned redder than my hair. 

Back to event  “Show off!” Matt ridiculed.  “Now remember what I said!  Attack that ball and absorb its impact when it reaches those arms,” he calmly whispered to me as I stepped back onto the court.   

     Meanwhile, we were losing 20-19 in a game that went to 21.  One more point and they would be victorious all because of me.  It was their serve.  Before I knew it, the ball was served, and it appeared to be heading toward Matt.  Suddenly, it curved and was headed for my part of the court.  “You got it Andy…easy does it. ..pass it here to me!”  I always marveled at how Matt was able to slow things down in the midst of battle, able to direct the flow of traffic in worlds running at 275 miles per hour.  So often in my life I had shied away from this type of competition, not wanting to fail or be embarrassed.

Flashback     Earlier in the day, Matt had called me on my cell phone while I was reading the newspaper and eating my lunch, asking me to come play.  “You have plenty of people you can call and play with those guys,” I protested. 

“Yes, but none of them are as funny as you and besides, we will hang out.  It will be fun, you will see, “ he insisted. 

And in the blink of an eye, there I was, about to either win or lose the game for his team.  “Easy does it,” I reminded myself as the ball began to move off the path I had projected.  I could have given up. “What will they say to me if I mess this up again, “ I worried to myself.  In an instant, as if some superhero powers took over me, I pivoted to the right, extended my arms, leaned forward, and pulled my arm muscles in tight so as not to send the ball flying off the court.  As I fell my arms hit the ball and delivered it just above the net where it hung suspended in midair, waiting for Matt to spike it quickly just underneath the opponent’s net, and send the game into overtime. 

End Ten years later, I ask myself reader if it really mattered who went on to win the game, for I gained something much more valuable than a win that early spring afternoon.  I saw the power a good friend and teacher could have over me, able to make me laugh off my weaknesses and help me to use the abilities I had and could develop.    

Lessons from MLK In My Classroom

     Just as I have had workouts where I could literally feel my body changing and growing stronger, so too could I sense emotional and academic growth this past Friday when my school's fifth grade went on a field trip to Real Art Ways in Hartford to watch two documentaries designed for young people about the Civil Rights movement. One of my greatest honors as a teacher is to witness students of all levels find success, growth, and positive identities as students while in my classroom. I have sought to expose my students to interesting and thought provoking content and challenge their existing beliefs and abilities in an affirmative (and sometimes humorous) manner to foster growth not just as students, but as human beings. Such a moment occurred at the movie theater when students personally witnessed the heroism that confronted the cold reality of the Civil Rights movement.

      I have always had a deep and growing appreciation and appetite for history and uncovering the mistakes and triumphs of the past. Perhaps this was due to the mutual appreciation I have had with the elderly, my interest in current events inspired by my family, or my warped perception that I was obliged to live up to the ideals set by historical leaders that I would later learn they didn't always adhere to. But I have found that history, and my enthusiasm for teaching it, serves as a conduit for student growth that no review for upcoming standardized testing can create. There is only so far the mastery of the implementation of the comma or estimation will stretch one’s imagination or soul. Things get boring, and creativity gets stifled for everyone.

      In recent weeks, I balanced out test preparations with a unique lens into the Civil Rights movement. While time nor the attention span of a ten year old would afford me the opportunity to cover the entire Civil Rights movement, I chose to enter the period via a study of the carpooling system Dr. Martin Luther King and his advisers developed to help the Montgomery bus boycott succeed. After reading excerpts from the book “Freedom Marchers”, I had my students put themselves in the shoes of African Americans and debate whether they would have donated their own cars, or walked through the rain, risked their own lives, or have been able to convince the rest of their community to make the needed sacrifices to force and sustain equality. Students took their assignments quite seriously, asked great questions, and developed great admiration for the leaders we encountered.

      Our study entered a unique phase Friday with our field trip into Hartford. As the school bus drove my suburban students into a Hartford neighborhood and artsy theater no one had ever attended, I could sense students were intrigued and no longer as interested in trivial distractions. The documentary within a unique setting served to breath life into our studies and suddenly the boycott and carpooling system seemed more real even to me. African American music from the 1960’s, real footage, and contemporary interviews with people who participated in this movement from both the black and white perspective were incredibly powerful. The vivid sight of MLK rising for the first time in his church to offer leadership to his people in their moment of need made him more real to me than ever before. My students, who were asked by the theater to take notes, actually filled pages and reacted maturely throughout the film. Not once did I or my colleagues have to ask any student to behave or sit down and almost every student wanted to participate in the discussions led by the theater’s educational representative.

