All That Mattered

There was no reason for me to be close, so I kept my distance. There was no reason for me to be a part of their game, so I remained invisible.

It probably began days, if not weeks, before I understood it was a game, but it came to my attention in the form of a girl filling a plastic witch's cauldron with things she had scavenged from around the playground.

A friend said some words to her. Maybe he asked, "Can I play with you?" but it was more likely something along the lines of "What are you doing?" which is typically a better playground question if the goal is to be invited in. So then they were filling the cauldron together, discussing each item, coming to agreements over what went into the mix and what was cast aside.

A decision was made to add water to the cauldron. By now it was heavy with the debris they had purposely, even meticulously collected. But it wasn't too heavy so it only took one of them to carry it over to the cast iron hand pump. While the girl held the cauldron, her friend began filling a smaller bucket, which they then poured over their collection. As they worked together, another child joined them. After a discussion that may or may not have included the phrase, "I've got an idea," they agreed they would forego the unnecessary step of the bucket and slide the cauldron itself under the flow of water.

Agreement, however it is arrived at, stands at the center of our preschool, as it does in life itself. Conflict, all conflict, emerges from the inability to agree. These children were not playing a game; they were living.

The children took turns pumping until the cauldron was full, or at least as full as they collectively agreed it needed to be. Now it was too heavy for a single carrier, so they circled around the cauldron and lifted it together. Walking with it was a complicated matter: they had to agree about where they were going, at what speed, and who would have to walk backwards or sideways. Maybe it was still too heavy. They staggered a bit under its weight before another friend joined them, dashing in to slide his arms under cauldron. It was still too heavy, but when another playmate tried to squeeze her body in amongst them, it became clear that they could lift it, but not effectively carry the heavy thing, even when they all worked together.

They agreed they would need to put it down, which they did, carefully, not spilling more than a drop or two.

As they discussed their next steps, someone said, clearly enough for me to hear it, "I've got an idea! Let's use the wagon!" This was met with approval, with the exception of one girl, the girl who had tried to squeeze in. She objected. "I'm using it." I had previously noted her idly pulling the wagon, alone, watching the cauldron situation from afar. She had abandoned it briefly to help.

"Please!" the other children begged. "We just need it for a second." The girl stood with her back to the group, apparently considering what to do. It wasn't long before she relented, "Okay, but I want it back when you're done." Another agreement.

Now the challenge was how to get the wagon to where the cauldron sat on the ground. It sat on the other side of the row of tree stumps that line the upper level of the sand pit. One child attempted to lift it, but when the others didn't join his effort, he gave it up in favor of what the group decided was a better idea, which was to pull it around to the side with the slope. It appeared to be the work of a single child, so the others stood around watching as he wheeled the wagon the long way around. He struggled, however, when it came to the steep part of the slope, so other children, spontaneously, pushed from behind.

Then, the wagon in place, a small miracle happened. The girl who had started it all, easily lifted the heavy cauldron all on her own, placing into the bed of the wagon. As it turns out, it could have been carried by a single child, but they had collectively agreed that together was better, even if that made things more complicated, perhaps even more difficult. The agreement, not the project, was clearly the important thing.

The project, this project of life itself, continued to play out for some time as the wagon, propelled over difficult terrain made its way in stops and starts around the space, eventually winding up back where the whole thing had started. The cauldron hadn't, after all, mattered. The debris and water it held didn't matter. Whether it was a witch's brew or a soup didn't matter. Indeed, even where they were going with it didn't matter. All that mattered, all that ever matters really, in the end, are the agreements we make with one another.

******

 

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

"Ready for a book that makes you want to underline and highlight? One that makes you draw arrows and write 'THIS!!!!!' in the margin? Then you are in for a treat." ~Lisa Murphy, M.Ed., author and Early Childhood Specialist, Ooey Gooey, Inc.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

The Dubious Mythology Of Growing Up

Sometimes when I was clowning around with the kids, I'd say, "I was born an old man, then every year I get younger until one day I'll be a baby and go back into my mommy's belly."

