Teachers, It Can Still Be Amazing

Photo by Georgette Sandoval

Today in my area public schools are reopening. Kids are headed back into the classroom by the thousands. I’ve had so many conversations with educators and parents about what the next several months will look like. The truth is, no one really knows. Everyone has a big opinion, me included, but no one knows.

The prevailing sentiment in my conversations has been a bit of cautious optimism smothered in generous doses of uncertainty. Some are excited. Some are afraid. Some are clueless. And some are just ready for something normal.

I’m confident of this. It can still be an amazing school year. I would dare say this has the potential to be the most incredible year you’ve yet experienced. Why do I think this?

We’ve all experienced what the world looks like when it calls a collective timeout. You lived through it—although many around the world did not.

We’ve all faced what it feels like to be more or less stuck at home for a few months. It messes with your head.

Both are major issues. And you’ve beat them already. Wouldn’t it be a shame to waste the big opportunity this year presents?

Photo by Georgette Sandoval

I’m not a conventional educator. I don’t sit in a classroom all day everyday like the real teachers who are reading this. I teach for two universities. I am doing it all online this term. For a wide variety of reasons. But I am trying my best with what’s been handed me, to embrace the opportunity the best way I know how.

I have 74 students in my care. I am responsible for part of their eduction. It is a responsibility I take incredibly serious. This semester I decided to do something I have never done before. I gave them all my cell phone number.

It seemed like such a simple thing, but when I stopped to think about it—I could only remember one professor ever giving me their personal phone number. ONE. And until March of this year I had rarely done so either. But that’s all changed now. Why?

Because maybe teaching is about more than facts and quizzes. Perhaps learning is too. Maybe it’s about one human transferring a piece of something they’ve been given stewardship of to someone else who needs it. I’ve spent many semesters focused on the theories of dialogic communication, but maybe not enough focused on an actual dialogue—you know—real communication with these brilliant and beautiful young men and women entrusted to me.

They are still going to get their money’s worth, and then some, when it comes to Comms Theories and practicing the mechanics of good public speaking. But I decided to give them something more valuable this semester. My availability.

Guess what? It’s working. I’m four weeks back into my classroom (thanks Google Classroom) and everyday I get a handful of texts from students. I don’t see them as a distraction. I see them for what they are. Another opportunity to make this the best school year ever.

I have no idea what you teach. If you teach. Or where you teach. But I do know this. You’ve been given stewardship of something amazing. You have been entrusted with knowledge, experience, and the opportunity of a lifetime. You have a chance to make this year about more than standardized tests and all the other crap politicians like to brag about. You have the opportunity to do what only you can do in your classroom—you have the opportunity to make it the best school year ever.

Try it. Shift your mind. See the opportunity. Embrace it. Maybe you can’t high five everyone in the hall, but I bet you can out smile everyone. Maybe the setup is a little different. The masks make it seem weird and impersonal. Call the elephant in the room out for what it is.

You only get a short season of influence with your kids. Don’t lose it to complaining, pessimism, and a victim-mindset. Disagree with administrators and leaders about big decisions? Great. You are 100% entitled to disagree. But don’t let it affect the way you embrace the opportunity to help your kids.

The truth is. You won’t. I know that. If you are in education and you stuck around long enough to read this much of my rambling you’re not one of the ones we should be worried about. You’re a Rockstar teacher. So thanks for reading this far. Before you go I have two promises for you.

First, I think we both know this is likely going to be the hardest year in education you have ever faced.

Second, I just want to promise you that there is incredible value and worth on the other side of this hard thing you’re starting today. It’s going to be worth it. It’s going to be the best school year it can be. It’s sure to be hard. It will also be beautiful—as beautiful as hard can be.

Go get ‘em. Thank you for what you do. I can’t imagine where we’d all be without you.

When You Are Frustrated Do This

It wasn’t a typical Monday morning. Not after twenty weeks at home in lock-down mode. School was here. Time to face the music.

We’d already made the decision to homeschool our oldest two. You might have read about that previously. But what about the little ones? What were we to do with our toddlers?

How would we navigate all four kids at home, fulfill all of our professional educational responsibilities, lead our congregation, and not lose our minds. Depends on who you ask. More than a few would say we lost our minds a long time ago. Which brings us back to this atypical Monday morning. 

All of us know what it’s like to be frustrated. There have been whole weeks (recently) when I hung out in frustration for so long I fully expected it to start charging rent.

I was frustrated this particular Monday. Why? Because we had made the choice to send our youngest two back to preschool. Not the source of my frustration. But I couldn’t actually walk them into their rooms. That was the source of my frustration.

