Month: September 2016

Brave Courageous and Bold

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

wyatt-earpI wasn’t allowed to watch much television when I was a child. My mother thought it prudent to limit the amount of time that I spent sitting in front of the box with its black and white images. She much preferred that I play outside or read. As the popularity of this new invention grew she began to relent just a bit but still insisted that she be the one to chose the programming that I was allowed to see. Being a woman she wasn’t particularly inclined to select westerns but for me those were far and away the best of the offerings.

The first adult western offered during primetime viewing hours was The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp starring Hugh O’Brian, a dashingly handsome man who supposedly was chosen for the role because he resembled an early photograph of the real Wyatt Earp. The show premiered in September of 1955 and ran until 1961. Four weeks after Wyatt Earp came on the air Gunsmoke joined its ranks. At one point in time there were more than twenty different western themed series being offered by the three big networks, many of them inspired by the success of Wyatt Earp.

I loved visiting my uncles Jack and Louie. They were western fanatics and while my mother was being otherwise entertained I was able to get my fill of those remarkable programs while sitting next to them in the dark. The lead characters became my heroes and I learned the theme songs for my favorite shows by heart. I’d ride around the neighborhood on my bicycle bellowing, “Wyatt Earp, Wyatt Earp, brave courageous and bold. Long live his fame and long live his glory and long may his story be told.” It gave me a bit of credibility with my friends to be so well versed in the more important aspects of kid life.

I had little idea that there had actually been a real man named Wyatt Earp whose story was a bit less impressive than the television counterpart. I only knew that he and the other cowboys who lit up the screen were always good looking, brave, honest and loyal men who fought for what was right. They were role models for all time. Little did I understand that in reality the men and women of the wild west hardly resembled their Hollywood posers. I innocently dreamed of their exploits and heroics and sometimes imagined that my two uncles might have made fine lawmen had they happened to live in the era portrayed on the screens each evening.

Westerns were popular at the movies as well as on television. Gene Autry was a singing cowboy and Alan Ladd was a brooding cowboy but the best of the lot was John Wayne. I loved every one of his movies and luckily so did my mom. Most people choose True Grit as his best role but I was a huge fan of Stagecoach and The Searchers. Somehow I imagined that every place west of San Antonio was filled with horse riding, gun toting heroes as amiable and charismatic as John Wayne.

Perhaps television and film producers alike created a few too many westerns back then much like the reality programming of today and the public grew weary of the sameness of the shows. Slowly but surely the old westerns were replaced with other fan favorites. Now cowboy shows are a rarity which is a shame because some of them really were quite good. Maybe we just outgrew them and began to realize that the image of the great hero of the old west was little more than a myth. We may have just become too cool for those guys with their ten gallon hats and boots.

I remembered how much I had enjoyed those stories when actor Hugh O’Brien recently died at the age of ninety one. I hadn’t really thought about him for years and I was actually surprised that he had grown so old. In my mind he was still a young lion in his early thirties with that steely eyed expression that told outlaws that he meant business. He seemed to be the perfect man to keep a town safe. Watching him in action always made me feel a bit more secure even in the real world. Hearing of his passing was like acknowledging the end of an era.

They say that what goes around comes around and I often wish that there might be a revival of the old westerns. I’ve heard that Longmire is a somewhat reasonable facsimile of those old shows so I may have to check it out soon. I still think that the viewing public might appreciate a well crafted western. Perhaps once we the audience have had our fill of present day offerings someone will think to create a really good story about the characters who roamed in the days when the western expanses of our country were wild and unpredictable.

We seem to be a bit down on cowboys and ranchers these days. I suppose that some of those of old did things that were of questionable morals but someone with a very creative mind should be able to create a character who is real and not just a cardboard caricature. It might be a compelling program that explores the complexities of that era with an imperfect but somewhat noble hero. I tend to think that Darrell of The Walking Dead is cut very much from the old western cloth. It shouldn’t be that difficult to build a story around such a man.

