The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier

Well, we just entered the second week of Fall semester classes. From reading the daily student journals, it’s already apparent that it is spirit which moves both teacher and student, that it’s spirit which sets the compass true, and that it’s spirit which gives–or should give–intent, meaning, and purpose to methods, techniques, technologies, and even assessment instruments. If we want to achieve, not in terms of research and publication and renown and position and tenure, but in terms of enhancing the life of each student, we need to change our too often ineffective and negative script to a positive one that underpins each student’s self-esteem and self-confidence. Many of us need, as a first year student just insightfully wrote in her journal, “a curriculum for caring, not just for giving out information.” It’s the only way that has a chance of getting a student to change hers or his fearful, self-disparaging, and discouraging script. To do that, you need to do several things unconditionally, selflessly, and tirelessly: dream big, believe wholeheartedly, respect sincerely, care truly, persevere tirelessly, commit endlessly, and love deeply. If you truly want to make a difference in a student’s life, if you want always to make each student feel appreciated and noticed and invaluable, if you want each of them to achieve, be careful to not demean or diminish her or him; if you want each of them to succeed you have to see intently in each of them the potential that they so often don’t know or believe is there. As you do these you’ll kick fear, doubt, resignation, excuse, and rationale out of the way; you’ll plan diligently; and, you’ll grow into your dreams.

Louis

      I feel some tingles coming on. Next week will be goose bumps time for me. On Monday, after being “unemployed” for the two and half months upon returning from teaching in China, I’ll be back in the classroom. Next Thursday, Susan and I will be celebrating our forty-second anniversary. It is “Tingle Week.”

      Now understand that for me, the anniversary day it’s no special day, although out of fear and cowardice I’ve already gotten Susan an anniversary present and took her out for a romantic anniversary dinner this past weekend on our last summer hurrah in St. Augustine. It’s not that I’m not mushy, romantic, sentimental, touchy-feely and all that. I am, to a fault. But, I feel that this day is not particularly different from any other day. I celebrate my time with Susan each day, especially with afternoon wine and cheese by the koi pond. Each night I peer into her hypnotic eyes and go to sleep, comforted by fact that I know she’ll be lying next to me, after a slight but not insignificant kiss and a deep “love ya.” I wake up every morning gazing on Susan’s angelic beauty, taking a deep breath with the thought of how lucky I am, carefully and gently touching her soft smooth face so as not to wake her, and listening silently for a minute or two to the sound of her breath. I know I can quickly come up with a list of the things she does that I dislike, that annoy me, and that even I hate. I’m sure she has a much longer list about me. But I set all those aside and to think of the things I love: her sparkling eyes, her deep compassion, her enveloping presence, her brightening smile. Everyday, I feel the warmth of her lips on my mine and the touch of her fingers on my skin. Everyday, she sends tingling chills up and down my spine. Everyday, a gentle word eases my soul and lifts my spirits. Everyday our love fills all the nooks and crannies. Everyday a quiet “I love you” drifts from my lips to her ears and from hers to mine. Everyday, I’m there for her, and she for me, through the betters and worsts. Everyday, I know how lucky I am to have gone on that reluctant blind date forty-three years ago. Everyday, I’m lost in her magic and beauty. I get the tingles every time she is near me and I think about her. And, that is more than often each day.

      Every day I know how lucky I am to have had my personal epiphany seventeen years ago, have survived cancer four years ago and a massive cerebral hemorrahage last September. Every day I know how lucky I am that after forty-one years in the classroom I still love what I am doing and doing what I love; I still unconditionally love each and every student. Loving to teach with love for each student, for me, is “The Tingle” by another name. It is more important than what I call “The Technical.” It’s the tingle that makes sure your light never dims. Now, it’s not an either/or situation though. You must have the subject know-how of the discipline, you must have the pedagogical know how of teaching. That is, you must have, “The Technical.” But, above all, you must have the unconditional love for each student, “The Tingle.” After all, it’s the heart that controls the head, and you have to work hard at honing “The Tingle” no less than you should do with both aspects of the “The Technical.”

