A Eureka Moment About Education (134)

Aha, Uh-Huh, You Get Me Right?

I didn't get two undergraduate degrees and a master’s degree in education to do this. I didn't student teach for a year for this. I didn't write a thesis, get gifted education certified, after two more years of school, or spend 19 years at three different schools to be delegated into a virtual classroom. 

Neither did any other educator, take their journey of fulfillment, to become an on-line teacher. Some may have chosen that route, but most of us did not. 

Our adventures are in progress, saving automatically. We are in a constant state of learning and growth. We attend professional development- both required and by choice. The latter being in more frequency. We want to learn. 

We build communities of like-minded educators, where we can continue to prepare, matriculate and wade through, the endless opinions, strategies and techniques of fellow educators.

We read, a lot. Watch videos, listen to podcasts. We jump into Facebook, Nearpod, Zoom and Flipgrid conversations. We listen, a lot. We look over our work and seek updates and data dumps. 

We are machines. Instruments of change. Mechanisms of relationships. We identify the gears, so we can help rotate the wheel. 

We have engines, powered by our sheer will to keep moving forward. The fuel of that transmission is our students. The frame our classrooms. 

Crash, Bang, Clunk

We feel as if we have been towed into a body shop- dented with scratched paint. We feel as if we have been in a fender bender and before we are street ready, we are stuck in the shop.

This seems like a vacation to some. Like what we normally do, has gotten easier, less stressful. Like we are sipping Mai Tai's on a quiet beach in the Caribbean. 

But, in fact, we have more work, longer hours, we are more invested because we are seeing the flaws in remote learning. Our instincts and compassion have been amplified and we are busier than ever.

We are professionals. We adapt. We maintain our composure. We endure.

But we also feel sad that we don’t get to see our students, again this year. We feel slighted. We feel our preparedness and maintenance fall short. Our options have been discontinued.

We feel uncertain, worried, and hopeful. But also, realistic because we know there is more disappointment to come. My eureka moment came this morning.

Repair, Upcycle

I have had moments of clarity. A lot of reflection. I have sought out feedback. I have maintained a routine- school hours and personal time. 

I have been in teacher mode on the weekends, late at night- making sure I respond to concerns and disappointments of parents and students.

But my eureka moment slammed into me at 7:00am this morning as I rolled over in bed and saw my computer light up after an update restarted it. Not one I scheduled, but an HP maintenance update. 

A forced shutdown. Automatic protocols. Rebooting a system. I stared at the screen, as my icons appeared one by one on the desktop. 

Popping back into their designated location- rows of brightly colored, labelled folders and badges- finding their place.

Not only has education, local communities and global society, been rebooted and had a forced shutdown, this much is obvious. We have been placed in a holding pattern, a waiting zone, for the update to finish. 

The folders and badges haven’t appeared yet. We are fidgety and nervous, for it to complete. The screen betraying us. The sound of overheating and rebooting filling us with trepidation.

We are on the blue screen. The blue screen that scares any computer owner to death. When that screen appears, we know there might be trouble. We stare at the ‘wheel of death’ or ‘spinning suspension’ as it rotates endlessly. Taunting us.

Hold Down the Off Button

We don’t know what to do- sometimes we panic and hit restart. We want so much for our technology to work fast and efficiently and when it doesn’t- we reboot. We want to feel in control, of our electronic connection, to the outside world.

We are in a real world computer crash. There is a massive resetting of parameters, reloading of our settings, reorientation of our home pages. 

There was a breach to the mainframe and now we are on the blue screen waiting for everything to appear back on our devices. We feel lost in anticipation. But we wait. 

Will programs be lost? Will software be outdated? Will ‘virus protection’ be enough? Yet, we wait.

As educators we understand technology issues. A failure in plan A. So, we have a plan b, and plan c, etc. But our best laid plans are obsolete. We are waiting for the new operating system to become available. But we don’t have access to the download instructions.

We received our degrees, we spent years in our classrooms, we built relationships, wrote lessons, collaborated and spent time team building.

We didn't do any of it, to end up looking at a computer screen, wishing we had students in front of us.

We didn't do any of it, to be waiting for a blue screen, to become a desktop and icons to appear- each a reminder of what we have done in the past.

Personally, I am dizzy looking at the twirl of the hoop, the roll of the gyre, the circulation of uncertainty. 

I feel frozen, like a screen un-moving, stuck in time. I know something is happening- I can hear the whirling sound of endeavor.

Eureka, Awe and Oh No!

My eureka moment was not, that like crashing computers and frozen screens we are locked into a cycle of wait. 

It was that the icons of change are loading. An educator’s portfolio varies, but their conviction is consistent. That is why we update and data dump.

We will get through this- probably not in a way we want or prefer. 

But like a mass data breach, it is difficult to identify every weak link. All we can do right now, is wait for the upload to finish, and keep our eyes and ears open.

The ‘wheel of death’ as so many computer users, shout out during frustration- will disappear and what remains will be our desktop. 

We will only have ownership of our personal screen- the rest, unfortunately will be designed by others, all we can do is wait.

Eureka- oh no! We are not in control. Awe and a biting sense of doom- we might not see our students in classrooms for awhile. The reason we became educators in the first place.

Eureka- we are educators! We are in this for students and we will do what it takes for them. We are optimistic- but we are also realistic. 

If we stay collaborative, maybe our icons will appear a little faster. Maybe, the operating system will function properly and we will be able to add our personal preferences. 

Blue screen not fading, icons not loading. Wheel spinning, computer whirling.........