We’ve lost most of the actors who made those roles come to life and brought little kids like me so much delight. I for one think it’s time again to “Head ’em up, move ’em on.” We’re ready for another Rawhide.

Tribes

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

salad-bowl2We humans seem to naturally gather together in groups. Sometimes we are part of harmless cliques or clubs. Often we belong to a particular race or ethnicity. As long as we respect one another’s differences and don’t devolve into mistrust or envy of the other alliances we manage to live in harmony but the history of the world all too often demonstrates a tendency for people to choose up sides with disastrous consequences.

My grandparents came from a part of eastern Europe with a tribal mentality. The people there have squabbled with one another for centuries. The Austro-Hungarian empire was an attempt to forcefully unite a disparate group of people who for the most part despised one another. Treaties with this country and that led to full blown war when the heir to the throne was assassinated. World War I and the tragedy that it spawned came from the inability of the many ethnicities to find ways to share limited resources and land. The horror of that conflict was magnified a couple of decades later when Adolf Hitler went so far as to attempt to create a so called master race by ridding his country of all those considered to be undesirable.

Most of the civil wars and disagreements in the world today are between different religious sects, political philosophies, and tribes. From the South Sudan to Syria the human suffering that we see derives from groups who can’t get along. There are Suni Muslims fighting Shia Muslims and everyone in the Middle East seems to hate the Kurds and the Jews. Here at home we are becoming increasingly divided by political and religious philosophies. It’s not healthy. We don’t want to become Balkanized like the place from whence my grandfather fled over a hundred years ago.

We all have a sense of pride in who we are. I am first and foremost a human being  from the United States of America. I am also a native Texan. My DNA marks me as mostly British and Eastern European. I am a Catholic but that same DNA indicates that my chromosomes show traces of European Jew. I am a unique combination derived from thousands of years of movements across continents and oceans. Today I humbly stand as someone who is just me, no better nor worse than anyone else. Essentially my only desire is to live in harmony and be allowed to have my own points of view.

I once worked with a brilliant historian. She held advanced degrees from the University of Houston and Rice University. She herself had been a war orphan from Austria who was sent to a family in the United States. She had a particular interest in the European alliances of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She also had a German car that often broke down so she needed rides home from time to time. Since her neighborhood was on the way to mine I usually offered to give her a lift. My motives didn’t always derive from generosity for I was fascinated by the conversations that I had with her. I used any excuse to hear her talk about the similarities that she saw between the Balkan states of Europe and the way she saw our own citizenry splintering into interest, religious and ethnic groups. She worried that we might one day be at one another’s throats and warned that we needed to find ways to resolve our differences or pay the consequences.

The age old argument is whether our American society should be a melting pot or a tossed salad. For years coming to the United States meant embracing the language, the culture and the beliefs. National pride meant loving America unconditionally. That was the melting pot. We set aside our differences and became as one. The problem is that such an idea was only minimally true. My own mother was taunted for being a Catholic and bearing the appearance of a foreigner. We all know that the Black citizens among us still struggle to be accepted as equals. There are those who would judge an individual based on color of skin, religion or language. Since we all like to celebrate our ancestry it seems more fitting to speak of being a gloriously beautiful salad in which each individual part mixes together to create a feast for the eyes and the palate. Such a theory only works if we agree to honor and respect one another and to share in a spirit of partnership. If we begin vying for power and resources the system begins to break down.

I believe in our capitalist republic. I think that it gives each of us the best opportunity to make something of ourselves but we have to be honest when it isn’t working as well as it should. We’ve often disagreed with one another on how to fix problems but the important thing is that we try. Of late we seem more inclined to turn our backs on anyone with whom we differ. Rather than attempting to find neutral ground we insult and push back on one another. Name calling has become a national pastime. As my old friend warned we are becoming increasingly divided and angry. Sadly I don’t believe that our tendencies will come to any good. I truly worry when I hear people say that if things don’t go their way they will move from the country rather than staying to work together. It is a sure sign that we are in grave danger of warring rather than finding solutions.