I’m not knocking the staff or the school. We love our little preschool. King kids have been dancing down those halls for going on eight years—and before that Jamie taught there. It’s the best preschool in town.

I was frustrated because it was time to let go of something I was hoping I could hold on to for just a little longer. See it was my daughter’s first day.  She is seventeen months old. She has never spent an entire day away from Mommy with a stranger. And I didn’t get to be the one to take her to the stranger.

Did I mention I was frustrated? I was frustrated at the options in front of me. I was frustrated at handing that little pink sippy cup over before I was good and ready. Circumstances had wrenched reality right out of my hand. You’d be frustrated to.

You probably have been. These last few months have been repeatedly frustrating for so many of us. What’s ticking you off lately? It’s probably not hard to figure out. What’s that thing just under the surface that seems to make you simmer inside? Loss? Confusion? Missed-expectations? Your frustrations might come from something else entirely. I get it. We all have them.

We all know what it’s like to be frustrated. Frustration often happens where expectations hit a wall.

There we were standing in the preschool lobby. They checked our temps. I signed the paperwork. Everyone was masked up. And then it was time to hand over my children.

Matty took it like a champ. He was so excited to be back at school with his little friends. He was good to go with his Paw Patrol backpack and Ninjago lunchbox. 

Anna didn’t know what to make of it. She is seventeen months old. Do you know how many of those months she has spent at home with Mommy? Seventeen.

But it was time. Time to let her go where I couldn’t go. Seventeen months just seemed too young for that kind of milestone moment. Hence the frustration.

I handed her backpack, some diapers, a lunchbox, and sippy cup over to the director of the school. And then it was time to hand over Anna. She was stoic. She obviously didn’t understand what was going on. She didn’t react emotionally. Not like I wanted to. But she didn’t want me to hand her over either. She held on to Dad. She held on to the familiar. Familiar is comfortable.

Our frustrations will often stymie the next step forward. Even when we know one simple step could take us from comfortable to something better. It’s usually just one step. For you, and for the one needing you to make a move. I didn’t know what to do.

And then sweet little Matty stepped in. My rowdy, hyper, rough-and-tumble three year old said, “I take you, Sissy.” As he grabbed her by the hand and bravely walked her through the front door.

The moment wasn’t lost on me. My decisive nature is quick to lean hard toward the solutions I like, and bow up at the ones that irritate me. Sometimes reality yanks the choice away.

When frustration hits big and you don’t know how to handle what’s important you need help. You need a hand. I know I did. But you don’t just need a hand. You need a hand-off.

You might need a friend to meet you halfway and help you carry some stuff. Maybe you need a loved one to just pick up the phone. Or, perhaps you need the innocence of a three year old to take his sister by the hand.

Whatever your frustration, don’t let the circumstances make you overlook the opportunity. Take a hand when you need one. Give a hand as often as possible. Handing off what’s got your goat will help you take your next step forward. Probably the one that will untangle your agitations. Do it.

You might not even know what the hand you need looks like. For me, it’s my faith. The providence of a friend with good timing. Or, the certainty of something more than imagination can muster. Faith is good at steadying me in the midst of frustration.

Handing off frustration to faith doesn’t make me weak to reality. It makes me better at trusting God.

I’m thankful for big faith. And I’m equally thankful for the small hands that remind me. Not everything has to be epic. Sometimes God will simply show up and say, “I’ll take you.” He’ll even do it through a three year old.

Hand off your frustrations. You don’t need them anymore. Emptying your hands of frustrations will free them up for whatever help God sends your direction. I don’t know what it will look like for you. I only know he’ll do it. When he does—just go. Take the hand that’s offered. Let faith in something better lead all of the important stuff in your life. It will take you somewhere you’d never go on your own.

Would you let us know what’s been frustrating you lately? Maybe we can help? And if you think someone in your circle could use some help handing off their own frustrations please consider sharing this with them.

How We Chose Homeschool Curriculum

Photo by Giuseppe Lombardo

Parents, you are trying to make a hard choice right now. Life has been full of hard choices for the last few months. And now this one involves the most important people in the world—your kids. 

Last week Jamie and I shared our reasons for why we decided to homeschool our oldest two this year. That blog was everywhere. People all over the U.S. and in many other countries checked it out. Many reached out in some way.

We’re here to help. Because, even though we are teachers, when it comes to our kids we are students too. So we’ve been learning. We’ve been figuring out what will work for our family. And by we I really mean my amazing wife. I’m convinced Jamie is the smartest woman on earth. You guys can argue about the #2 spot all you want. #1 is taken.

