Every September, I say to myself: "You know what? I had an awesome bunch of lesson plans last year! I am just going to reuse them! I figured out what the kids need and how they will learn it best!" And every October, I say to myself, "What the #$%* is wrong with these new kids? They are so dumb! How do they not get this simple concept?" Then, every mid-October, I am brutally reminded that I literally don't know anything about teaching if I am going to judge this year's kids based on last year's kids, and I have to swallow my pride, let go of my "rigor" crap, and I have to start over. Let me give you an example.
I assigned "Milkweed" by Jerry Spinelli as summer reading, thinking that would be a good introduction to how scary and horrible the Holocaust was for people in the ghettos or in the concentration camps. I thought the style of the book would be interesting because the narrator is kind of unreliable in that he doesn't always understand what's going on around him. But what I discovered when reading their projects is that the students had so little background knowledge that they actually didn't pick up on the things that Spinelli intended them to. I realized that my 7th graders have little to no understanding of the Holocaust. I spent a little while being pissed about that but then proceeded to figure out what to do. I assigned some informal research on various topics. I showed them a scene from "The Book Thief" where they were burning books and it became obvious that Leisel was a Jew but in hiding. They seemed to understand that some people were not on board with Hitler but that they didn't feel they had a choice. Then we read the play based on "The Diary of Anne Frank" and my students were shocked when they found out that Anne had died - even though we knew that from the first scene in the book! So this wasn't a context problem; it was a reading problem. It's like they forgot that part. I also realized that they couldn't put together how the stage directions demonstrated major insights into the characters' personalities - and that I couldn't assign them a page or two to read on their own without them becoming confused about who was talking when. Apparently they were unfamiliar with dramatic conventions and how to understand what's going on in a live production. To round out our study, I decided to read "Boy in the Striped Pyjamas" as a class, since it's told from the side of a Nazi soldier's family. I don't have the physical book but was able to locate an online PDF version. I figured that since the book is told from the perspective of a 9-year-old, and because it's not a tough text (vocabulary-wise), they would be able to read 3-4 chapters in a day if we did some in class and they did some at home. I thought we could FLY through it. BUT I WAS SO WRONG! This book's difficulty lies in A) genius storytelling, in that the reader has to infer a TON about the characters to make sense of the book since Bruno understands almost nothing, and B) the "toughness" level is increased tenfold because the students still don't understand a lot of the political and historical context that drives the characters. I gave 2 separate, FACT-BASED pop quizzes on the reading. I mean, these were like "Who-what-where" types of questions. I watched the kids melt down over these! Several students admitted to me that they didn't read, so that is one problem. But others swore they read but didn't pay full attention, or that they read it but couldn't remember what happened. I had more than one student get every answer wrong on the quiz but then have a full-blown conversation with me about what happened in the chapter! I was so frustrated and began to think - these kids are really low-level and don't understanding anything! What are they doing here? And then I thought - what am I actually trying to assess here? Let me force them to SLOW DOWN. I printed out only one chapter and asked them to read it that night and to write all over it- questions, ideas, predictions, theories, judgments, whatever. And yeah, there were some who didn't even read it. But most of them DID - and they had tons of stuff written all over the place. They were driving the conversation today, and we talked about how much more they got out of it. Now, I've been teaching a long time so I KNOW that this happens when students write notes on what they read, but I wanted to do this book really fast so we could squeeze it in and move on... but honestly, I was robbing them of enjoying the book, of discovering things as they read! That was my bad, 100%. I told them to go back into previous chapters and start making sense of things that now popped out to them since they have read so far into the book. They were KILLING IT. So I am throwing out the pop quizzes because they were not good assessments of what they can do. After this discussion today, after I apologized to them for rushing them, I felt like a door opened up and they really respected my vulnerability. They were so much more engaged and so much less stressed. I assigned them only one chapter tonight, and I know they are going to kill it. I can't wait to talk to them tomorrow! Just like any relationship, I had to really look at myself and see what I had done wrong in this situation. I am hoping this is a great turnaround for us as a group this year 😍
