Category: Blog

Fire

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

fire-generic-750xx724-407-0-38When my youngest brother, Pat, announced to our mother that he wanted to become a firefighter I suspect that she believed that he was just going through an adolescent phase that would soon enough pass. She told him that she would not give him her blessing to enter the Houston Fire Academy until he had first earned a college degree, a requirement that he dutifully completed. With his diploma from the University of Houston in hand he returned to her once again to announce that he had applied to become a candidate for the Houston Fire Department. This time he was only informing her, not asking for her permission. Shortly thereafter he began his training and was so taken with the lessons and skills that he learned that he graduated number one in his class. It was a proud day for him and all of our family when he earned his badge and a job at the downtown Houston Fire Station Number One.

Pat threw himself wholeheartedly into his work and it was not long before there was a major fire in the downtown area that was so large that it made the nightly news and there in a photograph for the ages stood my brother aiming a stream of water at a wall of red flames that dwarfed him. The image showed his back with his last name emblazoned on his jacket. It was a frightening reminder of just how dangerous his job really was. As a family we tried not to think too much about the kind of things that might happen to him but again and again there were reminders that firefighters literally place their lives on the line each time that they respond to a call for help. They never quite know what kind of situation awaits them and for the most part they rarely discuss what they have seen with those of us who would rather not be reminded of the dangerous possibilities.

Pat was as happy with his career as anyone that I have ever known. He spoke glowingly of the brotherhood and friendships that he shared with his crew members. He proved his mettle as a leader and began to work his way up the ranks, eventually becoming a Captain at one of the neighborhood stations. It was apparent that his men loved him as much as he loved them. They became a second family for him in an environment where he felt confident that he was living his dream.

He returned to school first to earn an advanced degree in Public Administration and then another in Fire Safety. He became such an expert in his field that Mayor Lee Brown tapped him to become the director of the Fire Academy. It was a post that he cherished because it allowed him to share his expertise with young men and women who were as eager to serve as he had always been. He upgraded the rigor of the training process with an eye to preparing his charges for the special demands of being a first responder in one of the nation’s largest cities. It was a very happy time for him but before long he was moving into other arenas of leadership.

He became a District Chief and then a Regional Chief. He helped to investigate fires and to set and maintain high standards for all of the firefighters in the city, all the while humbly doing his work without mentioning his ever growing status within the department. He was always far too busy working for the betterment of Houston to brag about his accomplishments but the men who had worked for him often whispered their admiration.

One of Pat’s most exciting moments came when he accompanied a group of Houston firefighters to New York City on the occasion of the opening of the 9/11 memorial. They traveled by motorcycle all the way from Houston and then participated in a parade in downtown New York. He was so moved by the stories of bravery that he heard from comrades from all around the world. It was a grand moment in which he truly realized the importance of his work and stood shoulder to shoulder with people who understood the unique challenges and joys of being a firefighter.

I can’t imagine what kind of courage it must take to don the heavy equipment of a firefighter and hop onto a truck for a ride to an unknown disaster. On any given day our firefighters know that they may walk into situations from which they will never return. Even in the best of circumstances they often experience damage to their lungs from the continual exposure to smoke. They may fall from the rafters of an attic or have a ceiling come down on their heads. They encounter life and death situations over and over again and are only able to relax once they are safely back at the station. Still they eagerly report to work again and again just as Pat has always done.

Pat Little has served the City of Houston with pride and enthusiasm for thirty six years. He has tirelessly worked during hurricanes, floods, freezes and even when he felt sick. On some nights the alarms awakened him so many times that he had little sleep. There were Thanksgiving and Christmas days when he was faithfully executing his duties while the rest of us were relaxing and celebrating without him. Missing even a single day of work was always anathema to him. He rarely complained when he had to be absent for the milestones of his children or when he had to forego special occasions because he was saving a life. Now his outstanding and selfless career is finally drawing to a close. On Sunday his crew is hosting a party for him and on October 11, he will retire for good. He will be remembered and revered by both family and fellow firefighters for the joy and dedication that he brought to his job for all of those thirty six years. I have little doubt that given the opportunity he would gladly relive his life as a firefighter all over again.

