Posted tagged ‘middle school’

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Knowing Who You Are

January 15, 2022

LIFE LESSON (from the Red Hot Novel Series): Knowing who you are is more important than who people perceive you to be.

Earvin Johnson is six-feet, nine-inches tall. Better known since his days at Michigan State as “Magic” Johnson, Earvin grew up in Lansing in the shadow of Spartan Land. I wonder how many of his coaches assumed he was a post player, a center, before anyone realized that he was a point guard who simply didn’t fit into the perceptions of what a point guard looked like? You see, 6’9″…even 6’4″…was more often than not viewed as the player who would be down low, on the block, close to the basket, the rebounder.

Perceptions and a-rush-to-judgment are hard to change. So often younger siblings are seen through the same lens as their older brothers and sisters. A have a student who is the youngest child in a family with four kids. I coached her two older brothers in basketball and assumed, since she is tall, that she would be a hoops players as well. Instead, she has other interests not connected to athletics, is a great student and a great kid. I’m sure, however, that she has had to answer the question, “Do you play basketball like your brothers?”

Middle school and younger high school students get pressured by their classmates and friends sometimes to be who they aren’t. I’ve noticed a few eighth-graders this year who, as seventh-graders, were responsive, respectful, and made good decisions, but have been drawn into groups where wisdom and common sense have taken a leave-of-absence. They’ve allowed their identity to be reshaped in order to fit-in and be accepted. It happens quite often in those years of “figuring out life”.

The adolescent years need mentors and advisors who model integrity, strong values, and trustworthiness. Middle schoolers, especially, need non-judgmental adults who help them in the defining of who they are. Young people need those encouragers who will keep saying to them that who others want them to be is not nearly as important as being who they really are.

That doesn’t mean that every six-foot seventh-grader is going to be a point guard or every eighth-grader who isn’t afraid to sing should be the lead vocalist. It’s simply to make the point that kids these days– especially kids whose self-image is shaky– need people to help them believe they can be something different than what others are telling them they need to be.

In evaluating my own life I am so thankful for a couple of friends in my middle school years and, after a move to a new town, a couple of friends in high school who helped me stay grounded and weren’t afraid to say to me, “What are you thinking, Wolfe!!!” when I was heading toward the valley of stupidity. I’m thankful for a great church youth group and awesome adults who lead it. Those ingredients and relationships solidified my discovery of who I was and am. I can only hope that I can now be an encourager, mentor, and coach for a few as they go through these years of their lives.

Categories: Novels, RED HOT Life Lessons
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Pulling In The Same Direction

January 9, 2022

LIFE LESSON:

“A successful team learns how to work together, not against one another.” 

There’s a scene in that great American comedy series, The Three Stooges, where Moe and Curly are digging two foxholes. As Mo throws a shovel full of dirt over his shoulder into Curly’s hole, Curly is throwing another scoop of dirt into Moe’s hole. In the tradition of the comedy of the clueless, it takes a couple of minutes for one of them (Moe) to figure out what is happening. 

For some teams, the difference between success and failure comes down to a tendency to work against one another instead of with one another. A step forward is discounted by an error in judgment. Something negative that happens in the school hallway resurfaces in a reluctance to pass to a teammate in the midst of a game. There becomes a battle seen by those observing the contest between some of the members of a team. They are pulling in different directions. In essence, they’re simply throwing dirt into the other foxhole. 

Successful teams find a rhythm to their work or performance. They have discovered and defined the roles of each teammate: who is the best defender, who is the best rebounder, who handles the basketball, who comes off the bench and picks the team up, who is the team cheerleader, and who is the go-to scorer? Successful teams discover those roles and succeed because of it. 

Years ago I was coaching a girls’ junior varsity team and I noticed that one of the players wasn’t passing the ball to a wide-open teammate. When I shouted to her that the teammate was open, another girl sitting on the bench said, “Coach, she’s not going to pass to her?” I asked why and she replied, “Because she heard that she (the teammate) was talking to her boyfriend in  the hallway today.”

I was dumbfounded! Differences had poured from their personal lives onto the court. 

In today’s culture there are more challenges for a team to experience success than there are ingredients of success. You can see it especially in a player’s drive for statistics. After all, a college coach is going to look at scoring average, rebounds, how well a player shoots three-pointers. The drive for individual recognition is always a tension point with team success. 

