ADHD Time

A common misconception about people with ADHD is that because we're hyper, we need a lot of stimulation. I've suffered from ADHD and the corresponding anxiety for as long as I can remember, and as an adult, it has gotten worse, but I've figured out ways to have a positive impact. With my ADHD, my brain is already running a mile a minute, and more stimulation is exactly what I don't need. I think this is why I like gardening so much. Why I like hiking, being outside with my pups, going for long walks. Most of the time I walk without any music. I just walk. I've never really thought about this, but then I came across this blogpost:
https://yourot.com/parenting-club/2017/8/23/green-time-treatment-for-adhd-symptoms

As a teacher I meet kids with ADHD all the time, and I notice that they are on 4 different volleyball teams (yes, I can think of two students off the top of my head in which this is true for).

I know anyone can make a kid, but not everyone can be a parent. If you are not willing to put in the effort, please stop reproducing.

My Ren-like self

I was teaching about the classes of chordates and the mudskipper had an appearance in our text book. When it became clear that my students didn't know about the mudskipper, I quickly jumped on my secret youtube, get around the school privacy pages, access, and found this: (it's totally worth the next 5 minutes of your life)

My students were literally falling out of their seats laughing as the males foolishly fought, sighing and pointing as the little baby appeared, and gasping in aw when the males transported oxygen to the egg chamber. It was a beautiful moment in teaching, when, without any preplanning, everything falls into place. At the end of class my students left saying, "the mudskipper is my NEW FAVORITE animal!"

I spent the rest of the day thinking about the mudskipper and, therefore, Ren and Stimpy. It's been years, like 24 of them, since I watched Ren and Stimpy, but watch I sure did. I remember the Muddy Mudskipper Show and decided that I should youtube it.

I had little luck finding the part of the show about Muddy, but I did find this:

AND I realized, oh my god, I am Ren. 

Daily I say things like this:

"WHAT? You don't have your homework again? Do I need to stab you with a pencil and make you bleed and form a scar so that when you get home you will remember that you have homework?"

"Do that again and I will come over there and cut out your tongue with these dirty scissors that I cut the sheep heart with."

"I don't have an icepick, but I could give you a transorbital lobotomy with this pencil."

"If I pinch you really hard on the back of the arm, will you associate your inappropriate behavior with pain and like a Pavlovian response, know that bad behavior = pinch = pain?"

Fight the self serving norms

I have always, as far back as I can remember, had a strong relationship with nature. I've also had this strong sense of altruism to dedicate my energy to supporting what is here, now, and to preserving what really matters. Humanity is dependent on our connection to nature and yet...

Someone sent me this video recently and THIS is it. This is why I didn't have children. Not because I'm out of the norm, or don't want to be normal, but because I see the bigger picture and until we step up and fix ourselves, we have no right bringing kids into this mess.

And the answer is...

Sometimes I don't want to "google it"
Sometimes I just want to wonder
Toss out questions
into the fabric of space
Let Q's land on a layer
mull around.

Do dogs dream?
How would we test that?
Are the electrodes hooked
up to the
frontal lobe?
Where do dreams
originate?

Yes,
I know
Google it

But then discussion
stops

I miss
intellectual
discussions.

Christmas trees are not only irresponsible, but they don't make any sense

This makes just about as much sense as anything we call a "tradition" around the holidays. We could leave the native trees alone to get busy spitting out oxygen, and think of how much preservation fluid we'd save in the mortuary if we let the bugs eat the flesh and use the skeletons as our holiday decoration. 

Freedom

The contentment of aging is miraculous. I was having dinner with a former student who is headed to her first year of college and understandably nervous. Our conversation brought me back to life as a younger person and the worries that accompanied me. I shared how being 42 is a bit horrifying and I have no idea how it happened so fast, but what I love the most is not caring so much. No obsessing about what other people think, but being content. Comfortable. It's freeing.

Then she reaches for her phone, searches for a bit, and shows me this image...

Start Fresh

Is it sad that I want a colon cleanse for my birthday?

I've been trying out my new age for about a month now. I have been slipping it into conversations at a quite frequent level. At school I'll say things like, hey kids, I may be 42, but I still need to annotate this problem before I begin solving. Or something like, what are you whining about the cold for? I'm 42.

As the weeks dwindle and the actual day approaches I started to think, hey, am I 42 now? Am I going to be 43? Wait, how old am I? Yup, tell me about it.

Usually with trial periods you just stick with what you got, and I suppose I can do that, stick with 42. It's hard to think about much else other than not freezing to death. Thanks Colorado, for keeping my mind off my birthday and on keeping my blood from freezing in my veins.

Revelation # 841

It was yesterday that I realized that not only do I love all things hiking, being outside, wandering along paths, it's actually my favorite activity. For the past several years I've search for and been on some pretty amazing hiking adventures but as I walked through the tree lined, pine needled paths of Harris Lake that I felt the realization that this is exactly where I want to be. Not at Harris lake persay but hiking. Outside. Among the trees and birds, wandering through nature not seeing a single building, store, or many people for that matter. In the past two days I've hiked 10 miles and passed 4 people.

I've also come to the realization that I am quite the introvert. I would choose going out into the woods on a hike over a party without a second thought. The one thing that does make my hike better is my dog. I want to spend more time hiking and less time working. 

I am going to spend more time outside and less time working starting now. 

Christmas Tree Alternative

You know how I keep ranting about the stupid dead tree in your house?? Well I have a solution! This holiday season try something new. Instead of killing a perfectly good oxygen machine, you could try this... This anti-oxygen machine will only need a little food and water and with some tender love and care he won't actually die and fall to pieces on your living room floor.