Congratulations, Chief Patrick Little, on a job well done. We are all proud of you and humbled by your quiet courage and your unflagging determination to make a lasting difference in the world. You have done well in a world that is all too often marked by evil and greed. You are our hero, a man who has shown the meaning of service.

Realize

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

dna_6339076_lrgThe history of mankind is the instant between two strides taken by a traveler. — Franz Kafka

There is great diversity among the people who live on this planet. Each of us is a unique blend of nature and nurture. We are born with a pattern of DNA inside our bodies that identifies us and holds the history of our ancestors. Ironically the genetic differences between one human being and another are miniscule. On the whole we are more alike in basic composition than we are different. All of us are members of the humanoid species known as homo sapiens, a Latin phrase meaning “wise human.” Our kind evolved over hundreds of thousands of years. Other humanoid types did not survive but remarkably we did, overcoming monumental challenges as we traveled from eastern Africa to all parts of the known world.

Modern man often follows the money but our ancestors set out on the original journeys in search of food. Unlike the prey for which they searched homo sapiens stood upright, had a larger brain, and created tools that allowed them to overcome animals that were faster and stronger. Early humans worked together and created societies that moved together, protecting one another from dangers but also communicating with stories and flights of imagination. They not only made useful implements but also invented musical instruments and made images that resembled the animals that they tracked. They explored the world both on foot and inside their minds.

Even as other humanoid species became extinct homo sapiens found ways to grow and prosper as the dominant force on our planet. They imprinted their wills and their creativity on themselves and on the earth. They celebrated the relentless changing of the seasons with rituals and customs that they developed and followed from one generation to the next. They created systems for maintaining their very existence and sidelining the darker sides of their natures. There were geniuses among them who learned how to read the workings of the heavens and to invent better and better tools for survival and comfort.

Today we live in a world so remarkable that none of our earliest ancestors would recognize us as being one of them and yet our DNA tells us that we are indeed mostly the same. We continue to evolve and learn more about our world, our universe and ourselves. There are people so creative that they boggle even our modern minds and yet they are our brothers and sisters, with essentially the identical chemical composition and genetic codes that we possess. Even people in remote and far flung parts of the world operate from similar human habits. The shades of our skin vary according to the adaptations that our ancestors needed to survive in different latitudes. The ways that we eat and the recipes that we use are based on the food sources available to us. Those who came before us were a flexible and ingenious lot who adjusted to the environments in which they found themselves. Our numbers today tell us that most of them made it to live another day and devise better and better ways to do more than simply exist. Time and again mankind has realized the potential that lies within each of us.

While individual accomplishments have literally changed the world, it is in our willingness to live as a community of people that our true greatness is realized. The physicist Stephen Hawking is celebrated for his remarkable intellect but were it not for the contributions of his fellow man he no doubt might have died long before he was able to pronounce his theories of the universe. He is able to “speak” to us in spite of the horrible disease that took his ability to move or talk. Others have provided him with the support and the tools that he needs to continue his work and his conversations with the scientific community. When reveling in his genius we often forget the group effort that has made his survival possible.

Each day there are literally thousands upon thousands of nameless individuals who make our lives what they are. We take our conveniences for granted until a natural disaster or a war causes the systems that we have contrived to break down. When the normalcy of our world falls apart we begin to realize just how greatly we depend on one another and yet somehow even as we create comforts that allow us more and more freedom to develop ourselves we all too often separate ourselves into artificial groups. We identify ourselves based on the color of our skin, our political leanings, our incomes, our levels of education, our sexual orientations, our male or female chromosomes, our religions or lack thereof, our countries, our states, our cities, our zip codes. We become members of certain groups and view those outside of our own parameters with suspicion. We forget that it has always been our ability to work together in a spirit of community that has insured the very survival of our species.

