curley-girly

Spring is just around the corner… I can taste it!
My good friend, Caroline Bickley, who is a Kindergarten teacher at my school, a fellow Teach for America corps member, and my carpool, is about to go enjoy the sunshine with me, now that DC has finally recovered from all the snow! We’re going to run to the Lincoln Memorial from Eastern Market, and enjoy being done with what was our 25th week of school, and our Regional PD (which was earlier today). I am going to really try and soak up all these opportunities, like running down the National Mall whenever I want, before I leave come June 12th or 13th. How crazy that we only have 16 more weeks of school! (I actually only have 14, since I’ll be moving before the year is over for my best friend’s wedding!! Crazy!)

On another positive note: The Regional PD we had today was also inspiring! Some of our teachers across our three Imagine School Charter Schools: Hope Community Tolson Campus (mine), Hope Community Lamond, and DC Southeast, have made some awesome gains in reading and math!! The daunting news, was that many of our kids are still soooo far behind! Myself, and the other Specials teachers, decided to partner with the fourth grade teacher at our school for the month of March, in preparing students for the DC-CAS Standardized Test. We will be implementing math into our Art, Music, PE, Spanish, & Sign Language class times before students take their tests in April. We hope our plan proves to be fruitful!!

I was also extremely honored and surprised when they called out my name among the names of about five staff members from all three campuses who were chosen by other staff members for modeling our Shared Values of “Integrity, Justice, & Fun!” I received a certificate and a $50 Target gift card!! How nice!! These little incentives truly go a long way in making a teacher feel appreciated. There are those days where you think your job is thankless… but the important thing to remember is that regardless of if we are recognized, appreciated, or awarded for our efforts in this life- Our students NEED us, and there is no profession, more rewarding than getting to “shape the hearts and minds” of children (quote taken from our Imagine School’s Mission Statement). I may have used this quote in previous blog entries, but I’ll use it again because I love it so much:

“A teacher affects eternity; they can never tell where their influence stops.” Henry Adams

Also in closing, I must say that no good is in me apart from Christ, the Master Teacher. His influence is what has shaped me into who I am today, and into the teacher I am today. He is what I aspire to be like. To Him be all glory & praise! Amen

So, I missed an ENTIRE week of school, due to the MAJOR Blizzard the entire Northeast coast received- reeking havoc on DC, Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas, Pennsylvania, New York, and so on. Most workers from the Federal Government were off as well! DC was called a “ghost town” on a CNN News Broadcast this week, which is pretty accurate!

I’m not gonna lie,… I was fairly pleased with the shut down of school, mainly because January was my busiest month of the year, and a break was warmly received What I was/am not excited about, is the very fact that my 6th grade boys (whom I only have 8 weeks of the school year) missed an entire week of art AND preparation for their final this coming week…meaning I’ll have to revise the final, and try to cram what I can into actually ONE DAY of teaching-… here’s why:

Monday is President’s Day, Tuesday they have a mentor group called Best Men come in (which I am all for, but not always excited that they come during Specials time every other week…), Wednesday is a LAB DAY for a Stanford Math program that has been implemented school-wide twice a week (again, I’m all for it, but not always excited that it happens during Specials time…twice a week), Thursday is our ONE DAY of reviewing and finishing their final project, and Friday, they test and we say goodbye! Phew- craziness. We’ll make the most of it! This is probably my main negative point for the snow, but what I’d rather share are…

Some other positives about the major snowfall:
1. I was able to really think through some planning for the rest of the year, and have had time to revise and make smARTer plans than my originals hehe …you like that play on words? This will undoubtedly benefit students.
2. I was able to just hang out with my roomies, and feel like a real person again…I watched TV!! Can you believe it? It is rare for me, those who know me…Don’t worry though, I stay connected with what’s happening in the world via the internet- CNN (to the horror of my Father, sorry it’s not Fox…), TED, npr, and the like.
3. I had time to do some more art, and read about different European art movements that I previously had a background knowledge base of slim to none…PS: Filling the well is important for artists- especially if you’re teaching it and never have time to just play around and study for your own curiosity anymore!!!! MAKE TIME ARTIST/TEACHERS!!!
4. I was just pleased by the sheer coincidence ( I thought ), that DC and NYC- two cities that ‘never sleep’ or stop for anything other than their ‘agendas,’ were literally SHUT DOWN by the snow. haha, and people were forced to stay inside and actually spend quality (I hope it was quality…) time with their families and loved ones! SUPER important.

