Reflections on the Last School Year

Reflections on the last year

            School starts a week from Monday and I am still processing the last school year.  I needed this summer – to sleep, read, walk, rest, sit quietly and process.

         There was so much this year – so much good and hard, so much laugher so many tears, so many euphoric highs and so many “depths of despair” (thank you Anne Shirley for the creative vocabulary!).  This year was the hardest, most heart wrenching, delightful funny, learning experience.

         I KNOW that a sovereign God placed each of the twenty wiggly bodies in my class for a reason -  I needed to learn from them and they from me. Y’all when I tell you, I know God had a plan, I am in NO way saying it was an easy journey.  It was hard, I am talking about gut wrenching, ugly cry (you know the kind) hard.

         But here is the beauty – God was there with us in the middle of the ugly and hard.  Never before have I been so aware of His presence.  He is faithful and he worked beauty from a mess.  There was beauty in the middle of it  - when things were still hard He gave me sweet laughter.  Not the mean kind – the kind that brings relief and delight.  Everyday God sent laughter and here is the best part of the gift y’all, every day he helped me notice and laugh too.  It was a gift and a reminder that God was there and working.  I needed those reminders to breath and enjoy and trust that He was working.  The changes that happened day by day were not extraordinary, but the sum total is breath taking.  It was hard work and God had a LOT of work he needed to do in my heart.  The Bible talks about how God knows the end from the beginning (I know it is referring to way more then a school year), what a reminder that God KNOWS.  He knew exactly where this sweet class and I were headed, even on days that I doubted that we were going to make it to Friday.  And I am telling you, the end was GLORIOUS!!! Not because it was the end, but because we, together, had come so very far and through it all God was faithful. 

         Can you see why I was tired?  It was so hard, but I am telling you that without a doubt it was my favorite year.  You know how when you are reading a really good book and there is character development all over the place and you feel exhausted and euphoric but you ache at the end because it is over and the story is done?  That is how I am feeling.  This year was full of growth in 20 little people and me.  Their hurts and triumphs became mine and this class crawled into my heart and will forever have a place there.  This class required an investment from me that I did not think possible.  They are ready to be passed on to the next teachers, but my heart is reluctant to let them go.  This  class forever be a little bit “mine”!

 So we have come to the final chapter of this adventure for the 2012-2013 school year and here is what I know for sure  - the greatest lesson learned this year– God is with us and cares.  He has plans to change us to better reflect him and to use us to love others.  It is not easy but He is Good!

The END

PS Stay tuned for a new lessons and adventures beginning in about a week!

Why I hate the last day of school

One day left and a half day at that – my heart is having a really, really hard time with that fact.  This week has flown by and they are so excited to be finished and I am aching.  I got lots of extra hugs today.  I have a few little friends who are just not quite ready for the end to come.  We have wrung every moment out of the past 177 days.  There were some AMAZING days and some really hard ones but mostly there were glorious, regular days filled with great learning.  This class caught my heart and when they walk out the door tomorrow, they are going to be taking it with them.  So if you see me tomorrow, I will probably have on my sunglasses to hide some tears.  It will be a great day of celebration but a hard one on my heart! 

Here are some thoughts on the last day of school.

Why I HATE the last day of school

by Blythe Chapman

I HATE the last day of school


They have gone, school has ended


The echoes of their laughter have ceased to reverberate

I have given my last hug and waved my last wave and sent them 
                off to adventures unknown


The memories mingle with the dust particles that dance through 
                my classroom


Oh, how I HATE the last day of school


Together we have grown and lived the daring adventures of 
                math and science, language arts and social studies


I expected much and they challenged me to be a better teacher  
                and rise above 
        This room, that is now blanketed with silence, was once filled
                    and over flowing with their laughter and kindness


I watched over them, pushed them, challenged them, and would 
                   not rest until they had grown


And now they have and I am glad, 


But . . .


Oh, how I hate the last day of school


For it means that the laughter and funny smiles, the favorite
                      books and stories have ended
          
I will no longer be the one to watch their eyes light up when they
                       discover they can write a whole sentence with no help


I will no longer be the one to see them ask for forgiveness and
                       see a friendship restored


I will no longer be the one to bandage scrapes and put on magic
                       lotion that can make the world a nice place again


My job is finished and it is with such mixed feelings I watch them
                      skip out the door

We have triumphed and finished a whole year together – oh the
                      joy and relief


But then comes the grief, for what once was, will never be again


So I will send them on to the next teacher, who will teach them
                     well and challenge them to be excellent


And I will remember . . .


