Soccer Coaching for the Fearless

Okay,  there are no fearless coaches writing this blog, I just wanted to sound tough.  Right now I am sitting at my desk (at home) mostly because it hurts too much to get up.  Yes, it is true.  I am in pain.  What is that thing people say when they don't know what else to say.......oh! "No Pain, No gain."  I don't know that I buy into that propaganda, but I did thoroughly enjoy my first day as a middle school soccer coach.  I don't know much about the ins and outs of soccer, but I know about working out.  I know the proper form of a lunge that doesn't damage the knee, and I modeled it up an down the gym floor about 20 times.   I know the proper form of a push up (oddly, my fave exercise) so I did about 30 of that exercise where you drop, push-up, jump, stand.  I did some running/jogging/walking with the girls who said they couldn't.  There is nothing more motivating than having a 40-year-old out do you.  It was all a show.  Although I told them to start working out during spring break, all I got in was one bike ride, one walk, and two days in the garden.  It is all worth the pain,though.  I already see that this is one more fabulous way to hang with the kids.  It is different than the classroom.  In someways, it is less stressful.  I just need to overcome my need to always keep up.   There is an element of desperation that comes with loving teens while you are losing your edge.   They will always try to love me, but the cool factor matters on some levels.  It hurts to see it go and realize that I am going to have to find my edge somewhere else...perhaps in being will to let other laugh at/with me as I age.  I am a quirky girl some days....and that still keeps them guessing.  So as I recover from soccer practice #1,  I anticipate many rewarding days to come for everyone involved (I hope)! Go Tigers!

Making Up for Lost Time

So we are on day three of spring break.  The important thing about winter, spring and summer breaks for a person like me (obsessive-compulsive, workaholic) is that if I take the time to remember the purpose of a "break,"  I can use that time to create enough memories with my kiddos to help them forgive me for the limited portions they often get the rest of our lives together.  I like to work.  I am not just some sacrificing, do-gooder who works in service to others even if I don't want to.  I like it.  I like to be busy, I like to have goals.  Actually, I am impossible to get along with in 2, maybe 3, situations in life: first, when I am so busy, I don't feel like I am being success or helpful in anything I am doing AND when I don't have a somewhat complicated and meaningful objective to keep my mind occupied.  My son did not come by his ADHD by accident.  I passionately love my kids, but over the years I have lost some of my ability to effectively prioritize.  I want to do it all; I want to do it all now, and I want to do it all well.  Just for the record, moms, we can not do it ALL well.  That is a myth.  I can't truly parent and enjoy my kids on spring break with a poetry methods book in my hand, for example.

So in order to put parenting on that list of "doing it well,"  I do try to make the breaks filled with "them" time.  Since I am very much an outdoor person,  the memory-making was on short supply with the overflow of an excessive winter.  It has been chilly and rainy for the last 4 days.  In spite of this, we could put off our adventures no longer. We had no plans, we were just certain that they would not involve me working or Sam playing video games.   Sam and I collected Emily from her friend's (Victoria's) house.  The day just about stalled out there because things got rowdy while I was visiting with Victoria's mom.  When I finally got them to the front door, Sam's face was red and his neck was scratched.  Emily was crying and holding an area near her left eye. This is a long story that involves the breaking of a HUGE rule in our house....don't put your hand's on people in anger.  So as I calmly (yes, I was calm) walked them through the choices (while trying to drive) they made and how they made the decisions to put their hands on faces and throats,  they cried profusely and apologized to each other and to me.  I am not naive...just for the record, but I do think they realized they were acting like heathens and I didn't want to go home to perform the semi-required ritualistic removal of fun.

At this point it was still cold,  but we had been planning to visit the community center in our new neighborhood.  We went in an played two hours of Foosball and ping pong.  I was gracious in my winnings and I even gave them a sporting chance.  After two hours of indoor table sports, one works up a thirst.  We went two doors down to an old-fashioned soda fountain in a drug store (I am not making this up). The gentleman there made me an old-fashioned diet cherry coke.  Em had a rootbeer float.  Sam had something green with a name that said something about being green and had a very strong lime flavor.  Then something AMAZING happened, as the gentleman was telling us about the drug store's large assortment of urology supplies, THE SUN CAME OUT!  It also seemed like it warmed up about 10 degrees, but that might of just been the warming of our hearts.  We went home, pumped up our bike tires and explored the new bike trails around our house. May I say at this point, the trails in KC are a gift.  Eventually, we we got home. Mike/Dad was there when we arrived.  He was a little miffed that I took the kids on some adventures on which he intended to be the first to take them, but he forgave me.  Emily and Mike helped me clean leaves out the the flower beds for about 20 minutes.  At about 6pm, they left to go back to the community center.  I cleaned out the beds for another two hours, and as I sit here at 8:31, I have not worked on teaching, coaching, or sponsoring anything for middle schoolers all day.   I am better for it, and I think Sam and Em are too. 

