Notes That Make A Difference

I am so challenged right now actually... I am attempting to write a letter back to every student who gave me a teacher appreciation letter last week. Why you ask? Because these letters MAKE students (literally make or break)... I have seen change of face in some students over the past week because of a note... let me share this with you.

Last year, I found that one of the greatest things that I have ever done as a teacher is write a personal letter to one of my kids. I'm not sure what made me begin doing this but I begin seeing huge change in students, especially those who needed self-confidence and a boost every once in a while when they were having a tough time. So I started these yellow cards that just said, "Thank you... You made my day." They had a sunshine on them. When a student did something nice for me or someone else and it made a difference, I just wrote them a quick note to say thank you. Students started displaying these as if they had been given a golden medal of honor and as I would walk through class... they all stared to see if it was going to be given to them or not. The ones who received them felt as if they had been "the chosen" and the ones who didn't followed it up with something nice so that they could get a card next time. It had an incredible effect.

So I have been really bad at doing that this year and, in fact, did not write any during the first 9 weeks of school. I decided that I better get back in the game, and boy, am I glad I did! Last week, I gave a few notes out to students who had done exceptional things in class and had gone out of their way to do something nice and helpful for me in class (it was a rough week last week). One was given to a student who asks every single day in between every single class and everytime he sees me, "How are you doing?" "Are you feeling okay?" You get the point. And then I gave a few to students who stayed after school after Student Council to help out and just be nice... oh how I appreciate kids with time who are bored! Right?

So I give the notes to the kids who stay after school with me. Not a huge deal. I give it to one of them boys who had helped me in class. Then, I give it to D (who had helped me in class) and he helped me again after he received the note. After school, we had a parent conference and when I walked into the conference, there were 2 pieces of paper on the table in front of his mom... one about a reading group and the other? My note to D from class. I was the last core teacher to talk to his mom. I had D share about what I had told him before the note... what a leader he was, what a positive leader he could be, and how he is not meant to be a follower. With tears in her eyes, his mom looked at me and said, "I can't believe you said that [in the note], I have always thought D was a follower and I am so glad that someone saw something else." I was blown away. Who knew a note could make that much of a difference? Unfortunately, the ending to that story is not so good... he got in quite a bit of trouble (as a leader) the day after that and I have not seen him since.

The last note went to S, one of the most polite, sweetest 8th grade boys I have ever met. That's pretty much what the note said. He was the only student in my 5th period class to receive a note that day and it really made him feel like a million bucks. He just looked at me like he had won the lottery as he flattened out the note on his desk. S then said, "I don't know where I'm going to put it!" To which I replied, "Your binder?" And then he reminded me that he doesn't have a binder with a plastic cover on the front and he didn't want it to be ruined. He told me thank you over and over and over and even reminded me the next day how thankful he was to get a note from me.

I realized, even more, the importance of this on Friday when I received a folder of letters from my students and Student Council kids thanking me for doing something to make a change. Not bragging, just sharing... these are some of the things that my students told me (some of these just made me laugh because kids tell the truth!):

• "You can be nice but if people get on your bad side, they're going to wish they hadn't."
• "You are the light of my day. Thank you, a million times."
• "I enjoy being in your class because you always make us laugh and have a good time."
• "I also appreciate how you were real with me and the class." (I am straight-forward and I'm not even lying...)
• "H is for the happiness you bring."
• "When I'm in 3rd period, I'm just looking at the clock, waiting until the bell rings to go to your class."
• "You always do nice things for us. Other teachers do the same thing every day and it gets old."
• "You have inspired me to care for others with all your activities (like the purple ribbons)."
• "I respect you because you're strict and won't deal with me and my friend's crap." (That seriously made me laugh out loud!)
• (This was the one that made me laugh the most-- this girl doesn't lie.) "I think you are so funny." (Okay, that wasn't what I was talking about.) "It's also funny that you put up with us, because I think you shouldn't... What I'm trying to say is you're a very good teacher.... oh and sorry the whole class stresses you out. :/ P.S. I'm going to try harder in class. :D And I love your sarcasm." (If you're not laughing, then you take yourself too seriously!)

There are lots and these are just a few... to prove to you that these letters to me made a difference and the ones I've written have too! So the challenge... write a letter to someone who deserves it, someone who needs it, someone you keep thinking you should write to and haven't and let the words in the note be words of life to change and make a difference!

