Day 11: ROY G. BIV IN THE HOUSE

Quick Hits: 

• Leslie tested positive for COVID-19. She's sluggish, some shortness of breath, but we're grateful she's experiencing it rather mildly. 
• Her symptoms started two weeks ago with a full week of loss of taste and smell but we didn't know that was a potential symptom. When taste/smell came back, it morphed into fatigue. She went from running 3 miles/day to her not being able to run at all in 3 days time. She's feeling better but we want to share this with you so that you know the symptoms. 
• Color Week - please fill out the survey on your favorite color. 
• My thoughts wrassling with "time" 

Color Week

Leslie structured this week of SchoolBitz around a color each day. Today, marking the distant, ancient event of Indiana basketball's last NCAA National Championship (won here in this fair city, at the Superdome, in ecstatic fashion) we celebrated the color RED. (all pics at the bottom). 

• We all wore red. 
• We listened to the Red Hot Chili Peppers and This is Indiana. 
• We made red jello. 
• We ate red meat bolognese. 
• We made cherry blossom pictures in art. 
• Ruby sorted buttons. 
• We began a survey asking for everyone's favorite color to construct a bar graph with. 

Please fill out this QUICK survey to help us collect more data: 

1/10,000th the Width of a Proton

I'm seeing a lot of Twitter jokes about "what day is it?" or "two weeks ago when we last saw each other seems like a decade ago!" I've always enjoyed puzzling over how we perceive time. Smarter people have written more eloquently about this but my own personal perception of time has always been bent by the intensity, the depth of feelings and experiences.

There is, of course, the image of a young person watching the clock slowly tick away as you wait for school to end. Leslie and I hear all the time -- at least when we were all allowed to be out in public -- that we will blink and our kids will be all grown up.

For me, the first epic shift in time perception came from my summer camp growing up, Goldman Union Camp Institute in Zionsville, Indiana. (GUCI for short.) Our camp was never going to win Best Facilities Award but we damn sure won for being a deep, meaningful, even holy community. I know this isn't exclusive to my camp. Being 14 years old in a cabin with 16 other guys, and 3 late high school or college student counselors did something to time. The fights, the dirt and grime, the clean up, the sports, the music, the love - it all just bent time like the sounds of a theremin in the hands of Dr. Madd Vibe. Four weeks at GUCI felt like four months. Living life minute by minute, so closely, so intensely...deepening each second of time so that it felt like an hour. In a good way.

It's not for everyone but at 3am, second weekend of Jazzfest Saturday night, in the pocket to some band pouring their heart into the beat - time slows down then, too. The clock might say the jam was 20 minutes but it feels both short and unending... rippling like a gravitational wave through the totality of time and space, that only moves the arms at LIGO the width of 1/10,000th of a proton. (you gotta check that website out). But I've spent enough time on the spacetime continuum for now (and mangled the science, the metaphors...)

Photo from https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/page/ligo-gw-interferometer

Being a parent in these times, in this situation - the fights, the dirt and grime, the clean up, the sports, the music, the love...well it's bending time again. Will we look back on this time like I look back on my time at summer camp?

Monday, March 30th, 2020
5 M&M day until 1pm. Then 2 M&Ms until 7:30pm. So 3.5 M&M day.

Day 8, 9, 10...time turns elastic

It was a week. Definitely indicators we are settling into some routine but humans aren't Gmail/Outlook calendar blocks so we've tried to remain flexible as much as we can.

One interesting dyamic Leslie has brought up is that we're all experiencing a common event: STAY AT HOME but, of course, who you are, where you live, who you live with...all of that varies and it is really difficult to truly empathize with each other's experiences.
Folks who live alone, without kids, with kids, older folks, younger folks, not to mention the identity differences we bring to life daily and the challenges/privilidges that come with all of that, etc. These differences (that have always been here) are exacerbated at this time or at least feel more pressing and in our way as we attempt to connect and work with each other through the Interwebs.

Are ya'll seeing that? What's your experience?

