Time for Reflection

I have become ever more convinced that the only way I can teach and learn is to have sustained periods of time for quiet reflection—either alone or with listening friends.  My experience affirms that this is also what my students need, so why is time for reflection in such scarce supply?  I think, deep down, we fear that reflection may not lead us directly or swiftly in the direction we want to go.  We want to plan, prepare, execute, and move on from each new task—a few moments’ affirmation that “that went well,” or embarrassed acknowledgement “that didn’t go so well,” often have to suffice for reflection.  We want to schedule time for reflection, thinking of it as a task in a list of “to do” items on our daily planner.   But my recent experiences affirm that reflection is something entirely different. 

Reflection means remaining open to lessons as they are revealed, encountering my fears about what gets in the way, confronting failure or disappointment without shutting down, dreaming without self-imposed restrictions, and allowing myself to be nudged in sometimes unexpected ways.  I had this experience recently as I reflected with three colleagues on what felt like a failed project in my Global Art History classroom.  I carried into this conversation a sense of shame and fatigue, a sense of time lost and relationships fractured.  As my colleagues graciously opened space for my reflection and contributed their own insights, I felt renewed energy for the project.  I could see clearly how and why the students had responded as they had, what about my own behaviors and expectations got in the way, and how I could re-imagine both process and product next semester.  These insights continued to evolve in the weeks following that initial conversation.  I sense, therefore, that reflection is much more than a habit (or skill) of mind that can be contained in a task (put on a planner!).   Rather, I am experiencing reflection as a space within and between people that allows growth and learning to happen.  

The Tangle of Collaboration

So much of our GROW experience was about collaboration.  In the wider school context, we talk a lot about collaboration, hoping that it will happen more often and impact our school community in yet-to-be-discovered ways.  What I have learned about collaboration with my cohort members, however, is that it doesn’t happen via a linear process or even a set of intentions or expectations.  Rather, it happens via relationships—relationships that open space for reflection, for sharing, for vulnerability, for questioning, and for gentle discovery of, as Quakers say, “way forward.”  One of the poems we engaged this fall is Marge Piercy’s “The Seven of Pentacles,” wherein she asserts that creation and building happen via a process of tangling.  While the tangling may in time resemble a weaving—with recognizable patterns, usages, etc., at the outset, the fibers coming together are simply in relationship to one another.  They don’t have a purpose, a plan, or a vision, but yet there is a sense of something new emerging—a new color, a new tensile strength, a new direction.  What I have enjoyed is this practice of “tangling,” out of which new ideas have emerged, ideas for my own and for others’ classrooms, visions of how we want to work together in the future, a new sense of purpose and place here on campus.

Time and Connections

What I have treasured about our season with GROW is the time and the connections.
This has been a hectic and demanding fall. Everyone seems to feel even more busy than usual. How could it be that committing to two extra two-hour meetings a week could make things less stressful? Somehow the act of committing to a schedule and setting aside the time made these four hours a week special. This was no longer a time of competing demands. It was time for GROW.
Time for GROW was special because of the connections. This was a time to gather with like-minded but remarkably diverse peers and learn. Each session had a familiar rhythm: unwinding with snacks, gathering around a short exercise, and settling into a shared experience. Sharing these practices build our connections. I now have a group of teachers across divisions and disciplines with whom I have a strong and lasting bond.
That is something worth treasuring.

And there were pies!

On the afternoon of our recent AIMS conference, the Grow members were hard at work enjoying lunch together, followed by an afternoon walk to the CARES food pantry where we moved and put away many cases of cans and helped the pantry get ready for the next day of receiving clients.  The amount we were able to accomplish was tremendously satisfying. 

After our walk back to the GROW house, we were treated to the exquisite tastes of homemade pies!  Not just one pie, but two, pecan and pumpkin.  What words can describe the feeling that you are so fortunate on the earth to have such a great place to work, estimable colleagues, the ability to serve, and pie?

Unexplored Resources

One unexpected bonus of being a part of GROW is finding out about unknown resources around campus.   I recently emailed the Lower School library to ask them if they had any books on Día de los Muertos, and an affirmative answer came back faster than I could say ¡Caramba!  I went over to get them and spent a lovely few minutes conferring with colleagues while my stack of books got higher. 

I am so grateful for this new resource! Thank you immensely! 

Looking forward to even more exploration of what our community can offer! 

Amy and DJ at work while I play with my sketchbook.

Art is always dangerous territory. GROW has given me a chance to share some of what I do. Being open to judgement is scary. Being with supportive friends makes this fear less prominent.

