A Sun in My Universe : Sangu

Cosmic Friends

I was sitting in class 4B with my best friend. We always sat together, from Class 2B all the way through 12B.

I remember drifting: feeling happy and lazy watching the sunbeams stream in through the windows. I glanced over at Sangu. Ever intuitively tuned into others, she followed my gaze, and together we watched the little dust particles dancing in the light.

Our new science teacher was teaching.

“Sangeetha! Come up here and be the sun!” she said.

Rattled out of our daydreams, Sangu scrambled to her feet and went to the front of the room, shooting me a nervous look as she walked up. I knew what she was thinking: Had the teacher caught us not paying attention? I gave her a worried look, hoping it would see her through whatever was about to happen.

Our science teacher roved the room again, looking for someone else. Catching my anxious face still locked on dear Sangu, she said, “You come up here, too.” I went up, half in relief that whatever lay ahead we would face together, but feeling my knees give out just a little.

Our teacher turned toward us and smiled. “No need to look so worried.”

“Now… Sangeetha, you can be the sun. You,” she said, pointing for me to stand a few feet away, “can be the Earth. Now as you go around the sun, you revolve like this,” she said, spinning me around, “and move around her!”

I smiled. This was fun. Sangu the sun, and me the Earth. Light-headed and dizzy after all the spinning, the lesson had suddenly turned magical. We were a smiling, cosmic pair of friends as we headed back to our seats.

A good friend is like a four-leaf clover; hard to find and lucky to have. Irish Proverb

Golden Moments

I still remember the first day she joined our school. She came and sat next to me, her wavy hair beautifully brushed, with a blue butterfly clip on one side. We were five years old, or maybe six, a memory that now feels like floating in golden memory bubbles.

Some moments do not seem significant except in hindsight. This was one of them. I spent the next ten years glowing in the warmth of her friendship. There are some people without whom you simply cannot imagine life; Sangu was like that. I cannot imagine childhood without her. She was the essence of its magic.

She taught me (and everyone who knew her) so much without ever preaching. She was competitive yet genuinely encouraging. She was fiercely intelligent, but never made you feel small. She was enormously talented, without a single strain of arrogance.

I have seen plenty of people with charisma like hers turn into “mean girls,” wielding popularity like a knife and sharpening their words to hurt or exert influence. I don’t think it ever occurred to Sangu to do that. She was b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l, inside and out.

She showed us all how to lead by simply shining brightly. She elevated everyone around her. In all the years I spent with her, I do not remember a single unkind word from her. So many people over the years remember her pure kindness.

I am eternally grateful that I got to experience what it was like to have the friendship of someone like her. The golden memories tumble like sparkly confetti in my mind: her raw power and speed on the track ( she was the vice head girl and the school athletics captain), her elegance with a tennis racket, her deep interest in biology, the songs she loved, the endless cups of tea we drank together, the black turtleneck she wore tucked into her maroon sweater, running in the rain, aimless lounging, her love for everyone, her verve, her laughter, the determination in her jaw before a race, and the way she loved to brush her wavy hair until it shone.

The Sun Dims

That bright, steady light that shone from her, illuminating everything around her, made her final fight with cancer all the more heartbreaking to witness. Yet even as her body was ravaged and her physical strength ebbed away, she remained a dignified little queen. Over the years, I would call and ask about her pain. She would answer briefly and then deftly turn the conversation elsewhere. How could someone not dwell on their own suffering?

I hear people go on and on with graphic tales of pinkie toes and varicose veins, but I never heard her whimper too long. I once listed all my aches and pains after COVID and said, “Okay… your turn. I shared mine so you could do the same.” She burst out laughing and said, “Oh Saumi! I was wondering why you were doing that!” I didn’t get a single whine out of her even then; she was too busy laughing.

I received the news of her passing just as I was entering my classroom, where similar memories were being made by a new generation. So, I shelved the grief and did what she would do: put others first. But when I was finally ready to feel it, I felt something crash and crumble within me with such force I didn’t think I could bear it. Even though we knew it was coming, it hit differently. With her gone, a part of me has gone with her. I will miss her good counsel, cheeky quips, intelligence, love, and warmth.