Day 8

• Schoolbitz routine with tons of choice continues to work. Today we added in Nola Bea's Chinese language lesson from school. 
• Popsicles on the Porch used to be a daily festival at our house but the winter months changed that. Well, we brought it back today. 
• Art class - a paper butterfly - was a winner. 
• We observed Taco Tuesday on Wednesday this week. 
• Nola Bea wants to build an online store to sell things. We're working on it as a long term project. 

Wednesday, March 25th, 2020

4 M&M's. I hope this is the new normal, our daily goal. 

Day 9

• Saw this article on the range of feelings out there and how this can be viewed through a lens of the grieving process: https://hbr.org/2020/03/that-discomfort-youre-feeling-is-grief
• Beazer has been coming down in the morning, getting her sister dressed, and making breakfast. Today, she made the daily smoothie using salad materials from dinner last night. 🤣
• At Morning Meeting, we did our Mood Meter check-in. Nola was still feeling "happy, calm, a little sad, and angry but I don't know why." 
• "Ruby, how are you feeling?" I asked. RUBY: "I'm a truck." 
• Painter's Tape Mosaics on neighbor's driveways

4 M&Ms!

Day 10

• Going to take this moment to plug Mike Emmert-Kanter's weekly email which can be viewed on the Information Superhighway here. Their family are good friends of ours and he is a really great writer. This week's piece was on "With Even Mind" and trying to hold equanimity in the midst of all of this. 
• Another family friend, Jeremy Parker, is DOMINATING the game with a hilarious, engaging musical "tv show" that he is producing. Ruby, the 2 year old, came in and out of attention but Nola Bea was engaged for the full 30 minutes. And some of the jokes are for the parents: 

• Leslie led the girls in a challah baking session. Everything Bagel Spice on one half of the challahs. DAMN, GINA. 
• Today's carbohydrates went cinnamon rolls -> challah -> pizza.  

 

4 M&Ms

Have a great weekend!

Day 6 and Day 7: M&Ms Rule Everything Around Me

The weekend was glorious! Weather was fantastic, reprieve from the hustle and bustle of Week 1, and an opportunity to chill a bit.

We faced Monday with a great deal of optimism since Friday had been an improvement.
We had a great start to the morning with Morning Meeting pictured above and the opportunity for multiple choices at each block of time really paid dividends.


This week's Essential Questions: 

1. How do the arts make people feel happy?
2. What music does the world need to hear this week?

For AM Exercise, we did some bike riding time trials to get the blood pumping. Nola's teacher has been sending morning videos and Google Slide decks that guide Beazer through some academic content.

We also started writing a song we'll try to complete this week. This one is academically focused per Beazer's decision and will be describing a trip to the desert.

We practiced Beat Boxing through this link from Bridging Education and Art Together

During Ruby's nap and Nola's TV time, I checked out my friend Kelly Harris-Perin's 13 minute video that does a great job of helping you (me) think through the important priorities of the week and what you can do to take care of yourself along the way.

Kelly's video: 
http://www.littlebitescoaching.com/blog/2020/3/23/work-better-feel-better-at-home-edition

Our great day did take a rough turn. Nola's got a lot of anger. This is a girl who LOVED going to school, seeing her friends, learning, and engaging in a lot of exploratory classes. She would skip to the car after her afternoon enrichment and play ground time at 5pm. Now, she's stuck here with a 2 year old (who is learning to antagonize her) and two old people who just don't get it. 

She was so angry that she ended up creating a store with stuff from around the house on our back porch. Not the highest traffic area even without stay-at-home statewide orders. Then she got mad at US for not going to shop there. Then mad at us for not shopping there when she wanted us to. Then mad at us for saying it was time to go to bed. 

While I ended up getting her to chill with me on the balcony, watch the sunset, and read her bedtime story, it was one of the more unpleasant run of hours we'd had. Definitely top 3. 

Despite that ending, it really was a much better day as we all settled into the new reality. 

