I come to school early in the morning. I get more done when the building is quiet and my mind has fewer things crowding (the somewhat limited) space. I have a general rule for myself that I only listen to Christian music or music on my iPod in the morning, after prayers, because the news these days is full of sadness, and I find it hard to be joyful and live in the moment with my students when my heart is heavy.
For some reason, I turned on my radio on Monday for the last 10 minutes of my drive and heard the news from Las Vegas. Immediately I thought of my students. In 90 minutes, there would be 16 kids in my room, excited to tell me what they had done over the weekend and on Friday, when I was gone. I was so angry.
If you have had students in my class before, you know that I want to keep these kids little for as long as possible. I want to shelter them from the parts of the world that are terrifying and horrific. I also want to empower them to find things to change about our world. I tell them to be brave and take risks with their learning, to try new things, but it can be a fine line. When we returned from school prayer and took our spots for Morning Meeting and prayer, a student raised their hand to pray for all the people in Las Vegas that had been killed. I quickly realized that God had led me to turn that radio dial earlier, knowing that I would have to be prepared later. In reality, I was not ready to talk about any part of this with my kids. As you all know, the kids don't care if you are prepared or not! In these moments, I pray that God gives me the words to give them the comfort and assurance that they need. One of them asked the question that we all ask- why does God allow this to happen? I thought about it for a second and said that just like God did not intercede for Jesus, he did not intercede in Las Vegas because He gives us all free will, but He never abandoned Jesus, and He will never abandon us. He was present in Las Vegas and He is present in our classroom. We just need to be alert to His presence. Today and every day.
For some reason, I turned on my radio on Monday for the last 10 minutes of my drive and heard the news from Las Vegas. Immediately I thought of my students. In 90 minutes, there would be 16 kids in my room, excited to tell me what they had done over the weekend and on Friday, when I was gone. I was so angry.
If you have had students in my class before, you know that I want to keep these kids little for as long as possible. I want to shelter them from the parts of the world that are terrifying and horrific. I also want to empower them to find things to change about our world. I tell them to be brave and take risks with their learning, to try new things, but it can be a fine line. When we returned from school prayer and took our spots for Morning Meeting and prayer, a student raised their hand to pray for all the people in Las Vegas that had been killed. I quickly realized that God had led me to turn that radio dial earlier, knowing that I would have to be prepared later. In reality, I was not ready to talk about any part of this with my kids. As you all know, the kids don't care if you are prepared or not! In these moments, I pray that God gives me the words to give them the comfort and assurance that they need. One of them asked the question that we all ask- why does God allow this to happen? I thought about it for a second and said that just like God did not intercede for Jesus, he did not intercede in Las Vegas because He gives us all free will, but He never abandoned Jesus, and He will never abandon us. He was present in Las Vegas and He is present in our classroom. We just need to be alert to His presence. Today and every day.