We certainly have our share of troublemakers all around us. They come from virtually every splinter group. They are rabble rousers who take delight in watching us fight among one another. Just as Osama Bin Laden and Nikita Khrushchev predicted we are in danger of being defeated from within. There are many people in the world who will celebrate if we fall. They are playing psychological games to make us feel unsafe. It is up to us to be better than they think we will.

We can all have good lives and still have plenty to share with others. We don’t have to fight unnecessary battles or follow those who would play on our fears. I would hate to think that my grandparents sailed all the way across the ocean to begin a new life here in the United States only to have this country end up much like the one that they left. We all love our children. We all want a bright future for them. It’s time that we began to work on accomplishing that without bashing those whose ideas differ from ours. We belong to the same tribe. It’s called mankind and underneath the superficialities that seem to define us is exactly the same flesh and blood.    

The Early Bird Catches the Worm

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

beautiful-sunrise-images-hd-photosI used to wonder about my early rising friends. You know the kind of people that I am thinking of, the ones who arrive at work at six thirty in the morning and boast that they have already been to the gym and vacuumed their living room. They come bearing hot muffins that they popped into the oven while they were getting dressed. They are overly perky given the time of day and more than ready to go. I always had a hard time fathoming how anyone might push themselves out of bed before six on a weekday and nine on the weekend. I have always needed my beauty rest and I have taken it with gusto whenever possible. Then something happened that changed my entire outlook on life.

For the past several months I find myself sleeping peacefully until about four in the morning. I awake and begin to toss and turn for an hour. By five I have come to the conclusion that I am not going to be able to fall back into a peaceful slumber so I lie uncomfortably in the dark closing my eyes in the hope that maybe my body will surrender. It doesn’t happen. I’ve finally decided that the only thing to do is to begin my day before sunrise. Since I don’t want to disturb my husband I use the time for quiet endeavors. It has been a remarkably freeing experience.

I check the news on my laptop to see what happened around the world while I was dreaming. I send birthday greetings to friends on Facebook and look for important emails. Then I write my blog. The words flow readily with nobody around. It is a perfect time for reflection and for going quietly within myself. As the minutes tick by the world outside slowly begins to awaken. I hear the cars backing out of driveways as my neighbors head for work or school. Children wait for the bus on the corner right in front of my house. Those on the early route are still sleepy and make little noise while the ones who leave when the sun has lit up the sky are frisky and mischievous. I keep my blinds open so that I might see the activities taking place all around me. They somehow make me happy.

I eat my breakfast and sip on my Diet Coke while I compose my essays. Sometimes I get quite excited because I sense that I have written something important that might influence the way people think. At other times I laugh at my own platitudes and Pollyanna imitations. I enjoy my little corner of the day and love that it is uninterrupted by robocalls or knocks at the door.

I have a dear friend who routinely meditates. She has often told me of the power of silence. I have always had difficulty stilling the voices in my head. They seem to be constantly scolding me and reminding me of all that I must do. My early morning alone time has brought me a newfound peace and I find myself able to become completely relaxed. I hear the beating of my heart and feel the breaths that I take. Somehow I feel in sync with the universe without the clatter of everyday life that begins with regularity as soon as the sun is on the horizon. I am beginning to experience the beauty of silence and meditation.

For the first time I understand why the early morning risers are so happy and even a bit self righteous. I don’t plan to look down on the sleepers like some do because I have been one of them for all of my life. I will instead rejoice in learning the wonders of greeting the day in the dark. I will enjoy this new phase of my life for as long as it lasts for I fear that one morning my body will revert to its old ways and I will awake to find the sun streaming through the spaces between my curtains and the clock registering a warning that I must hurry or fall behind.