We promised we’d be back with more to say via this platform that makes saying it and sharing it so easy. So here we go.

This is the curriculum we chose. And why we chose it. Our boys will be in third grade and kindergarten this year. So, our choices might not be much help to you. But I hope something here will help move you a little further down the trail as you sort this out for your own family.

We tried to keep this short. We’ll answer as many questions as possible. If you find this helpful please consider sharing it with someone who might need some help right now. And give yourself grace. We’re all students here.

We wanted a curriculum that satisfied four simple criteria.

1. It had to mostly align with Arkansas educational standards. Why? We believe in the public school system. We intend to return our boys to a public classroom in the future. So, we want to keep them “on track”. 

2. It had to be inexpensive because Daddy is a tightwad, and isn’t made out of Benjamins

3. The material had to be flexible. Have you ever tried to teach a five year old to read while changing a diaper, doing marriage counseling via text, answering an email about communication theory, and helping a distraught Boomer solve their problems in the middle of another Zoom Conference? We haven’t either, but we’re pretty sure we’re about to.

4. There was no compromise here for us. The bulk of the material had to be facilitated without a computer. We don’t want our children staring at a device all day. Period.

Here is the curriculum we landed on based on our four requirements. (Links to each are embedded in the subject title.)

1. SCIENCE: “Mystery Doug”
We paid $69 for one year of access. This curriculum also has free lessons to try. We tried it out with the boys and they loved it. Mystery Doug’s content aligns wonderfully with the recommended national science standards and schedule for each grade. As a bonus, it does have a computer based lesson component—so we are able to use it as an incentive for screen time that also doubles as school work.

2. SOCIAL STUDIES: Teachers Pay Teacher
We purchased a 3rd grade level download for $18.50. We will need to supplement some to meet Kindergarten standards. 

3. LANGUAGE ARTS: The Good and The Beautiful
Levels 1-5 are available to download for free. The “K Primer” is less than $35. Level K and Level 3 physical copies around $60 each. This curriculum is integrated to include multiple subjects. An added bonus for our family is the inclusion of Biblical references. We like the Bible. We are also using the Handwriting books from The Good and the Beautiful.

CAUTION: “Levels” aren’t really aligned to “Grades”. There are assessments to determine the correct level for your child. An advanced student might be on the same level as a grade. Whereas a traditional student might be one level below. Don’t let this psyche you out. It’s just a different metric for describing the desired development.

4. MATH: Math Mammoth and Jamie King
At the King Casa Academy Mrs. Principal Teacher Mom’s got this one covered. We are using Math Mammoth for most of Ethan’s 3rd grade material. Jamie is piecing together her own curriculum for Kindergarten. Why? Because she has approximately thirteen (I might be exaggerating) math and education degrees. There are plenty of good options available for someone feeling they need extra support in this area.

Now you know exactly what we chose and why we chose it. One the whole, there is a lot of good curriculum out there. Find the one that will help you accomplish what you’re aiming for with your kid.

We hope this helps you. As long as you have questions we’ll keep trying to lend a helpful voice. In the meantime share what you’re learning in the comments. How are you teaching your kids during this unique time?

Why We Decided to Homeschool This Year

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EDIT: So many of you have texted or messaged us about this. Thank you for the encouragement. I hope our words have been helpful. We have so much more to say about how we are going to approach homeschool. We will share what we’re learning as we learn it. This includes resources and application. If you’re curious and need help leave a comment with your email address. We’ll follow up with you or you can wait for the next post. God bless all of you.

Update: We wrote up how we chose our curriculum and what it is. You can now find that here.
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This was hard to write. This was also a hard decision to make. Jamie and I almost didn’t make it.  After finally reaching the decision we talked about not writing this. Then I wrote it anyway.

It was hard because we are teachers too. We don’t want to sound like we think we‘re better than those specifically trained to teach our kids. It‘s hard because we grew up with teachers, administrators, and coaches. We have so much admiration, respect, and, yes—love—for them. Educators are the most hardworking and underpaid people in America. If you disagree with that last sentence you’re just flat wrong.

Yet, we still decided to homeschool this year.

To be completely honest, I have never liked the idea of homeschool. Maybe it’s because my dad is a retired teacher. I've been getting up and going to school since 1985. Maybe I haven’t liked it because I’ve known some pretty weird homeschool people. Sure, I’ve known some awesome ones too. But I almost always judged homeschoolers. It’s sad but true.

