...random thoughts, opinions and secrets on children... aging... cooking... crafts... nature...divorce...second chances...
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~Copyright 2017. Hootie~

Monday, May 28, 2018

Wrapping up the School Year...

“Charlotte,” said Wilbur. “We’re all going home today. The Fair is almost over. Won’t it be wonderful to be back home in the barn cellar again with the sheep and the geese? Aren’t you anxious to get home?”
For a moment Charlotte said nothing. Then she spoke in a voice so low Wilbur could hardly hear the words.
“I will not be going back to the barn,” she said. Wilbur leapt to his feet. “Not going back?” he cried. “Charlotte, what are you talking about?”

                                                     ~from Charlotte's Web, by E.B.White

*****

Until I became a teacher, I didn't understand what the end of a school year and summer break truly meant.


As a parent, the end of a school year means, time to find help with watching your kids, or finding ways to keep the kiddos occupied for eight to ten weeks.  Family vacations or other travel plans are typically carried out.  Summer reading program schedules are accessed, and put on the calendar.  Swim, or soccer lessons fill time, as well as league games, and hitting a swimming pool.  Playdates, and overnight stays become a daily thing.  The first few weeks of summer break are welcomed by all.

I recall falling into the summer routine with my own children.  Sleeping in and playing with Legos or crafting.  My kids LOVED being on break, and I loved having them home, until the boredom set in, which happened quicker than I always liked. Yikes, being a parent over summer has it's challenges!  As a parent of two, at times it seemed I could not get them to agree on ANYTHING.  Nor could I get them to do what I wanted them to do without yelling or getting angry. Where were the teachers now?!  How did they do it, day after day with my two - both who were good kids I might add???

The end of the school year is filled with emotions.  Yes, this group of students came to me in August, but my year started before they arrived.  Weeks before school starts, I have to get my room ready for the year.  Items that were packed away need to resurface and find their home again. There are curriculum manuals to read, papers to copy, homework folders to set up, thirty-six weeks of lessons to generally spread out, to just name a few things that fill a teacher's time. In fact, as soon as school ends in May, I will attend professional development seminars, so assuming teachers have the summer off is truly wishful thinking.  Most teachers go to classes to help further their knowledge over the summer.  We attend technology, reading, writing, social studies, math, science, and classroom management seminars.  THIS is how we fill our summers.  We become students during our two month break.  Some of us also teach summer camps, so we spend time preparing and teaching, as well.

By the time "Meet the Teacher" happens the day before school, most teachers have all ready been working for two weeks in their classroom.  It's true, teachers do love school.  We are so excited for the new year to start!  In first grade, there are brand new, sharp crayons that still have their paper wraps neatly around them.  There are long, pointy, number two pencils whose erasers have yet to be pulled out and whose ends haven't been chewed on.  There are chunky erasers waiting to be shredded by scissors.  There are perfect folders and composition notebooks that teachers neatly have written student's names upon.  Name plates with student numbers on them have been carefully taped onto the student desks.  All their edges are smoothly stuck down to the desk tops and ready to be picked at by all the little picker's fingers.

In August, students and teacher come together, and a new community is born.  Rules must be established and enforced.  How to line up, walk in a line, sit at ones desk, play on the playground equipment, use the bathroom, get to the library, the specials rooms, and cafeteria are taught over and over.  Where to sit in the cafeteria and what manners there look like are explicitly shown.  Expectations are set for all aspects of the day and strived towards.  Letter formation,  spelling, number sense and learning to read are the curriculum that start a first grade school year.

Fall break is not really a break for teachers.  Grades and comments are due on report cards just after break.  There is also other data that is collected on students skill abilities.  This information must be added to a grade level data chart.  Teachers spend their days teaching, and it's nigh impossible to sit down to input information.  So our break is filled with inputting data and getting ready for term two.

When October arrives, a teacher has parent/teacher conferences to host after the first report card has been sent home.  These conferences give us a chance to connect with parents after we've had a little time to find out our student's strengths and areas of concerns.  We are happy to share positives with parents and offer ways to help their child be the best student they can be.

By Thanksgiving, we know our class very well.  We know who needs extra TLC, who needs pushed, who needs watched so they aren't falling through the cracks and who has it all together.  When winter break arrives, we finally have a few days we can turn our brains off from school, but the holidays quickly fill the school void.

The winter months of the new year find the class running smoothly as a community.  Light bulbs seem to click on as students suddenly "get" what is being taught.  It's a rewarding time to be a teacher.  One's efforts can be seen paying off.