My dear, darling Sangu. The Earth will never be the same without you. We will all miss you—miss you, miss you.

The Earth is never ready for the radiance of its sun to dim, no matter how many eons pass.

October’s Edge

Octobers in the Bay Area can bring rough heat waves. When the rest of the country seems to be cooling down and settling down into the beautiful colors of fall etc, Bay Area can feel dry, hot and a distinct wish to the universe to bring in the rains already.

Last week parched us all. The bright side of these scorching days were the sunrises. We had several days in which the sun’s rays burst forth, resplendent, and glorious.

Even the brilliant sunrises were not enough through. As I drove past the browning hills, I wished for rains. Then, as the days went on with the temperature relentlessly in the 90s, I settled. I just started to wish it would cool down. Forget the rain. Stop scorching please.

Bike rides

Last week-end, when the temperatures did start to drop, I took my bike out and went on a long ride through the riverside and lakes before hitting the bay. The cool breeze felt marvelous against my face. I biked on, listening to birdsong and taking in the gaunt river-bed – eaten bald by the starving goats, and the river barely a trickle. I biked on towards the lakes and saw that entire lake-beds had dried out too. I felt a pang for all the fish that lived there. The ducks, geese and pelicans had flown to wetter pastures or maybe had migrated due north.

In spite of this dry outlook though, I enjoyed the ride. I rode through a section of the trail with the waters of the bay on either side, enjoying the slow lull of the lapping waves, the quiet sound of breeze, and the occasional splash from the western grebes and avocets as they swooped into the waters nearby. An absurd part of me scanned the waters for the whale that got lost, and swam to Sacramento. Could it find its way back here?

I started back home eventually, somewhat reluctantly I admit. I would have liked to spend the whole day out there by the ducks, avocets and pelicans. To quiet the cacophony of expectations and ambitions, and belong in a place where no human voices could be heard. To rest. Luxuriate in the unhurried perfection of nature. Watch the herons stand for hours on end in the shallow waters by the shore.

The tranquillity of the water’s edge is enough to take the edge off October’s demands. 

I did head home eventually, rejuvenated in every way. The expansiveness of the trail and the waters are still intact when I close my eyes. To that, I am grateful.

What About Your School?

The joys of aging in a digital age

The son flopped on the bed, and gave me a commiserating look. I had a harried look on my face. I had just come back from university after a full day of teaching, and was surrounded by my course materials, some student books for grading, and looked like a demented owl looking for her sunglasses.

“Looking for your glasses or phone?” He said astutely, and I felt a little laugh gurgled up at that. He was right – I was always looking for one or the other. Talk about the joys of aging in a digital age.

Read Something?

“Well – Amma. How about I read you something while you look for whatever it is this time?”

I mumbled and groaned at the same time. “I would love that, but don’t you have work to do?” I asked him. It was 10 p.m. on a week-day night and most nights, he is busier than I am. High schoolers.

“I do….but let’s do this.”, he said, and picked up the book, My School Stinks.

I rolled at my eyes at his choice of book. I had picked it up from the library earlier that week, but still.

My School Stinks – Words by Becky Scharnhorst Illustrated by Julia Patton

It is truly a remarkable book. I love how children always astonish us. They have the ability to take something that unreal, know it is preposterous and go ahead to enjoy the nonsensical whimsical tales anyway. 

It starts off with

My desk mate STINKS, my locker buddy bites, and my teacher is UNBEARABLE.

I told Mom my classmates are WIL ANIMALS, but she said ALL little kids are wild animals. I think I’m going to be sick tomorrow.

The book carries on this vein, slowly turning our expectations and sentiments towards friendship on its axis, rotating it, reflecting it, and giving us a hilarious experience anyway. It turns out the boy was right – the school was full of wild animals – real animals and the family just drops him off and picks him up everyday without realizing that their son’s best friend could be a crocodile.

Well ?

