Carol Hurley was my educational midwife. She birthed me into my role as a classroom teacher. We met the spring of 1985 and by that September we were teaching side by side in portables. I was teaching a 5/6 split while Carol had a straight 5. I was so lucky to be paired with Carol as my grade teaching partner and mentor.

Carol, was and is, rooted firmly in classroom management with fair, respectful and natural consequences. She taught me to dig deeper in reasoning and challenging students to think about their actions and consequences. When students were ‘caught’ making an ineffective choice, she reminded them that they were part of a larger community and that respect and responsibility to the whole was essential. It was philosophically and theologically entrenched. Discipline wasn’t a matter of arbitrarily handing out lines, or detentions without any reasoning. To some she seemed soft as she didn’t follow swaggering ‘I’m the teacher, you better listen’ approach. Carol’s discipline approach was tougher than the traditional bully discipline. I am so grateful as she empowered me to take a stand from ‘old’ traditional ‘stick’ approaches to classroom management.

Carol, you birthed me to be a philosophically grounded teacher. A teacher who tried to be fair, respectful and inspire not through intimidation. You showed me how to be a compassionate role model and challenge students but not break them. You gave me strength to be proud of my own creative style and not buckle to peer pressure. I can’t thank you enough for birthing the fairy teacher!

Earlier this year before the launch of the new site, I posted the back story and the YouTube links to this story, Aluka. Seeing that it is a BIG birthday for Carol coming up on July 10, I decided to edit and re-post the back story and video links. Enjoy!

Aluka!

The meaning of the name By Kabalarian Philosophy:

• The name of Aluka makes you dynamic, restless, independent, ready to accept challenges, and outspoken.
• https://www.kabalarians.com/m/aluka.htm

This is story for two audiences, namely students on a team and for adults to challenge their perceptions of the children in their lives.

A couple of months ago, Carol and I were reminiscing of when we taught and coached at Mary Fix Elementary School back in the late 80’s. We reflected upon how children are often perceived and labeled as having issues (particularly ADHD & ODD), but then questioned who has the issues, the playful adventurous children or the adults who often have subscribed to inflexible agenda and expect these wonderstruck children to comply? Yes, there is a need for rules, expectations, and cooperation BUT on both sides, patience, fairness and flexibility must prevail. Do we not want to be teaching and modeling win-win, forgiveness and celebrating/learning from ‘mistakes’? We remembered one of our students who was a handful…. creative, fun, joyful, very bright  AND sassy, impulsive, courageously challenging. We were coaching him and Carol had him in her class. She always wondered what happened to him and low and behold she saw his name in the paper recently as a very accomplished entrepreneur with multiple awards.

Based on this conversation and my continual ponderings about how we perceive, assess, modify and accommodate children as parents, teachers and in the community at large, I recently birthed this story about Aluka. It is based on the true events that occurred to Carol while teaching and coaching this lad along with moments of my own teaching experiences with challenging children. I primarily wrote it for educators and parents as a springing board for discussion.

Here are some questions to discuss:

• Is this ADHD and ODD label we so often stamp on the foreheads of students veiled in negativity ….non compliance, lack of focus, selfish, stubborn, aggressive?
• What are the positive characteristics of ADHD and ODD…. courage, determined, multitasking, high intelligence, entrepreneurial, fun loving?
• Were the explorers, adventurers, pilgrims?
• We say learn from your mistakes and move forward but do we mean it? 
• Are we willing to forgive, salvage the positive and redirect?
• We complain that children with ADHD and ODD don’t have patience and flexibility, but are we modeling the same?
• How do we harness the gifts found in the “ADHD/ODD” child

Additional Links:

• https://www.soundmindsoundbodytherapy.com/post/2016/08/18/the-ultimate-career-ambition-1
• http://www.restlessgenes.com/2013/07/adhd-and-adventure-gene.html
• https://adhdawarenessmonth.org/coalition/
• https://adhdawarenessmonth.org/explorers/
• https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-21369/im-a-doctor-with-adhd-here-are-9-reasons-why-i-celebrate-it.html