I know you’re going to think I’m an absolute jerk here, but in the past I thought homeschool was equal parts being bad at algebra and making your own butter. I thought it was what scared ultra-conservatives did to protect their children from the scary indoctrination of woke left wing common core zombies. I had this mental picture of homeschool as a place where everyone had homemade haircuts, shirts, and learning impediments. I thought homeschool was a social and academic bubble for those who can’t handle reality. I know. I know. I’m a jerk.

So, why did we decide to homeschool this year? The reasons are as simple as they are complicated, but I’ll try to explain.

Photo by Agatha Tailor

This is not going to be a typical school year. Before you spout your favorite version of the momentary national bias, stop. I’ve read it. I’ve heard the arguments. I’m not here to argue. I’m presenting our decision making process for how to educate our children. That’s it. 

Jamie and I believe the upcoming school year is going to be a mess. Like an actual train wreck. You remember how you felt halfway through April when you were ready to pull the last hair out of your head. AMI had you so stressed out you developed an involuntary twitch. No? Just me huh.

As parents it’s our sacred obligation to spare our children from situations when we deem it appropriate. Our two school-aged boys will be spared the mess this trip around the sun.

I know our local school district is going to work extremely hard to do their absolute best. They are amazing people. Every one of them. We adore the faculty at our elementary school. The principal is an educational rockstar of the highest order. The mess I think is coming won’t be their fault. I know they would work themselves to the bone to do right by the kids. They love them.

Still, I don’t believe the nature of our educational support systems will be enough. Financially they’ll be stretched like never before. Emotionally and psychologically the load will be more than many, or maybe any, of them have ever endured. And that’s before a kid even gets Covid-19.  

We didn’t make this choice out of fear. We aren’t homeschooling because we don’t trust the teachers. In fact, we are worried about them more than ever before. 

It’s hard to explain to someone who has never been blessed with the burden of a classroom, but we’ve been demanding the impossible from teachers for years. This year is already going off the rails. We are asking educators to now deal with the increased emotional and psychological stress of trying to keep kids safe and healthy. They will be forced to adhere to new guidelines every 72 hours. They may be required to teach full time in the classroom, full time online, and take care of students who are in and out of the classroom. Teachers, we are praying for you. I hope this isn’t the year you walk away from the profession.

We don’t trust the system is capable of carrying out the primary function for which it exists under the present conditions. The education of our children in an emotionally, psychologically and physiologically consistent manner is its primary function.

I don’t see it happening this year. But, man, I hope I’m wrong. I hope it for your kids. Mine will be learning in their PJs around the kitchen table. The morning is for math. Afternoons are for writing, PE, and making butter.

I know homeschool isn’t an option for many people. I’m not here to cast a bad light on anyone sending their kids back in a few weeks. In fact, I’m a giant hypocrite because I’ll be right back in my own classroom teaching university students how not to suck at giving speeches. 

I wish I felt differently about the whole thing. I want my third grader to play basketball with his buddies on the playground and make jokes with his pal Charlie about Dog Man. I also want my kindergartener to get the absolute best start possible in an emotionally stable and consistently healthy environment. 

So this year the King Casa Academy is open for business. In fact, we started about three weeks ago and have the haircuts to prove it. We might be crazy but we aren’t crazy. Yet.

School Started: How Loud Is Your House?

Our house is crazy loud all the time. I find myself needing to escape the din and the noise and retreat to a room full of silence at times. But not this morning.

Today is the first day of school. Ethan started 1st grade. Jon and Matty went to preschool where they will be enrolled full time for the first time ever. So my home this Monday morning is silent.

I sat down with a cup of coffee and my Bible. I put some music on as I read and I drank all of it in—the quiet, the contemplation, and the caffeine. I like it, but I don’t want to get used to it.

Our house is usually what I like to jokingly call a “happy bag of chaos”. It’s always, always, always, full of crazy frenetic energy. Until it’s not.

This morning it is not.

And, while the peaceful moment is momentous I don’t want so many of them that it becomes the norm. Like many parents I wonder at the sanity of trusting my children to strangers during their formative years while at the same time being intensely thankful for the people who often lovingly and sacrificially give of themselves to better our kids.

My house is quiet, but my heart is not. I relish this moment to reminisce, but I am already ready to see my boys again. I’m already ready to fill this house again with the sounds of legos, and fighting, and boys at play.

Not all noise is great, but when it comes to the kind of noise arising within a house filled with life there can be no better sound. This is a rare moment. Next week I’ll go back to school myself and then my house really will be silent.

But our house is not our home. It’s just the place we experience the joy of togetherness most often. Where our noise is where home is. Even as I bask in the ever fleeting silence I miss it.