This was an obvious joke to most of the kids, who would of course call me on it. "No, Teacher Tom. That's not right!" they would shout. They know the universal scheme: humans, including themselves, get older, not younger. They've been told that they will one day be adults. They've had birthdays to celebrate the success of their aging process. They are prompted to tell us what they will be when they grow up. They may not know the difference between five minutes and five seconds, but if they understand anything about the passage of time, it's this.

Playwrite Tom Stoppard wrote in his book The Coast of Utopia: 

"Because children grow up, we think a child's purpose is to grow up. But a child's purpose is to be a child. Nature doesn't disdain what lives only for a day. It pours the whole of itself into each moment. We don't value the lily less for not being made of flint and built to last. Life's bounty is in its flow, later is too late. Where is the song when it's been sung? The dance when it's been danced? It's only we humans who want to own the future, too."

This is often a hard thing for young parents to hold in their heads, I think. This cult of growing up goes beyond childhood, staying with us through our lives. There's elementary, middle, and high school, each a rung in the ladder of growing up. Then there are things like university, career, marriage, and parenthood, all marking our progress toward the ultimate goal of being grown up. If we skip any of these steps, we find we must defend ourselves against those who insist we are doing it wrong. "Grow up!" we scold. We call it "failure to launch." We say someone has a "Peter Pan Complex." And when people die, we shake our heads, and sigh, "Too soon," as if they are a dance that's not been danced.

My mother had some insight into this. When we would say, for instance, "I can't wait until I'm old enough to go on that ride," she would caution, "Don't wish your life away." And that's the danger of embracing the dubious mythology of growing up. It teaches us that our purpose lies somewhere in the future when anyone who has given it much thought knows that we are lilies, right now!

I'm sixty years old. People tell me, "That's not old." And I don't generally feel old, despite the gray beard. But from the perspective of much of the world, I've finally arrived. I'm as grown up as I'm ever going to get. I don't expect that anyone will ever again warn me that the things I do will become part of my "permanent record," although I imagine some might whisper, "He's having a second childhood." They're wrong, of course. We each only have one childhood, just as we have only one life, just has we have only one moment, and that moment is now. None of it is a step along a path and to perceive it as such is to risk robbing ourselves of childhood, of parenthood, of songs and of dances. Even more tragic is when we rob others, like children, whose purpose is to be a child, by insisting that they must become school and career ready.

As a grown up in the eyes of the world, I assure you that growing up is an illusion of the young. People simply don't grow up. We live. And as Stoppard asks, "Was the child happy while he lived? That is the proper question, the only question." The rest is illusion

******

 

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

"Ready for a book that makes you want to underline and highlight? One that makes you draw arrows and write 'THIS!!!!!' in the margin? Then you are in for a treat." ~Lisa Murphy, M.Ed., author and Early Childhood Specialist, Ooey Gooey, Inc.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Nothing Will Change Until We Have a Dream

And one day we must ask the question, "Why are there forty million poor people in America?" And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. ~MLK

What I'm saying to you this morning is that Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the Kingdom of Brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of Communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines the truths of both. Now, when I say question the whole society, it means ultimately coming to see that the problem of racism, the problem of economic exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated. ~MLK

And I say to you, I have also decided to stick to love. For I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind's problems. And I'm going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn't popular to talk about it in some circles today. I'm not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love, I'm talking about a strong, demanding love. ~MLK

On this Martin Luther King Day many of us will listen to snippets, perhaps all, of his great "I Have A Dream" speech, and we should, but civil rights was not the only cause this great American championed, and it is not the only reason we celebrate his life today. He was also a great advocate for ending the war in Vietnam and on August 16, 1967 he gave what many consider his finest speech on poverty in America at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in Atlanta.

Usually entitled "Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos Or Community?" this is long, powerful, and to this day controversial speech that reminds us that almost nothing has changed when it comes to poverty. Millions of our citizens of all races remain poor, but people of color bear the greatest burden. One in five black children lives in poverty. And while the powerful in our nation are engaged in a misguided, punitive approach to reforming our educational system, they are turning a blind eye to the core issue with education in America: poverty. Let this speech be a reminder that whatever we do in the classroom, until we address the "triple evils" of racism, poverty, and war, we will, as a nation, ultimately fail.