I hate to admit that my newfound ability to wake up before the chickens is a measure of my age. My mother used to tell me that she was sometimes awake at three in the morning once she entered her senior years. She and one of my aunts would talk on the phone in the dark of the early morning hours because neither of them were able to stay in bed. Research tells me that I am supposed to get eight hours of uninterrupted slumber but I can’t seem to push it past six no matter how hard I try.

I sometimes wonder if we are creating a nation of insomniacs with the constant barrage of sights and sounds that overstimulate our brains. There is rarely a time when I do not hear a car driving past my house or a siren in the distance. Planes fly overhead and my phone makes little noises indicating that someone has sent me an email or a text. People are always checking their computers, reading from screens, playing fast moving games. It will be interesting to one day discover what the effects of all of this have been besides an epidemic of pinched nerves, frozen shoulders and numb fingers. We are caught up in a brave new world in which we eliminate the sounds of nature by shoving earphones into our heads so that we might escape to loud music instead. Air conditioners are humming, clocks are ticking, appliances are buzzing and we think that we have managed to ignore them but somehow our brains are taking note and perhaps even changing in ways that make it more and more difficult to simply relax.

I still consider myself a night owl rather than a morning person. I find it difficult to go to bed before eleven. I enjoy staying up late to finish a good book. I sometimes have my most eloquent ideas after everyone else has retired. I plan to enjoy my newfound morning hours for now. Who knew that I would one day be joining the early birds that I used to think were obnoxious? Life is certainly full of surprises and maybe even a few extra worms.

Get Out of Town!

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

votebuttonsLiterature is filled with words from wise men admonishing adults, especially parents, to always remember that children will often do what they see, not what they are told. In other words our kids are always watching us to determine if we practice what we preach. They may not yet know the word for hypocrisy or be able to explain its meaning but they are quite bright at detecting when we are disingenuous. Our youngsters are way more observant than we sometimes think which makes me rather concerned about our presidential candidates. I wonder what our young ones, especially our teenagers are thinking about now when two such terribly flawed individuals are vying for the highest office in the land.

On the one hand there is a bombastic blow hard who doesn’t seem to mind being continually rude at the very least and possibly racist in the way that he stereotypes entire groups of people. On the other hand there is a woman who has been caught in so many lies that it is now difficult to believe the sincerity of anything that she utters. How can we keep a straight face when we correct our children for their little white lies or punish them for behaving like a bully? Of course we ourselves may not be guilty of such behaviors but the kids may think that if such lack of character doesn’t matter in gaining the highest office in the land then why shouldn’t they be able to engage in a bit of inappropriate behavior here and there.

We used to live in a country guided by manners and respect. When we caught our leaders stretching the truth we turned our backs on them and sometimes even ran them out of town. Someone who was hurtful to certain groups might have had a limited audience and following for a time but ultimately we would opt for someone more amenable to the diversity of our nation. Now we seem to be saying to our youth that we are okay with bombast and lies. We make excuses for our terribly flawed candidates noting that nobody is perfect and that it would be ludicrous to expect them to be so. We have nobody to blame but ourselves for the low quality of our choices because we had the power to select men or women of higher moral character and we instead chose to overlook the obvious flaws of the two who will finally be on the ballot in November. Our children are scratching their heads in wonderment.

We may have had disagreements with the political thinking of presidential candidates from the past but few would argue that they were not mostly decent men. When it became apparent that Richard Nixon had covered up the sins of Watergate he was urged to leave office not by the opposing party but by Republicans who argued that he needed to do so for the good of the country. They did not attempt to justify his lies and obstruction of justice. Today we have so many unscrupulous individuals who engage in intellectual gymnastics to explain away Trump’s absurd comments and Clinton’s parsing of words. In many ways both candidates are displaying adolescent behavior and we the people are allowing it.

Our country has weathered many things in the past. We endured a civil war. We engaged in questionable battles. We watched in horror as it became more and more apparent that one of our presidents was indeed a crook. We made the grand error of starting our democratic endeavor with slavery intact and allowed Jim Crow policies to stand for far too long. Sadly our children noted these things and they influenced their thinking. Today those very same mistakes cause some of our youth to question the very existence of our great democracy. Had we been more careful all along a great number of the problems that we now face would not even exist. We fall victim to what we allow to happen. Our children see what we do and how we react. It affects them far more deeply that we might ever imagine.