May you walk in the knowledge that what you do makes a difference and may you do more than walk in it, may you make a difference because you can!

-Melissa

The Great Struggle

I think C.S. Lewis would have liked this title or he would have changed it to something extremely and wonderfully brilliant…. Like “Life.” I mean, isn’t that part of it? The Great Struggle that I am currently feeling and seeing and touching and hearing, and not necessarily loving, isn’t this part of life? Isn’t it all around us? I would definitely argue so and I would also say that most of us don’t like it. Let’s be honest, if you do say you like it, I’m not sure I believe you’re an honest person and if that’s shallow of me, then so be it. I like to think that I am a person who has it together, who seems great on the outside no matter what is going on inside of me and I am currently finding it harder and harder to pretend. There is too much inside of me to pretend like everything is “fine.” When asked today how I was, I was completely honest in saying, “I’m okay.” I am okay… I’m not great… everything’s not fine and I know at the same time that it could be worse. Please understand something with me here. I am not where I thought I would be and I am constantly fighting this battle as to whether that is good or bad. I have found it to be both…. And actually, mostly good. If I would have picked out where I wanted life to take me, I think I would have been ended up quite heartbroken. This is primarily because I would have never moved, never gotten out of my comfort zone, and I would have never seen life for what it really is…. It would have taken me a longer time to get to where I currently am and so I’m saying… this is good.

In all of this, I have been the emotionally out of control girl… yep, hard to believe, coming from the girl who doesn’t really cry and mostly smiles. It has been hard for me to admit that I struggle. I am proud and see myself as someone who overall knows the direction I’m going and I am just feeling stuck recently. I haven’t slept and I am continuing to believe that it is because God is speaking to me. I just haven’t really wanted to listen. I guess I have some people to thank in this process… like whoever it was a few weeks ago that told me that people wake up in the middle of the night because God is speaking, my college roommate who I was talking to yesterday that plain out asked, “How’s your time with God?”, and the precious girl I mentor (who recently should mentor me I think) who said, “I could see in your face that you are struggling.” I need people to be honest with me and to be real with me and understand me and still believe in me. Sometimes I just forget my purpose (as I have talked about in other blogs) and I lose my direction and I don’t listen or pay attention to my Guide (Jesus). I wake up and pray that I can go back to sleep, not hear what He wants to tell me and because this was clearly pointed out to me within the past 24 hours, when I woke up at 1:00 last night, I said (in probably not such a polite way) to God, “What are you teaching me?” The only word that was clear was obedience… the only word that is clear is obedience. I’m really good at telling others what to do, not always so good at following the direction myself when it’s something I didn’t come up with or something that I want to do. I woke up with the word “Obedience” still all around me and then decided that I hated everything I had to wear today, I boiled over my the last of my chai tea, and I was stressed out all of a sudden. Welcome to the Great Struggle.

As I’m sulking and complaining to myself today, I come across this situation (for lack of a better word). J (one of my unhappy children) comes into 1^st period and because he is more stubborn than I am, I have to at least aggravate him a little. So I look at him with the biggest smile I can muster up and say, “Good morning sunshine.” He laughs his not so nice laugh and I laugh at myself for getting such a kick out of something so ridiculous. He carries on, acts like a crazy person in class and eventually gets in trouble and has to change seats. He doesn’t complain (out loud at least) and then we go about the day as normal. Later in the day, after I have been just completely ticked off by a couple of kids, I’m standing in the hall and I see J. He looks at me with this huge, guilty grin and says, “Good morning sunshine!” What an irritation really and a laugh at the same time. He looked like he had just won the lottery (or just satisfied himself by torturing one of his other teachers) and I think to myself… I really set myself up for that one! In the midst of my great struggle, my frustration, my irritation, my annoyance, my whatever you want to call it… God chooses the strangest people in my life to point out exactly what I don’t want to see in myself. I’m fighting with this as I write, as I am still unhappy about it and happy at the same time. So what do we do with this Great Struggle? What do I do with it? Where do I go from here?