Jealousy, self-centeredness, overconfidence, lack of effort, not being coachable, not listening…all of those are challenges to a team’s rhythm and success. 

Successful teams discover a fluidness that leads them smoothly down the stream. They support one another, congratulate each other on achievements, create an environment of equality no matter whether it’s the best player or the last perps on the bench. When one player suffers the team empathizes with him. There is an attitude that says, “We’re in this together!”

I think of an Olympic rowing team. The importance of the oars hitting the water in a synchronized fashion determines success or disappointment. I think of teams I’ve coached where there’s been “an oar” that sticks out like a sore thumb in its bad timing or minimal effort. One person out-of-synch can detour a team away from victory.

Categories: Novels, RED HOT Life Lessons
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Putting Pants On The Same Way

December 15, 2021

RED HOT LIFE LESSON: Focus on the ways we are similar to one another, not how we differ.

I remember a man from a church I pastored years ago talking about his encounter with Jud Heathcoate, the Michigan State basketball coach. The two of them were on the same plane and the man said, “Hey there, Judd!” When I asked him if Jud responded, he said, “Sure! He puts his pants on the same way I do!”

That declaration that brought a chuckle to my inners then resonates even more with me in recent times. It seems to be easy, and even our nature, to focus on the ways we differ, rather than the ways we are similar. I see it every day I’m in the hallways and classrooms of our middle school. Students who might be short, chubby, not very coordinated, intelligent, talented, socially awkward, or anyone of a few hundred other boxes that might be checked on a list of differences, have students and teachers alike focus on their shortcomings and personality warts much more than their common traits and qualities.

In the first book of my Red Hot novel series, Red Hot: New Life in Fleming, I introduce two characters who are visibly different, one with thick eyeglass lenses, short hair, and short stature; and the other with bright red hair that makes him look like his head is on fire. In a small West Virginia town where no one would envision them becoming friends, they learn the value of having someone who notices how they are more alike than different.

There will always be those who feel the need to tell someone how weird, stupid, or unimportant he is. In middle schools it doesn’t take you long to figure out who the outcasts are, the kids who stay close to the walls as they down the hallway, trying to go unnoticed. Or the student who, when the teacher invites the class to work with one or two other students on the assignment, is the one who is never invited to join.

As I view the assortment of students conversing, socializing, or avoiding eye contact, I’m always impressed with the ones who seek out the marginalized and treat with respect, the ones who push the unusualness of a fellow student to the side and sees how clearly they are alike.

It’s like putting on pants. Everyone who wears pants puts them on the same way. The pants may have different designs on them, be bell bottoms, skinny jeans, or have a different designer label but…they’re all pants!

Focus on the ways we’re similar instead of trying to divide us because of our differences.

Categories: Novels
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No One is Worthless! Everyone Has Value!

December 8, 2021

In my novel series, Red Hot, one of the main characters, a seventh-grader named Ethan Thomas, has no one who believes in him. His thick-lensed eyeglasses, short hair, short in height, and freckles don’t help matters. Even most of his teachers don’t believe he can be successful.

Thankfully, a new boy with bright red hair moves to Ethan’s small West Virginia town and gradually convinces Ethan that he’s not worthless and can achieve things that he didn’t think were possible. Having someone believe in him makes all the difference in the world for Ethan.

In any middle school or high school there are numerous Ethan’s trudging down the hallways, struggling with the uncertainty of their worth, their purpose. They hide in the shadows, avoid certain people who enjoy making fun of them, and count down the minutes until they can escape the corridors and classrooms again. To have someone tell a kid something different than he has always heard is a God-send. Hearing positive words in a negative environment is like a fresh spring rain on a dried-out soul.

I love speaking encouraging words into young people who had resigned themselves to the fact that they were losers, nothings, not to be seen or heard. There was one young boy last year who was not doing well in class. His absences made it difficult to connect subject matter that built from one day to the next like building blocks. And then we had a section on short stories. Each short story was followed by a discussion or a quiz, so the day was self-contained. He did well, and I told him that. He’d contribute his thoughts and opinions when we’d have a discussion. He did well on the quizzes. In other words, he had the potential to do well, to excel, to do work that was deserving of an A or a B.