This is a magnificent, thoughtful and inspiring speech, one that taken in its entirety is guaranteed to make you think, make you sad, and may even make you angry. MLK calls here, for instance, for a "guaranteed national income." I know that's a non-starter for many people, but so was civil rights, so were at one time most of the great things humans have ever done. One reason we celebrate this man today is that so much of what he stood for has proven to be prophetic. If nothing else, we must think about what he has to teach us.

I urge you to find an hour today to listen and think, and even to dream, because when it comes right down to it, nothing will change until we have a dream.

******

 

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

"Ready for a book that makes you want to underline and highlight? One that makes you draw arrows and write 'THIS!!!!!' in the margin? Then you are in for a treat." ~Lisa Murphy, M.Ed., author and Early Childhood Specialist, Ooey Gooey, Inc.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

The Old, Dull, Work-A-Day Of Loving And Caring

Even a casual survey of human history gives us an understanding why there are always those eager to predict that these are the end times. Savagery and stupidity appear to be hallmarks of every epoch. Our fondest memories can always be ruined by taking a step back and realizing that we might have been having a good day or year or life, but we were surrounded by the unknown suffering of others. Acts of god aside, all the pain humans suffer comes at our own hands. That we, as a species, possess the capacity for evil is beyond question.

As much as I hate it, the cynic is always right. If we just wait long enough, it will all go wrong. Pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth, will always, as the cynics predict, bring even our loftiest intentions to ruin. And it seems to me that selfishness is the eighth sin that, like the ring of Mordor, rules them all. Cynicism, as author Rutger Bregman writes, is "a theory of everything." And it's true. No matter what argument one uses against their dark views of humanity, their answer of "Just wait" will prove them once again to be right.

Buddhism acknowledges this truth by conceding that "life is suffering." Other philosophies and religions lay down rules for us to follow. Advocates of specific governmental systems claim that theirs is the one that best mitigates our worst instincts. But if the goal is to somehow make humankind good, they have all failed, clearly. Just listen to the cynics who are over there in the corner chuckling darkly amongst themselves, right again, as usual.

This is all true. It always seems to go wrong. It is, it seems, the destiny of our species to forever fall, no matter how high we aspire to climb.

So how is it that so many of us still aspire? If the cynic is always right, why do I, and so many of my fellow humans, still refuse to give in? 

When our daughter was little and she would be stricken with fear or sadness over some evil in the world, I would try to calm her by pointing out that most people, most of the time, all around the world, are having a regular, even boring day; that the evils exist, but at any given moment, most of us are loving and caring for one another. Mister Rogers' mother would tell him when he was scared by something in the news "to look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." What cynics do is focus on the evil, entirely ignoring the day-to-day goodness that fills up all that time and space in between. And one thing the cynic never does is offer any sort of solution beyond their shrug of glum summation.

Our capacity to aspire, to hope, to care, to help, and to love far outweighs the evil in humanity. Indeed, it's so prevalent, so common, that it's not even news. If human goodness were as rare as the cynics assert, then it would be acts of kindness that made the news. The headline would read: Neighbor Buys Groceries for Elderly Shut-In Expecting Nothing in Return! Woman Comforts Man Who Was Upset! Strangers Welcome One Another Warmly!

Having known thousands of young children in my life, I can honestly say that I've never known an evil one. If the cynics were right, you would think I'd have met one by now. Oh sure, these brand new humans all do "bad" things at times, but let me assure you that this isn't evidence of an essentially evil nature cracking through some sort of thin veneer of goodness as the cynics would have it, but rather exceptions to how they are most of the time, which is loving and caring, helping, aspiring and hoping. When I stand watching my young friends play together on the playground, cooperating, sharing, and inviting one another, which is what most of them do most of the time, I see humanity, not at its best, but rather at its most normal and even boring. There are conflicts, of course, but most amount to little more than raised voices, left behind them in a moment as they default to the old, dull, work-a-day of loving and caring. Nothing to report here.

That human evil exists is beyond question, but goodness far outnumbers and outweighs badness. That is our strength and our hope. It's so easy to fall under the sway of the cynics, but they are ultimately the lazy ones, always scanning the headlines to prove their darkest points. But they underestimate us. "We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility," says Mister Rogers, and that is what most of us are doing, most of the time. Human nature is seen when we watch those children on the playground. When someone falls, they all gather around, like antibodies or endorphins, coming in concern to help, dropping their playthings and setting aside their games to be there where they are most needed. This is the solution that the cynics ignore.