Remember the laughter and tears and quietly place all this in a
                     corner of my heart


I will also remember that after the summer, laughter will visit me
                     again in the form a new class with new faces to love


As I lock the door, I will remember that it has been an incredible
                    year and the pain of the last day will always be worth it all


But, I still will always hate the last day of school

Praying for Caterpillars

 I did something this week that I never thought I would do.  .  . I have taught kindergarten long enough to KNOW without a doubt that something unexpected is going to happen, but I was NOT prepared for this happening.  Last week we received our caterpillars. The class was ecstatic (they decided that the caterpillars should be our class pet and that they needed names).  All last week we watched them crawl around their little home and grow bigger.  This week tragedy happened . . .  The jar of caterpillars got knocked off the bookcase.  Trying to be super teacher (picture me running and diving to catch the jar) I tried to catch the jar but I forgot one very very important fact – I am a CLUTZ!  Not kidding I really am, when the class was talking about the meaning of the word “Clumsy”  one of my sweet kiddos explained it as “you know what Miss Chapman does when she trips over things and drops things.”  So spectacularly, worth of a movie, instead of catching the caterpillars and saving the day, OH NO what did I do?  I hit the jar of caterpillars into the shelf and then they landed with a THUD!  There was a gasp of my students . . . and I felt like throwing up.  I quickly picked the jar up and in a very cheerful voice said, “they are OK.”  One boy, “Miss Chapman, they were crawling around this morning and now they are not!” Sure enough, no crawling for these critters.  I responded with, “Humm I think they are sleeping,  we should let them rest.”  We had to go to PE and Music so I hurried the kiddos out of the room.  When I came back and more closely examined the poor caterpillars one looked ok and three were bleeding!  Did you know that a caterpillar could bleed?  I had never really thought about it before but I got an up close view. 

I have prayed for some pretty interesting things in my life.  While living in Central Asia, I prayed that I could remember the Russian word for cucumber, I have prayed for a parking place.  I know that God listens and lots of times, he and I have really great, deep talks but on this day, I prayed for caterpillars.  Oh yes I did.  I prayed that God could fix the caterpillars and that he could help my kiddos be ok if the caterpillars all died. You see, it is a BIG deal in kindergarten to have caterpillars and the kiddos had been so excited about watching them turn into butterflies.   I have a few kiddos who are going through some hard things right now and it broke my heart to think that we were about to have a hard thing happen at school.  (I know you might think I am going overboard here, but you come tell a kindergarten class that their caterpillars are dead and then we can talk!) So I prayed for those silly little caterpillars, I really really prayed for them. 

This morning, I reluctantly checked on the caterpillars and much to my delight, we have TWO living caterpillars.  Compared to the five I thought were dead, two living is a BIG deal!!! 

You can imagine my relief.  In the scheme of things, caterpillars are really NOT a big deal.  Way better things are going to happen this week and way harder things are going to happen to. But how sweet is it that we serve a God who listens to the big AND small requests.  He is powerful and can part seas but he is compassionate and cares about little things as well.  I needed that reminder this week.  A reminder that we serve a LIVING God who is near. Funny how it started with praying for caterpillars and turned into a reminder of God's character and nearness!

20 days left

20 days  . . . 20 days until the end.  My head knows that I will see most of them again but my heart is having a hard time with this reality.  This has been one of the hardest years of my teaching career. It ranks right up there with my first year of teaching when I had just moved 10,000 miles away to Central Asia, had NO idea what I was doing, was the only kindergarten teacher, and was also going through culture shock.  Yep it has been a doozy of a year, but when I look back it has been filled with some of my favorite moments. 

This year I have learned to laugh.  In the middle of the  hard (if you don’t know about the hard this year- take my word for it – it was hard)  God graciously and pointedly gave me moments to laugh, laugh at myself, laugh at funny things my sweet kiddos said and most of all to laugh WITH them.  This year we have learned and come so far  - all of us – and the sound that echoes in my head and heart is the laughter.  What a delightful thing to sit together and laugh!  It is not earth shattering but it does take time to sit and notice and sit and laugh.  I have no regrets about the time it took.  It was good for my heart and for theirs. 

So for the next 20 days, I am going to take the time to laugh and soak up every little moment and relish every bit of it.