      Later in the day, during a discussion about the film in my classroom, many questions were asked that showed tremendous understanding and interest in the films. There was one question, however, that was most remarkable as it linked the student's own conscious to history and the personalities and social forces that drive it in a manner I used to try and engage an understanding of the Holocaust when I was her age:

 Mr. B, do you think that most of us would have acted like the whites in the film and have been so cruel to the black people if we lived back then? 

      My most immediate response was to say it is important as historians to view history and its participants through an unbiased lens, that we are all products of our times. Our founding fathers owned slaves, JFK brought us into Vietnam, and Ronald Reagan enhanced our nuclear arsenal to deter the Soviets. At the same time, I pointed out that there were a number of white people shown in the film that supported the Civil Rights movement and fought against the hatred and racism that surrounded them. I explained that society changes slowly, and invoked the importance Bill Cosby, who we had read about earlier, played by being one of the first successful African Americans on television.

      As the conversation played itself out, I extended the question: Just as we can’t help but be perplexed by the behavior of Southern society at that time, how might people of the future look at our behavior? Do we sometimes act in ways we don’t want to just to fit in? Do we always recycle? What is our carbon footprint? Do we waste food? Is today’s society truly equal? Is our own school truly integrated? What would Dr. Martin Luther King be proud of if he were alive today? What would he urge us to change?

     My strength or interest in being a teacher is not being the disciplinarian I sometimes need to be, or teaching the specified skill set mandated by the government so that the “quality” of my teaching can be lined up as a set of data points with the other elementary schools across town or the state. My goal is for students to appreciate where they have come from, to make the right decisions, and maybe, dare I say....feel like we owe something to the leaders who have come before us to carry on their legacy. And if we do that, maybe, just maybe, we grow up, take our learning a bit more seriously, and over time our ability to retain the boring information gets just a little bit easier. I look forward to seeing this growth continue throughout the rest of the school year.

The Mastery Test and my life

Question:  Johnny, can you please explain in five lines or less what kind of glasses Svenson would need if he is struggling to observe the characteristics of a Waxing Crescent Moon in his backyard while listing examples of the Doppler Effect even though he requires Cochlear Implants and the Parallel Circuitry on his neighbor's holiday lights are annoying him with their incessant blinking during what is supposed to be the serene time of the Winter Solstice?

Tomorrow morning my students will have completed their fifth grade Connecticut Mastery Test (CMT) experience, a series of tests designed to measure student aptitude and ultimately my performance in teaching core curriculum, culminating with Science.  There are a variety of well documented reasons to hate the CMTs and the Science CMT  in particular that I won't get into here.  In many ways, I hate it too.  Yes, there are many other creative endeavors to pursue that would honestly provide my classroom with more of the inquiry based learning that our nation's politicians and science leaders so crave.  ( I can't wait to teach them the science of the potato chip for example.)

But, I also enjoy it.  I appreciate how my class comes together to embrace the challenge that is facing them.  I love how some students go home, further research a topic on line, and return to discuss their findings with me.   I appreciate the many opportunities for humor that science instruction, typically at the end of each day, brings to us as a class.  I love the "aha" moment when a student finally understands a key concept.  I live for the student who pulls it all together and stumps me with a complicated question that I can't
immediately answer and we try to solve it together.

Yet, while all of those reasons are wonderful and fulfill me as a teacher, my life is defined more by human relationships than work or learning.  It was the encouragement and nurturing of important people in my life,  some of whom are sadly no longer with us, who put me in a position to open up to learning and opportunities.   One of my "Beautiful Rewards", as Bruce Springsteen terms it, is to sit on the other side of the table, and lead a group of students who respect and look up to me, in the same direction that my people led me.  Along the way, before many could even comprehend what a "wave length" was, they had to be taught about the importance of pride, confidence, respect, and dedication.  These skills will remain with my student long after any test has been completed and turned into a data table.

Unlike a Reading test that measures comprehension of a specific text, or even the bulk of the Math test which is fairly predictable, the Science test covers a plethora of material and requires more common sense and awareness than the others .  We discussed, researched, and investigated as much of it as we could.

I cannot take the test for them tomorrow.  We will warm up with a song from my Ipod (no, I do not play them Springsteen each time but if I could I would play Wrecking Ball if not for his reference to "growing a pair of balls"...can't play that), and then I will read to them the lengthy redundant instructions from the teacher's manual.    I then become the manager sitting in the dugout watching events play out on the field that I created.

Now it is their turn to do well on their own terms.  I have brought them as far as I could up to this point in time.  Like me, they have the rest of their lives to try and figure things out.

Just remember that a green balloon will appear black if a red light is shined upon it.