Oh, we live in dark times, no doubt, but the cynics cannot hold me because I've made a long study of humankind. What I've learned, above all else, is to never underestimate human beings. We are a species of helpers. Just wait. 

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

How Did We Get Here?

Earlier this month an NPR's podcast Money Planet was in an Ohio third grade classroom doing a story about how economics is taught in elementary school through the reading of popular children's picture books like Pancakes, Pancakes! by Eric Carle and Put Me in the Zoo by Robert Lopshire.

The basic idea would be familiar to any preschool educator. The teacher sits in front of the kids reading to the children, pausing frequently to prompt conversation, answer questions, and entertain the thoughts and ideas that emerge from the story.

The following are excerpts from the transcript of the show. BERAS is the NPR host. ROBEK is the teacher reading from the Dr. Suess book The Sneetches:

BERAS: The star-bellied Sneetches live the good life, and the nonstarred Sneetches do not. The star-bellied Sneetches don't let the plain-bellied Sneetches come to their frankfurter roasts, picnics or parties or marshmallow toasts.

ROBEK: (Reading) They kept them away, never let them come near. And that's how they treated them year after year.

KATIE: Oh, that's kind of mean.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #2: They got to fight back (ph).

ROBEK: Katie, what did you say? You said it felt mean.

KATIE: That's kind of mean because, like, just 'cause their bellies are plain and they don't have stars in it doesn't mean that they're not special.

ROBEK: Right. Doesn't mean they're not special.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #2: I kind of think . . .

ROBEK: Noah.

NOAH: It's almost like what happened back then, how people were treated . . .

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENTS: Yeah.

NOAH: . . . Like, disrespected . . .

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #2: I think that book was made in that time.

NOAH: Like, white people disrespected Black people, but then, they might stand up in the book.

ROBEK: Oh, so we're -- let's keep reading to find out if they do stand up maybe a little bit. So when you say stand up -- get included?

NOAH: Yeah

ROBEK: Yeah, that's what we're hoping for, right?

This is familiar ground for many of us. This is how story time generally goes when I read to children. It's not just a silent read-through, but rather a dynamic give-and-take as the children to make connections to what they already know about the world. 

BERAS: There's a lot in this book. That's the beauty of kids' books. They're so simple and complex at the same time. And this is going so well. They're making connections, and I haven't even asked a question. Mandy Robek keeps reading "The Sneetches." And non-Sneetch Sylvester McMonkey McBean, he rolls into town. And he sees how much worse it is to be a Sneetch without a star than to be a Sneetch with a star.

ROBEK: (Reading) Then, quickly, Sylvester McMonkey McBean put together a very peculiar machine. And he said, you want stars like a star-belly Sneetch? My friends, you can have them for $3 each.

BERAS: He sees an opportunity to profit.

ROBEK: (Reading) Then, of course, old Sylvester McMonkey McBean invited them into his star-off machine. Then, of course, from then on, as you probably guessed, things really got into a horrible mess.

BERAS: At this point, Amanda Beeman, the communications person with the school district, stands up. She looks really upset. She waves her hands to get Mrs. Robek's attention to stop reading.

Amanda Beeman: Sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #1: They're scaring them because (ph) . . .

BEEMAN: Can I pause this?

ROBEK: Yeah.

BEEMAN: I don't know if I feel comfortable with this book being one of the ones featured. I just feel like this isn't teaching anything about economics, and this is a little bit more about differences with race and everything like that. So do you mind, Mrs. Robek, if we pause this book.

BERAS: I mean, we have a list here of all the things this is about -- preferences, open markets, economic loss.

BEEMAN: Yeah, I just don't think it might be appropriate for the third-grade class and for them to have a discussion around it. Are you OK with that?

ROBEK: I'm OK with that if that's your . . .

BEEMAN: OK. I just -- as someone -- I just don't think that this is going to be the discussion that we wanted to have around economics. So I'm sorry. We're going to cut this one off.