Name one person you know that wouldn't love this instead of a tree. And with this miraculous alternative you could forgo the wrapped presents and have a tree/present combo. Yeah, I'm pretty sure this is a good idea.

Flailing

If you are not part of the solution, then you are part of the problem.

Lately I've been feeling a part of the problem. Usually teachers can go to sleep at night and calm their money and time worries by thinking of all the good they are doing. All that progress towards making the world a better place and then NPR decides to do a report on the state of science education in the country. Dismal. To make science real, kids want it to be more fun and well, who the hell wouldn't want that?

I gave my Semester Exam today, well just two class periods, and dismal is the bright side. We have a screwed up exam schedule and bunches of kids that don't give a crap. Showing up to school and not even knowing what exam they are about to take... nice. I decided to let them have a "cheat sheet" with formulas, units, etc for physics and from both classes only 5 students had the where-with-all to bring it in and use it. We started it on Friday and they just had to finish over the weekend, or they could just bring what we did together, but no. Nothing. Then it dawned on me, that if you don't even care enough to see what exam you are about to take, why would you bring in a cheat sheet.

I decided to do a performance assessment for my kids on a modified diploma. This would enable them to show me their knowledge of the science process. I put together a lab idea, gave them the supplies and let them go for it. I sat back and listened, only interjecting for clarification. Remember I am teaching 9th grade. Obviously being on a modified diploma means you are below grade level, but while the kid was sharing his data, of 2.71 from reading the stopwatch, I asked him to clarify and said, 2.71 what? What unit are you measuring with. He said "distance". I cried inside.

Today I felt useless. Like my passion, energy, and excitement is being wasted on a group of people that don't have the ability, desire, I don't know, to be better, more awesome. If our system is broken, no I take the back, our system is broken and because our system is broken and I continue to work in it, I am contributing to the problem not the solution.

So what crazy, civil disobedience move do I need to make? What can I do to be a part of the solution? 

It's the small things

I planned an activity where kids were using a laptop to guide themselves through a computer simulation about movement. I've been trying to encourage my kids to be present, not just physically, but intellectually and emotionally. I'm a really predictable teacher, kids should know what I'm about to say and do next from patterns they have observed, but that only happens when you are present. So I was asking them to be present in the lab. To use their time to learn some new knowledge, not just finish the assignment, but to make predictions and observations about physics, instead of thinking about whatever.

So it's a challenge. It's hard to encourage kids to be present when there is so much going on in their lives. 

I see 90 kids per day. I have an hour of planning time and a 35 minute lunch. It gets frustrating, BUT then there is that ONE moment...

Today in lab I walked up behind a kid at his laptop, he was working alone, and I hear him say quietly to himself, "hum, 5 m/s, that's exactly what I thought". 

I about peed my pants! I yelped in excitement, causing him to jump in his lab stool. I started exclaiming, "yes, yes, yes, THANK YOU for being present!" Of course at this point the other kids are like, Miss, what are you talking about? What did he do? So I told them about his predicting and being present in the lesson and he turned bright red and I gave thanks for those little, small things that totally make my job worth it.

A months worth of cookies, actually 35 days.

When you live in a 3rd world country you pick up some strange habits. Going to the grocery store has always been a chore for me. I don't like shopping because I don't like cooking. Well, at least in the US you can go to the store, walk down the isle and buy what you usually buy. Not in the 3rd world. Going to the grocery store is like russian roulette. You never know what you're going to get. The worse place I've been? Bolivia. We all swore that what was on the shelves was just whatever got crammed into the container ship and slowly made it's way South. There were mac and cheese boxes that when you buy don't expire for 5 years and in Bolivia they were going to expire in a few weeks. Dinged cans, old packaging, Halloween candy in January. What happens is that when you do go to the store and find something you like you end up buying the whole shelf. Laura did this with diet coke. We heard a rumor that the special part at the coke plant broke so when we shopped she bought the entire shelf. Good thing too because diet coke went missing for a while.

In the DR it was hummus. You never knew if the store would have it and what kinds.

It is so weird to be back in a place that just stocks their shelves. Unfortunately I've picked up this bad habit of hoarding products when I find ones I like.

This is what my cabinet looks like right now.

I found these cookie/snack things that I like and have been using as my mid morning snack and the only place I can find them in Whole Foods and the one that is convenient to me is always packed in a pain to get in and out of so I got online and look what I did... I ordered $91 in cookies and had them delivered right to my door. Free shipping, I might add.

Power hugs

Yeah, yeah, I have control issues, but listen to what I realized on the way to school this morning. First let me explain for those of you who don't know that I have issues with my personal space and by issues I mean that my personal space is very large and there is no reason for you to be anywhere in that space at any time. Living in Latin America has been challenging because they kiss everyone here all the time whether I just saw you yesterday or not. Entering a party means that you walk around to every single person and give them a kiss greeting. Nice gesture, but not really me.

Yesterday a student gave me a letter (a 3 page letter) that I took home with me to read. Before bed I sat down and started reading and was touched with love, compassion, proudness beyond belief. I immediately wanted to give that student a hug and knew that first thing the next morning I would do just that.

On my 4 minute early morning walk to school this morning I had an epiphany. I actually do like hugs, when they are on my terms. During the awards ceremony at school I announced the science winners and when those kids came on stage I gave them real hugs. I couldn't wait to see my student and give her a hug, wait?! That doesn't sound like me. Am I that much of a stubborn control power mongrel that hugs are only allowed when I say it's ok?