Another thing that happened to me today was an e-mail… a God send e-mail that made me cry in the middle of my prep. (Not like it’s taken much lately to make me cry but still.) In this e-mail, this teacher friend of mine says, “Teach your kids to dream. Not little dreams, big dreams. I mean, if you are going to dream, make it the biggest one you can, right?” Now I realize this was more about the kids but it hit me right in the face. Part of my struggle has come from a lack of dreaming, a lack of believing, a lack of seeing things as God sees them and as I was thinking about this and some other things that were said in the e-mail on my drive home from school… it was as if God said, “Why did you let those things go? Why did you decide I wouldn’t give you what I gave you to dream of in the first place? Why wouldn’t you be good enough to receive a gift like a dream?” Maybe those are things you should think about too… maybe you are in the Great Struggle too… the Great Struggle that we call “life.” (Unfortunately for you is if you think you’re out of it and you’re still breathing?… Well, good luck on that one.)

May you learn to dream in this struggle, as you admit that you struggle and hear the voice of God speaking obedience and learning to love and give and make a difference. I’m there… it hurts and it comforts all at the same time. I see and feel your pain and am praying that God teaches you who He is all over again… even in the sweet life and time He has given us.

-Melissa

Re-graduating college?

Have you ever had those moments where you feel like you are reliving a decision or a BIG moment in life? I feel like (in my kinesthetic mode) that this weekend I relived graduating college. I visited Salt Lake to see one of my best friends, Katie, who teaches 8th and 9th grade English there now. While I was there, I had an opportunity to revisit a few different things in my mind because I did have a 7 hour drive there and back and plenty of time to think otherwise.

1. We went to see a play entitled "The Drowsy Chaperone" which was good, but had an extremely lousy ending.... and I was quite disappointed with the ending. The play is about this guy who lives alone listening to records of musicals and he tells the story of 'The Drowsy Chaperone' as it is played before his eyes. I won't tell you all the details of the actual play but in the process of giving details and allowing us to see the play take place in his small New York apartment, he has monologues describing what his life is like. He mentions a wedding but obviously (as later given) has gotten a dirty divorce and is heartbroken because of it and here I am sitting in between 7-8 college best friends (who went to a different university than I did) and I am just thinking-- is that what reality is actually like? Does everyone end up lonely? As I was watching another movie this weekend, they gave the following statistic: "80% of women who are not married are lonely." Well, there you have it... if life is like a movie (which mine often is) does it just end up lonely? Does it end with an unhappy ending?

I had this reality shake-up when I graduated college about 3 years ago (it feels like longer!). The reality that you are going out into the world alone, facing it alone... or at least that's what the world would say. In my realizations (and in graduating college) I am not alone, it just feels that way sometimes. It's this overwhelming emotion when I'm sitting at Panera watching and listening and feeling that everyone is sitting with someone or talking to someone or going somewhere with someone. I am finally to the stage in my life that my friends who have been on this journey with me are no longer physically alone. It's hard. And it doesn't always feel good and I am often an emotional basketcase because of it. So that's the first thought in re-graduating college... I was attempting to avoid a list AND it is just impossible. My mind processes things that way, in detail and in lists. You can thank my high auditory learning style and my genetic OCD for the rest of it.

2. What do you believe? In Salt Lake, I had the opportunity (yes, I'll call it that) to visit Temple Square. Have you been there? Have you been approached by the sisters and the elders? Not only that, but I am with a Mormon on this walk as I'm being approached. We went into a couple of the guest centers and it was completely awkward because I absolutely know what I believe. (Now, you probably didn't think this after reading my first saga on this blog, but I do!) I saw pictures of the stories of creation (including the most awkward portrait of Adam and Eve I have ever seen) that looked similar to pictures that I saw when I was younger, and even pictures of the prophets of the Old Testament (even though I also have to believe that God must laugh at the ridiculous ways we make Jesus look in these portraits and it must freak the OT prophets out that there are now statues and replicas of what we think that looked like-- that, of course, is just my opinion on the matter). Then we get to the part where there are pictures and stories of the Book of Mormon. Oh, and quotations of verses as well. This simply freaked me out. I'm not gonna lie. It was this weird feeling in my gut and a clear voice in my Spirit that said, "What a lie they are choosing to believe." Even from an unChristian perspective and as History major, the stories of the Mormons being in America is just untrue and the fact that they look Causcasian makes it even harder for me to believe if they were supposed to be living in Utah. Is that weird to anyone else? Anywho, I am, of course, asking a million questions to Katie (because I love to question her when she thinks I won't) and because it just doesn't make sense. In the midst of this conversation, there are 2 "sisters" (Mormon girls who are on their mission and serving in Temple Square) that are talking to some visitors. One of the sisters turns to the visitor and says, "Isn't it great that we can find another testament that God loves us this much?" When did the Bible not become enough? When did humans become so greedy that we would take the very Breath of God and tell him, "Sorry, there's more you missed?" I just quite frankly don't get it and at that very moment, everything in me said, "Pray and then pray some more." As we're walking out of the visitor's center and Temple Square, we are approached by two more sisters and then Katie and I continue talking and had some interesting conversation about salvation, Jesus, and we both became quite passionate. At that moment though, I didn't doubt what I believed at all. It was as if God was alive and well in me (as He always is) and holding me in the very palm of His hand reminding me that I am not alone and He is the only way to Heaven, it will never matter about all of the activity I do. Never ever. {Apologies for that not even making sense... sometimes words come out and they are just totally me. I am currently having a conversation with you at a dinner table and you are completely unaware- until now. :) }