By the time spring break hits, the end of the year is now in sight.  Teachers panic a bit...can they get through everything they need to get through?  Students start acting more like siblings.  They pick on and tease one another.  They are much more comfortable and they speak their minds.  Class rules and expectations need to be revisited.  Students rat out each other's poor choices, ones made while away from the teacher, without blinking an eye.  Even best buddies do this to one another!  That is, unless they were making poor choices together...like using the bathroom as a parkour training room.  Then, students from other classes rat them out!  The first grade beast is both funny and fun to watch.

May arrives, and the finish line approaches.  One hundred and eighty school days completed draws near.  Charlotte's Web is the last read aloud.  Tears stream down teacher's cheeks and his or her voice may crack as these words are read...

"But as he was being shoved into the crate, he looked up at Charlotte and gave her a wink. She knew he was saying good-bye in the only way he could. And she knew her children were safe.

“Good-bye!” she whispered. Then she summoned all her strength and waved one of her front legs at him.

She never moved again. Next day, as the Ferris wheel was being taken apart and the race horses were being loaded into vans and the entertainers were packing up their belongings and driving away in their trailers, Charlotte died. The Fair Grounds were soon forlorn. The infield was littered with bottles and trash. Nobody, of the hundreds of people what had visited the Fair, knew that a grey spider had played the most important part of all. No one was with her when she died."

Tomorrow, I will say goodbye to my students.  They are ready to move on, even though I am not yet ready for a new groups of kiddos.  I will have the summer to let this group go in my brain.  My students have had a great year, and I am happy they have been in my life and classroom.  They will always be my kids.  That's how a teacher's heart works.

The day after tomorrow,  I will clean out files, take down things hanging on the walls, and clear off shelf tops.  I will be in my classroom, all alone. My heart will ache a little at the end of the day when I turn off the light and pull the door closed.

I will wake on Thursday and I will not head into school to see my students.  I will not start each day seeing and greeting my friends.  When I decided to teach, I hadn't expected the bond I form with other teachers to be as deep as it is.  I adore all the people at my school.  It truly is an extended family.  I will fall into my own summer routine.  I am looking forward to nuzzling my kitties randomly through the day, and hiking with Toby.

When August rolls around...

I'll be ready for my next class full of kiddos.  More importantly, I'll be ready to be back home, in my barn cellar, alongside all my friends.

~Lisa Kroll
 




Saturday, May 12, 2018

Growing a Passion


Independence is what Habitat is all about.  The first time I volunteered to help build a house, my mom had recently died.  I built in her honor, and I built on Saturday of Mother's Day weekend. The house I worked on was to be for a single mom and her three children. My mom raised me to think of others, and I felt like I was doing something good in her memory. It felt wonderful to help someone else when I felt that I had so much in life. I had to ask people to donate to my cause, and that was really the biggest challenge for me. I don't like to ask anyone for anything. My parents were very giving souls.  Both worked full-time, AND volunteered in our community as a volunteer fire fighter and an EMT-A, respectively. When I was married, I was made to feel weak if I had to ask for help. So I did whatever I needed to do, to NOT ask for help. Ever.  

In my past life, I was a "super" mom, and "super" wife. 

I stayed at home and ran my household. I worked part-time, but spent the rest of my time figuring out the logistics of dinner menus, chauffeuring duties, house keeping, flower gardening, play dates, birthdays and doing all those things a good wife does to make her husband shine.  Even as I lead a Girl Scout troop, I struggled to ask co-leaders to do anything.  I did not want to appear weak. I could do everything, and I could do it all.  

When I volunteered to build on my second Habitat Women Build, my life was changing.  I had lost my "super" status and was feeling pathetic.  A friend had asked me a year before if I would build with her.  At that time, I was in graduate school and told her to ask me the next year, because I literally didn't have the time.  Thankfully, she remembered, and she did asked me again.  When we went to the call out meeting, I saw so many familiar faces. I found a supportive community that only asked me to give what I was able of myself. No more, no less.  I was drawn to be a part of this greater good.  It was simple to say yes, and to do something for someone else. I was happy to have a new purpose, and something to look forward to doing with others. It was still hard knowing I was going to need to ask for money, but I sucked it up. I asked my relatives.  They quickly put me over my $250 required to build dollar amount.  I thought, 'Wow. That was easy and painless.' 

My build day came.  We were working in a brand new neighborhood, on the very first two houses to go up. I was witness to a new beginning.  I had one of the future owners and her husband up working with me.  That was my first time up on a roof.  It was invigorating!!! The hardest part was transferring from the ladder to the roof and vice versa.  I have learned how to walk on a roof, how to properly cut and lay singles, and how to communicate with new people while speaking a new coded language.  I had a few friends up with me, but most of the people on the team were not people I knew personally.  Trusting others and working together, such great gifts I was receiving.  

