10 Moments Of 2021: Part 4 - The Vaccine

1. The Vaccine

When I think back at the most emotional moments of 2021, most of them are all related to the same thing: the COVID-19 vaccine. 

The vaccine changed the pandemic from something that felt insurmountable to something that we could handle. The vaccine made my job as a teacher feel more reasonable, it meant that I could finally see my parents, and it meant that my wife and my son were much less likely to be tragic statistics.

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I signed up as soon as my school sent out the email for vaccine appointments. My school coordinated vaccines appointments for everyone in our community, and I was fortunate to get one on a Tuesday morning before my classes started.

The actual moment of getting the vaccine was unremarkable. I did see some of my colleagues in line and waved to them as I headed to my car. I sat in my car, trying to process what had just happened. I had learned in this pandemic to hope for the best and not to believe things would happen until they happened.

I didn’t tell my mom that I had made the appointment. I didn’t want to get her hopes up just in case something happened. Now that I had the shot in the arm, and it happened, she was the first person I wanted to talk to. It’s hard to know how difficult it was for her knowing that I had been teaching in person for the entirety of the fall and early winter. I hated the idea that my job was causing stress and anxiety to my family. So I called her. Close to tears, I told her I got my shot. She was happy for me, relieved, and told me to take care of myself and watch out for side effects.

My mom was not as emotional as I was over the phone, and in a way, this was helpful. She responded to me getting the vaccine as something pragmatic, something that I would, of course, do. This was an affirmation of what she believed would happen. For me, it was a promise made true.

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Unsurprisingly, many were hesitant to get the vaccine. Sick and demented individuals played on this fear to make more money and consolidate power, most of whom were vaccinated themselves. The vast majority of anti-vax advocates are Republicans. Their lack of care for their constituents was a sad reminder that they were willing to sacrifice, even their supporters if it meant they could get reelected.

I wish I could say that these people didn’t get to me, but they did. I have raged, sworn at, and felt great anger at those Americans who are holding us back by refusing to get the vaccines. Do I still have hope in humanity? Yes, but after seeing the cruelty of the past year, I’m beginning to think that cruelty is our nature and that kindness is what is truly extraordinary. 

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I watched my colleagues getting booster shots in the school gym, some from parent volunteers who are health care professionals. I knew that some of my colleagues had side effects from previous COVID-19 vaccinations shots, like mine or worse, but they were lining up to get their boosters.

After getting a COVID-19 booster, I sat there talking to another teacher. As my colleagues lined up in front of us, it felt nice to see all of us doing the right thing. That evening the side effects started and the following day. I felt awful. I was achy, and I felt hungover for three days. After I got my second shot, it was far worse. It took me a week to get over that shot.

Other colleagues had far worse side effects from the first two shots, but that didn’t stop them from getting their booster shot. Some of them got rough side effects from the booster, but that didn’t make them bitter.

We decided to come back to get the booster shot for ourselves, our families, and our students. We know that the short-term pain and inconvenience are worth making the school safer. And we see that getting to a point where our students can experience school with fewer mitigations that hinder their social, emotional, and academic learning is worth the short-term pain.

I am proud of my colleagues for doing the right thing, the parent volunteers for helping, and my school for hosting a booster clinic for the faculty and the community.

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People with children have experienced the pandemic very differently than people without children. For example, early in the pandemic, some without children worked from home and binged watched Netflix, while people struggled to help their children with remote learning. At the same time, they tried to remote work, working late into the night and being woken up by their children early in the morning. Similarly, the lack of vaccines for children was felt very differently by those with children.

While some people hadn’t even gotten one shot, many Americans had reached their third shot, and many more were desperately waiting for the COVID-19 vaccine to be available for children. The fear parents had of their children getting COVID-19 was genuine and felt by many, including myself.

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When I turned on the car and picked the NPR app on my phone, the news immediately came up. The FDA had cleared emergency use of the COVID-19 vaccine for 5-12 years olds. I immediately felt myself getting emotional. I knew all along since the beginning of the pandemic that my children were not the ones at high risk of getting COVID-19 and dying from this virus, but still, I worried. So we were careful. It doesn’t matter how low the risk is of your child being hospitalized due to COVID-19 when it’s your child. And I did know that this vaccine meant that risk would drop dramatically for my child.

I sat in my car in my school parking lot after a stressful day at work, feeling the sunlight on my face. This important step, young children having to have vaccines, meant that my child would be much safer. More than that, it was one step closer to all the children in the world being able to take masks off and return to experiencing childhood as it should be. Every day, I am reminded of what our children are losing due to necessary COVID-19 mitigations.

I had just gotten my COVID-19 booster shot, and soon my son would get his. I thought to myself, “we are going to be okay.”

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Getting the COVID-19 vaccine is an of self-love and also love for others. Like voting, getting a vaccine is a patriotic act that dramatically impacts society when we all participate but has less meaning if only a few take action. The COVID-19 vaccine results from generations of scientific achievement by scientists and researchers. We make meaningful these people's work and their gifts to us by taking the vaccine.

The vaccine was a reflection of people’s selfishness and their selflessness. Oppressors used the vaccines to harm others, and many felt oppression through how the vaccine was distributed. While the COVID-19 vaccine was one of our most outstanding achievements, there is shame in how some dealt with vaccines.

As we choose who to hire, who should lead, and who we spend time in our lives with, we can find reflections of their character in whether they got the vaccine, as they were physically able to do, and how they talked about the vaccine to others.

2021 was the year we had the power to make choices to change the course of the pandemic, the course of our lives, and the lives of others. The vaccine gave us power, greater freedom and a brighter future.

10 Moments Of 2021: Part 3

4. In Buffy’s Eyes 

There were times in my life when I took Buffy for granted. 

I’m ashamed to say that there were times when caring for Buffy felt like a chore than an expression of love. I was able to get away with this because Buffy doesn’t ask for much. Instead, she is content with some time to explore the world and our presence. Because of this, when I was too self-involved to notice, I wasn’t present for Buffy.

Buffy had some tough moments this past year. The kibble that we had been feeding her for years wasn’t working anymore. She had bouts of stomach issues, sometimes needing to go out in the middle of the night four or five times. We would take her off the kibble, and then I would cook her chicken and rice. She would get better, and then we would switch back to kibble, and then she would get worse again. Finally, it got to the point that she was starting to have stomach issues with chicken and rice. Buffy had less energy, and there was a little less bounce in her walk.

One of our best friends suggested we try a dog food service that cooks human-grade meals for dogs, freeze it, and then ship a month’s worth of food in a box with dry ice. We settled on The Farmer’s Dog, and Buffy is doing great! She has gained weight back, her coat looks wonderful, and she has more energy. Buffy is excited to eat and complains to us if we don’t feed her on time. This is a change for a dog who hasn’t been food motivated in the past.

This food is expensive, but Buffy is worth it. She is one of my children, my first, and she doesn’t ask for much. Giving her quality food that makes he feel better and brings her joy is the least I could do. The expense is not unreasonable as I have come to accept where Buffy is in her life.

Everything in life is finite, and when we forget this, we take it for granted. Accepting these realities is hard, but it motivates us to get more meaning from our lives. The truth is that Buffy is closer to moving on than coming into our lives. The distant future with Buffy is no longer unimaginable. 

In the past couple of months, I’ve made an effort to say goodnight to Buffy every night. Sometimes I tell her that she’s a good dog. Other times I thank her for her help with the boys. And I always make sure to tell her that I love her, nuzzle up in her mane, kiss her on the forehead and say goodnight. Some nights I wake up in the middle of the night, feeling uneasy like I have forgotten something. And then I get up and kiss Buffy again.  Then I immediately fell calm, knowing that I didn’t forget my puppy and grateful that she is near.

3. Home At Last

After almost a year and a half, we traveled to the Seattle area and visited my parents, my brother, and his family in August. Since I moved to the Chicagoland area in 2000, I had typically seen my family three or four times a year. This was important in my life, and when I had children, the time with my family felt ever more precious. All of this changed when the pandemic started.

Being with my family after so much time way felt wonderfully “normal.” Even though it had almost been a year and a half that we had been physically apart, we talked like we always did. We stayed at my parents’ new condo, which was a fun adventure. This place was smaller than their old house, but it had many amenities like a pool that we enjoyed.  Also, they now live in a downtown area, so there were a lot of places to go within walking distance.  

We were there for the most extreme heatwave that area had experienced in decades, but we figured it out and still managed to enjoy our time.

This was a truly wonderful trip. My parents followed this up with their first trip to visit us during Thanksgiving in twenty years, which was also a great experience. We agreed that the next time we would get together is in February, so we planned on that.

