Sharing The Pain

Kaitlin Roig-DeBellis and her surviving students (2013),  Glamour Photos.

I know technically, that our unit has come to an end. However, I cannot seem to stop thinking about liminal spaces. Today, as I was driving I heard an interview on the radio with Kaitlin Roig- De Bellis who was a teacher at Sandy Hook Primary School on that fateful day in 2012 when one individual took so much from so many.  On December 14, Adam Lanza fatally shot his own mother before he forced his way into the school and proceeded to slaughter 20 children and 6 staff before finally turning the gun on himself. Most of these children were so young, life stretched before them holding promises of who they would one day become…. but it was all cut short on that tragic morning.

I was interested to listen to Kaitlin’s story about how she managed to keep the kindergarten children and herself alive that day. As the shooting began, she responded quickly, closing the door and turning off the lights in her classroom and ushering 15 children and herself into a bathroom stall meant for a small child. She remained calm, reassured her children and managed to keep them quiet and prayed for their protection and safety. Emerging alive after listening to the sound of death repeated over and over was not the end of a painful saga but rather the beginning of some enormously challenging times.

Kaitlin’s perspective provides some insight on how we navigate those times of struggle in our lives,  when darkness envelops us, when pain is searing, grief is overwhelming and each breath we take is filled with loneliness.  We may not face a school shooting but everyone goes through pain.  It is something we all share in as human beings. Kaitlin admits in the initial aftermath she was faced with days of asking herself endless why questions.  For these questions, she had no answer. Kaitlin says that the day she stopped asking  these questions was the  day she got herself on the road to healing.

“I will never, not one day in my life, move on from December 14,” she said. “It is wholly a part of me. It’s every second of every day. However, every day of my life I will move forward. Because I have to, and because I can.”

Her message  is that our darkest days and times, whilst always a part of who we are, do not have to define us. We can move forward, albeit slowly and surely.

Kaitlin says she learned much from her students, particularly a few weeks after the massacre, when as a class they started receiving gifts of support from the wider community to make them feel loved. Kaitlin talked to her students about the importance of giving, and they began to discuss  how they could not just receive gifts, but pass on encouragement and gifts to other people as well (Chate, 2015).

“My kids were way more excited about the prospect of giving back, of reaching out, of helping, than they were about the gifts they had just been given.”

“As their teacher that was the greatest moment. Because I realised that not even a month after they’d had their own darkest day – at six or seven years old – of just unimaginable despair, they were able to say, “We want to help someone. We want to make someone feel loved.”

“And that’s the greatest gift they could’ve ever given me.” 

Kaitlin now runs a charity called “Classes For Classes” – a social network connecting teachers and their classes with others, to share gifts and resources. The aim is to teach children about the power of kindness. We never know just what one act of kindness can do for someone.  Kaitlin believes that by teaching empathy, the children will have “no room for hate”  (Chate, 2015).We do not have to be at the heights of success to make a difference. We do not have to be wise or of a certain age.  Even in the hardest moments, no one else but the individual can determine how to respond to the circumstances before them. We don’t have to feel like it, sometimes we just have to make a choice in spite of how we feel, to reach out, to forgive, to love and to be kind.  What lessons we can learn from our children! Being in a liminal space does not always result from the choices we make. Sometimes it is thrust upon us and may indeed come as a thief to steal precious and irreplaceable things…life, innocence, trust…Those who experienced what took place at Sandy Hook Elementary school are forever changed.   However, by responding as they have, their lives bear witness to the undeniable fact that the light will always shine brightest in the night (Schlink, 1986).

References

Chate, C. Finding Hope After Sandy Hook Massacre -Interview with Kaitlin Roig De Bellis ( October, 2015). Retrieved from  http://hope1032.com.au/stories/life/news/2015/how-kaitlin-found-hope-after-sandy-hook-massacre/.

Schlink, B. (1986). Mary The Mother Of Jesus. Basingstoke: Lakeland.

Photo retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/glamour/photos/a.415642050478.210138.26815555478/10151953312725479/?type=3.

What A Ride!

 Roller Coaster Tycoon World, (2015).

I began this unit The Learning Space as a journey, and likened my title Reason, Reflect, Resolve to those items I would normally cram into my bag.  To reason, to think about the merits of an issue; the ability to reflect,  to take time to muse over my learning and to resolve to do something with my new/deeper understandings – to read some more, clarify some issues, put something aside for the time being or take some action…. I knew like the story of the two truckers, https://reasonreflectresolve.wordpress.com/about-2/      I had to be wary of my own perspectives.  Well, all I can say is, what a ride!