BERAS: For the first time that day, the kids are really quiet. They sit still on the rug in their chairs, just staring up at the grown-ups in the room.

BEEMAN: So is there anything else that we can pivot too?

ROBEK: I have lots of books.

BERAS: Then, the kids start asking how the story ends. Amanda, the press person, addresses them in kid talk.

BEEMAN: Sometimes, when you don't feel comfortable, you got something in your belly you got to just speak up about it, right?

This whole interruption is outrageous, but this particular line really burns me. This communications person is trying to co-opt the children's language about "fighting back" as if she is some sort of civil rights champion. Not only that, but clearly she is lying. She was motivated by nothing more noble than the potential for parent complaints.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #4: I don't even know what happens in the story.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #5: Yeah, me neither.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT #4: Like, I wasn't to read it (ph) -- haven't ever read that.

BEEMAN: You know what? I think that's one that maybe we can ask, you know, with our parents at home.

The kids were having a dialog about big ideas. They were curious. They were thinking. They were making important connections. If the goal was for the children to learn about economics, they were, right there, recognizing the intersection between economics, politics, and race. In reality, the three things cannot be separated in our society and this is what the children were beginning to recognize. These are the moments that teachers live for, when the children start putting things together. This is what education in a self-governing society is all about. These are the dialogs of democracy.

But the adult was, in her own words, "uncomfortable." The children clearly were not.

How did we get here?

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Taking A Leap Of Faith

The kids had anchored a plank of wood under the gate so that it protruded over and beyond the four steps that lead down to the playground, creating a "diving board." It was one of those games that survived from year to year in the institutional memory housed in the children themselves -- they had seen older children do it when they were younger and now they were the older children.

At first it was just the big kids, queuing up, and taking turns springing into the air. I had once played Olympics-style judge, arbitrarily awarding 7.6's and 3.2's, so now that was the necessary part I played in the game. If I forgot or was distracted, the kids were sure to prompt me from where they lay sprawled on the ground, "What score did I get?" taking satisfaction in whatever I said.

Before long, some of the younger children began to watch, then some joined the queue. Whereas the older kids hurled themselves willy nilly into space, these inexperienced kids, moved cautiously, inching their way along the plank. Some wanted me to hold their hand, to which I would answer, "I won't hold your hand, but I'll stand closer so I can catch you if you fall." This assurance was enough for some, but others, after long hesitations during which they contemplated the situation, backed out.

Usually, the older kids were patient, even encouraging. "You can do it!" they would call out or "Don't be afraid!" I don't know if "afraid" was the right word for how they were feeling, but most were clearly trepidatious as they balanced unsurely, then stood contemplating the leap of faith before them.

In our secular society, we hold it as a virtue when one believes nothing without sufficient evidence. That is one of the primary edicts of science and logic, after all. This is why religious faith so often stands in contrast, even defiance, to the world around it. The older children didn't need faith to run off the end of the diving board because they could rely upon the evidence of past experience, but the younger children only had the evidence of watching other, more experienced, children. They didn't yet have sufficient evidence that they themselves could survive that leap, so they hesitated there in their doubt.

We've all been there, standing on the edge, contemplating a leap, actual or metaphorical. Indeed, one could argue that this is what life is: having faith that we can succeed without persuasive evidence that we can. As the philosopher William James asserted, "It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all."

As these three-year-olds crouched at the end of the plank, they were summoning courage, which is what we all do when faced with a leap of faith. It is a radical act in this world in which we've raised sufficient evidence and "objective truth" to stand beside the gods. Because in this moment, what that child is doing, what we all must do, is choose what is true and either leap or not. When the child finally jumps, and most of them do, it is because they ultimately choose to trust themselves, the universe, and themselves in the universe, despite evidence, either way, that they can expect to land safely.

The whole idea of choosing truth is the radical act, one that much of the modern world is built around denying. Our school system is founded upon the dictates of right and wrong answers. Success, they tell us, is based upon hard work, planning, and being realistic about our goals. Every one of us has been told we can dream of reaching the stars, but first we must have a fall-back plan, like accounting. We pad the fall zones and corners. We seek, at every step, to take the risk out of children's play, preventing them from climbing too high or running too fast. 