We missed so much being apart, but I don’t dwell on that. Instead, I feel grateful for the time we had together and the times we will spend together in the future. This pandemic has been tough, but it has also been a confirmation of the strength of my family. The pandemic kept us apart physically, but it didn't make our love wane.  This was confirmed with Lucas. He saw my parents when he was a baby and then over Zoom. How would he react to them? Well, he knew my parents and their love almost immediately.  He smiled at them and was comfortable with them, cuddling with them and enjoying their company.

I miss my family when we are apart, and that’s hard.  However, I also love that I have people that make me feel the twinge in my heart when we are part and fill me up so completely when we are together.

2. Self-Care Becoming A Reality

I’m great at preaching about self-care. I’ve read articles about self-care and listened to lectures about self-care in numerous conferences, but I’m horrible at actually doing self-care.

I kept exercising regularly through the pandemic, but that was about it with self-care. I didn’t drink enough water, eat all that well, drank too much alcohol, spent too much time on my phone, and didn’t sleep enough. I knew that this was affecting me, I was gaining weight, but I felt like I didn’t have the time to change. Then it hit me when I saw some photographs of myself in September. I wasn’t feeling great, and it showed.

So I went for it and started with Noom, a health app I had heard advertised on one of my favorite podcasts. Noom is a meal tracker, health tracker (weight, steps, and water), community space, and self-help book all-in-one. Is this a diet? Kind of, it does categorize food and push you into a type of diet. However, there is a lot of choice and leeway. Each day, you track your food, weight, water, steps, and exercise. In addition, you are supposed to do ten minutes of reading on your Noom app about various topics, including hormones, sleep, mindfulness, and nutrition.

In the last four months, I have made a lot of changes with the encouragement of Noom. I sleep more, and I’ve started reading books before going to bed, which I love. In addition, I cut myself off my phone an hour before I go to bed, I eat a lot better than I’ve lost weight, and I’ve even played around with meditation a little bit.

There’s a lot I need to work out. First, I need to accept that at 39-years old, I will never look like a fitness model, and I need to be okay with that.  At the same time, I can strive to be healthier. Second, I need to learn to balance out my healthy eating choices with allowing myself to enjoy indulgent food, and third I need to know to celebrate health goals not passed simply on my weight.

I sometimes feel like I’m spending too much time thinking about my health, and maybe I am. However, taking better care of myself feels like a hobby that I’m enjoying right now. I know Noom has its flaws and it may not end up being the right thing for me, but I have kept this up for four months.  Right now this feels like this approach to self-care and an important part of my life journey.

I want to feel proud of my body, but more than that, I want to feel proud of myself. Maybe this is what self-care is all about.

Parenthood: Week 455 - 10 Moments Of 2021: Part 2

My reflection on my sons, in no particular order...

Ollie has an excellent mind for games.

In the past year, he continued to develop his skill with chess. He has also gotten into playing other games too. Somehow he ended up with some Pokemon cards. He would take them out and look at them periodically. I asked him one day if he wanted to learn how to play the game, and he was excited about this idea. So I bought him two duel decks, the most basic one I could find, and we got to it. Ollie caught on quickly. Every other time I got him more decks, he was really excited to get into the game and play it. I would sometimes find Ollie playing a Pokemon against himself to practice and get to know the decks better. 

On our trip to Seattle over the summer, one of the things that we did was play board games. So, I suggested that he play chess with my dad. My dad was a little apprehensive at first since he hadn’t played the game in a while. However, my dad quickly found his groove. Then I suggested that my dad teach Ollie Chinese Chess.

Watching Ollie learn Chinese Chess from my dad was really special. It was more than a board game. This is part of Ollie’s heritage and a way that my dad and my son could bond. In full teaching mode, my dad helped Ollie understand the strategy and nuances of the game, and Ollie paid attention well and worked hard at playing the game.

Through Ollie’s talent with games, he learned about dad and himself, and through sharing the game of Chinese Chess crossed over that generational and cultural barrier.

 

Ethan is a lot of things. 

He is exuberant, opinionated, and loud. However, he is also creative, focused, and determined. We first saw this early in the pandemic because he did puzzles. This little child, whose energy at times was almost too much for our house to contain, would work quietly at a puzzle designed for children twice his age.

This evolved into workbooks in 2021. At first, it was these Color Wonder coloring books. These markers revealed color on the special paper but otherwise came off on normal paper as white. As Ethan worked on these, he started coloring specific shapes instead of just coloring all over the page, which he previously did. As a result, he colored through almost every Color Wonder book I found. He easily did upwards of fifty of these coloring pages.

Next was color by sticker books. Most of these books had stickers that you would peel off had numbers next to them, and you would put the stickers on a page space with corresponding numbers. Only recently is Ethan able to use the numbers to do these books. He just went by the shape and figured it out that way. He’s done at least ten of these books. Then I got him workbooks with letter practice, cut and paste activities, and matching work. H has done about a dozen of these. Now he’s only color-by-number work, and it unique his accuracy with coloring in the lines and the care at which he works.

Ethan has a set of markers. I have a backup set, so I can replace it for him whenever he uses up a marker. Ollie used his markers, but he never used them up the way Ethan does. It’s remarkable.

I love the moments when Ethan is concentrating and working. This year he really blossomed with this type of work. I am excited to see how this continues to evolve and the wonderful work he will do next year.

This year, Lucas began to reply.

When you have a baby, you communicate with them for the day they are born, but initially, you don’t get much back. Then, after a couple of months, they start to smile when you make a funny sound, and eventually, little baby sounds come out when you talk to them. In addition to words, we use hand motions to respond to babies, and over time they start doing them back. It’s a wonderful moment when they start to wave because it’s an exchange, a wonderful moment of connection.

For Lucas, 2021 was the year,so many connections came clear.

Lucas comes over when I ask him to. Even though he can’t say many words clearly, he knows many, which is clear when I ask him if he wants a banana and gets excited. In addition, he shows that he knows other directions and gets excited when I understand what he asks when he gestures towards something.

When my mom would say goodbye to Lucas on FaceTime, she would blow him kisses for months. At first, I held his arm and made him make the motion in response. This changed to Lucas responding to my mom on his own when she blows him kisses. Just two days ago, when Lucas saw mom on FaceTime, he started blowing kisses to my mom on his own. It was adorable.

Lucas is starting to come up with names for everyone in his family and is working really hard at talking. All of the learning he did around language his whole life is now being expressed more actively through his speech.

A couple of days ago, I started teaching him the baby sign language for “I love you.” With a huge smile on his face, he copied the motions. Like my other two sons, I know it’s only a short time before he signs “I love you” back to me.

I’m so proud of my Lucas-bear. He is wonderful beyond description.

10 Moments Of 2021: Part 1

10. Admiral Rachel Levine

Confirming a pediatrician and Four-Star Admiral for the United States Assistant Secretary for Health should have been straightforward and non-controversial.  That was not the case as the “senator” from Kentucky, Rand Paul, decided to engage in a disgusting line of questioning attacking Admiral Levine because she is transgender.

President Biden nominated Admiral Levine for the United States Assistant Secretary in a powerful statement of inclusion, making her the first transgender American to be nominated for a Senate-confirmed position. More than a “diversity” hire, Admiral Levine was an example of how you can have diversity and excellence in positions.

Paul and the Republicans could have joined President Biden in making America a more equitable and accessible society. Instead, the Republicans continue to make up false crises, “boogeymen” to make their supporters feel insecure and consolidate power. In the past year, their shameless attempts to do so have been sadly effective in riling their base. Once upon a time, it was the idea that Black men would assault white women, and now it’s CRT in schools, COVID-19 vaccines, and transgender rights.

In the face of paul’s attacks, Adrimral Levine did speak with dignity and grace. This is an important reminder that transgender Americans suffer from unjust discrimination and oppression. If a four-star Admiral can face such an attack on live television, imagine what is happening to less powerful transgender individuals.  We must all work deliberately to support transgender rights. 

The Republican party and most of its leadership have no intention to work to make American’s lives better, so it’s up to us.

9. Simone Biles

Simone Biles changed the narrative. She helped us all see what it meant to be tough and what it meant to be a hero. She further revealed exploitation and trauma in the “heroic” past of USA Gymnastics. And she showed us how to take care of others and ourselves.

Biles made me realize that sacrifice for your job was overrated and that our admiration for those who achieve “greatness” at the cost of their own mental and physical health needed to be questioned.