I think the snow proved that…
Sometimes we need to be reminded that we’re not in control really… ever, and point blank: relationships are waaaaaay more important than anything else. ANYTHING. Test scores, making AYP, etc.

You may be thinking, “did a TFA teacher just say that?,” and Yes, yes I did.

Relationships- Quality, life-giving relationships are what it comes down to. I say, start THERE with your staff and students, and then work like hell and pray that those test scores go up, and your school makes AYP. Relationships should be the FIRST investment of your time in your community and your school.

Of course, this is all my opinion, based off my personal experience. You decide what you want to take with you in the end though. I want to know, did I love well? I hope so.

At home, watching the second ‘big winter storm’ to hit DC this season, accumulate out my window. Beautiful. I’ve had 2 snow days this week, and I’m not trying to get home to family this go-round, so I WELCOME the snow! Anywho…
I was reading over my last entry, and I wanted to include a Winston Churchill quote that one of my old collage friends had on their gmail status a few weeks ago. It ties in perfectly, stating: “Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.”
Walking in that truth, I am approaching this last semester with COURAGE. Our winter exhibition, which was January 25-29th, was a little bit of success and failure. I was successful in hanging close to 400 works for students all around the walls of our school, and spending about 20 hours of my life preparing and finishing all the other ‘aesthetic’ details of the exhibition, but I failed in delegating. I’ve decided that for the next exhibition (which will be May 13th), I shall hereby have a COMMITTEE of people to help!!! Hold me to it.
Asking for help is easy for me in some areas, but when it comes to ‘artistic vision,’ I am at a loss. It’s sort of like asking someone to help me pack… you feel me? I run the risk of asking for help, but then feeling like a “B” because I don’t like the way the person is “helping” and I end up re-doing it all anyways… lol. Problem. I’ll try to move forward with courage, and better delegation.
In other news, I found a school in OKC that I reallly want, called Western Village Academy. It’s a K-5 innercity charter school. Pray I get it! I’ll keep you posted… For now, enjoy the snow & stay warm and safe all you Northeasterners!

I just finished my first week of teaching in the new year of 2010, and although I’m not quite back in the routine yet… I’m feeling the urgency to get it together as I approach the end of my second year in Teach for America. As I sit at the beginning of what will be the end- the final semester- the completion of my 2-year commitment with TFA- I ponder where the Lord will take me next. At this point, I want to continue teaching art, but truth be told…I will not be staying in DC. My reasons come down to relationships. My boyfriend and family are all back in Oklahoma, and although I’ve enjoyed my time out here, and learned and grown a whoooole lot, I am ready to be close to the people I care about the most. Needless to say, they are also ready to have me home
I don’t feel like leaving my school after these 2 years makes me a person that is ‘giving up’ on the mission of TFA, because I have definitely become more of an advocate for educational equality. My experience thus far has shown me what the ‘achievement gap’ actually looks like, how and why this occurs across racial and socioeconomic lines, and why we need to work diligently to close it, and give ALL of our kids what they need.
Have I done a perfect job? Absolutely not. Does Teach for America do a perfect job of preparing and supporting their corps members? Absolutely not. Having said that though, I can speak for myself and what I’ve seen of Teach for America staff and other corps members whom I live/work with, and the point is that we have a passion and determination to do all that we can in this moment, with the knowledge and skills we have at this time, to try and do our best each and every day. Do we feel like giving up sometimes, and do we not always give the 110% that we anticipated giving? Absolutely. We are human after all.
What amazes and encourages me about this movement though, is the persistence I see. It’s the getting back up, the trying again, and again, and again…. and again, to try and make that kid ‘get it,’ to know they are cared for and loved (even on the days you struggle to love some of them…), and then the simple act of showing up even on days when you don’t think you can. On days like these, you hang onto hope.
I hang onto my belief that no problem is ever too big for God. No child or person is beyond redemption. In this world, where we wait for things to be made right, we must also do all that we can with the talents and abilities the good Lord has given us, to try and make things right. It’s the whole concept that says, “Pray you catch the bus, and then run like hell!” I’ve felt this way many times in my Teach for America experience. All that I do and say for my kids, in my efforts to ‘close the achievement gap’ in the art room, and to let them know they are loved and special, is in vain without prayer as my foundation. If it’s all just a bunch of ‘fluff’ and ‘warm fuzzies,’ I don’t feel I’ve really done the job.
Some days require tough love and lots of discipline, but my prayer is that art will be the means to a number of things: to open up their world to other cultures and art periods, to provide a greater awareness of themselves and their peers, to foster healthy ways to express themselves and to be creative, and then to simply enrich their lives with the beauty and therapeutic act of creating! We have a great Creator, and we are all meant to reflect the creative process. There are many ways I believe we manifest this, so if you’re reading this and don’t feel you have a ‘creative bone’ in your body, I challenge you to look again!
One more thing, as I think about ‘the end’ of my term in DC, I am reminded that the process in any artistic endeavor, is almost always more important than the actual product. Let’s think on this as teachers. Yes, we have “big goals” to reach, but let’s not get so fixated on the ‘final product,’ that we lose sight of the process. There may be times we have to relinquish the “big goal” and deliver a “teachable moment” that will go on much longer than a statistic will. I’m not taking the importance off the “big goal,” and reaching those numbers we all want, but there is much more to teaching, and the process of caring for children, than simply that. At the end of the day, let’s remember what is MOST important.
Here’s to completing the work that’s been started!
God, go before me! God, go before all of us that teach and care for children! Amen.