3. Re-evaluating life from a different perspective as I did when I graduated college--Me being auditory.... it is within the last 6 months that I have learned this about myself. It has made me feel better about things that I have been so unsure of before, and it has helped me understand other people so much better! And again in all of my honesty, I am glad to be auditory! Who knew that would happen?? (And it explains to everyone around me why I am "one of those people" who reads out loud and says what I'm typing while I'm typing it.)

4. "Let those who love the Lord hate evil, for he guards the lives of his faithful ones..." Psalm 97:10a.... may you pray for those who do evil and may you be found faithful!!! I knew so much Scripture when I was in college and it really was a defense against evil... just a thought for you as I think through it myself. Have a great week and boast/bask in what the Lord has done in your life as you are faithful to him as well!

May I be found faithful....
Melis

To blog or not to blog...

Let me take you for a little rant... because it's been a while...

I have been so busy that I don't know what to do when I have a few minutes to sit so I do exactly that, sit... and do nothing... sometimes I watch planes out my windows, sometimes I just stare at the wall and think about how not straight my pictures are, I hum a little tune or even talk to myself. It's ridiculous I know. So here's a little update on how things are:

1. TMI Alert... over the last week I have found out Too Much Information about too many of my students, most of it absolutely heartbreaking and I believe that most of it is caused by parents... wow... if they only knew. If you're parent, please ask your child what they are doing outside of school, they are dying (literally) because they think you don't care.

2. MAD Project... apparently it will be about abbreviations here and we'll go from there. MAD is where I'm headed and for more than one reason, I am changing it to mean "Make A Difference" if you get my drift. So we start with my 180 students and we will send our MAD ribbons to Salt Lake Friday and I'm hoping somewhere else in a week or two... if you want in, let me know. I want to start seeing students reach their potential and I think they will begin to do that the more they know that they are breathing and alive everyday to make a difference!

3. Teenagers... if you are reading this and you pray, pray for my students. It is hard and it is hitting that time of year when it is overwhelming to be a teacher. Besides all the stuff that is passed down from districts and admin, there are a lot of things taking place outside of school that is becoming and already has become major issues for these kids. If you have not watched the youtube video "Lost Generation" do it... here's the link....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42E2fAWM6rA

4. Where have I been? Where am I going? I have been living the life in Las Vegas... right? Ummm... okay.... so I've been in Las Vegas since August (which is TOO long for me in this ridiculous city) and I'm going to Salt Lake this weekend... my heart is thrilled, and I get to teach 9th graders (pumped about that too) about community service, Africa, you know all the things that get me so fired up constantly. AND I'm going back to Georgia in about a month... it's about dang time... I really miss my family.

5. Birthdays-- mine is in 18 days... yeah I turn 26 this year and I seem the same and different all at the same time. Good luck getting older to all of you (myself included).

6. Last thing... if God has shown me anything over the past month, the past week, the past 24 hours-- it is that I am exactly where He wants me to be. EXACTLY. It has been confirmed in people around me and it has all come because of my obedience and believe me, that obedience would NOT have come without the grace and faithfulness of God. He is so good and I couldn't be more grateful at this moment for the moments and hours and days I've had with him lately.

May you walk in grace and peace and your faithfulness to Him as He is faithful to continue to give us direction, let us love people, and even be loved ourselves.

Great is thy faithfulness, Melissa

P.S. Sorry that you missed my Gospel church version of this song last night in my apartment... I'll open it up for visitors soon! :)