I have had my thoughts about technology stretched and I am much more up to date with current educational theory.  I had not thought of the ‘learning spaces’ so clearly, be they physical or abstract.  It is something that will now enrich my practice. I had heard the term ‘Community of Practice’ in health circles but not so much in education. It is central to so much in life. Again, something I will keep as centre stage in my approach to teaching/learning.

I have learned a great deal in watching how our lecturer has put this course together. He is always thinking, he has a level of intuition in monitoring the progress of participants.  He has a lovely balance between scaffolding the learning and expecting academic ownership and exploration. His content was relevant to issues of the day, his responses succinct yet considered. At no stage did I feel like any question was too stupid to post. I am grateful he used his intuition to encourage me on the days I was very daunted.  A few words of encouragement and I could fly once more.

I love learning new things, pondering the deeper issues therefore, I have loved learning about the liminal spaces in life.  I had very little understanding about what this was and I don’t believe I can recall anyone using the expression before.  It has given me new things to think about, something new to pursue.

Personally, I have grown in quantum leaps and bounds. I stand tall and proud of all that I have achieved knowing I have done my level best.  I feel much more prepared to re-enter the profession as a result of this course which has been exactly what its name suggests…. an upgrade.

The world of refugees has been a privilege to enter.  It is not one of those issues that any of us can leave.  Knowledge of the situation is where we start, there is so much more we can do as individuals and as a nation.

Thank you to all those wonderful people who encouraged me along the way.  It has been an exhilarating learning experience!  This is just a beginning……

 References

Roller Coaster Tycoon World, (2015). Retrieved from

https://forum.rollercoastertycoon.com/showthread.php?3615-More-realistic-roller-coaster-support-beams

Virtual Reality

Our 10th week of studies brought us across the topic of ‘virtual reality’. Fran Kelly along with Peter Marks on Radio National (October, 2015) reviewed Google Cardboard which is an experimental platform for entry to the three dimensional world when all that is needed is some inexpensive cardboard which fashions into the shape of a visor and a smartphone.

Google Cardboard, Wikipedia (2015).

One application of this technology was so viewers could spend a day in the life of 12 year old girl, Sidra, in the Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan. It allowed the viewers to actually experience her school, her playground and to sit alongside her in her home (Marks, 2015). An amazing experience to build empathy and knowledge in our places of education in Australia. You can take a look with the link below.

Clouds over Sidra

http://www.vrse.com/watch/id/21/

Yet another of these applications of virtual reality is the Expeditions Pioneer Program…. a way of taking a guided tour from where you are in life’s present reality.

Expeditions are guided tours of places schools buses can’t go. They are comprised of virtual reality panoramas and are led by a guide or teacher. Expeditions Pioneer Program (2015).

This could be a truly wonderful way of broadening the horizons of our refugee children currently in camps. What a wonderful way to take them into a ‘beyond the classroom experience’. As parents, we do not confine our children to the house only. We go on holidays, outings, attend performances and socialise children to broaden their horizons.  Those children in refugee camps have limited opportunities to experience the world beyond their constraints. New experiences can allow children to see the world with new eyes and can have huge benefits for social and emotional learning and can forge lifelong memories (Johnson, 2009).

See the  link below.

https://www.google.com/edu/expeditions/

Listen to the interview with Fran Kelly:

https://radio.abc.net.au/programitem/pgJE6glXJV?play=true

References

Johnson, J.(2009). Beyond four walls:experiential and situated learning.           Teacher, (198), 18-20.

Google Cardboard, (2015). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Cardboard.

Reflections on Learning At The Half Way Mark

As with any journey, it is very nice to stop the motion, find your own legs again, stretch and reflect.  What have I seen so far?  What have I learned?

Tech Savy Teacher. (Ivers, 2014)

I embarked on this trail with some basic knowledge but I have come to consider the critical importance of the different ‘learning spaces’ we have studied (although there are many more) the classroom and the school, beyond the classroom, the electronic learning space, the individual learning space and the group learning space.  Their form needs to be understood whether they are in fact physical or abstract; individual or collaborative (Staples, 2015). Learning spaces do need to be flexible to cater for the ever changing needs of our technological age and for the way the role of learner and teacher is evolving too (Siegl, Zottmann, Kaplan & Fischer, 2010).