The son & I cackled at the book, and I asked him. “Well – any wild animals in your school, my man?” And he responded with dead pan humor, “Of course!”

Then he went on to relate a totally hilarious and grossly exaggerated tale of the red hawk that made its home in the rafters of the school one time, and all the drama that ensued.

I told him about the time some child tried to flush a tree branch down the toilet and we each went back to our respective tasks with a smile on our faces.

 

Which Planet Are You Feeling Like Today?

Learning to Teach Science

One evening, I trudged up the hill to my classroom. It was after a long day of teaching, and I had spent a hot hour commuting to the university for my teaching credential lessons. The evening’s session was on learning to teach science. It is one of my favorite classes, but I did not envy our professor who had to infuse engagement and learning in a bunch wannabe-teachers after we had sent the whole day and week teaching. She is an excellent educator and never shies away from the task though. Somehow, she ends up making us feel invigorated and inspired to teach science by the time we leave, and that is noteworthy in and of itself.

Really, I am glad some people chose to develop others as teachers, and are so generous with their time and talents.

Moody and Muggy – like Venus?

This class, she chose to have a guest educator come in, and the lesson they had planned will stay with me for a long time. She had us answer a question related to our solar system as we walked in. She asked us which planet’s moods matched our own. Hot and muggy like Venus, or dealing with too many moons like Saturn.

  • Mercury: swift orbit – cratered surface
  • Venus: scorching heat – thick clouds
  • Earth: liquid water – teeming life
  • Mars: red dust – massive volcanoes
  • Jupiter: big red spot  – swirling storms
  • Saturn: beautiful rings – gas giant
  • Uranus: tilted axis – ice giant
  • Neptune: supersonic winds – deep blue

It was an interesting exercise and she soon solicited a few responses. Some felt they could be like Uranus or Neptune just to freeze or pause for a moment, or maybe just to escape the heat of the past week. 

A giant step is ?

Soon afterwards, she led us outside to the sprawling campus grounds overlooking the bay. The sun was beginning to dip in the sky, and she said a little walk might do us all a little good. We agreed and off we went. She set up a traffic cone in one spot and called it the sun. Then, she had us estimate the number of steps we would have to take if the scale was : one giant step  ~~ 10 million kilometers.

We guessed and took the steps placing the cones as we went. We only went up to Saturn, but it was enough to get us out of our heads, and into an expansive space. A place to let go of our daily worries and revel in the grand universe we belong to.

A simple search gives us this, but walking outside and acting silly with our classmates as we took giant steps never teaches us things the way a textbook or video does.

If 1 step = 10 million km, here is the step-by-step distance from the Sun out through the solar system (rounded to the nearest whole step):

Sun to Mercury: 6 steps (~58 million km)
Mercury to Venus: 5 steps (~50 million km)
Venus to Earth: 4 steps (~41 million km)
Earth to Mars: 8 steps (~78 million km)
Mars to Jupiter: 55 steps (~550 million km)
Jupiter to Saturn: 65 steps (~646 million km)
Saturn to Uranus: 143 steps (~1.43 billion km)
Uranus to Neptune: 165 steps (~1.65 billion km)
Neptune to Pluto: 140 steps (~1.40 billion km)

The more I live and experience life, the more I realize how little I know.

As we headed back inside, my head was already buzzing with a dozen different activities I could do with the children with this simple activity. They would never forget scales, and the enormous universe we live in once we had tried this.  Everything can be wondrous.

Where is the time?

The only problem is the classic one faced by all teachers. Where was the time? There is precious little of it given all the curriculum demands, testing requirements, standards to be met, small-group coaching, differentiated learning for different skill groups etc. Dedicated teachers try their best, and learning all that goes into running a smooth classroom, is something I am enormously grateful for.

Excerpt from Billy Collins poem: 

Early People – By Billy Collins Book: Whale Day & Other Poems

“Teaching is a noble and time-honored profession,
But little is known about it
Because no one is allowed in the classroom
Except the teacher and the students”

As we babbled our way out after the class, we were an invigorated bunch full of ideas to try out with the children, and I saw our Professor’s smile turn wider and fill her face, as we thanked her.