Unfortunately, his family system didn’t put much value into his schoolwork or time at school. Suddenly, he’d miss a day or two and the residue from his past struggles would reappear. The doubters in his life far outweighed those who believed in him and, although he kept being reminded of his potential, the depth of his personal lack of belief was a rocky journey filled with stumbles and missed opportunities.

He’s just one example of a young person who needs the cheers of many who drown out the jeers of a few. Value is more than there ability to throw a ball well or dress like a million. It’s more than being like by a lot of people or coming from a family of prominence. Value is in anyone. It sometimes simply needs to be cultivated and uncovered.

Categories: Novels
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Saying Goodbye…Kinda!

September 9, 2021

Yesterday was my last day teaching/leading/corraling my seventh-grade language arts students. Divided amongst four classes, about 90 students at various levels of maturity and immaturity would descend upon me each day to engage in the “E’s”: Entertainment, Experience, Expression (creative writing), and Education. Some days, perhaps, there was more entertainment than education!

I had been asked to fill in until a new teacher could be hired. Since I’m a “pretend teacher” (pseudo instructor), I wasn’t being considered for the teaching position. I was simply acting as the rubber band around the personalities until someone with the right credentials could be located. It’s the same position that I ended up filling for the whole year in 2020-2021. I could have stayed a while longer this year, but needed to be step to the side before the ninety bundles of joy became to attached to me.

As it is, a number of them were looking at me with pleading eyes yesterday. Without putting myself on a very shaky pedestal, most of the munchkins enjoyed my classes. We learned about the importance of commas (The difference a comma can make between the meaning of “Let’s eat, Grandpa!” and “Let’s eat Grandpa!”), creative and imaginative writing, kindness in words and actions, and learning how to support opinions with reasons for those opinions.

But more than learning, my classes included rolls of Smarties, a back wall of Far Side cartoons that were arranged to spell the word “Smile”, conversation, bad puns, a daily Wolfe Wisdom saying and Trivia Question, and Beanie Babies used to indicate the student was going to the restroom.

I enjoyed it…and am glad I’m done! This morning I occupied my Starbucks stool again, last one of the right facing out toward Pikes Peak, and savored my Pike Place medium brew. Tomorrow I’ll probably get a call asking me to fill a vacancy for a day.

My teaching team threw me a “Kinda Going Not Far Away Party”, complete with balloons, chocolate cake, and card. One of the students gave me Chips Ahoy cookies, and several asked me why I’m leaving with a tone in their voice that conveyed my physical demise was about to begin.

So today, once again, I’m attacking the writing of the final book (Book 4) in my RED HOT novel series, creating the further adventures of middle-schooler Ethan Thomas and his flaming redheaded friend, Randy “Red Hot” Bowman. The previous three and a half weeks have provided me with new fodder for the fiction.

To that Ethan Thomas would probably say, “Jiminy Cricket!”

Categories: Novels
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The Ethans of Life

September 5, 2021

One of the main characters in my RED HOT novel series is a middle school boy named Ethan Thomas. As Book 1 begins, the reader discovers that Ethan has thick-lensed eyeglasses, a buzz haircut, freckles, is short, and has no friends. He’s the kid that is there but nobody sees.

I developed his character out of some of my memories of middle school more than a half-century ago. I was the shortest kid in my class, had a buzz haircut, and wore glasses, although they didn’t have thick lenses. I did have friends, but always had that feeling of inadequacy as a result of my 4 foot 8 inch height in seventh-grade.

Now that I’m teaching a seventh-grade class (although I’m done this coming week), I see the Ethan’s that still side-step people walking down the hallway, the kids who long to belong but don’t quite jump over that wall with its constantly changing boundaries.

I can see it as they enter the classroom. Which students are chattering away with one another as they enter the room and which students come in with eyes lowered, unsure if someone will say something that causes them to feel smaller than they already are?

I see it as certain students stand in front of their lockers. They are the ones whose faces are almost buried inside the place that holds there possessions, hiding as best as they can from the mass of peers who crowd their space. The Ethan’s want to be noticed, and yet they have a fear that if they are noticed it will be in a demeaning sort of way.