Rapid Changes (edublogs.org, 2015).

You cannot continue on with the journey without knowing the direction ahead to some degree. I think we are headed more into the abstract spaces of this world. Whilst this course has been enormously challenging, I am amazed at what I have been able to do so far and look forward, be it with some trepidation, to the remainder of what is to come!

See link below to my e presentation for the above 5 learning spaces.

Reason, Reflect, Resolve: Thoughts About Learning Spaces from Lee Hoffmann

References  

Ivers, S. (2014) Who Flipped The Classroom Inside Out? Retrieved from

http://scalar.usc.edu/works/smarter-than-you-think/role-of-the-teacher

Rapid Changes. (2015). Retrieved from http://emrefirat.edublogs.org/

Schratzenstaller, A. (2010). The Classroom of the Past. In K, Makitalo-                Siegl, J. Zottmann, F. Kaplan & F. Fischer (Eds.).  Classroom of                the Future: Orchestrating Collaborative Spaces (pp 15-                              39). Netherlands: Sense Publishers.

Staples, A. (2015). EDFD459 The Learning Space. Retrieved from

http://leo.acu.edu.au/course/view.php?id+16635.

The Struggle To Fly

The Struggle To Fly (Nabhaniilananda, 2013).

Have you ever seen a chrysalis crack open and the new butterfly slowly emerge? It is painful to watch the struggle of the delicate creature as it forces its way out into the world, and one is tempted to help by breaking open the hard shell of the chrysalis. But if you help the emerging butterfly, it will die. The effort it makes to escape its shining prison forces fluid through the veins in its new wings so that they can spread and stiffen and bear the little creature into the air in its glorious new form. Aid its escape and it will never fly. The struggle is what forces its body to develop so that it can spread its wings (Nabhaniilananda, 2013).

Our vacation week challenge was to have a look at part of Victor Frankl’s work, Man’s Search for Meaning (2006). For any readers unfamiliar with his work, he was a psychiatrist who has written about his experiences within Nazi concentration camps. I found it a fascinating read and have included some points he made which struck a deep and resonant chord.

Everything can be stripped from us except the last of our human freedom and that is the freedom to choose how we respond to our circumstance.

Man may retain his dignity even in the degrading circumstance of a concentration camp.

The way you take up your cross, even in the most difficult of times can add a deeper meaning to your life.

One of the most depressing things is being held somewhere or being captive to a situation with no release date…. A concentration camp is a provisional existence…..when you can’t aim for a life goal… the decay starts to set in.

If you are separated from the world, behind barbed wire for a period of time the world starts to feel out of touch and unreal… the disconnection strengthens.  It is important to get people to realise that life still expects something from them.

He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how. That which does not kill me makes me stronger( Frankl cites Nietzsche).

No one has the right to do wrong even if wrong has been done to them.

These are really interesting comments to ponder on when we are considering what is happening to the Syrian refugees at present. How can our struggles at this present time aid us that in the future we may emerge and be able to spread our wings with strength and grace and truly fly ?

Share your ideas, click on the link below:

https://reasonreflectresolve.wordpress.com/future-learning-space-3/

References

Frankl, V. (2006). Man’s Search For Meaning. Boston: Beacon Press.

Nabhaniilananda, D. (2013). Shiva’s First Secret. Retrieved from

     http://www.themonkdude.com/shivas-first-secret/.

Let’s Think Again About Refugees – a story close to home – Najeeba’s Story.

Australian people are really great. When people know my family’s story they always understand and I think feel proud to help us. I will always thank Australia for giving me the opportunity to be educated, safe and secure. I want to contribute to Australia and make it proud of me.” Najeeba Wazefadost, 22, Australian citizen, university student, former refugee.

I have followed Najeeba’s  journey for many years now. You can read her initial story below. 

Click to access Najeebas_story.pdf

Below is a link to Najeeba today, it is a Youtube clip from Amnesty International. It is an achievement our country can be proud of.

Rethink Refugees – Najeeba’s story

Education was a key component of Najeeba’s succuss. Please visit:

https://reasonreflectresolve.wordpress.com/future-learning-space-3/

A

Sometimes Someone Else Says It Better!