A Day Off......Mostly

So the Coopers are in full-fledged spring break mode. It is officially day 2, if you count the days we would normally go to school, and it I just got up, Sam is already playing Kirby on the wii, Emily is still sawing logs, and Raymond is sitting lovingly on the floor outside my office excited that the people are home again (no 8 hours in a kennel). We have big plans to day...we might go for a bike ride around our new home, then go to the civic center to play some pool, and maybe start on Emily or Sam's science projects (getting chocolate out of fabrics and building a newt habitat, respectively). In between I need to reinvent the curriculum "wheel" again by turning a topic and a book normally for 8-9 graders into an exploratory poetry unit for 7th graders.

So we don't have less to do, but we have more flexibility over when we do it. It is days like this when I get how my job has its perks for my own kids too. Even Ashley has gotten more mom-time. Plus I get to take my 21-year-old baby girl up to get her grown up license tomorrow. We won't mention that I wouldn't have to take her if she hadn't had a series of silly ungrown-up reasons for not having it renewed already...but, again we won't mention that.

On an added note....Ashley and her friend Megan (with more than a little help from her roommate Kreisa) are officially off on their American dream journey of starting their own business. They have obtained their first new client (the only one currently not related to the preschool teaching duo) into the coolest licensed preschool/daycare in Mission. She doesn't look like me, act like me or even think like me, but I managed to damage her with some seriously obsessive similarities when it comes to caring and educating children. She will need her own blog soon. Wait...that is a good idea..I am going to tell her right now. Blessings all!

Okay... I get it!

So I have been working through my frustration with the education system, and most specifically my own school's deficiencies. Mostly, I've been whining and fretting a lot about how much more energy I have for the constant barriers that have been constructed to success....both mine and my students. I even pursued other options outside my own building. Got a tentative offer from a high school in the district. I've been weakly praying about all this. Then, as God would have it, two things happened simultaneously that seem to be His way of both encouraging me and maybe telling me to buck up and stop whining. First, my students were the first to take the state assessment and they rocked it. During that time, I received a handful of letters from my students. They were asked to write a letter to their "favorite" teacher as an assignment in their computer class. I get these two times a year, and they are always such a gift.

Although I don't know how some days, the kids and I are in sink. The thought of leaving them after two successful years makes my heart ache. God isn't setting me free. Moreover, my own kids don't need me to take on any more new adventures. The last three years have already been crazy enough. I can't give up just when I am finally getting to come around the horn again and teach a grade level for a second time. My husband has been waiting for this. I keep telling him that if I make it through all three grade levels, I won't need to buy and create so many new resources. Now, just when we get to that point, I am trying to bail. I need to stop acting like I am the only one with something at stake here.

All that said to say that I am staying on at the lowest performing middle school in my state, and I am going to do so with a positive attitude.....though I am still growing that attitude. It is a privilege to get the opportunity to work with my awesome students and passionately work with them to help them get what they deserve. I get so frustrated that public education isn't the great equalizer it was intended to be, so the least I can do is be part of the solution. I don't want to be another teacher who bails when it gets to hard.

Words from my kids/students:

"The things you help us with lets us know that a lot of people care about us and not just our parents. They make me think more and learn to appreciate the things we have. I just wanted to say thanks for being the best teacher."

"Some teachers don't get my sarcasm and you did so that was awesome. I'm glad I have you as a reading teacher. Thanks for teaching me all those things and being a great reading teacher."

"Thanks for opening up a whole new world to me."

"I wanted to thank you for understanding me."

That is all I can post at the risk of puffing up my own ego. These kids make me who I am. Without their buy-in, my gifts as a teacher mean nothing. There are days when I still wonder what my value is as a white, female teacher in a school color. Somehow they find value in me. I am in awe everyday that they open their hearts and minds to me. God is reminding me that they are all that matters and that I am missing the point if I let the grown ups in my world steal my joy.