I see them in the cafeteria sitting alone, or sitting as if they are a fenceposts between two groups of students, not a part of either groups’ conversations, just a student to indicate where one group ends and the other group begins. The Ethan’s sit there with their heads down and trying to eat their lunches in front of them that have lost their taste.

I see them in the classes where the assignment has students teaming up in groups of three or four. The Ethan’s become the filler that the teacher ends up assigning to a group. Sometimes the response from the group is positive, but sometimes a deep sigh can be heard in their acceptance of the one who has been put upon them. The Ethan’s are often afraid of contributing anything to the group out of a fear of being laughed at, even though great ideas percolate within him/her.

The thing is the Ethan’s of middle schools have the seeds of greatness, the potential to be heroes, the hearts to empathize, the imaginations to create, and the minds to figure out what needs to be done and can be done. In their loneliness amongst the masses they can make the difference between a school being just a school and a school being a great place of learning and developing life-long friendships.

Back to my growing-up days even though “growing” seemed to be the thing that eluded me. There were a few boys who made the difference for me. Mike Bowman and Terry Kopchak pulled me along with him during my 8th and 9th grade years when we lived in Zanesville, Ohio. Dave Hughes and Mike Fairchild picked me up through my last three years of high school after my family had moved to Ironton, Ohio. Those four guys made the difference. They got my face out of its locker hiding spots, made lunch a time of conversation instead of me feeling like a fencepost, and made me laugh just as much as I made them chuckle.

I pray that the Ethan’s I see everyday in our school hallways will find friends like that. Or, perhaps I should say, I hope they will be found by friends like that.

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Storyline Life Lessons

August 2, 2021

The third book in my RED HOT novel series was the most challenging and interesting book to write so far. Those who had already read the first two books in the series were anxiously anticipating the next part of the story. That created a bit of anxiety in my creative spirit. It needed to be good. Not that the first two books weren’t good, but this needed to be even a bit better.

When you write a sequel your readers already have pictures of the characters and their quirks, qualities, and shortcomings. New readers new to be introduced to them and bring them up to speed and who’s who without having to tell the whole story again. Continuing readers want to know what happens next to the protagonist, the antagonist, and the character that has tugged on their heartstrings.

A lot of questions go through a writer’s mind: What new characters can still be introduced? What new plot twists can be written that aren’t too much a reach for the reader? With a number of characters already introduced in the series, how can the storyline be written that is able to involve all of them, or do a couple need to disappear into the margins? Since the third book is further along in time, are there changes that need to be may in some of the adolescent’s lives, like getting a driver’s license or having a growth spurt?

A lot of thinking went into the plot formation before the writing began. And then there’s the life lessons. RED HOT is about friendship, seeing that everyone has value, rising above the low expectations of others, respecting one another, forgiveness, and grace. It’s about one boy who no one seems to see and another boy who can’t be missed. It’s about that kid in every school grade that seems to be invisible to his classmates as if he doesn’t matter, and another kid with bright red hair and extraordinary talent who everyone notices. It’s about an unlikely friendship that becomes an unbreakable bond. It’s a story about faith and prayer and rescue.

I received a note from the mom of a 6th Grade boy last week. He had read the latest book Red Hot: New Peace in Fleming in three days and loved it. A 75-year-old former high school basketball coach that my sister knows had received the first book in the series, read it in five days, and called my sister to find out where he could get Book 2. His two grown daughters response: “Dad, you read a book?”

Life lessons. I love writing stories that resonate with teachable moments and important values.

Last night, four from my oldest daughter’s family joined me in a Facebook Live reading of the first two chapters. What fun it was as we took on the voices of different characters!

And yes, I’ve started writing the fourth and final book in the series, Red Hot: New Hope in Fleming. And yes-yes, it is looking to be even more of a challenge than Book 3!

Categories: Novels
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Smile, Students!

November 24, 2020

Since I’m a fill-in teacher this year, kinda a fake instructor, I do some things that are a little bizarre and lacking in academic seriousness. Like last week when I started adding stuffed animals to flank the Cabbage Patch doll that was neatly arranged at the desk close to my classroom desk. I refer to the troupe as my fill-in students, since in-person students won’t be in the classroom until January.

On my back wall I had the word “Laugh” for a couple of weeks, the letters formed by Far Side cartoons. Last week I rearranged the letters, inserted some new Far Sides, and spelled out “SMILE”. Unfortunately, our school went to remote learning before my students had a chance to see it, but I’ll keep it pinned to the wall until they come back.