My mood, as I walked back to the car after a long day, matched Earth – teeming with life and ideas.

I wish I could give my own students lessons like these over time- lessons they will enjoy and remember. Even if they do not remember the specifics, it is enough if they remember feeling awe, accomplishment, sighing with understanding, and being happy to be learning.

Lost Whales – Look up!

Whale? Lost?

We tend to get inordinately excited by tales of whales. And why shouldn’t we? They are gorgeous creatures with songs of their own, lores and stories of their own, family structures that helps them navigate the whole planet together. All done with a sense of joie-de-vivre that we would do well to embrace.

The other day, there was a news item about a humpback whale spotting in the Sacramento River.

https://abcnews.com/video/136549664/

Humphrey the Lost Whale

This sparked a fascinating conversation with my younger colleagues who had grown up here in the Bay Area. Many years ago, they said, excitedly, their voices and the color in their cheeks rising with the memory, Humphrey the humpback whale, had also gotten lost in pretty much the same way. It was apparently a famous book too. A book that has enthralled millions over the years.

So, of course, I went looking for the book.

Humphrey the Lost Whale: A True Story by Wendy Tokuda (Author), Richard Hall (Author), Hanako Wakiyama (Illustrator)  Format: Paperback

Humphrey the Lost Whale: A True Story

Poor Humphrey was beloved and managed to capture the imagination of Californians as he lost his way spectacularly from the Pacific Ocean to the Sacramento River hundreds of miles away from the ocean.

Migratory creatures and their sense of direction

It is especially shocking to hear of whales losing their way because they are rather famed for their migratory paths. I remember watching beluga whales migrating to Alaska for the summer, and I can still see the image in my mind’s eye. Hundreds of white flashing beluga whales splicing through the waters with a splash. It is one of the most astounding sights I have ever seen.

Migratory creatures have captured our imaginations, and their powers of navigating a planet with nothing but magnetic fields and other innate knowledge sources is marvelous indeed.

Little Narwhal, Not Alone

by: Stone, Tiffany, & Ashlyn Anstee

I read another book of a narwhal getting lost and making friends with migrating whales, and found many thousands of kilometers away from its natural habitats. 

This book too is based on a real life story of a real-life narwhal who lost his way and made his home with a pod of beluga whales. Narwhals and beluga whales aren’t usually friends in the sea, but this one adapts to life with the pod, and the resulting story is heart-warming as every story of unlikely friendships is bound to be.

As California gets ready for a heat wave lasting for a week or so, I found myself thinking of the whale that lost its way and went way up the Sacramento River a few days ago. We don’t yet know whether it found its ways back to the oceans. I hope it does soon, if it hasn’t already. The river after the oceans must feel very hot & claustrophobic, not to mention that the salinity of the waters. 

Last night, as I walked home in the evening, taking in the stars in the skies above, I hoped Humphrey’s cousin would take inspiration from the stars above and find his way back.

Commensalism & Unlikely Friendships

Unlikely friendships

“I wonder whether these birds have a symbiotic relationship with these goats!” I said to the husband. Both of us were gazing at the hundreds of goats grazing in the river trail.

Watching these beloved goats graze in the river trail is a gentle form of entertainment. For one thing, they are used to having an audience as they go about their business. Children and adults find them endearing creatures. There aren’t too many goatherds in the vicinity which means, their audience has no means of being bored by cattle. The goats have a captivated audience, attracted by both their behaviors and their sanguine sense of happiness.

There were a few egrets too, and they caught my fancy.

You see? These egrets don’t fancy each other’s company very much. Pretty solitary creatures they are. Yet somehow, they seem to be with the goats. Hundreds of them. They don’t seem to be eating any pests on the goats. No hitching rides on their back. Nothing of the kind, I’ve seen in documentaries of rhinos and oxpeckers, where the oxpeckers keep the rhino’s hide clear in exchange for their protection, and a free ride.