     Over the years, through adversity and challenge, Susan and I have learned of the need to put effort into our love and to put love into our efforts every day. We have learned to fall in love every day and to work at keeping our tingle sharp. Without effort, love is shallow and insincere, a meaningless utterance. Without love and commitment behind it, effort is mostly wasted, a purposeless groping. Without love and dedication and perseverance, our tingle would have diminished long ago, and we would have grown apart over the decades rather than have grown together. If it wasn’t for love and effort, we wouldn’t still be on our extended honeymoon. It’s no different with teaching.

      We teachers are persons serving other persons. Because “The Tingle” is intangible, because it can’t really be quantified and easily assessed, it is easily overlooked. That omission flattens the goose bumps. It wrings out the tingle and won’t let the tingle ring. We teachers are in the people business. People must always matter most! I’ll repeat that because it needs repeating. We teachers are in the people business. People must always matter most!! When they don’t come first, nothing really happens or lasts very long. So, when I talk of love I mean the habit of the spirit that holds up every individual student before me as a unique, miraculous, and sacred creation; I mean the habit of the heart that proclaims that every student is too important and too valuable to lose without a fight. I mean the habit of the mind that understands and is being constantly reminded that each student is someone’s beloved son or daughter; I mean an acceptance that each student is a very special person, a very special person, very special. Very! I mean the habit of deep caring for the dignity, well-being, and integrity of each student.

      Love for each student is like, as I once wrote, seeing an angel walking before each student proclaiming, “Make way, make way, for someone created in the image of God.” Sound wishy-washy? It isn’t. The heart controls the head; your attitude controls your actions. And, therein lays the true and almost unbelievable pedagogical power of love. When you are blasé about your work, how can you be excited? When you’re down on students, how can you be up? When you truly want to be somewhere else, how can you be there? When you want to do something else, what can you do? When you’re distracted, how can you focus? What can you possibly accomplish? But, when you truly love to teach more than anything else, when you truly unconditionally love each student, when you truly want to make a difference in her or his life beyond offering information, there is no limit to what you will do and no limit to what you can do. There’s stubbornness in love. It calls for unconditional inclusion rather than exclusion. Love is the name we give attention to each student’s possibilities and opportunities instead of to her or his problems and limitations. It forces you to see who each can become rather than focus on whom each presently is. Love means you have a feeling of responsibility for others. It’s the commitment and perseverance to help them help themselves actively overcome their challenges, difficulties, and problems. When I talk of love and teaching, I’m saying, “Care. Believe! Have hope! Don’t just say these words. Live them! Work at them.”

       So, I can’t think of doing anything more for a student then to unconditionally love her or him, for no shadow can stay dark in its presence, no demon can stand up to its power, no fear can overcome its faith, no blahs can drown out its hurrahs. Just like my love for Susan.

      Doggone I’m tingling just thinking about all this.

Louis

     It takes work to engage in Hokey Pokey teaching, that is, to be of the classroom rather than just in it, to be a part of it rather than apart from it, to lose yourself in the service of each student. There’s no cruise control “I can teach in my sleep” in teaching with passion. It takes practice, practice, practice. Like Jack Kornfield, I don’t use the term “practice” to solely mean rehearsal. I don’t mean “practice” in the sense of going over something again and again. I’m not talking about repetitive rehearsal to get better and better at some performance or in some competition. I am talking about practicing an attitude, a feeling, a belief, a faith–and a love.

       For one thing, I am talking about learning to believe that each student is worth the effort. If you don’t feel and think “capable” for each student, none of your work will work. The best salespeople, the best musicians, the best designers, writers, actors, coaches, doctors, ministers, teachers and engineers are the ones who practice how to think and act “capable” most diligently. To get that way doesn’t come with the wave of a wand, or pulling a rabbit out from a hat, or a wishing upon a star.

        I am talking about learning to understand to be adventurous, for going into a classroom is like sailing into the unknown each day. The “status quo” is an illusion; change is the fundamental natural law; “It worked” means nothing. You’ve got to approach each student in each class on each day like you’ve never done anything before because you haven’t. No amount of pretending will alter that reality.