As individuals we have the power to talk with our young and let them in turn make their honest commentaries. We need not approve of either Trump or Clinton but rather note that we are in the unfortunate position of having to choose one or the other. We must decide who is more fit for the job and that is not an easy thing to do. Some among us will choose a third party candidate instead, post a write in vote for some worthy person or abstain altogether. Regardless of what each of us ultimately does I think that parents owe it to their children to discuss why we think we have reached such a dilemma. We need to turn off the noise from the pundits and talk about our country’s history with honesty and explain what we want from our leaders. Our youngsters will appreciate that we trust them enough to bare our political souls.

I doubt that any of our presidents have been perfect. We all learn soon enough that George Washington probably did tell lies and that he had slaves as well. We read that even honest Abe had a trick or two up his sleeves. We feel great disappointment when we hear of the racist comments that Woodrow Wilson made. We know that our beloved Franklin Roosevelt died in the arms of a mistress even after he had promised his wife that he would not see the other woman again. It hurts us to realize just how much clay makes up the feet of those that we entrust with our fates but still we prefer knowing that for the most part we can believe what they tell us and that they will not be constantly bullying and offensive.

I’ve tried my best to lead a life of which my children might be proud. I’ve wanted them to see how to treat people and to understand that lying may temporarily get us out of a fix but ultimately it destroys the foundations of relationships. I have stumbled here and there but always owned up to my mistakes, even in the classroom. I remember being rather militant with my students about getting their homework to me on time. I was generally unwilling to accept excuses especially when they claimed to have done it but accidentally left it at home. There came a day when I was supposed to meet an important deadline with my principal and in rushing out of my house I forgot the paperwork that he needed. Lucky for me he was far more understanding than I had ever been with my pupils. Feeling both fortunate and a bit guilty I revealed my error to each of my classes and announced that because I had messed up I was going to give each of them one chance to mess up without repercussions. The interesting thing is that few of my students took me up on the offer. Instead they began turning in their homework in record rates and often mentioned how much they had appreciated my honesty.

Our children are only moderately impressed by what we preach but dramatically taken by what we actually do. They are constantly watching us. We need to be certain that we do our best to model the behaviors that we wish them to have and that includes in choosing the people who will represent us. Hopefully we will do a better job in the future. For now I suppose that we just have to consider how we will hold whoever wins the race to higher standards than he/she has thus far demonstrated otherwise in four years we need to consider telling them to get out of town.

Don’t Throw the Baby Out With the Bath Water!

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

153679054-620x4131Last school year one of my grandson’s called me using Skype so that I might help him with his seventh grade math homework. It was an unusual request from him because he is generally quite mathematically inclined and is even taking Algebra I this year in the eighth grade. I learned that he had a long term substitute teacher who wasn’t especially equipped to teach math and so he was not grasping concepts during class the way he normally does. In addition the homework assignment didn’t appear to match the information that he had been given during regular school hours. Even worse was the fact that it was over four pages long with a total of about eighty problems. He caught on quickly and managed to complete the assignment with little help from me but it took well over two hours and he was almost falling asleep as we worked to beat the clock. I suspected that perhaps he had been given the worksheets earlier in the week and simply chose to get them completed just before they were due but he insisted that it was a one night deal. Since he is generally quite honest I had to believe that the situation was one of those travesties that students must sometimes endure.

There is a great deal of discussion regarding homework these days. There are pros and cons regarding its impact on learning but virtually everyone agrees that in some cases there is way too much of it, particularly for younger children. I have a feeling that much of the homework trend is being driven by the tightly packed curriculum that literally does not allow for any breathing room in the teaching cycle. Educators today are pressured to introduce an impossible number of concepts during the school year, sometimes more than one new idea during a single hour. It is a race to get everything done and often assigning homework is the only way to provide the practice that students need. The problem of homework is brutally complex and needs to be addressed but not in isolation. Unless the entire issue of scope and sequence, skills and knowledge and testing is addressed the fixes may be quick but inadequate.

