Highs and Lows

Every evening, during dinner, my family plays a game. We call it high-low. The rules are quite simple: 1. You must state a ‘high’ from your day…something that stands out as going really well or making you happy. 2. You state a ‘low’…something that didn’t go so well or made you sad. 3. You finish by stating another high (changing the name of the game to high-low-high has been proposed, but never stuck with the kiddos) and then picking someone else to go. We do this until everyone has had their turn.

We do this for a few reasons:

-Everyone is clued in to at least a couple of happenings of everyone at the table.

-It is a great starting point for conversations about how to be humble with the highs and reasonable and positive with the lows…this is certainly something my wife and I want to instill in our three children.

-It allows for the family to have perspective. There will be highs and lows during our day. The important thing is to learn from them all and to be the best human we can be. My wife often says to our children as they exit the care for school to be “a good listener and kind friend”.

As many around the globe are preparing to transition their teaching and learning to online environments, I think it may be important to remember that there will be highs and lows. For many of us, this is a massive represents a massive change. You will do some things correctly, but you will also make mistakes.

I encourage you to not be so hard on yourself (or your students) during this time. As long as we’re all earnestly attempting to navigate through these changes, let’s give each other a break. Communication is key. Seek help from fellow teachers. Encourage your students to be very communicative with you about how the class is going and any struggles they’re having. Let them know that you are also figuring this out, too. You may even want to play high-low with them every so often to gauge how a lesson went or how the class is going in general.

There will be highs and lows. Reflect. Acknowledge them all. Learn. Grow.

And don’t forget to be a good listener and a kind friend.

*Feature image can be found here.