When the children finally do leap, it is always a decision made without sufficient evidence, which is, by definition an act of courage or faith or trust. This is the great secret of success in life. 

When a child, or any of us, stands at the edge, contemplating a leap, actual or metaphorical, we are engaged in the radical act of choosing truth. And when we leap, that's when we live.

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

A 6-Year-Old Shot Their Teacher

The story, in a nutshell, is that a 6-year-old took their mother's gun to school and shot their teacher. The teacher-hero is in critical condition.

There are people calling for throwing the book at the parent(s). The child, who is simply too young to understand the ramifications of his actions, is already severely traumatized. I doubt it would be improved by putting his mother in prison. Someone was certainly negligent, but it wasn't just the parent, it was all of us for allowing our society to devolve to the point that there are guns everywhere, and 6-year-olds not only have access to them, but know how to point them and squeeze the trigger.

Others are blaming the school, an elementary school that already puts kids through metal detectors. There are already calls for more armed officers and a further ramping up of the prison-ification of America's schools.

We live in an era when comedy shows often do better journalism than actual journalists. In an episode of Last Week Tonight that aired in the aftermath of the Uvalde shooting, host John Oliver, after a detailed half hour on why armed policing of schools is a failed idea, got to the heart of the matter (excuse the language, although I believe in this case it is warranted):

What it means is asking ourselves, "What really keeps kids safe?" And I would argue that one good way to do that might be to take the money that we are inevitably about the flood toward school cops and instead direct it to counselors, nurses, and all the other resources that actually protect students. School police are not the answer to school shootings. The answer to that is gun control. And when we throw more cops into schools as an easy way out of that difficult and necessary conversation, we not only fail to keep our kids safe from gun violence, we condemn them to a system that criminalizes the very essence of childhood. Kids deserve to be annoying without being arrested; to be sad and angry without being body slammed; they deserve to have tantrums, throw carrots, and do science experiments, to talk sh*t, and to carve their name into stuff without risking ending up in the back of a police car. They deserve to be curious, to make mistakes, to go a little too far, to be a little too loud, to basically be a f**king kid. And they definitely deserve better than the fundamental lie that the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy who can arrest a five-year-old.

To that I would add, they shouldn't have easy access to guns in their homes. The answer is common sense gun laws, not day prisons for our children.

We've been here before. We've all heard that other nations have solved the problem of school shootings by dramatically limiting access to guns. We all know that when the Clinton administration banned assault-style weapons in 1994, shooting fatalities fell by 70 percent. Most of us know that if you live in a state with stricter gun control measures, you are safer from gun violence than you are in states that have lax gun laws. Of course, we could do more for mental health in our country, but the common sense first step is clearly to make guns very difficult to acquire.

As I've written before, as educators we have the power to make common sense gun laws happen, but only if we choose to use it. We are involuntarily on the front lines of this literal war against common sense. We have the power to compel change. What if we all agreed to simply not return to school until Congress passes common sense gun laws, the same laws that have worked everywhere they have been tried? We shouldn't have to worry about guns in schools at all, let alone arriving in the backpacks of kindergarteners.

I urge everyone, including Congress, to take a moment to watch John Oliver's full segment:

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

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"This Day Has A Powerful, Huge, Even Big Magic In It!"

I've never written about the day I became a father. I think about that day and often tell parts of the story, but so far I've not found all of the words to do so, if words are even adequate. What I need to say is too complex to express in my normal way. Maybe it requires a novel. Maybe it requires poetry, sculpture, or painting, or it's possible that the way to say what I need to say hasn't been discovered yet.

Those of us who have spent our lives around young children, are familiar with their creative struggle to express themselves. It's part of the process of learning the language, of course, so the conversational short cuts and "good enough" putty with which we spackle our day-to-day adult conversation is yet to be learned. Children regularly find themselves thinking thoughts or having feelings for the first time and they need to communicate about them. Without being able to make use of the cliches upon which we adults rely, they must invent a way of saying it.

An excited five-year-old once replied to an adult who had off-handedly asked, "How are you?" by replying, "This day has a powerful, huge, even big magic in it!"

A three-year-old described an accidental lever she had made on the playground in the form of a chant: "Push down, go up, push down, go up, push down . . ."