My entire life, I have had women who were described as “petite” as central figures in my life, my mother and my wife. I’ve witnessed how they have been condescended to, insulted, and belittled because of their stature. Watching Simone Biles last summer in the Olympics, it occurred to me that there is something very wrong and disturbing about how we see and treat women who happen to be shorter than others.  

The most important thing that Simone did for me was raise questions. These aren’t questions that had easy answers, but they are essential questions that change how we see our heroes, athletes, and the women in our lives who are a couple inches short than average, who in my experiences are anything but average. 

8. Amanda Gorman

I’ve talked and about almost every single part of my life and my identity except for one until I heard the words of Amanda Gorman.  Amanda Gorman gave me the strength to see the face part of my life and identity. I have rarely talked about but thought about every day of my life: my speech impediment.

I thought I heard signs of it in her voice when I researched her before the inauguration, which was confirmed in many of the interviews and lectures that she gave. Gorman is the first person I have ever seen in my life to talk openly and honestly about the type of speech impediment that I had growing up.

After hearing Gorman talk about her struggles, I didn’t immediately decide to dive into my feelings about my speech. It took a couple of months. Then, when it did feel like the right time, I wrote about my speech impediment in these blog posts and decided to see a speech therapist. 

This was a challenging and emotional process, but it was worth it. I know that I’m a “powerful speaker,” and I have taken more joy in speaking to others as a teacher and a person. I understand my daily challenges with speech better, and I’m getting closer to having pride in my journey with speech.

No, I am not yet proud of how I speak, but I see my speech as a strength and part of my life that has made me the man I’m proud to be today.

Parenthood: Week 454 - Being A Teacher/Parent

Sometimes being a teacher makes me a worse parent. 

 Like all jobs, a stressful and draining day at work leaves less in the tank to be an attentive and patient parent, and I have felt that in the past month. There are days that I come home and want to be alone and do nothing, but this is not an option. Parental responsibilities are one of the non-negotiable essential tasks you have to do when you don’t feel like it, so I just push through.

Teaching has another layer that makes it unique in how it can affect you as a parent. No, education is not parenting. My students at school are not my “kids.” I am not responsible for them. However, there are parts of teaching that are just like parenting. Effective parenting, like effective teaching, requires you to do set a good example as much as you talk. Parenting and teaching are based on the cross-generational relationship that needs to be managed thoughtfully, and there is much overlap in how teachers and parents discipline.

When there are days when teaching is filled with those elements that are more like parenting, spending time with your children can feel more like a second shift than a different job. On days like this, mental and emotional exhaustion is reached, and you just can’t get off the ride.

Days when teaching takes away from my energy and emotional space to parent are frustrating. One reason that I continue to be a teacher is that it’s a job that allows me to impact the world to make the world better for my children. Work takes me away from my children, so it’s important that my time away means something to them.

In the past two years, the toll that teaching has taken on my parenting, I have felt more acutely. In the fall of 2020, going into school to teach in person was scary. This was the time before vaccines, and much of our more effective treatments for COVID-19 were not widely available. I feared for my health and my children’s health. While many things about this fall are better than last fall, there is still a lot of stress and uncertainty that takes a toll on me.

Every day as a teacher, there are reminders that while being a teacher and a parent in 2021 is difficult, being a teacher makes me a better parent. Professional development covers topics like gender identity and bias that apply to parenting and teaching. Working in a profession where the employees are invested in the lives of children means that people get it when I have to miss work because my child is sick, and when I get a text from my wife about my child and need to call her.

People who work at my school love children. That is why they are educators. I never have to look hard to find someone who enjoys seeing a picture of my children or hearing a funny story about something that happened at home. And I am surrounded by experts about children, so I never have to walk far to get advice about my children. 

I don’t love everything about being a teacher, but I love being a teacher. More often than not, being a teacher has helped me be a better parent. I’m proud to tell my children that I’m a teacher. Because even if the most difficult and stressful at work, I’m trying to do right by other people’s children. If I care for other people’s children, and others can care for mine, we’re going to be okay. There is nothing admirable than to dedicate your life to caring for others. I’m proud to do that as a teacher and a parent.

Year 12 - Week 15: What A Week

I don't even know where to start. 

On Monday, I taught my sixth graders about the incredible indigenous rapper and musician Frank Waln.

In addition, I taught my students about the American Indian Boarding Schools in exploring his work. This discussion led to some of my students feeling deeply about this part of our history, and one student started crying when learning about these "schools."

 

I put an assembly on for my 4th and 5th graders instead of performing for their families. Unfortunately, because of COVID-19 restrictions, we couldn't bring parents into this school for this event. I've never done anything like this before, and it was a wonderful, magical event.

Tuesday, I had some difficult moments of teaching that shook my confidence as a teacher. I struggled to try to get work duties done while at the same time spending some time taking care of some essential personal things. Also, on Tuesday, my youngest, Lucas, got the flu. 

Wednesday, I stayed home with Lucas. While it felt rewarding to stay home and take care of my son, things at school kept moving forward. Unfortunately, our COVID-19 testing procedures revealed that a significant number of students testing positive. This led to the cancellation of the classes for the 8th grade for the remainder of the week and the rescheduling of the choir concert that was going to be Thursday night. As schools all across America put on concerts, ours was canceled. Even though this decision was made for the right reasons, it felt like something was taken from us.

Thursday, I spent a lot of time on parent communications. I have to craft these messages carefully, and this takes a lot of time.

Throughout the week, I received emails about students testing positive for COVID-19. This, along with the cancellation of the choir concert and 8th-grade classes, changes the school's mood. Parents were feeling this, and as Thursday went on, many parents pulled their students out of school. Many families decided not to send their children to school.

Some parents sent their children to school but requested that their students not play in band class due to concerns about COVID-19. I let these students have a study hall with another teacher. These students combined with students who didn't go to school resulted in half of my band students not being present in class, which was the day's final period.

Thursday night, disturbing social media trends came to my attention, which warned that school violence. Also, Thursday night, the high school in my community, Evanston Township High School, shut down after two guns were found on campus. 

Friday, I went in for a half-day of school. Many, many students were absent. I had two calls with the student's parents that went well. While these conversations were productive and felt rewarding, the morning was exhausting. I'm not sure what being burned out feels like, but I think I'm close.


I could write a whole post about each day this week, and I may later, but I'm done thinking about school right now.

It's been a week. It's been a month. It's been a year, and it's coming to an end. I'm not sure what 2022 will bring to my life as a teacher. I just hope it doesn't start how my 2021 ended.

Parenthood: Week 453 - Lucas is Two!

Lucas turned two years old last week.

Lucas' life has been very different from Ollie's and Ethan's. Even though he wasn't born during the pandemic, I think of him as a pandemic baby; he was born only a couple of months before it hit. As a result, he has spent most of his life living in his pandemic. His world is filled with people wearing masks, a smaller village, and a lot of time at home.

Ollie and Ethan experienced things by age two that Lucas hasn't. Lucas has missed trips, family gatherings, live theater, group music class, and many other things. What he does have that Ollie and Ethan didn't was more time at home and two wonderful older brothers. Even though this doesn't really make up for what was lost, it's a meaningful benefit to Lucas's life.

Lucas is adorable. This morning, I found him in our bed, sleeping when I left for work. He had somehow managed to settle in the space between his two pillows with his arms up around the sides of his head. Because of the proportions of his body, the top of his hands barely reached the top of his head. It was super cute.

Last week, along with turning two years old, Lucas decided that he would talk more. He's been saying more sounds in the past couple of days, and it's wonderful. There is so much joy when he says something, and he can tell we understand what he is saying. He has a little growl which he learned from Ethan, but he also has a higher voice that is cute and gentle.

Lucas has entered the climb on every stage, so I'm having to pull him off the table more often and off of the top of the couch. His fast toddler walk is pretty close to a run. The best part is that he often provides his sound effects by screaming while he runs or making a motorboat sound with his lips when he moves quickly.

All my sons are special for different reasons. Ollie was first. I learned how to be a dad with him. Everything was new with him, and everything was an adventure. He's my sweet boy who changed my life forever. Ethan was the challenge. From his first diagnosis with hearing loss to the fact that he was challenging to put to bed tonight, he was the one who has required more. He has shown me that I have more to give, and I have so much to learn.

Lucas is my reminder. He reminds me to slow down and read a book with him. He reminds me of what Ollie and Ethan were like as babies, which warms my heart in moments of frustration. He reminds me that the simple things in life bring the most joy. And his smile reminds me that I am enough.

I'm looking forward to Lucas' life being more defined by a time after this pandemic. As he grows every day, I will cherish the milestones and the small moments, nd I can't wait to see the wider world through his eyes.