Hallelujah! I made it out of DC alive, and back to Oklahoma by Monday the 19th. Sitting in the family room in Tulsa on Christmas Eve right now- movie on, fire going, and sleeting snow. Christmas services have been canceled, but we are so thankful to all be together as a family. If I hadn’t made it out of the Dulles airport on Monday morning, I would not have made it here until Christmas day (or possibly later!). Planning for school will resume later…have a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa and New Years! God bless us, everyone.

Yowzerz! Stupid winter blizzard came right at the WRONG time. I was scheduled to fly back to Oklahoma this morning, but last night got the first cancellation of my flight out of Dulles. Perfect. I shamelessly cried on the phone with the Southwest lady, trying to find something for Saturday, but when I couldn’t, I found another flight out of BWI -Baltimore! With high hopes, I had an amazing co-worker, Beth Brodersen, agree to drive me there. We left my house this morning at about 9 AM in the ridiculous snow, and arrived to Dulles by 10:30 AM with only a few minor skids here and there. Hooray! I got in the line to check my bags, then found out that this particular flight was also canceled!! Booooo. Plan C… United found me a flight from Dulles to Tulsa no earlier than Monday. Done. You think this is the end of the story but.. Oh no… it gets better! haha..On the journey home…
Brodersen and I leave around noon and head back to DC in the snow that is STILL FALLING (after reports that it would stop… right), and did not get back until almost 4 FRICKIN 30! Normal drive is 30 minutes, or 1 hour in traffic. Crazy face. Best parts of the journey home: we got stuck for about an hour on an exit ramp…her back tires couldn’t get traction and we were sliding all around….about 10 people (including me) got out and pushed on the car while she put pedal to the metal (THANK YOU STRANGERS FOR YOUR HELP!)….a truck tried to literally push her up the ramp, no luck …but we did break his license plate partly… she finally took off and so I ran in the snow to catch up with the car before we got back on the highway… later on, we got stuck in a traffic jam that literally DID NOT MOVE for about an hour on a road called “Good Luck Road,” …how ironic. haha …so overall- Great day. Good news though, we are alive and well, and will (hopefully) be home (eventually) for Christmas!
Praise God from whom all blessings flow, praise Him even for crazy snow, praise Him above yee Heavenly Host, Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.

Yes- It is that time of year, when teachers and students alike anticipate being with their loved ones over the holiday break, and getting the time to relax, kick up their heels, and enjoy the blessings of good food and fun! I have less than a week left until I join my family and friends back in Oklahoma for a celebration of togetherness, catching up, remembering the birth of our Savior, the birth of yours truly…haha, and bringing in a New Year! I canNot WAIT! The countdown is finally drawing near, and my perseverance is growing slim…. I am so ready for this long-awaited break! Yeeeeeah!
In the art classroom, students have been busy drawing and painting their family portraits! I want to showcase some of their art in January when we have a Fall Exhibition of student work. I thought it would be special (and possibly eye-opening) for families who come through the school that week of Jan. 11-15th to see how their child chose to illustrate their family. Some of the things that have come up in this process, are students sharing with me about their separated or divorced parents, their absentee parents, their incarcerated family members, and their family members who have passed on. Students have found interesting ways to include all of those whom they love, whether alive, deceased, absent, or present in their lives, within their family portraits. Some have actually drawn a line of separation between the family; some have put their angel-like ancestors in the clouds; and some have put all of them ideally together and at peace, despite the conflicts there.
I hope that this special time of the year, when we gather together with our families, we give ourselves time to ponder and think on how grateful we are to have had those whom we loved in our lives, even for a short time, and to not forget to show our gratitude towards those whom we love and hold dear at this present time in our lives.
Life is short, but sweet for certain. Make the most of it this time of year!

