🚌 Open Chalkboard: Teachers in June
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✍️ Discussion Topic: Talk about the first weeks of summer. How do you handle the transition from something to nothing? Where do you succeed? Where do you struggle?
My Take
Preface: In Indiana, school goes from August to May, so summer means June and July. Substack says my audience is global, so our timelines won’t match. Summer for me means June and July. Adapt that however.
Okay. It’s that time of year again. Time for my favorite teaching joke. Are you ready?
Person: What day is it?
Teacher: June
What is June? A mindset. A mission. Time for recovery and reinvention. The calendar year runs from January to December, but the teaching year runs from August to May with a two-month gap to recover. Just two months. June is the timeless Saturday while July is the frantic Sunday with industrial strength lesson planning. August is a-comin’ whether we’re ready or not.
I initially struggle resting. Teaching requires a neurotic Type-A personality which I fight to ignore in June. Teaching demands accounting for every minute from eight to three from August to May. Summer means stumbling off the furious treadmill and feeling disoriented. Like stepping from a dark theater to a sunny day. Like sailors feeling land sick.
And it’s not that summer transforms me into an overachieving dad or person who tries doing as much as possible. Rather, rest takes effort. Remembering. My best summer plans involve devoting myself to one restful thing that first week—reading a big book, playing through a game like Kingdom Hearts, going on runs.
Summer and life may be seasonal, but as our years taught tick upwards, things change. Summer at 35 isn’t summer at 25. Two summers ago we were expecting. Two weeks ago my son conquered walking. And by Halloween we’ll have two under two. (I hear adjusting to two kids is rough.) So next summer will mean diapers everywhere.
All this to say, I’ve never figured out June. And maybe I never will. August is a-comin’ whether we’re ready or not.
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