Happy Birthday, Lucas. Thank you for being my sunshine in the darkest of times.

Year 12 - Week 14: Pandemic Dress Code

"I'm Asian too. I love your shirt." 

 At first, I was startled by this studnet, and then I remembered I was wearing a shirt that had the Sandra Oh quote, "It's an honor just to be Asian," written on it. 

This wouldn't have happened before the pandemic. 

My first teaching job had a dress code for teachers. Men had to khakis or dress pants and a buttoned polo or buttoned-down shirt. (I don't remember what the dress code was for women). But, on Fridays, we could wear jeans! At the time, I didn't mind it too much, except for the ironing. In retrospect, this dress code was silly. It was supposed to be a way to be "professional" and engender respect, but both of these things are more meaningfully earned, and understood through actions more than clothing. Maybe it was a high school thing. 

My second job was in an elementary school, and there was no explicit dress code. I wore jeans and a button-down shirt. I was working with younger students and often would end up helping out in PE or sitting on the floor. Other people dressed about at this level, while others wore t-shirts and jeans to school. 

I kept up this at my current job: jeans and a buttoned-down dress shirt. I like being a little sharp, often wearing a Brooks Brothers shirt. The dress shirt made me stand a little bit taller and helped me feel like I was "at work." 

And then the pandemic hit. I think I wore a dress shirt one with pajama pants for a Zoom class, and I gave up on that. While we were remote for the spring of 2020, I pretty much wore a t-shirt and yoga pants or pajama pants for all of my online teaching. 

 
I remember the day before the first day of school in the fall of 2020 when we were going back for in-person teaching, unclear about mitigations, before there were vaccines, and scared about the school year and saying to myself, "I'm not going to dress up for school until the pandemic is over." Since then, I've worn a t-shirt, jeans, and a zip hoodie to school. 

 
I started noticing that people saw what was on my t-shirts that I was wearing. Most of the shirts had pop-culture references and some funny sayings. I avoid wearing my political shirts at school. But, I realized through my t-shirts I could create a feeling in the classroom like a poster on the wall could. So I upped my t-shirt game.

Students love the "The Patriarchy Isn't Going To Smash Itself" shirt. I have a Ruth Bader Ginsburg shirts I get comments about, and I have a fun shirt with a cartoon of a Sheltie, which reminds me of my dog Buffy when I'm asked about it. This leads to my sharing videos and photos of my dog. 

 
The most wonderful responses I get are around my Asian pride shirts. The Sandra Oh quote shirts get comments, and I have a shirt that simply states, "Asian-American Teacher."  I get compliments from adults and other students about this shirt. The fact that I can display pride in this part of my identity and be embraced for this display in my school community has confirmed this school's values of diversity, equity, and inclusion. And I am very aware that I would get criticized for such bold declarations of racial pride in other schools.

Will I go back to dressing more formally at school after the pandemic is over? I'm not sure, but right now, what I'm wearing to school feels right. I can bring more of my full self to school wearing what I would wear at home around my family. In this time of crisis and continual trauma, being less formal and sharing who I am and what I value through what is on my shirt is what my students need from me and what I need to do to be the best teacher I can be.

Parenthood: Week 452 - Figuring Out How To Be a Dad

My children are not scared of me. 

When they do something they shouldn’t do, I can effectively redirect them, but I don’t sense a level of fear or intimidation from them. When I am trying to express anger at them, it is clear that it is not effective. I’m not surprised, as I have found through my teaching experience that fear is not an effective tool for me.

This all stems from really good things. Many men in my generation are doing the best they can to be a better kind of father. We do more chores around the house, support our partners the best we can, and try to be emotionally available to our children. The problem that I have found in conversations with other men is that knowing how to discipline gets confusing. Traditional models of discipline from previous generations don’t work because the relationships we are trying to create require a level of emotional distance that we are actively trying to work against. 

Sometimes I wish I could use a stern tone, and my children would immediately stop what they are doing and change their behavior. But that doesn’t work. What is usually effective is if I come to their level, get them to slow down physically, and calmly talk things out. The best tool I have to get them to snap out of behavior is to take something away (e.g., a toy). This is the only thing that gives them a shock to the system that gets them to pause. 

 
There is a level of aggression with taking something away or removing a child from a room that I don’t like, but it is sometimes the only thing that works. I’m trying to do this less suddenly. Ideally, I ask them to give me the toy, but I’m only there with my oldest right now. 

The hardest thing about disciplining my children is how the quality of my tools has to do with how much I have left in my tank. I am a teacher, and I spend my whole day with young people. A big part of teaching is discipline. While I rarely have significant issues, I am always maintaining a certain level of work and awareness around children. It’s part of the gig. 

 
After a day of teaching, I come home and I have to do often more disciplining.  It’s hard to do this when you’ve been doing it all day. The other difficult piece is that it feels more personal with my children.
Once upon a time, I took it personally when a student acted out in class.  After almost seventeen years of teaching, I don’t take students’ misbehavior personally most of the time. It’s rarely, if ever, about me. 

Honestly, I think it’s the same with my own children. I don’t think they are doing a lot of things “to me.” This is because so much of what they do is impulsive. While I know they love me, they don’t fully see me as a human being all of the time. They don't understand the impact of their actions and what it means to show love is still developing. I’m learning to take less personally when my children misbehave. Because like with my teaching, more often than not, it’s not about me. 

 
As we seek to figure out what it means to be a man and how to make expressions of masculinity inclusive and constructive, the search for how to be a dad persists. I don’t think the fathers in the past who ruled over their children with fear enjoyed that and felt like what they did was effective. I think fathers who used fear to parents felt lost and struggled. Like many generations past, they just wanted to feel connected with their children. 

 
There is a lot of work to be done, but it is good to work. The problem modern fathers find themselves is an opportunity to make fatherhood better for our children and ourselves. Being a parent-focused on love will be the greatest gift we can give our children so they can build off of our struggles and learn to parent better than parents than us.

Year 12 - Week 13: The Best of Us

Where do we go from here? 

Teachers are resigning, and there are not enough people to fill these positions. Republicans have created another boogie-man in CRT, convincing people to fill school board meetings with lies and threats. Schools continue to struggle to figure out how to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic with wide variation policies resulting in rampant inequity. In all of this, our children are suffering.

Like many other professions, the pandemic has helped many teachers understand that they don’t have to accept mistreatment. They’ve learned that walking away from a teaching job that asks too much and pays too little is not letting students down. Is it the administration, the school board, and other systems that have created an unsustainable teaching position that is letting the students down. A teacher leaving for their own mental health, and other reasons that reflect self-care is doing the most important thing: not letting themselves down.

We can’t afford to lose great teachers right now. And if quitting a job now and taking a break from teaching means that you can come back to the profession a couple of years from now, please do that. It’s a much better path than getting burned out from teaching and not coming back.

When I was fired from my first teaching job, my belief in my abilities as a teacher was rock bottom. I couldn’t find a full-time teaching position.  One of the reasons that didn’t happen was that I didn’t believe I could be successful doing one and that I deserved one. So I took an assistant job, and I was incredibly fortunate that I had a wonderful supervisor who built me back up. She believed in me more than I believed in myself. Every day and in every way helped me see the great teacher I was and my potential to grow.

I had that person pick me up when I was down, but many teachers do not, so you got to get out before you hit that bottom. The most important person that teachers save right now is themselves.  I should have taken care of my first job and left it after my first year there as opposed to hanging on for a second year.

I don’t know how we will solve all of these problems in education right now. But I do know that we have no hope of building back better in school for our students if the best of us are not there to greet the students in the morning and engage in the essential work of education. And we can’t be there if our budgets are too small, we have too many children in the classroom, and we are burned out.

Teachers, please take care of yourselves. We need you in the game. Don’t let recommendations of “self-care” from your administration be lip-service. Don’t be hard on yourselves because you can’t do the impossible, and don’t give too much of yourselves. Because when all is said and done, when you give a teaching job too much at the detriment of your own mental and physical health, you will only lose.  You will never get back what you give, when you give too much. 

Love teaching, love your students but most importantly, love yourself.

Parenthood: Week 451 – Lucas' Explorations

Lucas now can teleport. 

I will walk by and see him playing in the living room, and then I'll go into the kitchen. I walk out of the kitchen a minute later, and Lucas is now in the den, standing on top of the coffee table. 

Ethan and Ollie both hit this stage when I underestimated their ability to move quickly, reach higher, and get into stuff. It feels like a slow process from birth to walking. However, the process from walking to running, reaching, and climbing goes quickly.