        I mean learning to accept the real diversity in each classroom. I mean learning to appreciate the uniqueness and sacredness of each and every person in each classroom.

        I mean learning to understand that if you see the good in each student, you will radiate a caring energy which inspires the students around you. Then, you will generate a steady current of love and will only be able to strive to do good.

       So, I mean learning to have a sharp sense of otherness, to be focused on, to be mindful of, to be alert to, to be fully aware of, to be awake to, to get to know, and to be empathetic of each individual student.

       I am talking about a willingness to take risks and not be afraid of failure. I am talking about accepting your imperfection. Those who don’t, those who are afraid of making mistakes, who are not the friends of serendipity, are the ones who most try to protect themselves with tight controls and are most critical of the imperfect students. The more you accept your own fallibility, the more you develop the capacity to learn from mistakes, the less you feel defeated and deflated by setbacks, the more gentle and quiet and understanding you become toward the shortcomings of students.

        I am talking about learning not to trip over pebbles while you gaze up at the mountain summit. Learn to be patient and take things in what seems to be small steps. It say “seems” because any small step on a great journey is not small. The little things aren’t little. If you have to sweat the big stuff, be sweatier when it comes to the little stuff. The small steps are easy to take. Unfortunately, they are just as easy to ignore. I am talking about learning that that small today is significant later on.

        I’m taking about, as Stephen Covey might say, just commit, work, learn, and do—commit, work, learn, and do—and commit, work, learn, and do again and again and again–and then, again.

That’s what it’s all about.

Louis

      Well, after being passionate about special students and the need to accommodate to their special needs, it’s back to hokey pokey teaching. I see teaching with passion is composed of five basic elements: work, vision, “wise reflection,” imagination and creativity, and love. So, let’s start with a couple of reflections on work. Substantive hokey pokey teaching without exertion is unbridled excitement and optimism. It’s just Disneyesque, Jiminy Cricket lying on a window sill, staring out at the dark sky, “wishing upon a star.” Someone said to me recently, “You know, so many students are just plain headaches. They demand so much of my time. It’s too much work.” Well, you know, your head aches only if you do not want to work at offering aid and comfort to a student. But, when you gladly and willingly do, no student is a headache. It’s as Richard Bach wrote in Jonathan Livingston Seagull, “You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it come true. You may have to work for it, however.”

      To be sure, sometimes the effort seems effortless, and the labor doesn’t have the texture of seriousness. Sometimes, it looks like play; and, sometimes it looks like it’s nothing more than impromptu. Sometimes, all people see is the madness, but don’t understand either the structure or the method to the apparent madness. But, hokey pokey teaching it’s not just walking into a classroom and magically letting it all happens by itself, although at times others may think so.

       Hokey pokey teaching, truly caring about each and every student, is serious and demanding on. Make no bones about, it isn’t a something “I can do in my sleep;” it isn’t one of those “anyone can do it” things; it isn’t simply “if you know it, you can teach it.” The knowhow of teaching does take a lot of time; it does demand a lot of constant effort and commitment; it does need a lot of incessant energy; it does require persistence and patience. Why should that be such a surprise to so many? After all, some academic arduously researched, gathered, and organized data, and then wrote it all up for presentation or publication. Someone poured a lot of sweat into every made fortune. A lot of weary searching went into every important discovery. Behind the magnificent work of art is an artist who spent hour after hour, month after month toiling at tedious and seemingly endless tasks. Behind the beautiful, soaring music is a composer who struggled to arrange carefully each note, each chord, and each tempo. Behind every book is an author who struggled with rewrite after rewrite to insure every word fit precisely into the prose.

     Should teaching be any different? It takes a lot of work to live, care, and love; it is a lot of work to reflect, articulate, imagine, devise, activate; it is a lot of work to prepare, design, deliver, evaluate to what extent it worked or needs reworking; it is a lot of work to get to know each student, to be in their thoughts and emotions; and so, it is a lot of work to know of the currents students are swimming against in order to offer the support and encouragement for each of them to have a chance to make it.

Louis