If it were possible for each of us to track our ancestry all the way back to the beginnings of mankind’s time here on earth we would learn that we are all cousins descended from the same people who long ago stood up and began a journey that would ultimately span the globe. Perhaps one day we will realize that our bickering is rivalry among siblings and we will learn how to understand and cooperate in a spirit without judgement or evil intent. Surely if we are able to view inside the very essence of our bodies we will one day realize the ultimate potential of our hearts and minds. 

Tree

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

tree1024x1024There is a tree in Rockport, Texas that has been growing in the same spot for centuries. Some wise soul thought to save the old oak forever by declaring it an historical treasure and building a fence around it. People travel from all parts of the world just to stand under the shade of the sprawling limbs and to marvel at the girth of the ancient trunk. They snap photos of the wondrous image and try to imagine what the old tree has seen in its time on this earth. If only it could talk we might hear of native people pausing under its branches to rest after a day of hunting and fishing or learn of explorers from Spain who traveled along the Gulf Coast searching for cities of gold. Did the tree once see vast flocks of whooping cranes wintering in the area in their annual journey from Canada? How did it manage to withstand the forces of tropical storms and punishing hurricanes? What is its secret to long life?

We humans have love/hate relationships with trees. We plan trips to Vermont in the fall to marvel at the glorious colors of leaves but also cut down beautiful specimens to make way for factories. We plant trees in the yards of our new homes that once sat in forests that we eliminated to build our suburban communities. We enshrine trees in metaphorical poetry even as we topple them in real life. We use them for our own whims often forgetting that they are helping to provide the very oxygen that we breathe. They cool us and shelter us and we all too often take them for granted. When we flee from natural disasters we abandon them to bear the brunt of wind and water and fire.

Along the Big Thompson Canyon on the road leading from Loveland, Colorado to Estes Park is the dead stump of a once mighty tree. It is bent and gnarled into a contortion created by the power of the river that took homes from their foundations and turned nature’s bounty into piles of rubble. Somehow that tree has become a work of art. Its determination to hold fast to the rocks in which it once grew is a testament to its strength and flexibility. It stands as a sentinel as rugged as the huge boulders along the face of the canyon. It has somehow withstood the onslaught of both nature and humans.

We personify trees. They teach us lessons. We track our human history in their branches. We have a special kinship with trees, especially when we are hot and weary. We sit under their branches cooling ourselves and dreaming of futures that we may never see but they are more likely to enjoy. Trees remind us of ourselves as they travel along with us through the seasons and the years. They are our silent partners in a lifetime journey.

My paternal grandmother was a child of nature. Her father and her grandmother are buried in a national forest in Arkansas where their homestead once resided. It seems fitting that her ancestral home is now protected and allowed to return to a wild and unfettered state. She so loved to walk in the woods under a canopy of trees that sheltered the birds and critters that she enjoyed. When she died my grandfather handpicked a spot in the cemetery that sits under a grove of oaks whose limbs reach gracefully over her final resting place. She would have loved the serenity of the area. In life she marveled at nature’s wonders and seemed almost to be a mischievous sprite as she wandered in the forest behind her farm naming every tree, plant and bird that crossed her path.

Hanging on the wall at the entrance to my home is an image of an enormous tree spreading its limbs across a landscape of green. I have placed it there to welcome my guests and to remind myself of the glories of the natural world. The painting calms me and makes me smile. Gazing at it takes me to my roots. I think of the people whom I never met who had to live in order that I might now exist. Like the tree they once began with a tiny seed and then reached to the heavens with their dreams, becoming ever stronger with each new branch. I know their names but not their stories. I can only imagine what their lives had been based on what I know about the places where they lived. I wonder what they would think of me and the world in which I exist. I suspect that they would be happy that things have turned out as well for me and my extended clan as they have. After all, each of us wants the best for our children and grandchildren. We want to know that they will be safe.