Lucas is enjoying his new mobility, and it's adding a whole new dimension of "fun" in our house. Beyond climbing onto the coffee table, he can get onto the dining room chairs and the sofa. Lucas can also climb up onto our bed which is pretty incredible to watch. He grabs onto the duvet with one hand, swings one leg onto the bedside table, and manages to climb up onto the bed with his horizontal body. It is adorable how proud Lucas is of himself when he does this. He smiles and giggles to himself after he's on the bed. It's like he thinks he is being sneaky and loves getting away with getting on the bed.

Lucas has found freedom in the kitchen step stool. Diana and I are short, so we have a folding step stool we keep by our refrigerator. Someone Lucas figured out how to carry around the house and set it up. This step stool gives Lucas access to a whole new world in the kitchen. Lucas loves exploring the silverware drawer and other places in the kitchen previously out of reach. Yes, part of me is annoyed how he now gets into more stuff he shouldn't, but mostly, I'm proud of his ingenuity.

Now his ability with the television is something else.

Lucas will walk up to the television and turn it on using the button on the side of the television. Then, he will find the Roku remote, sit down and start moving through the Roku menu. On more than one occasion, he has figured out how to start a show or movie that he really shouldn't be watching.

Lucas isn't really a daredevil right now. He doesn't throttle himself off of things like Ethan did when he was at this age. However, he does periodically fall off of things. For example, the other day, he rolled over on the sofa and ended up falling on the floor because he misjudged the depth of the cushion. Also, like other toddlers, sometimes his core muscles fail him, and he will flop out of a chair.

It's fun to see the world open up to Lucas. He is at an age when the world is an adventure. He is often the first of my three sons to be ready to leave the house for an outing. Whenever I take Buffy for a walk, Lucas usually runs over, puts on his boots, and wants to join us.

The world must be an excellent place through Lucas' eyes. He's got two older brothers who provide entertainment all of the time, the warm presence of a cute dog, and a life where there is something new and wonderful every day to experience.  

It is one of the great joys in my life to see the world through Lucas' eyes.  

Year 12 – Week 12: Taking a Break From Teaching Christmas Songs

For the first time, I'm not teaching any Holiday music this winter. We've had to make some changes to our Winter program because of COVID-19 mitigation. Instead of doing a JK-5 Winter Program for parents, we do two smaller assemblies for just the students. Because of the format of these programs, it didn't seem logical to do an assembly that featured music representing music from many different cultures, as we have done in the years past. It's a weird feeling, but it doesn't feel wrong. 

As someone who is not Christian, growing up in America, the "Holiday season," which, let's be honest, is the "Christmas season," is challenging. America started as and continues to be a Christian-centric society. As a result, overtones, implications, and direct inclusion of Christian quotes, themes, and ideas are in almost every part of our society. Add in the fact that a significant percentage of Christians flagrantly misinterpret the teachings of Jesus Christ as oppressing people, and the Christmas season is a mixed bag.

Cultural American Christmas with its mythology that has loose to no associations with the birth of Jesus Christ (e.g., Flying reindeers, elves on shelves, and Coca-Cola's Santa Claus) is really confusing. I have thoroughly enjoyed the more secular aspects of Christmas, like buying gifts for people, and the religious traditions, like singing Christmas hymns in church. But I have also felt left out and isolated during this time of year.

All of this has been with me when I've taught Christmas music to my students over the years. I have felt it was important when teaching "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" to help all students understand the origins of Santa Claus and understand the secular nature of how many people in America incorporate this myth into their Christmas celebrations. I think one way of helping students who are not Christian find something to enjoy in the Christmas season is to understand that so much of what people do in the name of "Christmas" in America isn't religious at all.

At the same time, it has always felt frustrating. We, as Americans, struggle with Holidays. We can't do Halloween without racist and sexist costumes. We can't do Thanksgiving without propagating racist colonial myths, and we can't do Valentine's Day without pushing heteronormative ideas about gender and romance. Yes, we can honor Veterans on a certain day, but we don't honor them when they need us the most in their times of need. I can't think of one Holiday which does not reveal a flaw in our culture. 

I want my students to be able to rock out to "All I Want For Christmas Is You," but it's really hard to explain how this song expresses the "Christmas spirit" featured in many places in American popular culture. Because if, from reading," the "Christmas spirit" is about giving, love, forgiveness, and community, then why does this spirit seem so lacking in a significant minority of Christians who celebrate Christmas?  And most importantly, what does it mean to a student who is not Christian to sing a song about Christmas? 

I don't have good answers for these questions, but I'm glad that I have this month ahead without teaching holiday music to reflect on the inclusion of holiday music in my curriculum. We have to embrace our culture for what it is and help our students understand it. We have to do this in a way that empowers more than confuses. I hope I've been doing that, but right now, I'm not sure.

Parenthood: Week 450 – Buffy & Ethan

As Ethan is going to bed, sometimes he asks if he can "sleep somewhere else." This means that he wants to sleep in my bed. Since he goes to sleep a couple of hours before me, and more often than not, he goes to sleep pretty quickly after settling in my bed, I don't mind. However, at some point in the night, I will move him to his bed.

This happened the other night. As I was getting ready for bed, I picked up Ethan to carry him to his room as he slept. I opened the door and found Buffy lying on her side, completely asleep on Ethan's bed. Maybe, she decided to keep Ollie company, who shares a room with Ethan. Maybe, she liked the scent of Ethan and wanted to snuggle up into his covers, or maybe she had settled there because it was a bed, like hers, that was close to the ground.

I awkwardly put Ethan in the top corners of the bed so that he wouldn't bother Buffy. Then, I carefully picked up Buffy and placed her on my bed. I went back, rearranged Ethan on his bed, and put the covers over his body.

*****

I figured that Ethan would catch up. He was going slowly around our neighborhood on his scooter. It had been a while since he had used his scooter, and he was stubbornly trying to hold a Lego Mini-figure, which was hindering his progress. I tried to move Buffy ahead of Ethan, but she refused.

Buffy is a small dog; she always loses in a game of tug between her and me, though I am cautious not to pull her hard unless she is in danger. She's older, and while I sometimes push her to go on a long walk, I try to take my cues from her. Sometimes she wants to go for a shorter walk and head home, and more often than not, I let her take the lead.

Buffy kept looking back at Ethan and refusing to go forward. I walked back to Ethan, and held his handlebars, and started pulling him along. At this moment, I felt Buffy's leash go limp, and she started strolling along with us. As soon as Ethan stopped, she stopped.

There are times on walks when she doesn't seem to notice or care about the boys' pace, but on this walk, she felt it was important to keep her pack together.

In the past, Ethan has tried to ride Buffy like a horse, he has tried to push Buffy off the couch, and he has yelled at Buffy to wake her up while she was napping.  In the most challenging times of Ethan's sleep training journey, while Ethan cried loudly, I remember Buffy groaning loudly and leaving our room to go downstairs and try to get some sleep.

This morning, Ethan got up early. After I fed him breakfast, he wanted to go upstairs. I told him to be quiet because everyone else was still sleeping. Ethan quietly walked over to Ollie and kissed him while he slept. Then hearing Lucas crying, he went over to his room to say good morning.

Buffy noticing the movement, slowly lifted her body out of her bed and stretched. Ethan went over to her, gently petted her, and said, "Hi, Buffy!" He walked closely next to her as she walked out of the room. As she went down the stairs, Ethan said, "bye, Buffy."

I'll never fully know what Buffy means to Ethan and what Ethan means to Buffy, but I have seen in moments that they see each other as family, and continue to share a life with and for each other.

Year 12 – Week 11: Feeling Inadequate

When you are teaching a group of students show to sing or play an instrument, sometimes your assessment of how they sound and are progressing can be distorted. 

Sometimes it's because you are listening for something in particular when you teach, so you miss the forest for the trees. Other times you aren't listening carefully, and you miss things because you are focusing on classroom management or the next part of the lesson.

This is why it's really helpful sometimes to get a guest teacher to come in and work with your students so you can sit back and really focus on listening and assess where your students are at, without worrying about being an active teacher.

Sometimes observing your students while someone else is teaching can be inspiring and affirming, and other times it can be distressing.

This week I brought in a colleague to work with my students. She is an educator and a professional singer. At this point in the unit, I felt that my students needed different energy in the music room, and I needed some ideas on how to get my students to move to the music and encourage them to sing with more confidence.

I'm sitting there behind the piano, hearing some really good things from some of my classes. Because I wasn't leading classes, I focused on each student, and it was interesting to see how they were singing. Most of the types were doing some really good work, and I felt that I saw signs of the work I was doing in the students' progress.

