As an educator, we there is a routine to how the year goes.
August is a shedding of summer. Like a snake shedding its skin, we spend the first few days/weeks of school shedding off old habits and creating new ones.
September is paving the road. In preparation for the year, the journey ahead, we spend a great deal of time in September installing and ensuring norms and procedures for our kiddos. Learning is still happening, just as people can still travel during road construction, it just isn’t smooth yet because the road isn’t fully paved. Just like learning in the month of September.
November is kicked off by a Halloween celebration. Then, it seems, everyone is in a progressive shutdown mode for Christmas break. With the invasion of holidays and Christmas concerts, class parties and the like, there just never seems to be a full week of intense, all-out instruction,
Which is why we have October.
In the month of October, the road is finally paved and there are minimal interruptions. It is a perfect month for a Double Stretch.
At times, we need to put forth a little extra, reach slightly further, and endure a little more. Our bodies are used to this. Like when we need to reach for that jar of cookies or box of Mac and Cheese that is just out of reach, somehow, we reach a little further and grab it! We double stretch.
For the month of October, find ways to give just a little bit more. As an educator you already give a lot, but where can you stretch slightly further? We can’t always live like this, with our arms and minds and bodies stretched to its fullest, but we can every now and then. October is one of those “then’s.”
Where can you put forth a bit more in your lesson? In an activity that you’ve been thinking about doing? In a relationship with a student or staff? Where can you improve your own mind or heart by giving just a bit more this month? How can you improve someone else’s life by doing just a bit extra?
Where can you double stretch this month?