Total Breakdown

Well, since last December, much has happened to say the least.

Aside from desperate attempts to just keep swimming through grad school, there was one of my passions, the Hope Center Arts Academy, to see through to its year-end production last May. More than one hundred students danced, sang, acted, painted their way through a theatrical production that I must say was just fantastic.

Because I NEVER do anything the easy way, I also assumed the helm of a preschool in April. There can be no more pure definition of a school marm than that! When I first caught the fever way back I romantically thought I'd be teaching quadratic equations and the fineries of literary analysis to middle schoolers, but alas! Serendipity has me dealing with why crayons don't belong in the mouth and how to grip a pencil just so. I'm scoping this re-visit to the wonder years from the other side of the Jordan—given that my own are navigating elementary and middle school—and boy does it make a healthy difference on my perspective. It's exciting to think of what the possiblities are. God sure has a sense of humor—I claimed I wanted to build, so here I am, just a peg up from children's first learning experiences.

Wow. Talk about breaking something down to its most basic elements; rather than a dream deferred, mine has been reformed.

My mind has been addled with thoughts of lesson plans, fundraising, bulletin boards and inventory questions and blown by the idea of participating in the city's largest policy area. Just think; EVERYONE goes to school, be it private, public or at home. Not everyone is hospitalized or sits before a judge.

While the work of managing preschoolers is hardly a walk in the park, there is NO doubt that the adults are the most difficult ingredient of the education area. Anything is possible, from outrageous neglect to impossible expectations to poor communication—all of which you'd think the preschoolers would be guilty, eh? Nonetheless, it is solid proof that learning is a life long process. Can anybody say amen? On the other hand, I watched a teacher have LOADS of fun teaching the letter P last week. Who'da thought you could use popsicle sticks and frozen pears to make peacocks?

So I'm making it through the dog days of August with thoughts of opening Parent Night, teacher training and beefing up enrollment, and I'm EXCITED.

More from the trenches as it comes....