Then there was that one class. They didn't sound like how I thought they would. To be clear, this was more about my misperceptions than anything the students were doing wrong. They were singing softer than I thought they would and were very timid. Were they like this in previous classes, and I hadn't noticed? Most likely. Why didn't I see this?

At that moment, I felt inadequate as a teacher. This is a feeling that all teachers know well. Typically, it happens less and less as teachers get more experience. While this is true with me, teaching during the pandemic brought this feeling back in full force as I struggled to figure out how to teach in the worst of times.

Along with this feeling comes reflective questions—some less productive than others. I felt bad that I was letting my students down, that I should know better how to help the students be better singers, and doubted that I could move them along. I tried to push this aside with evidence from past performance that I was, in fact, a competent teacher. It's hard in that space when there is a tension between what is and what you thought was there. 

This experience reminded me that, in some ways, I'm a much more insecure teacher than I want to acknowledge and that I still have a lot to figure out.  There was plenty of good that I saw this week, and I will try to let that excite me as I take the time to figure out how to do better for my students.

Parenthood: Week 449 – The Love In Vaccines

I had no hesitation.

Ethan was going to get his last, and final polio vaccine dose and his fifth DTaP shot (diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis vaccine)

I had told him that the vaccine would be like a pinch in his leg and that it would hurt, but only for a little bit. I assured him that he is brave, just like his older brother Ollie who had gotten his COVID-19 vaccine just a couple of days ago. This all seemed to assure him about the vaccine experience, but once the nurse came in, she instructed me to lie him down, Ethan lost it.

There are moments to pump the brakes and talk things out, and there are moments to make things happen. This was later, so I forced Ethan’s leg down that was kicking at me, moved his pants, and held him down.  Ethan told me in a shaky voice that he was scared. I told him that it would be over soon. I looked straight into his eyes, and as much as I hated to do this, I thought to myself, “this is better than him getting polio and being paralyzed.”

I felt his body tense up as the first shot that went into his thigh. I told him that he was almost done, and I felt his body shudder as the second shot went in. The nurse quickly put band-aids on his legs, and I swept him up into my arms and wrapped him up in my jacket. I carried him over to the chair of the examination room and held him close. Calming down, Ethan whimpered in a soft voice, “when am I got going to get the vaccines?”

“You just got the vaccines,” I assured him.

“What?” Ethan asked, confused. I laughed to myself and hugged him tighter.

The COVID-19 vaccine has helped me come to no longer take for granted the vaccines that generations of medical researchers have developed for the human race. The amount of pain and suffering that my children have not had to experience because of vaccines is incalculable. My children have never had to endure the pain of hepatitis B, rotavirus, haemophilus influenza, pneumococcal, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, and hepatitis A because of vaccines. And if you don’t believe me about how destructive these viruses and diseases are, Google them and read about what they do to children.   It is horrifying.

What's more disturbing is the fact that without the widespread use of these vaccines, one or more of my three children most likely would be dead.

COVID-19 has also brought into our children’s minds the importance of vaccines. Ollie knows that Diana and I have gotten the COVID-19 vaccine, and Ethan has been wondering about it. It’s a very abstract idea to him, which was evident a couple of weeks ago when he asked us if the vaccine would fit in our house.

I told Ollie last weekend how proud I was of him for being brave and getting the COVID-19 vaccine shot. I explained how vaccines are more than something clinical and scientific. It’s something that we can do for ourselves and others at exactly the same time. It’s a way of saying “I love you” to yourself and others.

As I held I told him that I loved him, and I felt gratitude for who people who dedicated their lives to creating vaccines.  I can see their work in the light in my children's and the hope in their hearts. 

Year 12 – Week 10: It’s Not All Lost

Students have lost a lot during this ongoing pandemic.

My students didn’t perform on stage, some of them had less music class than I years past, and they didn’t sing in school for a year and a half. They are not in the same place musically as students I had in previous years. I don’t like thinking about my students being “behind” because that implies that they are somehow deficient, which they only are if you compare them to educational standards that cannot be applied to students right now. And I don’t like the term “learning loss” because it implies that they lost something. Our students didn’t “lose” anything. They were denied opportunities to learn because of the pandemic and the lack of prioritization on children throughout this crisis.

I don’t want to walk into my classroom feeling sorry for my students, thinking about how they are behind and what they can’t do. I wish things could have been different for them, and I am empathetic about their experience, but we are also in the space of privilege in the present. And with all that we are given, we need to do the best we can to move forward positively.

My thinking lately has been more on what they can do and will do more than what they can’t do. While growth opportunities have been lost, we can create new opportunities in the present. The potential in our students is still there.

My 6th graders did a group composition project. It required a lot of discussions, compromise, and creativity. Overall, they worked really well together. The compositions were fun, and they worked in an inclusive and supportive way. There is work to be done in thinking about what it means to collaborate. I was worried after hearing over and over how students lost the ability to work together that this project would not go well, but it did go great. The students felt this in the room as I did.

I have some wonderful singers in my 5th grade. I wanted to give them a challenge, and one of my co-workers suggested teaching them “Stand By Me.” I could teach them the bass line, melody, and some harmony lines, and they could become a apella group. I’ve don’t simple 2-part things with my 5th graders in the past, but nothing this complex required a good level of musical independence.

They learned the parts much faster than I thought they would. I was getting excited. So with only eight of them around the piano, I asked half of them to sing the bass line and the other half to do the melody, and they kept it together. I was floored. I can’t remember the last time I was that genuinely impressed with a group of my students. They were doing things that students in previous hadn’t and probably couldn’t.

Some of it is me growing as a teacher.  But most of it is the students.

Yes, our students missed out on experiences, but the most important things: their potential and spirit are still there for us to nurture if we give them the support, the space, and the light to grow.

Parenthood: Week 448 – Monkey See

I heard the insert in the potty shake in the corner of our living room as I was looking down and writing an email on my laptop.

“Ethan, good job, buddy,” I affirmed, and then I looked over and saw Lucas sitting on the potty. Lucas is turning two in December and is very early to start potty training, but he has seen Ethan use that potty and wanted to do just like Ethan even though he didn’t understand what Ethan was doing.

So much of what young children do is based on imitation. While Ollie did imitate Diana and me, after observing my two younger sons, it’s clear that children learn from imitating each other differently than they imitate their parents.

To a child, so much of what adults do are impossibilities, physically and mentally. To Lucas, Ethan is doing things at this level, and it makes sense that he sees what Ethan, as doing as more accessible.  Lucas is sitting on Ethan’s potty instead of trying to sit on the toilet as I do.

It’s not uncommon to see Ethan and Ollie on the couch watching television lying on the couch in the same way. Ollie does this thing where he tries to stand on his head against the wall which Ethan learned from him. When Ollie and Ethan are running around the backyard, Lucas often is trailing after them, not fully understanding what they are doing in their pretend play, but he knows that they are doing fun, so he copies them.

There is another side to this. Ethan sometimes growls when he says goodbye during FaceTime calls, and guess what? Now, Lucas does the same thing.  If Ollie decides to be energetic around bedtime, Ethan will copy him, and we have two children we are trying to calm down. In this way, Ollie and Ethan have a lot of power over what their younger siblings do, and it’s something they are beginning to understand.

Every child is a teacher, and it’s fascinating to see how my children have continued to teach each other different things. Most of the teaching is not deliberate but through actions. Yes, Ollie will read to his brothers, but they have learned more from watching him read, which I see every day as Lucas looks through piles of books on the floor every day.

Watching my children learn from each is an important reminder of how much they learn from me when I’m not actively teaching them.  Children see more than we realize and are learning all of the time. 

As I see them learn things from each other, I wonder what they are learning from me.

Year 12 – Week 9: Taking a Sick Day

I remember hearing early in my teaching career that the most important thing you can do to take care of your students is to take care of yourself. If you are sick, then you can’t be there for your students. I have said this other teachers throughout my teaching career, but I got to be honest. There are many times I haven’t followed this advice.

I can think of numerous occasions in my teaching career when I came to work sick or stayed at work when I was starting to get sick. I remember one instance coming in and teaching when I was so congested that I could barely talk, let alone sing, but I came in anyway.

Why?

Some teachers like to show that they are tough. This manifests in teachers showing off their “teacher voice” and refusing to use a microphone, teachers staying working late, and probably worse of all, powering through being sick and coming to school.

You often hear teachers bemoan that “it’s harder to create sub plans than coming in and teaching.” Some schools have very unforgiving sick day policies. Also, other teachers feel pressure to keep their students moving forward academically and are afraid of lost learning when they are absent.

There have always been risks of a teacher coming in when they are sick. Teachers could get sicker themselves, and one teacher who even has minor symptoms can spread a virus to their many students.