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Ajay got his wisdom teeth removed on Thursday and cannot chew food for a few days. We are currently doing the 2B Mindset nutrition program. I am actually coaching a small group of people through the course, providing food tracker analysis and "assignments" throughout the last 90 days of the year. Ajay was basically planning to eat ice cream all day everyday for the next week, but he realized this would kind of be "off plan." 😂 Sooooo I went ahead and made a bunch of stuff he could actually eat. For breakfast each day, he's having a Shakeology for protein and cooked steel-cut oats with peanut butter, blended up so it's smooth enough to eat without it getting stuck in his tooth-holes. For lunches and dinners, he is having combos of proteins, veggies, and carbs in the form of purees and soups. What I made this weekend was: 1. A can of black beans blended in the food processor with an avocado, a can of Mexican diced tomatoes with chilis, and some chicken. He topped that with some sour cream and cheddar. 2. Roasted eggplant, zucchini and garlic, blended into a creamy puree. 3. Mashed potatoes with kale and butter. 4. Sweet potatoes blended with almond milk. 5. Mushroom soup with garlic, blended into a soup with silken tofu. 6. Store-bought organic, low-sodium creamy tomato soup. 7. Recharge shake at night for a little dessert - blended with some flax milk, cocoa powder, and xanthan gum to resemble ice cream. He's actually eating and feeling full so I think it's working out okay. Where there is a will, there's a way. No need to throw your diet out the window when you can't chew! First, you’ll want to be adopted by Italian-American parents who raise you to believe that 1. you are perfect 2. you should always act unabashedly like yourself 3. life is always going to be happy. Then, you’ll want those parents to adopt a second child who ruthlessly steals all the attention away from you. You will ask them when you are taking him back to the adoption place. Next, you’ll want to act unabashedly like yourself in front of other children. You can start by swimming in the Ocean City ocean, singing the church hymn “Seek Ye First,” and wondering why all the other children are swimming away from you as if you had just peed in the water. Later, while having a pasta dinner at a family friend’s home, you can ask Hannah McMac to “Pass the gravy.” The entire room will go silent and look at you as if you had just peed on the kitchen chair, and Hannah will drawl with complete disdain, “Graaaaavy??? It’s’ sauce!” and the McMacs will laugh. When you ask your second grade teacher to clarify something about the Bible story of Adam and Eve, she will look at you as if you had peed your pants, and ask how you could really believe that a woman was formed out of a man’s rib. The rest of the class will laugh and act like they knew the story was only a myth. When your 4th grade teacher informs the whole class that there is no Santa, you and Sheena will stand agape until you both sob of embarrassment, and Gavin will excuse himself to the bathroom so that no one sees his giant tears spill out of his eyes. In 6th grade, your favorite teacher will find your best friend’s notebook, in which there are dirty stick-figure drawings, and you will take the blame - and the teacher will cry as if you had just peed on The Bible. And even better, when you get home at the end of that school year, your mom will tell you that, all week, your father has been moving out, and in an hour you are all going to have lunch together and visit his new apartment! Your next phase has begun - the one where you try to become different from yourself. In fact, you will have forgotten what it is like to be yourself. You don’t even remember your parents being married, or any of the vacations you took together, or any of the dinners you had as a family around the table. This memory-wipe will be completed on your 14th birthday, when your dad brings his new girlfriend and her two little girls to your party. The couple will marry a year and half later. Your mom will sell the house in Maple Shade, move down the shore, and you’ll move into the new house with the new happy family, and you’ll manage to be out of that house as much as humanly possible until you go away to college. In college, you will become the least like yourself you’ve ever been. You’ll get some piercings and tattoos, and hang out with people that have no business contributing their input to your life and decisions. Your best friend from high school will actually stop being your friend because she hates who you’ve become. (Of course you will still have a few wonderful friends who love you and try to give you some advice about the no-business group, but you’ll ignore their warnings.) Your brother will join you at college, and he’ll tell you all about how his biological mother found him, and he has a sister who is only a year younger! You’ll wonder what that makes YOU. You’ll also wonder why your own biological mother never bothered to look for you. You’ll also wonder why this never bothered you before. You’ll graduate with honors from college, then work in a doctor’s office making 8 bucks an hour putting up with irate patients and trying to smile when everyone around you is yelling. When you have your first panic attack behind the counter and nearly pee yourself in the process, you’ll question who the heck you are and how you got here. You’ll date your uncle’s girlfriend’s brother. You’ll actually move in with him and live together for 4 years. You’ll try to be yourself, and he’ll say, “My friends love you...” but he’ll say it suspiciously, like an accusation. “Can’t you stop talking to everyone?” and “Can’t you stop being the center of attention?” he’ll ask. You will stop. You’ll even start seeing a counselor together. He’ll cheat on you anyway, and you will feel as if someone peed down your back. He’ll marry someone else not too long after this. At this point, you are an adult. You own your own place, your own car, your own career. You are five years into your high school teaching job, where you shine and feel Actual Purpose. For the first time since you were very little, you are ENCOURAGED to be as wildly creative, as maniacal and bipolar as possible. The Real You shows up everyday in the classroom. It works for you. The students are happy to be in your class and you love them so ferociously that you cry hysterically as each each senior class graduates. The Other You… is still doing stuff to make sure The Real You is stuck on a demented hamster wheel. The Other You decides that at 