Oxpecker riding on a white rhino, AI generated

Symbiotic Commensalism

Curious, I went looking for the reasoning behind unlikely friendship. It turns out they share what is known as commensalism. One of the creatures benefits while the other is unaffected. The goats, grazing and trampling through the river-beds expose smaller creatures in their wake, which the egrets prey on.

“What is it about unlikely friendships that attract us so much?” The husband said, as we stood there for too long watching the fascinating world in front of us: Here was food in plenty for everyone, and harmoniously, the egrets and goats made their way through the day.

I shrugged but I knew I had that smile on my face: the one I get when I  think of all the ways in which nature shows us about life’s simple things.

A Small Book With Big Questions

Small Boat – Vincent Delecroix

Small Boat is a small book. It is a translation of a book written in French. The book’s events are based loosely on a real life event.

 The book, Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix (Author), Helen Stevenson (Translator),  was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize. There are some books whose narrative voice and choice of perspective makes all the difference. Small Boat is one such book. In all of 100 pages, the book makes you think of moral dilemmas, and the apparent lack of them too. 

The book is based on an incident of a boat full of refugees drowning in the British Canal a few years back. The incident happened on Nov 24th 2021. In it, a boat with 33 people capsized, and 27 people drowned at sea.

Version 1.0.0

Perspective:

Usually, the perspectives we hear or write about are the ones we hear on the news. With social media blowing things out of proportion all the time, news and ethical questions take on a new meaning. Polarization makes it hard to hear any one person’s perspective.  

Small Boat approaches the night in question from the perspective of the naval officer who took the 14 phone calls from the drowning refugees. Her increasingly exasperated responses played out on the air waves and televised on loop notwithstanding, there is the ‘I didn’t ask you to leave!” echoing across the seas. 

The premise is that the emergency naval officer in charge of despatching nearby ships to rescue the passengers failed in her duty, citing the boat was technically in English seas, and therefore not in her jurisdiction. 

Excerpt:

“Empathy, I said to the police inspector, is an idiotic luxury indulged in by people who do nothing, and who are moved by the spectacle of suffering. Good for them. But the truth is, you can’t do both at once…My job is not to take an interest in people’s lives or to be moved by their suffering, feigned or real, it’s to fish them out of the water when I have to. I don’t want to know these people…their existence, their story, what they’ve done, or what they are worth, and especially not what drove them to be fools. All I care about is life stripped bare.”

The naval officer goes on in this vein for a few more sentences.

“Even though what I was saying was completely obvious, the police inspector looked disconcerted (or alarmed maybe?) “

The mid-section of the book pivots into the perspective of the refugee. The only one who had enough charge and coverage to make the emergency phone calls, even as their little dinghy boat filled with water. Their feet, their torsos, and then like a beacon of light, holding the phone above his head as he was pulled under by the relentless seas. 

I expected the third section of the book to be from the police inspector’s perspective, but it pivoted back to the naval officer. 

Dum inter homines sumus colamus humanitatem

The small book about the small boat leaves us with big questions about big topics. It reminded me of one of my favorite sayings by Seneca: As long as we are among humans, let us be humane.

  • What does empathy mean, and is it something that determines our humanity?
  • It isn’t our job to determine whether a life is worthy of being saved or not: why or why not?

Ultimately, is our work a calling? A duty? A means to an end?

What Kids Know That Leaders Forget

Hispanic Heritage Month

It is Hispanic Heritage Month. I was curious to learn the difference between Hispanic and Latinos. In forms from the diversity teams in HR departments, the two terms have been chunked together.  Latinos may be Hispanic or not. Hispanic refers to those hailing from Spanish speaking countries. Latinos are those hailing from countries in Latin America. For instance Brazilians may not identify as Hispanic because Brazil was a Portuguese colony, and therefore do not speak Spanish. 

Cougars roar in Spanish

I now teach in a school where the Latino and Hispanic population is high. So I often get little peeks into the culture. The children like to tease me and ask for science videos in Spanish. “Ms Bala! We want to hear the cougar roar in Spanish!” 

“Can we watch the leopard eat the gazelle in Spanish?”