When COVID-19 hit, one of the significant changes in schools was a hard stop in many schools to teachers coming into school sick. This, combined with the higher standard of health to let students come to school meant that I have had to take more days off to be with my children at home.  I have taken far more sick days in the past year than in previous years.

Seeing this coming, I have structured units and included technology in my classes to set up tools so that if I am absent, the students can still engage in productive work. It doesn’t cause me as much stress to take a sick day as it has in the past. Part of it is that often I don’t have a choice and I need to accept sick days as part of my job.

My school won’t let me teach sick even if I tried, but I think the main thing is that the pandemic has finally helped me truly understand that the best way to take care of students is to take care of myself. Showing toughness or having a level of “self-sacrifice” is just ego, and no one is impressed.

Moving forward, if we want to do right by our students and create a healthier school atmosphere, we need to remove barriers for teachers to take sick days and take care of themselves. Talk of self-cares by school leaders is meaningless without structural change that encourages teachers to care for themselves.

There’s been a change in how I think about self-care, and there needs to be a change in how Americans help teachers take care of themselves.

Parenthood: Week 447 – Halloween Meltdowns

I think it's fair to say that I have a love/hate relationship with Halloween. I love dressing up my little children in cute costumes when they are so young that they can't have any say in what they are wearing. I love the wonder of my older children getting excited to dress up, and I love watching my children go on the adventure of trick-or-treating.

That's about it.

Halloween with young children is accompanied by confusion and meltdowns. They don't get why they can't dress up like a certain character, they don't understand why they can't eat all of their candy at once, and the whole social interaction of going to people's houses to ask for candy is odd.

Our neighborhood does trick-or-treating early in the afternoon on a Sunday around the actual date of Halloween. This year Halloween was on a Sunday, so it lined up for once. Because taking young children trick-or-treating when the sun is down is not a good time.

My 4-year-old had an epic meltdown the night of Halloween after trick-or-treating. He was upset that I didn't let him eat more candy, and he was tired from the day's activities. There was no logic that I could tell him that would get through to him about why he couldn't get what he wanted, so I held him as he screamed.  Eventually, my wife took over and managed to get him to calm down.

After the kids finally went to sleep, Diana gave me a weary high five. We had gotten our children through another holiday. It took a lot of effort, far more planning than my children could understand, and we were left cleaning up after the day literally and figuratively.

Halloween is the start of the holiday season. Next will be Thanksgiving, then the winter holidays, and New Years. In our family, this time of year includes two of our son's birthdays. It's a time when children get excited about getting stuff, and I get excited about spending time with my family. Once again we will try to balance out the joy of giving our children presents with making sure they don't feel entitled to get more presents. And try to have experiences that minimize meltdowns and help us all focus on what it means to be a family.

Holidays are hard for parents. We want to replicate good things from our own experiences as children and create magic. Even though we try, sometimes we just can't. So we give and do more as parents during these times than receive. That's why holidays make more sense to me as an adult than they did when I was a child. Holidays are times I push myself to do more for my family, and that feels right. It makes the things I hate, like the too much-candy-meltdowns, fade into memory as the image of my 1-year-old walking down the street dressed up like Frodo Baggins makes me smile.

Year 12 – Week 8: This King’s Speech – Part 8

This King’s Speech – Part 7

“You are a powerful speaker.”

For the past two months, this affirmation has been in mind. But, mostly, it’s unsettled like a leaf in the wind. At times, it brings me a feeling close to pride, and at other times, it makes me uncomfortable.

I’ve been teaching for sixteen years, and I had the perception for all of this time that I was an unclear speaker, and that my childhood speech impediment was still me with. Teaching students and talking to groups of teachers was a big part of my job that brought me anxiety and discomfort.

For years, before a class, or a meeting, I would push aside thoughts and doubts and go for it. Sometimes I would forget about any concerns I had about my speech in front of students and other faculty, and others times, I would feel that my speech was flawed.

Part of me knew that I was a good speaker.  I love reading books to students and telling them stories. Still, I’ve always doubted how effective I was in communicating verbally with other people.

The comment form the speech pathologist, “You are a powerful speaker” permitted me to be proud of my speech. Early in the school year, before teaching class, I let myself think of this affirmation. As a result, I let go of some doubt and came closer to fully enjoying speaking to my students. It’s one thing to be good at something and thinks you are bad, and it’s an entirely different thing to be good at something and accept that you are good at something. And I’m getting there.

I’m letting go more and more about concerns that my speech is not clear. I don’t feel myself avoiding words as much, and I enjoy taking the time to express things to my students. It almost feels like a dream being in the classroom now and letting myself feel and accept that I am good at speaking.

I feel like I can grow as a speaker, let my words come out more with less preparation, and participate without hesitation in conversation. I can be more of a speaker because I am more than I thought I was. I think about my students and those who don’t realize they are good at something. I hope that I can help them see themselves as being powerful and permit them to believe in themselves in a small way.

As I see myself better as a powerful speaker, I am becoming to understand better that I am a powerful teacher.

Parenthood: Week 446 – The Eve of Ethan's 4th Birthday

Do you work hard on something because you love it or do you grow to love something because you’ve work hard at it?

This question came to mind last night as I lay in bed with Ethan on his last night as a three-year-old. Diana was reading a book to Ollie so I took Ethan to the guest room to read to him. I told Ethan to get into the bed so that we could cuddle while I read to him. I watched his struggle to figure out how to climb up on the bed and carry the books he wanted to read at the same time. Eventually he threw the books onto the bed, grabbed a hold of the comforter and climbed up onto the bed.

Ethan cuddled close to me as I read to him. He had been wanting to cuddle for a good part of the evening. He’s a physical child who likes being near people. It he had his way he would be cuddling with someone most of the day. While we do cuddle him, we have our limits. Earlier, he cried and threw a tantrum when I wouldn’t carry him up the stairs and when we told him that we didn’t want to cuddle with him when watching television.

Ethan had what he wanted now. We were cuddling and I was reading a book he was really interested in. After we were done with the books, I asked him if he wanted to listen to a song as I cuddled him to bed. Ethan requested, “She Used To Be Mine,” and I played it on my phone and balanced it on the headboard above Ethan’s head.

 

As the song played and the voice of a woman coming to terms with the struggles in her life, I thought about all that I had been through with Ethan. I remembered the stress, and anxiety, around his disability. I thought about the therapy sessions that were difficult in-person that felt nigh-impossible when they were remotely. Then there were the nights. The years of Ethan waking up in the middle of the night, sleepless co-sleeping and the months of work sleep-training him to stay in his own bed.

I’ll never forget the nights sitting on the floor of his room as he stood in his crib screaming at me. I knew if I picked him up and carried him to my bed he would stop screaming, but I also knew for all of us it was best to let him scream and leave the room.

The typical tantrums of a toddler, the challenges of parenting more than one child at the same time, and the pandemic on top of the strength of Ethan personality, made being his parent very difficult at times. There have been times I’ve needed breaks from him, and there are times that I didn’t know what to do with him. However, through it all I have loved him every single day, and leaned into the work of being his parent.

It’s both. My love has made me determined to work for Ethan, and the hard work has been satisfying and help me bond closer to Ethan.

Sometimes life just slips in through a back door
And carves out a person
And makes you believe it's all true
And now I've got you.

Year 12 – Week 7: The Joy Of Teaching WIth Imperfections

The general approach that music teachers should take in preparing their lesson as if they are a performer. If they teach a song, they should know the lyrics by heart, if they teach a dance, they should be able to teach the choreography without reference, and if they are playing an instrument in class, it should be at a high level.

I’m not there right now.

After a year and a half of not teaching singing, my voice is not at its best, and my guitar playing is rusty.  Songs that I taught for years are taking an extra second to come back to since I didn’t teach many of them last year.

This is a feature of this school year that I’m okay with. It’s getting better. But it doesn’t help that I decided to add some things to my curriculum that I’m not very good at.

With the challenges of this school year, I decided that creating routines would be really good for my students. I wanted these routines to teach foundational skills and also help them bond.

The answer: solfège.

Solfège is a way of teaching music that attaches syllables to certain notes (e.g., Do, Re, Mi). This educational method teaches aural skills, notation, and sight-reading. It can be an empowering tool that can help people better understand and learn music.

I’ve never formally taught solfège. In the past, I’ve played some solfège games and introduced the syllables and hand signs through rounds, but I never systematically taught solfège. I’m not sure why after teaching for sixteen years, I felt a need to teach something new, something that I have not mastered and very little experience with as a teacher and a student. I do know feels right to try to teach it now, and I kind of enjoyed the challenge of doing something new.