One of my favorite books is Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree. I have presented it as a gift many times over. I never tire of its story of unconditional love and sacrifice. I have now travelled through almost seven decades from the time when I was born. I have been the child, the teenager, the young adult, the middle aged individual and now the old person described in the tale. I have known both the exuberance and the drudgery of life, sometimes forgetting the people who have brought me to the place where I now linger. Like all humans I sometimes take my blessings for granted and even abuse the kindnesses that have been shown to me. I forget to be thankful and to simply enjoy the shade and the sound of the wind whispering through the leaves of the tree of life.

Trees keep me optimistic. They remind me that there is a continuity in this world that is bigger than our individual human efforts. We may falter and even become a bit full of ourselves but the ebb and flow of life remains essentially the same. We all benefit from being a bit more like trees. It is important that we “Stay grounded. Connect with our roots. Turn over new leaves. Bend before we break. Enjoy our unique natural beauty and keep growing.” (Joanne Chaptis) If we remember these simple rules we will surely find more of the contentment that we seek, especially in a world as seemingly mad as the one that we now face.

That tree in Rockport has seen more than we might ever imagine and still lives on. There is something rather nice about knowing that it is there and will be even when we are gone. Like the giant sequoias of Yosemite, the groves of Aspen in Rocky Mountain National Park and the countless shady lanes that soften the highways and byways across the land trees are the constant that we all wish to be in the world.

Daunting

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

main-content-management-imageBecause I grew up in a single parent family led by a strong and confident woman I am strong willed and independent. Had my husband, Mike, not been nurtured by a mother who was an equal to mine in her commanding presence he might have struggled with my personality after we married forty eight years ago today. I suppose that the real me may have been a bit of a surprise to him. I was a month shy from being twenty years old on that Friday when I walked down the aisle to exchange vows. We were still in that tingly romantic stage of our relationship. Both of us were on our best behavior. As so often happens our true selves ultimately revealed themselves in the day to day routines that evolved and Mike noticed that I was not exactly the person that he thought I was.

I’m a daunting competitor who likes to win. Since nobody ever mentioned to me that women are expected to fulfill certain roles and that we are supposed to struggle in a man’s world, as a young bride I simply threw myself full force into handling the household and preparing for a career. I was not held back by beliefs that there were glass ceilings above me or that I wouldn’t get as fair a shake as the men with whom I interacted. I carried on the way my mother did after my father died, unafraid to try almost anything. Of course Mike had unwittingly provided me with the last bit of courage that I needed to emulate the confidence that I had always seen in my mom. I had been socially shy and uncomfortable around men before I met him mostly because I had not been around males very much. Mike taught me that I could hold my own with a man and he admitted at every turn that he was my biggest fan. With him in my corner I felt able to tackle any problem that came my way, which was fortunate because I would have to muster great courage to become a lifelong advocate for my mom when she began to show signs of her bipolar disorder.

As I evolved in my marriage and my role as a woman I had perhaps the two best role models possible in my mother and my mother-in-law. I witnessed both of them walking without fear into the fray of what was at that time a truly male dominated world. They encouraged me to follow my dreams no matter where they might lead. My mother-in-law in particular gave me the priceless gift of her time, often rescuing me when one of my children was sick by coming to babysit while I went to work. When I had a job that kept me at work until late in the evening she faithfully came to my home each afternoon so that my youngsters would not have to be latchkey kids. She prepared dinner to give me a break when I arrived home exhausted. While these may sound like very traditional womanly duties they came accompanied with profound advice that kept me feeling that I was doing the right thing in pouring myself so totally into my work.

Then there was Mike who never complained when I became absorbed in the many time consuming aspects of being a successful educator. My days and nights and weekends were filled with planning, grading, attending seminars, and working toward an advanced degree. I often spent more time with my students and our daughters than I did with him but he understood my need to perfect my craft and to give my all to the work that I thought to be so important. He took pride in my accomplishments and supported me without question even as he sometimes sacrificed his own needs. To this very day when I become involved in new pursuits his only bit of caution is that I do what makes me happy, not what I think that other people may want.