Monday, March 23rd: 

4 M&Ms - the new schedule works and providing multiple choices for each block is working

Tuesday, March 24th: 

4 M&Ms - We're in a groove and while it's not perfect, it's mostly working. And we'll be "raring to go" by Easter (and Passover). 🤦

Day 5: "The sun's coming up"

Hey, we made it 5 days before any Phish references but Saturday night, I was sitting on my balcony consuming a Soul Center of the Universe from Parleaux and decided to watch the webcast video from the Trey show back on 1/31/20 at the Civic. Set 1 closer was "Everything's Right" which does come off a bit literal, cheesy, but also opens into an anthemic uplifting chorus and usually a pretty good jam.
At any rate:
"This world, this world, this crazy world I know
It turns, it turns and the long night's over and the sun's coming up"

Nice version with Derek Trucks here

That seemed to encapsulate our Friday. The new schedule with lots of choice combined with the positive incentive system worked really well. Also nice knowing we'd made it to the weekend. 

Leslie dominated Art class and really put it in the dumpsta - "let's paint a trash can"

 At one point, Leslie and I were just talking and this happened:

Ultimately a nice end to the week and we're more optimistic (easy to say Monday morning at 9:30am) for our plan this week. 

Friday, March 20th, 2020: 

4 M&Ms - Schoolbitz = system + (schedule x choice) + incentives + (a real embrace of happy hour x airport rules)

Day 4 - Friday's Eve

Thursday always feels like such an optimistic and positively anticipatory day to me. We've made it through the week, the weekend is in sight, and well, it's almost Friday.

Our Friday's Eve was all over the place. Both the girls went IN on making some Lego houses instead of our usual outdoor field trip. I let it go because they were enjoying it and it gave Leslie some focused work time.

Seemed to be downhill from there, though. The age difference and the lack of independence of Ruby as a two year old make for complicated calculus. A lot of "NO!" and resistance - you might even say insubordination - to what we're trying to make happen throughout the day.

I know I was stressed and frustrated, snapping more than I like to, raising my voice more than I want to admit, and feeling pretty beat down from the whole process. And I'm an education coach! Tons of empathy and love out there for folks not grounded in the field now having to make this happen at their homes.

Aunt Leslie did some more science: "Will it float or sink?" via iPad. We had a happy hour virtual yoga session with Aunt Dena (custom yoga props)

  

We compared early Black Eyed Peas (Fallin' Up, Joints and Jams - really innovative video at the time) with Fergie-included Black Eyed Peas. The girls built a clothes line after "accidentally" hosing their clothes down:

But ultimately, we had a very tense staff meeting where we vented and then, like all good educators do, came up with a new plan to attack the next day. While drinking wine. (Leslie broke 22 days of sobriety since Mardi Gras!) And then we watched Picard. 

I'm grateful for Leslie's skills, experience and wisdom, and lucky to have her as a teammate in all of this. But damn, not the type of Friday's Eve I am used to. 

Thursday, March 19th: 

2 M&Ms - sick of whining, being screamed at, and trying to balance work/email with all of this. But optimistic for tomorrow. 

Day 3: Naked and Afraid

Incentive system: Effective
Leslie/Ron Division of Schedule: Semi-Effective
Schedule for the Girls: Ineffective

Scavenging old hummus mini-cups. Building houses with bootLegos. Pants and Shirts optional.

Wednesday, March 18th: 

2.5 M&Ms: Before 12pm, it was a 4 M&M day. After 12pm, it was a 1 M&M sort of thing. Averaged to 2.5. 

Day 2

Started much later today. Leslie went for a run while I ran breakfast and Morning Meeting. We did a Mood Meter (another tool from RULER) check-in, reminded ourselves of our schedule and Charter

and then watched our Song of the Day. Today we watched The Roots' "Proceed" and talked about how we will, indeed, proceed and continue to rock Schoolbitz. My dream school includes Black Thought and ?uestlove as cornerstones of the faculty. 