*****

The following January, I quickly jumped at building again. I saw the home owners I had built for the year before.  Witnessing the smiles on their faces and hearing them talk about how wonderful it was to own their house made my heart smile.  I didn't need them to know who I was.  I just needed to know I made a difference.  Here was my proof.  Stories of their new place were easy to hear.  Asking for donations for a cause I felt so strongly about made this year's requests a little easier.  I expanded my donor base and ask friends.  With just a little more effort, I was close to earning a pink tool belt, which I really, really wanted.  So I pushed a little harder. That tool belt was going to be nice to have!  

On build day, I again found myself on the roof and working online side the future, and current neighborhood owners. Getting to know someone I was helping felt so good.  I was helping make a difference.  The take away for me was that I was helping better my own community.  As I was working together with others, I was growing, and so were they.  

Additionally, that spring a former student of mine became a Habitat family.  Future Habitat homeowners are selected based on three basic criteria:  1) their need for housing 2) their ability to repay an affordable mortgage and 3) their willingness to partner with Habitat by earning 250 hours of “sweat equity” or volunteer time.*  They must also take classes on home ownership, and simple repairs. The support network Habitat creates in doing all this is such a gift in it's own right. Habitat families are asked to speak in front of others and tell their stories. They inspire.  

When I signed up to build the next year, I realized that I had actually raised $1000 by simply asking the year before; more than enough to get that pink tool belt.  I raised my goal to $1000 and decided to give even more of myself.  I joined a group called S.H.E. -  Society for Habitat Empowerment.  I have agreed to raise $1000 a year for five years.  This year marked my third year in my fundraising efforts as a member of S.H.E.  

I am forever grateful to those friends and family who support my cause.  I am forever grateful to Habitat for allowing me the opportunity to help build a house for someone else in my community.  I am bonded with the knowledge that if I can help make a difference in my community, others can as well.  

We just need to choose to spread positivity, understanding and love.  

~Lisa Kroll
     volunteer, wonder woman, independent soul who is still learning to ask for help and knows she is not weak for doing so...just smart

*from the Habitat For Humanity of Monroe County Web Site. Click Here for more details. 

Words to Build By... Habitat Women Build, Day 7, 2018

I was asked to give the devotion, or words of wisdom, before a Habitat Women Build day.  

Here's what I had to say... 



"Independence is an amazing gift to receive.  But I have found, it an even more amazing gift to see, and be witness to.  

'I spend a fair amount of my time each day trying to build community and independence within my classroom.  There are skills my students need to learn, and tests that I am required to give, but I know the bottom line is that the group of students whom I am molding at any given time, will, with a little bit of luck, have 11 more years of school together.  

'I figure I'm really laying the foundation of their people skills.  Learning to work together and solve problems is what life is really all about. 

'I  like to think of myself a little bit like Wonder Woman.  Not as a hero, but as someone who is a little bit mysterious, someone who has a past that has shaped them, someone who is strong, and someone who can accomplish anything when they focus their mind on it.  I find that’s how I live my life these days really.  

'I am old enough to know, we all experience adversity at some point in our lives.  And because of those experiences, we can look at the rainbows and flowers and the butterflies in the world and see their colors a little more deeply.  We become more compassionate and understanding. One of life lessons we must learn is to ask for help.  And when we do this, not only do we become richer by admitting we are human, but those we ask become richer as well.  For in being asked to help someone, we feel valued.  And truthfully, isn’t that what we all want is to add value to the world?  

'So today, I ask that the powers above,  help us to share our mysteries, embrace our pasts, give us the strength we need to focus on and accomplish today’s tasks.  

'When we work together, we grow together.  


'Thank you all for sharing today with me."  



 -----
Our day, in pictures.

May 5, 2018 - 7:30 a.m.
Bloomington, Indiana

new shirt, old hat and tool belt

two houses to roof, my fifth time to build

instructions on the roof

selfie time! 

when in Indiana...Indiana Jones time

part of our team working on the ground

...and we are off!

morning picture of both roofs under way

first build, first cut,
first time on the roof, strong lady

power tools

our chef, taking orders

team work

my work area

roof one almost done!

my tools, and roof two almost done!

6:00 p.m.
                                                            ~Lisa Kroll
                                                                    wonder woman, lower case W's



---------notes---------

Independence: The state or quality of being independent; freedom from dependence; exemption from reliance on, or control by others; self- subsistence or maintenance; direction of one's own affairs without interference.

Habitat for Humanity: Women Build
information and my web page: click here