28, you should start dating the 22-year-old guy who works at the gym and who has a disturbingly co-dependent relationship with his mother. Everyone thinks this will be a fling, but no. You stay together, sort of, for 4 years. He never spends holidays with your family, and his mother hates you because you are disrupting her hold on him. You break up in dramatic fashion: in a snowstorm, on the night before your birthday, when you think he is coming over to propose but instead shows up with a painting. A little more than a year later, he’ll propose to someone else. You’ll start seeing another therapist to help you figure out why you keep ending up unhappy. She will tell you to “feel your feelings.” You’ll take her advice right away and have a panic attack right in front of her. She will talk you through it, reminding you that you will not die and that it will pass. She’s right. (Meanwhile, your career is taking off and you are doing awesome things and articles are being written about your projects and you have earned a Master’s degree from Rutgers and a Holistic Health Certification from a nutrition school and you are in great shape and eating well most of the time and have strong friendships and you fear that someone at some point will expose you for a fraud and everyone will laugh at you.) Then you will date a complete maniac whose own family even asks you why you are dating him. Because some part of you is hell-bent on proving that you are a fraud, you will stay with this dude for two whole years. The only exciting part of this relationship is that you get to go to Hawaii. By exciting, I mean that on this trip, you will face the obvious: that breaking up with this person needs to happen upon returning home, and that it is the smartest thing you’ll ever do. You will take a new job, teaching middle-schoolers. You will get manipulated and bullied by the two teachers who teach the same subject and grade level. The kids will hate you. Your will boss tell you, after your first observation, that he hired you to be Yourself in the classroom. He is disappointed that you are trying to teach like the bullies teach. You will immediately stop going to team meetings and instead develop your own lessons. The bullies will hate you, but the kids will not, and that’s what matters to you. Meanwhile, you will start to actually define what you want in a husband and will realize (palm smacking forehead) that you gave away all of your 20’s and most of your 30’s to people who display The Completely Opposite Qualities. You will join Match.com and eHarmony and start going out on dates. They will pretty much all stink, but at least you will learn how to tell men, early on, that you are not interested. You will meet Ajay. On the second date you will realize you want all the same things out of life. Out of fear, you will both try to play stupid games to show that you are independent and don’t need each other. Then you will try to break up. Then- you won’t. You will move into his townhouse. Each time you reveal more of The Real You, he celebrates it. Your walls come down, and it will feel glorious - as if you are peeing in your bed and you don’t even care! You will realize that you have become Yourself, the person you have always been but had forgotten about. Your friends and family will tell you the same thing. They will cheer, they will cry, and they will breathe loud sighs of relief. (The people who don’t like this development will be dropped from your life, leaving you much lighter.) Six months later you will be engaged, and five months after that you will be married. You will accept, no matter how strange it sounds, that deep down, in your Italian-Irish-German body, you have always been Mrs. Patel. They say once we write it down, it is a reality. That gives us a moment to decide - Are we going to record this or not?
The other day, I had a really emotional discussion in the morning with my husband about whether we were going to continue with our last IVF for infertility and continue to pursue adoption at the same time. My first thought in a moment of boredom at work - when I was feeling overwhelmed with all the classes I was prepping, and when my mind kept drifting back to the conversation with Ajay - was that I WANTED PRETZEL CRISPS. I tried to head off a binge by pushing it off, like Ilana would tell me to. I said to myself, "If I really still want them at lunch, I will have them; then at least it will be part of a meal." I also went on IG stories and told anyone who was following me about it. That worked. I ate them with lunch -one serving - and enjoyed the hell out of them. But then I went back and had three more servings at the end of the work day. Why? I was on the phone with my husband again. When I got home, I actually tracked the pretzels - ALL 4 servings of them. I was pretty mad at myself. BUT then I talked to my husband about The Pretzel Incident. He asked me why I did that. It actually led to me being more honest with him about my TRUE FEELINGS about what's going on with our personal issues. I was eating my frustration and my words - because sometimes when we talk, I don't feel like he actually hears what I'm saying correctly. That's actually pretty important to realize! So, I'd say that's a win, even though it felt a little crappy at first. It’s going to be good for our communication - which will need to be strong as we go forward with the donor egg fertilzation and adoption! Ways to keep costs and time in the store to a minimum:
I was listening to The Life Coach School Podcast, with Brooke Castillo. She has a whole "model" she created in which she teaches you how to change your thought pattern. She believes that "your thoughts are not necessarily what’s true; your thoughts are what's familiar." In other words, we often create a pattern of thinking based on things that might have happened to us, or habits we have formed over the years, but we really don't have any good "proof" for those thoughts.