I give in, enjoying their gentle humor as they giggle, 

“Sounds so different in Spanish!”

“Totally different gazelle you guys!”

Last week, during a session of free play, I was invited to a game of Mexican Bingo. Amidst great cheers, the beans were passed out to each player as the cards were drawn. 

Esperanza Rising & Sonia Sotomayor

When we read Esperanza Rising together, there were so many moments when the children showed me in different ways how much they valued their cultural heritage, and roots. After the book was done, I had the children do a quiet session of art on the book, and some of them did a fantastic job. Some of them needed heavy scaffolding, but they came up with a good theme in the end.

I read a non-fiction book on Sonia Sotomayor to the children to complement the fictional Esperanza Rising the other day, and told them to keep note of the ways in which the books were similar. Once again, they surprised me. A surprise sticker contest really can get their brain cells thinking like nothing else can. 

What Happened?

Schools do a fantastic job of being inclusive, creating a sense of belonging, and teaching everyone to celebrate diversity.  I see the Hispanic child consoling an Indian-origin child for unfairness on the playground just as seamlessly as a Chinese immigrant child looking out for her Polynesian friend.

Somehow, everyday, I wonder how this beautiful dynamic gets lost on the way. Could it be that age jades our outlooks, and makes cynics of us all? 

A Whiff of Pine, A Hint of Grass

How we are influenced by the world around us is never more apparent to me than when I am trying to immerse myself in another world – one not rife with human presence. Our effects, unfortunately, is omni-present as the flash floods in Nepal proved.

Lines Written in Early Spring – By William Wordsworth

I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sate reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.
…
…

And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.

  • William Wordsworth

But out on a nature trail surrounded by bird-song, peering above into the skies through the leaves in the branches above, is when the world feels alive. Alive in a calm, peaceful sort of way. That particular evening, there were no frenzied crows cawing or geese squawking. The goats in the riverbed near our trail seemed sanguine, munching away leisurely at the tall grasses. A great blue heron took flight and the son & I stopped to catch its magnificence, our breath catching for a minute as it flapped its wings directly overhead.

The birds around me hopped and played,
Their thoughts I cannot measure:—
But the least motion which they made
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

The son was running, I was biking. I was already in high spirits.

When Carnations Give You Hope

The carnations given to me by a neighbor had revived in spite of the hot few days, and as the first bloom smiled at me, I felt hope stir. This plant had been given to me with the assurance that I cannot kill them. “Carnations are hardy. You can’t kill them if you tried!”, she said confidently, and I shushed her.

“Challenge accepted!” I said, laughing. I placed it in a place where I knew there would be plenty of direct sunlight and water. Just as she said. She came over to inspect it and nodded approvingly.

Just a few days later, the carnation died. It took on a pale brown color, and then withered away. My face matched the poor c plant. Never one to give up that easily, I persevered. I watered it with extra care – I hosed down the flower beds, the front yard and the back yard with extra whim on hot evenings but lost hope about the carnations.

Then, the evening I took out my bike for a ride, I peered into the flowerbed and saw the little flower. My heart soared. I have always loved carnations – their bright colors and how long they stay vibrant for being such petite flowers.

If only they knew the vibrations in the heart strings they caused!

A Whiff of Pine & A Hint of Grass

My mind flitted from topic to the next. Carnations to the hawks who sat on low twigs in the riverbed, and the inevitable sufferings that human-beings are faced with. The sun’s rays glistened across the waters I rode by. Calm, soothing.

I got off my bike and took stock of the year gone by. It was already September. How could the leaves be turning color already? Yet, here we are. I rode back, and inhaled the scent of the freshly mowed grass doused with water, and felt grounded once more. The pine trees dripped with water droplets from a rogue sprinkler, and I gazed lovingly at them clinging to the pine needles. A yearning for rain, but a lovely reminder of one of my favorite children’s books, A Whiff of Pine, A Hint of Skunk.

Lines Written in Early Spring – By William Wordsworth

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,
The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;
And ’tis my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.

Feelings, hopes, life, all bound together in a single whiff of wet pine and grass.