I taught math. I knew for certain that the vast majority of my students needed infinite amounts of practice before they mastered concepts. I tried to direct teach and then provide lots of in-class time to try out the new ideas while I walked around guiding those who were struggling. I managed to cleverly work in short periods of practice when students had to demonstrate understanding without assistance from anyone. I gave homework Monday through Thursday with regularity. I learned that ten problems worked as well as fifty for reinforcing learning so I tried to keep my intrusion on my students’ home life as short as possible. I generally found that I needed to work the problems myself before giving them to my kids because I had to see how much time they actually took to solve. I also checked regularly with those of varying skill levels to find out how long it took them to do my homework. I adjusted whenever I learned that they were having to work for more than forty five minutes. I tried my best not to give assignments on the weekend or before holidays. I wanted my students to have family time and to come back rested.

Some teachers and parents are suggesting that there should be no homework at all. I find that such ideas are akin to throwing the baby out with the bath water. Instead of attempting to adjust the situations that worry us we tend to use one size fits all strategies and as an educator I am certain that it is never a good idea to do so. When I was a student I needed homework because I was always too distracted inside a classroom full of other people to adequately absorb the information that my teachers were presenting. I needed the quiet of my home to go over my notes and study examples. I tend to die in group settings. Even in college I had to avoid the library because I was constantly losing my attention because of the distractions of the sounds of people walking, turning pages, shifting in their seats and so forth. Teamwork projects were just an extra burden for me because I always had to later go into my quiet little lair and study in my own way to master concepts.

Educators need to bear in mind the many different learning styles that make their students tick. One of the best ideas I have ever seen is giving students choices regarding how to reinforce their learning. Allowing them to select activities that correspond more closely with their innate learning styles just might be a great way to reduce the stress that universal homework assignments create in so many kids. They might for example have the opportunity to stay a bit longer once school is out so that they can participate in group study settings, especially if that is a better way for them to learn. For those like me who lose all focus in a crowd a private room might work or even the chance to just go home to do the work in solitude and familiar surroundings. Until we begin to assist each student in building on the strengths that they already have we will almost always find problems.

Another way of dealing with the homework problem is to have teachers from the different curriculum areas communicate with one another. I wanted to know when science fair projects or research papers were due so that I might shorten my own assignments or even eliminate them entirely. When every teacher is piling on huge amounts of work students become overly stressed and little learning is actually occurring. By working together to consider their needs it is far more likely that they will actually take care in meeting the demands from each class.

I think that high school students have to have homework or they will be totally unprepared for the rigors of college. They must learn how to manage their time but teachers should also bear in mind that few university students are held captive in classrooms for seven or eight hours. They instead have many extra moments during the day to complete their reading, papers, labs and studying. When high school students don’t even arrive home until five or six at night they have a very narrow window of time in which to get everything done. Sometimes they struggle to complete their work before midnight and then have to arise with only five or six hours of sleep to begin again. Little wonder that so many of them become unduly anxious and burnt out.

I advocate for continuing to assign homework beginning about third grade and slowly increasing its intensity as the student progresses through up the line. Perhaps first year homework assignments should be as little as  five or ten minutes in the main subject areas total while a senior in high school might handle as much as three hours total in a single night. All grades from the fifth grade on should have a summer reading assignment as well to encourage a lifelong habit of learning. Students can prove that they actually read the text in different ways such as writing a critique, analyzing characters, giving a speech or presentation, and so forth but not with a “gotcha” test over small details. Let’s face it nobody recalls such things and the literary experience should be as enjoyable as possible.

I’m glad that people are thinking about homework. We’ve gone way overboard of late and it’s well past time to begin a more creative way of insuring that everybody learns.