I suppose that the key to the success that Mike and I have achieved in our marriage is that we are truly best friends in every sense of the word. Neither of us has ever felt that one is superior to the other. We equally value the contributions that each of us has made to the partnership. While I compete with the world at large, neither of us feel compelled to outrank the other. We are truly coequals, each with different skill sets that are important to the family. There are no jealousies or fears. We can be ourselves and feel completely safe. Nothing in forty eight years has given either of us reason to believe that we cannot trust the other without reservation. Ours is a union of mutual respect and admiration.

I suppose that my circumstances have been fortunate in that my brand of feminism is a bit different from most. I did not grow up around domineering men, instead I watched a widow woman earn a college degree, work as a teacher and researcher, purchase and pay for a home, raise three well adjusted children and lead a profoundly happy existence all without assistance from a man, while also battling the horrifically debilitating symptoms of mental illness. I married a man who gave me total freedom in determining how I wanted to use my own talents and then became my most devoted cheerleader. As if that wasn’t enough to encourage me to be formidable in my interaction with the world, my mother-in-law became a source of limitless wisdom as I drew upon her experiences as the manager of a family electrical business, the chief financial officer of a mega church, and a well read student of history and politics. Based on the complaints that I hear from women today I suppose that I was too blessed and too ignorant to realize that I was not supposed to feel as equal to men as I always have.

I grew up in what is defined as a classically dysfunctional family. We were poor and had no father. Because of my mom’s optimism and strength, somehow the situation never felt that terrible. I married a man when I was too young to have enough sense to make things work but our love and respect for one another carried us through both triumph and tragedy year after wonderful year. My incredible mother-in-law served as a sounding board and a sterling example of what a determined woman might accomplish even when all of the world is telling her that she may not have the right stuff. These are the people that I knew and the privileges that I had that made me the woman that I am. As daunting as the world may sometimes be I have always been able to tackle it. The real key to my success as a woman has not been in having some kind of special sources of influence, because I have never had any, but in being valued and loved.

Breakthrough

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

frustrated6-e1461345600746She was a brilliant young woman who excelled in virtually every arena of life with the exception of her mathematics classes. She had learned to excuse her missteps in Algebra with a tilt of her head and the classic excuse, “I’m just no good in math.” Somewhere along her educational way she had decided to accept mediocrity when dealing with formulas and algorithms because it had secretly bothered her competitive spirit that questions of trains meeting at a station seemed both meaningless and confusing. Little of it made sense and she had it on good authority that she would rarely use any of the information again in “real” life. She approached mathematics with disdain and longed for the day when required courses would no longer stalk her. One day she would proclaim to her family and friends that she had done well without being a mathematical whiz and that her genes were evidently unfit for ciphering.

As a long time mathematics teacher I heard all of the negative commentaries and phobias associated with fears and misunderstandings about the subject that I taught. In conferences parents often explained away their children’s low grades with familial anecdotes outlining a long history of ancestors who shied away from arithmetic and all of its components. Students often masked their own confusion with difficult concepts by feigning laziness or bad behavior. In general a significant proportion of the populace is frightened by the mere thought of mathematics and runs from its grasp as soon as the educational system allows them to do so.

As with so many things in this world we are saddled with a necessity to approach the teaching of numerical skills with a one size fits all approach. The natural born mathematicians reveal themselves rather quickly. They possess a keen understanding and of how numbers work and what they truly represent. They manipulate them easily and are able to explain why we need numbers both whole and rational. They are innately fascinated by the beauty of mathematics and its ability to explain how most of the universe works. These students only need be guided by their teachers as they master one concept after another. As educators we know how to accelerate their progress so that they remain inspired by the world of numbers. It is a joy to teach them and to realize that they carry the future of inventiveness in their minds. Sadly, the journey through mathematics is not so easy for the vast majority of the children that we encounter but we nonetheless persist in teaching it in pre-dispensed doses, insisting that everyone keep up with the pace even as we witness many stopping on the sidelines.