Another preschooler, playing with a wine cork in a tub of water, explained, "It went on the water and didn't go down in the water, but I could push it down. And it went back on the water!"

In each example, you can hear the child grasping for complexity, for depth, for knowledge about themselves and their world, then striving to express the fullness of it, grasping at words, building with them the way they build with blocks. Soon they are going to learn to simply say, "I feel good" or to reduce the complexity into words like "lever" and "float," but right now it's the complexity that matters, because it's not just the angels and devils that live in details. Understanding complexity is all about the details, the fullness of a thing, the process or experience. Later will be the time for more concisely summing up the complexity.

Too often, educators try to skip over the complexity and go straight to the summing up, immediately offering children the simple concise answer. Stripped of complexity, the responses are rendered mostly meaningless even if absolutely correct. In Douglas Adams' novel The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, they build a computer programed to answer the question, "What is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything?" After seven million years the computer calculates the answer, which is "Forty-two." It's the right answer, but without the rest of the story, it's useless for anything beyond passing a test.

When children play, we sometimes see it as frivolous and purposeless, and perhaps to that child, in that moment, it is, but we should never make the mistake of thinking it's meaningless. This is why we don't step in to correct the child by telling them that there is "no such thing as magic," or "help them" by showing them what else a lever can do, or which other objects can float on water. When we do, we risk rendering the moment meaningless, or as the great developmental psychologist Jean Piaget wrote, "Every time we teach a child something, we keep him from inventing it himself." The complexity is where the action is because that's what interests us about a new thing, the details. When we leave children to decide for themselves which of those details are relevant, where to build their own scaffolding, and whether and when to move on to something else entirely, we free them to learn beyond the surface of right answers into where complexity lives. When humans engage like this, even frivolously and purposelessly, we're inventing for ourselves.

And as we invent, we find we must communicate about it. But it's more than that. We're a language-using animal and we must use language to bring our inventions into existence. Learning is literally being constructed as we strive to express it, be it through words, art, or science. That someone else, like a loving adult, has listened carefully, understood, and acknowledged that they've understood is a vital part of that process. It's this process of inventing that's important, not the outcome.

As we get older, we tend to experience fewer things for the first time, which leads many of us to fill our language with words and phrases that rush us past the complexity. We've got places to be and things to do, after all. We don't have the time to just play, to let ourselves fall into the details and wander around, being frivolous and purposeless. I suppose when you've seen it all before, it's hard to summon the enthusiasm for inventing things, unless, that is, you have young children in your life. If you listen to them, listening not just with your ears, but with your heart, it's impossible to not be inspired. 

When a child answers, "How are you?" with, "This day has a powerful, huge, even big magic in it," you find yourself nodding along, at once understanding something more complex, and therefore more true, than the old shoe of, "I'm fine, and you?" We can't do this ourselves without play. Without play, we lose sight of complexity and stop inventing our world, becoming increasingly efficient, but going nowhere. 

This is something I started to discover on the day I became a father: children are here to remind us to keep inventing life for ourselves.

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Fungus, Bacteria, Viruses, And Other Parasites

There is a 660 ton fungus, a honey mushroom, in the state of Oregon that covers some 2000 acres making it the planet's largest known living organism. It grows at a rate of one to three feet per year, killing every tree in its path, which it has been doing for at least 2500 years, probably longer. Fungi are neither plant nor animal, occupying a gray area in between the two, betraying the arbitrariness of our human labels. 

But not all fungi kill trees. Indeed, most trees thrive in partnership with the right kinds of fungi, which penetrate, integrate, and expand their root systems so that they connect with the root systems of other trees. In his book The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben  writes, "This makes fungi something like the forest Internet," allowing trees to share information and nutrition via a network that operates through the so-called "mycelial web." There are specific fungi for specific types of trees; the wrong match will lead to the death of one or the other. But the right match creates a bond that is essential for life.

We live in a similar relationship with bacteria which are also neither animal nor plant. By now, most of us know that we live in a powerful symbiotic relationship with bacteria that, like fungi do with trees, make our lives possible. Our "gut microbiota" alone is made up of 250-1000 different species depending on the individual gut in question, comprising 2-4 pounds (1-2 kg) of our body weight. And that's just the bacteria in our digestive system. Overall, bacteria cells represent nearly a third of the cells the make up our body. But like fungi and trees, the wrong bacteria can kill you.