It’s difficult for them to smile much these days, being partially in class and partially virtual until now, and now they are totally remote. My teaching teammates and I started doing virtual lunches with them to help keep the connection. As they sit and eat their PB&J, they can log into one of our communication channels and converse with other classmates and teachers. It’s like an online cafeteria.

I want them to know that it’s okay to say they aren’t okay, to say they don’t enjoy this distant educational experience. If, in the midst of that, I can bring a smile or a chuckle I’ll have led them toward a moment of normalcy. If I can make comments about their on-screen backdrop or mention that they’re looking awesome that day, perhaps they will let their defenses and reservations down for a few moments.

This year education is more about instilling a calmness in the midst of the pandemic storm. It’s about getting these adolescents to trust in the belief that it’s going to turn out okay.

It’s getting them to rediscover their ability to smile.

Categories: children, Community, Faith, Freedom, Humor, Parenting, Teamwork, Uncategorized, Youth
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Redefining 7th Grade Deadlines

November 8, 2020

Since we’re living in a time when some seem comfortable in the rewriting of history, it makes sense that other parts of our culture are also being redefined.

Like at Starbucks this morning where my tall Pike Place coffee is really the small, or the email I’ve received for fifteen days that says “this is absolutely the last day for this mega-sale.”

Many of my seventh-grade language arts students have decided that the term “deadline” now has a new definition. In the middle school urban dictionary it is rendered like this:

Deadline: An estimate; a suggestion; in academia, the stated time when a student should begin thinking about working on the assignment; an approximation.

Last week- the third week of the new school quarter- I received five different assignments that were part of the first quarter. That is, they were part of the grade that had already been punched in…four weeks ago! Sorry, Charlie!

I’ll receive the glazed over looks again this coming week. “Answer the discussion question and submit it. I’ll give you the next five minutes to complete it.”

What some of the students hear: “Would you consider giving a response to this discussion question and, if it’s not too much of a bother, submit it in the next couple of weeks so that I might have the privilege of granting you a score?”

I must say this! There are plenty of students who are responsible, on-task, committed to the old definition of deadline, and in pursuit of excellence. They give me hope that my hair will not fall out in the midst of instructional agitation.

It’s interesting that the “deadline-redefines” become irritated if the school food service didn’t plan accurately and run out of chicken nuggets, or their video game doesn’t load quickly enough. So, they do show some reaction to slowness.

I’m wondering if in a few years when they become taxpayers if the IRS will understand that they might not get their tax returns completed by April 15? I’m envisioning their 2030 tax return being submitted in 2032…but only halfway done!

Categories: children, Community, Freedom, Grace, Humor, Parenting, Story, Teamwork, Uncategorized, Youth
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Being Coach Wolfe

October 17, 2020

A teacher, and friend of mine, told me a story last week that brought an ongoing chuckle to my soul. His daughter is a sixth-grader at Timberview Middle School and run cross country this fall- a sport that I head up for the school.

Timberview’s mascot is a timberwolf…the Timberview Timberwolves. Yes, and I’m Coach Wolfe of the Timberwolves!

One day the confused sixth-grader revealed her mental ponderings to her dad and asked the question.

“Why is he called Coach Wolfe?”

It brought a moment of Jeopardy music hesitation to her dad and he realized the roots of her question.

“Well, because that’s his name.”

“It is?” she replied, eyebrows raising. “His name is Coach Wolfe?”

“Yes, dear. That’s his name.”

Yesterday, my 7th Grade Language Arts class met in the school library for each of its sessions. The sixth-grader was also at another table in the library doing her classwork. I noticed that she kept looking at me. I’m not sure if she was trying to discern if there were pointy ears underneath my graying hair and fangs inside my mouth. Perhaps the Little Red Riding Hood story was coming back to her, as I drew each group of seventh-graders into my den.

Names are sometimes puzzling. What may dumbfound her even more is when another teacher from the school goes by me who greets me with a cheerful “Wolfie”, and I return the greeting by saying her married last name.

“Fish!”

Truth be told, some days it feels kind of like a zoo!

Categories: children, coaching, Grandchildren, Humor, Parenting, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
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