There was a scavenger hunt in the neighborhood for things in nature. We ended up meeting George Porter, Jr's first cousin. (She and George are ok.)

My sister is a high school science teacher in Columbus, Ohio. She led a science demo on surface tension in liquids via the Facetimes. 

We also had some rather lax time as Leslie and I tried to get some work done. At one point, Beazer had figured out how to turn on Old Town Road, close the blinds and dim the lights, and throw a Dance Party. 

We had some driver's ed:

And at one point Nola was topless in the front yard with a jump rope tied around her waist (the style of the times?) connected to a bucket and hula hoop that was placed around an old cardboard box. I'm still not clear what was going on there. 

So there were some great moments but also some pretty low moments. Getting some outright defiance at times from both girls and as this reality sets in, Leslie and I are coming to grips with the fact that this is only just beginning. Feels pretty daunting. 

Tomorrow we built out a schedule for her and I to get a little bit more work done, update an incentive system, and use even more of the materials Nola's teacher has been posting. 

Tuesday, March 17th: 

2 M&Ms - while we had some good things happen, the weight of the situation is setting in

Wrap Up of Day 1

Scholastic's Daily fiction, then non-fiction, then activity focused on bunnies. 

Good ol' bunny hopping and measurement here.

We made it. Didn't stick to that schedule we made too tightly. Biggest takeaway was that this is going to be difficult to balance our work with running SchoolBitz, to say the least. I'm wondering if our (collective we here) construction of time across a day or week is going to change as a result of this situation?
Or since the typically healthy "littles" don't experience COVID-19 the same way as adults, will we create mini-schools/daycares/groups where the Littles can go to school, socialize, be with each other but completely remove anyone over the age of ~50 from being apart of this group as a staff member? Maybe our high schoolers and college-aged young people can staff it.
I'm no public health official or doctor but have got to think we'll try to find solutions so folks can go to work/work from home.

This isn't an example of rigorous thinking so would love to hear other ideas, reactions, and quiche recipes.

We're going to be rating each day on a scale of 1 to 5 M&Ms which may or may not double as our bribe incentive system.

Monday, March 16th: 
4 M&Ms - "new" is always exciting and today definitely was new.

Streamed an art activity

Went on an adventure looking for the Little Libraries - found 3 of them!

Planted herbs, you herb.

Emotional Literacy Charter Creation

For our initial Morning Meeting today, we started by creating an Emotional Literacy Charter. This is a tool I learned through the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence's RULER program and Mark Brackett.


It's a simple document where we ask a few questions:
1. What feelings do we want to feel in SchoolBitz?
2. What behaviors do we need to do so that we feel those feelings?
3. What do we do to repair or respond if we don't feel those feelings?

Beazer was very generative while Ruby mostly watched.  Ultimately, we want to feel HAPPY, FOCUSED, SERIOUS, TEAM, LOVING, CURIOUS AND KIND, and DOMINATE THE DAY.

We also introduced our week-long Essential Question: How is SchoolBitz similar/different from our other schools? We'll use it to drive some reflection daily as we co-create this little community.

It begins...

At least a month of Saturdays...

It's a new adventure in our world and we're priviledged to have a home, our health, and over 25 years of education experience between Leslie and I. So today's the first day of NoRu SchoolBitz or NoMo SchoolBitz, depending on who and when you ask. The girls created the name, we created the schedule, and we thought it would be fun to document the process as we go. We know everyone is trying to do similar things so if you have ideas on how to improve what we're doing, please let us know in the comments or via email.

Also hope this serves as an opportunity for Les and I to process the experience and build our own meta-understanding of this whole thang.

We bought this website domain after a crazy night back in 2009 at the Broadway Oyster Bar seeing Glen David Andrews, or maybe it was Rebirth, or maybe it was Gumbohead. It served as our wedding website as well as an ethic, a way of being. Being insubordinate to the funk isn't something literal - it's a feeling. So look inside your heart, figure out what it means for you, and let's see where we end up...

Initial Daily Schedule