Tr for Teachers

Teacher’s Day

September 5th is Teacher’s Day in India. This year, I was wished by my parents and family, and I glowed with happiness. It really is a marvelous profession. The day is packed with things to do, and activities to finish, lessons to teach, and all the rest of it. But most importantly, it is filled with loving, energetic children who sometimes dance into the classroom, other times have to be coerced through a tough lesson with the promise of a treat at the end of it.

As my biological children were growing, I often heard complaints about teachers from my friends. How teachers weren’t doing enough, how their children were smart and were not being challenged enough etc etc. Having grown up in a school environment  and the child of teachers, it was interesting to see their perspectives. Like many of us do, the adults seem to have forgotten what we were capable of at every age, and the expectations from the children and teachers was especially high. We live in the Bay Area after all. A place notorious for its high expectations of its children.

But now. I am in a classroom all day long. I see what a hard job teachers are presented with everyday. There is a wide range of personalities, learning abilities, attitudes, quirks, and even motivations for coming to school. A child once confessed that the favorite part of their day was recess, and I smiled at that. How could I blame the child? After all, recess is the basis of culture, as I myself wrote. Every other place, they were being asked to do this and that. At recess, they did what they wanted. Bright sunshine, choice of playmates, choice of play, and more importantly no expectations of them. Of course they love recess! 

Nothing All Day!

I can feel their excitement seep through my ears – the cheers and moans at recess are of a particularly dramatic nature. There is drama too. The cheaters at 4-square, the one who refused to take their place in line, but that rarely walked into the classroom with the children. How can one not admire that?

Sometimes it did. Thorough investigations lead to root causes. So how is a teacher meant to juggle all of that, and ensure that the children feel sufficiently stimulated, develop good behaviors and keep the parents happy? After all, the parents think the children and the teachers happily do nothing all day.

For years, when asked about school, our conversations went like this:

“How was your day?”

Good

“What did you do?”

Nothing!

Never one to let things be, I’d prod.

Ask them about sharks-and-minnows, and their friends, they’d be eloquent, their vocabularies vibrant, and their passions evident. That too, is as it should be. Our learning is safe and steady. Our passions, dramatic and vivid. As parents, we get a tiny window into their day and it is hardly fair to form our opinions based on it. Yet, what choice do we have?

Whenever I asked about what they did learn in English, or Math, or Science, or Social Studies, the answers were hardly inspiring. I can imagine the same across millions of Bay Area homes. But our children learn to read, do math, read and analyze scientific articles, learn about community and history. The growth seems gradual, yes, but it is there, and in just a few years, it is phenomenal. A child who could barely read confidently picks up books for pleasure. A child who struggled to evenly split the pizza between his siblings does so seamlessly, and tells you strange facts about caterpillars when you’re least expecting it. 

The educational calendar reminds me more than ever of one of my friend’s favorite sayings: “We always over-estimate what we can do in one day and under-estimate what we can do in one year.”

I wish there was a way in which we could afford a better peek into their energetic days, but alas!

#TrForTeachers

My loving family in India sent me Happy Teacher’s Day wishes and I glowed all day. I had lost my voice teaching the previous week. But I still croaked to them excitedly and passionately about my children. The biological children rolled their eyes and said, “Ask Amma about her kids, and she doesn’t talk about us anymore. It is all about those 5th graders of hers!”

The parents laughed, and said, “It is what happens to teachers!”

My parents still receive wishes from their own students who are now adults. It always brightens their day, and they smile thinking of their days teaching.

“You aren’t just given happiness, you have to pick it up here and there all through the day.”

― Miss Read, Fresh from the Country

They told me that the Karnataka State government initiated a movement to give teachers the prefix, Tr (like doctors have Dr). What a marvelous idea?! I saw the campaign gain strength and the videos were inspiring and oh so loving. I wish the idea catches on. A simple idea, sure, but a powerful one. One of my professors in my teaching credential program also showed us video, and we all glowed. 

#TrForTeachers

Happy Teacher’s Day to all wonderful teachers.