The fact is that anyone may learn mathematics and learn it well but whenever we insist that they master concepts within a narrowly defined timeline we are asking for trouble. The brain is quite complex and each of us interact with the physical world in different manners. We have clearly proven that some people excel more at linguistic tasks than those requiring the centers of their brains that decipher mathematics. There are students who learn through movement and repetition and those who need to hear the information that is sending signals to their minds. Some, like me, have to see and visualize what is happening before they are able to solve problems. In our large classrooms crammed with individuals of every sort we often attempt to serve each type of learner but our efforts often fall short due to a lack of time and pressing pacing requirements. We generally paint a large swath of information through the middle and hope for the best. Of course again and again there are students who become lost and those who become bored. Unfortunately they mistake their feelings as a sign that they are somehow unfit for the world of mathematics and begin the process of reinforcing negative feelings about numbers. We lose them and they lose possibilities that they might otherwise have had.

I have met countless adults who have confessed that they harbored great fear of mathematics all the way through high school. They purposely avoided college majors and jobs that were intensely mathematical because they worried that they might somehow become failures if they reached beyond their perceived capabilities. They noted that somewhere along their evolutions as adults they began to feel more and more comfortable with all things mathematical as they realized its patterns and its rationale. They developed number sense and learned to calculate mentally. They wondered why it had taken them so long to feel as competent with math as they eventually did. 

My answer for everyone who struggles with mathematics at some point in time is that we have to begin to teach the critical skills of numbers at a pace that allows the learner to thoroughly understand and appreciate what is actually happening in the process. That means that children will be learning along a wide spectrum that is not defined by parameters associated with a particular grade. There must be flexibility and teaching for mastery and breakthroughs that often don’t occur. Far too many students memorize processes without ever being able to explain why those processes work. They derive answers but can’t tell if those answers are within the realm of reality. Because they are merely parroting ideas they eventually hit a wall and begin to doubt their own abilities.

There is an old platitude that all children can learn, which is generally true, but it masks the reality that the pace and style of learning is different for each of us. Unless we are moving through concepts appropriately we will falter and therein lies the rub for all of education and especially for mathematics. We need to somehow design a system that allows for differences so that more people will experience the breakthroughs in understanding that so often daunt all but our most gifted students. It may require employing more manpower and technology in our classrooms to accommodate each individual. Instead of simply teaching a topic, giving a general test and then moving to the next concept we need to reteach those who failed to grasp the ideas in the first go around. This might require before or after school tutoring that includes methodologies that were not initially employed. We need to also provide our students with a new kind of mindset in which they understand that the goal is not to meet certain requirements by a certain date but to achieve ultimate mastery at the pace that works for them. Failing grades should only be interim markers with the final score being a replacement of low scores with the ones that indicate student success. Time, patience, inventiveness and a different mindset can and will produce more and more individuals who not only do well mathematically but actually enjoy the beauty of this incredible subject.

Such breakthroughs are within the realm of possibility. In some ways they return us to the world of the one room schoolhouse in which a gathering of students represented many different levels of progress. It is a challenging idea to even consider. We have become accustomed to a clearly defined process of sequencing and pacing from one grade to the next. Our teachers are mostly trained to do direct instruction to a whole class and then to attempt to provide one on one guidance in an exceedingly short span of time. They buzz through concepts like bullet trains leaving behind those not quick enough to jump onboard, not so much because the teachers think that what they are doing is right, but because the packed curriculum for each grade requires them to work faster than they should. Common sense and our own educational experiences tell us that far too many of our students are being left behind. It truly is time to view our methods through a more critical eye. We need to consider the research of countless experts that has shown the need for teaching in ways that address our differences. Society must find the willingness to expend the time and resources necessary to make educational breakthroughs that will change minds and lives for the better.