What’s Next?

That’s always the question that drives me. For better or worse, I like moving forward—too fast, at times.

This school year gifted me something that I kept wrapped until now; a gift that I couldn’t make sense of because I was too busy moving forward. I was too busy making plans for units, trying to follow pacing guides and a way of teaching that expired in March 2020.

Consistency is vital when running a classroom—no argument there. Students respond positively to routines and protocols. It’s not just my [sometimes] tameable urge for control; it’s the well-known effect normalcy brings to students. So, when we started school in August, I moved forward and left the gift in the closet.

Allison and I agreed to start with routines and classroom guidelines; then, it was assessment time. I had never taught 4th grade before, but I knew that the first weeks were about community and identifying where each child was. The data I gathered shook my ground because I couldn’t start where I thought I would. I came from a school where the curriculum calendar was handed to me. “This is what you will teach from Week 4 to Week 9.” This time, I had a blank page to fill.

I hit the books and planned for hybrid units. There were many nights of reading, note-taking, and session planning before trying things out in class. In writing, those sessions were aiming at the right target: solidifying routines and developing reading and writing behaviors students desperately needed. There were some noticeable wins: many students’ volume grew, some of them transferred teaching points right into their work, and a few began to make choices in their writing. Still, I felt like I wasn’t doing enough, so I’d spend another weekend reading, making changes, and planning new sessions.

My focus became too narrow; I only saw what was missing because I moved forward without looking at the big picture. Now that we’re getting ready to start the second semester, I feel that urgency to keep moving forward, but instead, I reach for the gift in the closet. This gift isn’t a single thing but a combination of facts:

• I cannot teach these children as I would have before the pandemic.
• They will be expected to perform at a certain level before entering middle school.
• I can’t teach them all those things in 5 months.
• They don’t need me to teach them all those things in 5 months.
• I know what they truly need.

It took me a whole semester to unwrap this gift that isn’t really for me. Part of this gift is the joy I feel when planning new units, and this time, instead of hitting all the books and searching for answers in work written before March f 2020.

I will trust my instincts, have some fun, and plan units my class needs.