The Big Fresh April 25, 2015 What We Crave

By Friday afternoon at the end of the day most of the school had already emptied for the weekend. Lucy, a teacher, stopped into my room. She said, “Thank you for my card today.  I used to get notes all the time from the principal every time she walked through my room.  I put the note in the top of my desk along with all the others I have received over the years. Every spring when I clean out my desk I look through all my notes over the year and remember.” Lucy is the most veteran teacher in our district, with close to 40 years of service. With that I smiled at her and opened my top drawer revealing my own pile of notes that I too have saved over the last 16 years in this position as a literacy coach.

In this age of endless accountability,  curriculum work, and testing, I sometimes get the sense that many of us are walking zombies — going through the motions of compliance (I am referring to teachers and students alike). Yes, we may have more developed assessment systems, mapped curricula, and detailed intervention systems than ever before, but I find many of us are losing our spark. We are all so busy getting through our to-do lists that we often walk through the halls each day passing with a hurried hello before moving on to our next task.

Seth Godin wrote, “I see you is what we crave.”  As I think back to last Friday, I realize that my note was a way of seeing Lucy. There are many things that I have no control over in terms of the demands of our schools but I can always work to see people and take the time to show appreciation.