2012 Election and Mindful Listening in the Classroom

From Helen:

So, weeks ago, I led us all in a Mindful Listening exercise.  Two people are paired together; each gets ten minutes to talk, while the other listens.  The exercise is really “for” the listener, who is asked to listen non-judgmentally, without responding.  Even nodding is a response and implies an affirmative judgment.  This exercise is about listening with one’s whole self, and noticing judgments but letting them pass without reacting automatically to them.  Then, the two people swap roles, so everyone gets to be a listener and a speaker.

Today, the first time I’ve met my “Literature and Politics” class (11th and 12th graders) since the election, I was daunted by how to respond to the election.  We have to talk about it somehow, given the content of the class, but I’ve had a harder time than usual in this presidential election finding analyses of the Republican candidate’s rhetoric (I’ve got lots for Obama), and I have had a harder time knowing how to discuss the election in class because of that.  So, how to handle today?

I decided on Worship Sharing around the prompts, “What most perplexes or worries you about the election we just had?” and “What do you most deeply hope for, coming out of the election?”  But this group that I’ve got is both marvelous and a challenge: they are smart and engaged, but tend to chatter a lot and move around a lot.  How to set the tone for Worship Sharing?

So, we started with the mindful listening exercise that I’d tried with you.  I gave them five minutes each, rather than ten, and asked them to share how their days have been, so far.

We got off to a bad start: they were too close to each other, and had trouble focusing only on their interaction with their own partners.  So, I gave them new partners and permission to go find a spot on campus, not in the classroom. That went better.

When we came back, I asked them to debrief.  How did it feel like to listen that way?

It was hard!   That was the main response: they told how their attention wandered, how their minds raced, how they wanted to be able to respond.  I suggested that minds just do that, they race, and that we can praise ourselves for noticing and choose where to put our attention next.  We talked about how rarely anyone really listens to us, really hears us, and what a gift we give others when we take time to really listen.

Then we went into worship sharing.  That lasted for about forty minutes or so.  Students shared their confusion about what is right and what is wrong when millions of people feel so vehemently that the Republicans are all wrong and millions of others feel so vehemently that the Democrats are all wrong.  What’s really right and wrong, in that climate?  How does a sixteen-year-old know?

Some students who identified themselves as Republicans lamented the extreme reactive stances of their party, and hoped that Republicans would begin to value the youth vote more; they feared their own party would become irrelevant and a joke if it continued to rely on “old guys” who were out of touch (one student mentioned Karl Rove’s behavior on FOX news).

One student heard a peer call the president by an unspeakable derogatory slur, and we sat in shock with him.  He also wondered how folks felt that they would have to move to another country; yes, we each want our party to win, but after that, we’re all one country together.  You can’t just want to leave.

Another student talked about how the feeling of cheering on a political party feels eerily similar to cheering on a sports team, and how those two things shouldn’t feel so similar.

At the end, we debriefed the Worship Sharing time.  Students who are usually quiet in class discussions appreciated the slower pace, and the rule in Worship Sharing that we each speak once; this way, nobody dominated, and everyone thought more carefully about what they really wanted to say.

One student looked up at the very end and said, “I see why you had us do that Mindful Listening thing!  Because it set us up to really listen during the Worship Sharing!”

Yup.

It was all pretty gorgeous and wonderful and imperfect but great.

And it wouldn’t have happened had I not been in GROW this year.  The chance to try out the Mindful Listening lesson on my colleagues helped me to place it firmly in my toolbox, where I can pick it up quickly when I need it, as I did today.  And all of our thinking and talking and writing about how to create really rich, deep group discussions helped me think differently about how to approach this election discussion.

I’m grateful.

CARES on AIMS day

Trying not to question it

I wrote the original draft of this during some reflective time at GROW house a few weeks ago. I just revisited it today at the conclusion of our gathering for lunch, service and reflection. I can’t quite figure out why my reflections seem to emerge in poetry form, but I’m trying not to question it.  🙂
Shadow Dance
She tumbles gently to the forest floor.
Still green, nestling.
While the seasoned trees and brush
cast long shadows,
she detects the lush, green scent of moss,
cushioning, tempting, and inviting.
Though she knows not exactly her direction,
the music of the forest harmonizes with her own melody
and stirs her spirit.
The forest whispers, “Up, up!”
Yet, still concealed, she rests in awe of the tall trees,
sure that her time and gift will make themselves known.
In time, in time.
A foggy ray chases the forest’s shadow
across the sodden earth, and
a swell of warmth pulses with the whisper chorus.
She sprouts forth on a journey full of growth and promise.