I have a substantial number of blog articles that were drafted, but never finished. In an attempt to honor the ideas presented in them, I'm going back and at least getting them ready to publish. Some are more practical than others, but they should at least see the light of day.

A colleague shared this poem/prayer during faculty devotions last week that I thought I'd share with you.  It highlights a fundamental truth about children and how much school, even though it tries, denies them the freedom to be who they truly are.

Jesus and the Children

Oh, Lord Jesus,
Some days I wonder what you saw in them.
How could you gather those whiny, crabby little humans in your arms and bless them?
Did they push and shove to get ot you,
or worse yet,
take cuts in line?
Did they tattle on their best friend
or ruthlessly tease the victim of the week?
That's the reality of kids, Lord.
Oh, but help me to remember
that no less real
is their curiosity, their open-heartedness, their zest.
Nowhere but in children
do we see such receptive, eager and humble learners.
So, Lord Jesus,
remind me what you saw in them:
the very kingdom of heaven.

Murphy, Elspeth. Chalkdust-Prayer Meditations for Teachers. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1970. 24. Print.

I absolutely love the section about God creating students with "curiosity," "open-heartedness," and "zest." I truly wonder sometimes how much of the way we "do school" actually takes those traits into consideration. When as a teacher, I sit down and design a learning experience for my students, do I see them as "receptive, eager, and humble learners"? Do I acknowledge their ability to l when I create an environment for them to learn?

Those are very powerful descriptions of our student learners. How willing are we to take advantage of that and capture that with our students?


Image: "Children learn how to make Chilean Rain Sticks at East Palo Alto Library" by Flickr user: San Mateo County Library
Used under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic

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