Back in Richmond, VA with Great Uncle Bob & Aunt Mary for the second year in a row! I got a ride last night from a church friend, and am currently enjoying the quiet of their living room. It’s been a gray day here, but almost 60 degrees! As soon as I’m done writing, I’ll probably go on a run to enjoy the fresh air, and the views in their densely wooded neighborhood Their son’s family arrives tomorrow for the official Turkey Day celebration, and I will once again be the random second-cousin, haha. No problems there though. I will get to see my family and Brandon at Christmas, in just 3 weeks!!!
Time here is sweet, but it’s good to not be sooo desperate as I was last year for a break. Still very thankful to have one though, and still much-needed. Hang in there, all you first-year TFAers, and those of you getting ready to join the core next year! It gets easier, I promise!
I’ve done a little lesson-planning, and still need to finish some grading… but for now I need to get outside & give thanks for TIME OFF! Don’t feel guilty. Enjoy the gifts that are given. Peace!

One of the highlights from week 13 of my second year teaching, was surprising a 2nd grade teacher with a “Gratitude Wreath” that her students made in my class! I had her kids each draw a leaf on a piece of paper, write a thank you note on it, and then assemble all the leaves together onto a big, circular piece of cardboard. Simple stuff that made a big impact. When I hung the wreath outside her door that afternoon, I came into the room to ask her to quickly come out and see something on the wall. (Her kids were all in on it, haha, so they started squirming around and squealing in their seats!) I also got the pleasant surprise, when she started to cry happy tears upon seeing it!! She said “Thank you Ms. Curley! I really needed that! I can’t let them see me cry, they need to think I’m big and tough!” haha, I said “Aw, you’re welcome, and I think it’s okay if they see you cry.” When she came in, the kids yelled “SURPRISE! WE LOVE YOU!” Some kids whispered to each other “She’s crying!” It was really cute. Moments like these make my job worthwhile. Art should bring JOY, and lift the spirit!! Of course, art isn’t limited to these two means, but they are two of the most crucial in a world which needs a little “pick-me-up” most days. Spread the love around. Show appreciation. You never know when someone might need it the most. I hope you are pleasantly surprised by the act of giving this holiday season

The CORE virtue at Hope this month is gratitude, meaning thankfulness. This virtue helps me keep perspective. This time of the year helps me keep perspective. There is much to be thankful for! I am one year and one quarter done! Things are only getting better. I live in a great area, have other roomies who understand the ‘TFA struggle,’ and a network of support that far outweighs what I had last year. One of the most exciting NEW things, is getting in touch with TFA’s Mississippi Delta Art resource page!! I have already found a couple helpful things! I am very grateful to have some support, even from a distance. (Is this a theme in my life right now?) haha, as I’ve learned in long-distance relationships… being “close” is not always a matter of proximity. I am also grateful for shelter & food. These basic provisions, that I’ve so often taken for granted most of my life, have been actualized in this past year at Hope and living in DC. If you’ve ever been to DC, you know how prevalent homelessness is here. You cannot ignore it if you want to. If you don’t think you have anything to give, you see how great of a need there is, and if you’re complaining about your situation, you see how counterfeit it is in comparison.
This year, we have a family with some really tough issues. The kids come hungry every day, sometimes no coats on in the cold, starved for affection, and dealing with other issues at home. (Though unfortunately, this isn’t the case of just one family at Hope…) Seeing these little ones, so hungry: mind, body, and soul, breaks your heart. Moments such as these, when they cling onto me, or say “I’m still hungry,” or almost cry when they have to leave school…remind me of how grateful I should be for the childhood I had, and try to do all that I can to love these kids well, look after them, and pray for them. As strongly as I feel for the mission of TFA, and “closing the achievement gap,” sometimes we have to stop teaching, and just listen, love, & tend to the brokenness around us. I don’t think TFA means to overlook this fact, but I think that those of us ‘in it’ can sometimes overlook the MOST important realities, while trying to keep up with the ‘tracking of data,’ ‘assessments,’ and what not.
Remember this month what you are truly grateful for. Stop. Breathe. Be present in your workplace and at home, as I try to live up to this myself.