One of the most disturbing parts of this that our microbiota seem to influence how we behave and think. And it's not just bacteria. We tend to envision ourselves as individual and independent, but there are a whole host of bacteria, viruses, and other microscopic parasites living inside of our bodies that beg to differ.

A topical example is the impact of what we are calling "long Covid." This potentially deadly virus (also not plant or animal), even after it has been killed by our immune systems, can leave behind feelings of fatigue, trouble concentrating, general fogginess, and may have other cognitive impacts. Many are rightly concerned about the long term impact on our brains and nervous systems, especially in children. 

A particularly interesting example is Toxoplasma gondii, a protozoan parasite capable of infecting any warm-blooded species, including humans. It is clearly to be avoided as it is one of the leading causes of death attributed to food-borne illnesses. That said, only about 200 Americans a year show symptoms serious enough to require medical treatment. Our immune system, which is as integrated with our microbiomes as fungi are with the root systems of trees, were long thought to be capable, in most cases, of effectively fighting back, but scientists have recently begun to take a closer look. Studies of rodents, chimps, hyenas, gray wolves, and humans have all shown that males infected with T. gondii were found to be more aggressive, less predictable, more likely to take risks, and less likely to seek out novelty. Human males with the T. gondii parasite are more likely to disregard rules, and more inclined toward suspicion, jealousy, and dogmatism. The presence of this same parasite in human women results in higher warmth and higher superego strength, suggesting that the parasite causes them to be more warm-hearted, outgoing, conscientious, persistent, and moralistic. To me this suggests that this is a beneficial parasite for some people while harmful for others.

In other words, it could be that there is a parasite at the bottom of toxic masculinity. It makes me think that we need to start taking a harder look at parasites when we are trying to understand bizarre and destructive behavior in humans. There is, for instance, some evidence that there is a parasitic component to everything from schizophrenia to chronic asthma.

The virus the causes Covid is obviously one to be avoided, but there are many others that seem to be beneficial to their hosts in a variety of ways, including cognitively, we are only just now beginning to understand. And, perhaps not coincidentally, viruses are also neither plant nor animal.

Round worms might make women more fertile, while certain types of hookworms have the opposite effect. On the other hand, there is some evidence that the presence of hookworms in a human body can reduce the incidence of environmental allergies and may ease the symptoms of multiple sclerosis. 

We've taught ourselves to resist being infected by fungi, bacteria, viruses, and other parasites, but the truth is that while the wrong ones can be deadly, the right ones make life as we know it possible.

When I watch a baby try to shove a fist full of mud into their mouth, I stop them, of course, both because I worry about choking and because it is "unsanitary." But, each time I do, I also can't help but wonder about the underlying instinct that causes most babies to explore the world with their mouths. It's a wonder that this urge has survived in our species even given the heightened risk of choking. Could it be that shoving mud in our mouths at a certain developmental stage is adaptive behavior?

The relationship we have with parasites is evidence to me that there is no boundary between our bodies and the rest of the universe. We are, without a doubt, fully woven into the rich tapestry of life, through our breath, the ability of our skin to absorb and expel, and through these tiny creatures that live within us, sometimes killing us, but also, more commonly, helping us to thrive.

As preschool teachers and parents, I often joked, pre-Covid, that we live in a pit of pink eye, a world in which fungus, bacteria, viruses, and other parasites thrive. During my first few years in the classroom, I was sick a lot, but for the past couple decades I've barely registered a sniffle. I'm not the only early childhood educator to experience this.

In the meantime, we continue to wash our hands and stop the babies from eating mud. Some of us wear masks. Some of us use bleach solutions an other disinfectants to sanitize surfaces. We take antibiotics which kill both harmful and beneficial bacteria. I've received all of my vaccinations. I'm not suggesting we stop doing these things, because they definitely protect us from deadly parasites, but at the same time our species has evolved to be integrated into the web of life and being home for parasites is a big part of it. We forget this at our own peril.

******

 

"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

If you liked reading this post, you might also enjoy one of my books. To find out more, Click here! 

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!