Every day as part of the opening of my class, we work on tonal patterns using solfège. I don’t have these patterns memorized, and currently, there are two out of about sixteen that I have trouble singing in tune. When I first started the year, I would play the piano along to know what notes to sing. Now I only use the piano for the two patterns I still struggle with.

It’s going really well.  The students don’t complain or point it out when I make a mistake. They enjoy the routine, and I’m really excited about the musical growth I’ve seen.

It’s easy for teachers to fall into habits and routines, but it can be fun and rewarding for teachers to take a chance and teach something that they have not entirely mastered. I didn’t like this feeling when I was an inexperienced teacher, but doing something new is rewarding right now.

It’s humbling, and a great reminder that I am a learner and sometimes that teaching can be imperfect and effective.

Parenthood: Week 445 – Lucas Tang 10/18/21

Sometimes I wonder what Lucas is thinking.

A couple of months shy of two years old, he is in full toddler mode. He walks around the house freely and climbs all over the couches. Lucas hasn't reached the "jump off of things" stage, but he gets himself into plenty of trouble. For example, he climbs on our coffee table and onto chairs, reaching for things left on the kitchen table. He does understand to get down when we tell him to.  Lucas can pretty much run now, though he hasn't quite figured out what to do with his arms when he does run.

Lucas has mini-tantrums.

For example, when he climbs up on Ollie's chair, I will pick him up. Then, with my arms around his chest under his elbow, I can hold him away while his little legs kick and he squeals in protest. More often than not, he gets over this pretty quickly. There have been rough moments with him when the crying has continued, but usually, it's related to something like teething or a cold.

In the park, he will run happily around the playground. But, like most toddlers, he trips every so often. He stands up, looks at his hand, and tries to brush the dirt off of them most of the time. His little brow furrows when he tries to figure out what is on his hands. It's a very serious problem for him when this happens.

Lucas is doing more independent play at this stage than his brothers. Maybe it's because he has had to learn how to entertain himself. After all, he has the share the attention of Diana and me with his brothers. Or maybe it's just his personality. For example, he will bring me plastic bins of toys to open for him and books to read.  However, he doesn't insist I sit with him. When he asks me to read him a book, he happily will sit next to me. When I tell him that I can't read to him at a certain time, he usually walks away and looks at the book himself.

One of Lucas' new favorite games is chase-kiss. He will run around the couch, and I will catch up with him, and he will pause, then I kiss him on the forehead, and he starts running again, waiting for me to catch up so he can get another kiss. The sounds he makes, the grunts as he runs, and the giggles as I kiss him to fill the house with energy and positivity.

When Lucas is hungry, sometimes he goes up to the high chair and tries to climb up into it. Other times he goes into the pantry and sees what he can find. That's why I found a bag of almonds lying on the ground when I got home today. A couple of days ago, I heard a crunching sound, and I saw standing in the front of the television reaching into a family-sized box of cereal. This box goes up to his chin, and he can barely carry it. He has to put his whole arm into the box to retrieve cereal, and he calmly puts the cereal in his mouth. I was about to call him to tell him to stop, but I let it go.

It was just too cute.

Year 12 – Week 6: Responding To Sexism In The Classroom

Teachers can control what they bring into the classroom, but they can’t control what students bring. When children walk into a classroom, they bring the love of their families, memories of life outside the school, and their incredible potential for hope and kindness. They also bring their anxieties, fears, and words and phrases that dehumanize and oppress into the classroom.

“Your mom.”

When he whispered “your mom” into the boy next to him, both of them laughed to themselves. I had just commented how they need to stand up straight and keep their hands to themselves while they sing. I was initially puzzled because my comments were a nonsensical set-up for a “your mom” joke. However, I quickly remembered that as of 4th graders, and most likely when they heard a “your mom” joke, they probably didn’t understand it. However, they did know that they were was something funny to some people about this joke.

When I asked them directly, “why did you mention his mom?” they both looked at me like they had been caught doing something they knew they shouldn’t have done. I told them that jokes about people’s mothers are often degrading, sexist, and racist. Joking about others in a demeaning way has no place in the music classroom.


“Oh, I LOVE talking about Frozen.”

He was trying to figure out a way to get in the conversation. I was playing some music from Frozen 2, and a couple of students debated which Frozen film was better. Most of the class was engaged in this debate, but this one boy wasn’t until he yelled out.

He spoke in a high, sarcastic, mockingly feminine voice.  I responded, "What did you say what you said in a high voice? To me, it sounded like you were trying to sound like a girl? Are you saying that only girls like talking about Frozen?”

In his eyes and the way he squirmed in his chair, I could tell that he wasn’t sure how to answer my question. I explained how my sons like Frozen, and my brother and I have talked about these films and even mapped out a plot for the third film.

The boy was surprised to hear about the affirmation that boys do enjoy Frozen. He couldn’t explain to me why he had interrupted in that voice. I left our exchange stating, “be thoughtful about what it means when you use a feminine voice.  What you did sound mocking, and I know you don’t want to make the girls in the room feel less than.”


“She looks SO Old.”

I was so excited to teach my students more about Sarah Bareilles. I clearly remember the first time I heard “She Used To Be Mine.” It was a wonderful moment of musical discovery, and I wanted so much for my students to have a similar moment.

This is why I was straight-up annoyed when one of the students yelled out, “look at her wrinkles!!! She’s so old!!” in a disgusted and mocking tone.



I put my hand up, and she stopped speaking, immediately knowing that she had done something wrong. I took a deep breath, and then we talked about ageism.

I asked her and the class to look around the classroom. They are were all different heights with different faces and they were all the same age. We talked about how you can’t judge people based on their skin color, and you shouldn’t judge people and place value on others based on how old they think you look.

Then I told them the harsh reality that women in society are judged far more harshly for having wrinkles and looking older than men are. The room was quiet.  I was still annoyed that the moment of enjoying the wonder that is Sarah Bareilles had passed, but I felt satisfied knowing  that we took the moment to talk about the intersection of sexism and ageism.

Parenthood: Week 444 – Volunteering

I didn’t really think that much about the women in this safe house.

I knew they were victims of spousal abuse; I knew that they came there with their children and left their homes in ways that were closer to an escape than a move to a new residence.

One of the reasons I didn’t think a lot about the women is that when I volunteered at this place, I didn’t interact with them. My job as a volunteer was to help prepare dinner, do chores around the house, and most of all provide child care for the women who lived in the house while they had other obligations like therapy or work.

I needed to get volunteers hours in to make my transcript look better for college. I didn’t want to be stuck doing one thing, so I found this summer volunteer program through the park district. They had this packet, almost like a course catalog for college, that had all of these different volunteer opportunities, the dates and hours they would happen, and you would sign up for what sounded interesting. The only obligation was to do a certain number of minimum hours to be in this program.

I chose a variety of things that looked appealing. I spent an afternoon pulling ivy off of leaves, which was not fun. Then, there was the time I helped out at a music concert with a person who ended up becoming one of my best friends in high school. I’ll never forget the orange-poppy seed muffin we shared and sing “Faith” by George Michael to her. What a way to start a friendship. I also helped out with an art fair and worked on forest trails.

Then there was the safe house. It was run by two nuns, which to my surprise, were not wearing habits. There were happy to have us there but were very direct. A graduate student from the University of Washington helped run the house as well. The one rule they told us was not to tell the children that we would see them again. The nuns instructed not to say goodbye to them by saying, “see you later.” There was a good chance that if we came back, they would be in this place and that we weren’t helping these children by leading them on. Also, they told us not to promise these children anything.  With all that these children had gone through, they didn’t want these children to be let down by us.

There were projects and supplies set up for us in the backyard, where we spent most of the time with the children. We made type-dye shirts and played hide and seek. When they found out I had the time to pay attention to them, some of the children would never stop talking to me the entire time I was there, and others wouldn’t acknowledge I existed when I spoke to them.

I liked coming to this place, and I visited there seven or eight times over two summers. I knew about domestic violence, but I didn’t understand this issue like I do now and how incredibly challenging this is to deal with, and how much more we need to do as a society to address this issue. I sensed at the time that there was a more significant issue going on, and I didn’t think that this experience would affect me. But now, as parents and teacher, I see clearly that this experience with these children in this place has helped me understand what I can be and need to be for the young people in my life.

Recently,  I’ve been thinking about those women in that house. As I parent, I wonder if I had the strength to do as they did, I wonder about their journey, and I wonder what more I could have done for them and what I can do for parents right now with an abusive partner, struggling to keep themselves and their children safe.