Please take a look and listen to what Melissa Fleming has to say:

Today’s refugee crisis is the biggest since World War II, and it’s growing. When this talk was given, 50 million people had been forcefully displaced from their homes by conflict and war; now, a year later, the number is 60 million. There were 3 million Syrian refugees in 2014; now there are 4 million. Inside this overwhelming crisis are the individual human stories — of care, growth and family, in the face of lost education, lost home, lost future. Melissa Fleming of the UN’s refugee agency tells the refugees’ stories — and asks us to help them rebuild their world.

United We Stand (We Cannot Do It Alone).

Teachers Without Borders promotes the free and open use of collective wisdom generated by teacher leaders from every culture to help all teachers work more effectively. For us, bridging the education divide is about removing barriers to education and each other.

We know, too, that a society that respects its teachers reaps inestimable economic and social benefits, along with greater human rights.

We simply do our best to invest in local heroes.

Teachers Without Borders (2015).

Teachers Without Borders, (2015).

Educators are indeed facing huge change at home and abroad. I recommend taking a look at the website (link below) and allow yourself to be inspired.

It is indeed nice to know that we are largest professionally trained group in the world. (Teachers Without Borders, 2015). It is really good to read these words that give life to those teachers struggling with the mundane… ‘teachers can be key local catalysts of change and hope’. This is a really good statement to hold onto when faced with the everyday challenges.  On a broader level, this mission statement gives us some professional pride, solidarity and a greater global purpose. We need this assurance when facing the bigger challenges.

If you want lasting positive change in society, you have to educate people and if you can educate the young you have a greater chance of achieving this.  I think when you explain the reasons why to people, the chance for change of a permanent nature increases too. The thing is we can’t deliver on our own… we need to be connected to each other in order to be truly effective.

http://www.teacherswithoutborders.org/

Liminal Places At Home In Australia

Refugees coming to Australia can be a deeply polarising issue for the community.  There can be an attitude of open arms – fellow human beings in need and conversely an attitude of scepticism- how do we know who these people really are?  This is potentially a threshold space for us personally, as local communities and nationally.  This is an unprecedented opportunity for us to grow personally and locally as we integrate others into our lives, learn about different people and cultures and their life experiences and of course, we learn about ourselves.  We see hidden things in our hearts and minds which may not have come to light without the catalyst of this particular situation.  Nationally, we are looking to our leaders to lead and we are also being looked upon from a global stage.  We do not have all the answers but rather will have to deal with the situations as they do arise.  We have a challenge to face, but it is also an opportunity to shine. We are not typically a group of people who shy away from a challenge, we are historically known for our ability to dig in and deliver when it is required of us. Is this still the case as we move through the generations? Can we do things better?  Time will tell.

What’s On The Horizon? (2013).

                                             References

What’s On The Horizon. (2013) Retrieved from http://www.barefootbeachblonde.com/travel-blog/australian-road-trip-playlist/

Caught Inbetween

Calais- the Syrian refugees – No man’s land

No Man’s Land, (2009).

My understanding of the reference to no man’s land is just that….no man owns the territory between the opposing sides. It is a place of waste, devastation, risk, barbed entanglements and fraught with danger.  Things do not flourish there.  It is a place of… enter at your own risk but also a place that must be traversed for progress to be made.  It is certainly a threshold stretch of land/ passage way to possible injury, death, devastation and fear or conversely……a path to freedom, liberation and the future.  This threshold space requires immense courage and discernment, strategy and tactical prowess. For our weary Syrians who find themselves at Calais, this is the space they inhabit. Neither here nor there, literally, physically on a threshold between two countries with nowhere to go…  This makeshift camp is known as the jungle and what a ‘terrible cloud of unknowing’ (Rohr as cited by DeWaal, 2015) its inhabitants live under.  Rightly or wrongly, it is also a liminal place for the mounting deep seated fears and anxieties held by Europe about change, identity and social challenges presented by the influx of refugees (Cottee, 2015). Something else that educators should be thinking about.

References

DeWaal, J. (2015). What is a liminal space? Retrieved from      http://inaliminalspace.com/about/what

Cottee, S. (2015). ‘I am Strange Here’: Conversations with the Syrians in Calais. Retrieved from

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/08/calais-migrant-camp-uk-syria/401459/

No Man’s Land retrieved from https://sites.google.com/a/ucps.k12.nc.us/wwi-y/trench-warfare/no-man-s-land