I got a little obsessed with this when she said something that really made sense to me: "Everything you do is because of a feeling." What she explained was that all of our actions are driven either by trying to create a feeling we think we will get if I do something, OR a feeling we are trying to avoid by not getting it. Figure out what feeling you’re trying to get or avoid and then work on changing your thought pattern FIRST, before you try to change your actions. If you try to change your actions first, you’re not going to get results because you’re working against that thought pattern every time you act. I'm going to answer her set of questions here to figure out why I am so negative and cry every time I go to the Reproductive Endocrinologist for infertility treatments/ procedures. What do you feel that makes you so pessimistic? Fear & dread of pregnancy/ motherhood What are the thoughts that causes that feeling? I can’t control my pregnant body or birth. I will get really fat/ be in a lot of pain. I can't control my child's behavior or keep bad things from happening to him/her. There will be too much to do. I won't have any time for myself or my husband or my friends. I will never lose the baby weight. I won't be able to drink to distract or numb my emotions or help my social anxiety during events. I will be the only one doing any work while I'm pregnant and after the baby comes. Ajay won't help me enough. Where do these thoughts come from? I have heard horror stories about pregnancy and birth. I know a lot of women who have carried babies all the way through 9 months and then lost them. I've seen a lot of my friends and a lot of women I know completely lose themselves once the baby is born. I've seen a lot of men run/ leave/ not know what to do to help raise the child. I'm adopted so maybe somewhere in me I feel like I ruined my biological mom's life and maybe my dad's too. Also, I've relied on alcohol so much to get to me through certain events that it's become a habit over the last 20 years. Does it make sense in this situation? Does it really apply to this present one? It does make a little bit of sense to think some of this but it doesn't necessarily have to apply. Ajay and I are both kind of clueless about raising children but that doesn't mean we can't figure it out. My biological parents made decisions that had nothing to do with me, so I can't feel guilty about something I didn't get to decide for myself. If I get used to not drinking at events, I can probably get through them okay. Ajay cannot get pregnant, so there is nothing he can do about that part. What proof do you have against the thought? There are people I know who enjoyed their pregnancy and had decent birth experiences. Many friends of mine have multiple children so they at least wanted to do it again! I'm pretty healthy and have taken good care of body for almost 20 years. I have been a teacher a long time and have some pretty tight relationships with so many former and current students. I am great with my friends' children and Ajay's nieces love me. I have a very nurturing side that I can access if I just allow it. I didn't want a dog and look how much I love Phillip. There are things I don't know how to do and won't be good at but that doesn't mean I can't learn or ask for help. Ajay has been working his butt off to prove to me that he can do things like take care of Phillip, do laundry, wash dishes, cook, and handle bills. He loves children so much and really wants to be a father. My adoptive parents WANTED me and have always put me first, so I didn't ruin their lives! What will be different when you get what you want (pregnant)? I will have a lack of control to some extent over my body. I will have to stop drinking altogether. I will have to lighten up on workouts at some point. I will experience things I don't even know about yet. What will be exactly the same? I can still control what I eat, how much I move (to some degree). I will still have Ajay to support me through the changes. I will still have Phillip. What do I want to feel? Freedom! like I can be healthy and know myself and do what I want to . (This is also why I over eat and binge, by the way! I want to feel like I have control over my decisions and my life.) What do I want to avoid? I want to avoid feeling trapped, pinned down, and forced into a corner. I want to avoid being taken for granted. Solutions/ NEW THOUGHTS to start thinking: I can still have freedom as long as Ajay helps me - and maybe if I can stay home for a while or if we are able to hire help for a few hours a day. I don't have to feel trapped as long as I am able to express what I need and want. We can establish some rules and routines that could help us both feel like we are not doing this alone and not drowning. We can also express to our child that sometimes he or she is not going to get what he/she wants all the time. SO YEAH! This is a starting point. Now I turn it out to you, Dear Reader! I would appreciate any comments or advice about pregnancy (or at least motherhood if we have to adopt)! What is working for you? What do you wish you had done instead? What did you do differently with the second or third pregnancy or child? |
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