A Time to Talk

Robert Frost (1874–1963). Mountain Interval. 1920.

A Time to Talk


WHEN a friend calls to me from the road

And slows his horse to a meaning walk,

I don’t stand still and look around

On all the hills I haven’t hoed,

And shout from where I am, What is it?

No, not as there is a time to talk.

I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,

Blade-end up and five feet tall,

And plod: I go up to the stone wall

For a friendly visit.


I read this with my eighth graders. I have a bit of a problem communicating literature to my students, I've realized. I just want to read it and love it and discuss it, like we did in college, but they don't seem to be able. So I sit there, loving it, trying to get them to appreciate it, and I just don't get the feeling I'm being very successful. The questions in the textbook are not much help, but I don't know what to say exactly to get them to appreciate the stuff, even though I really do. Working on it.

I have assigned an essay in response to this poem and three other pieces we have read with themes similar to the one here. They were kind of struggling with it. (I decided later they were faking it a bit due to laziness, but I'm not sure I'm right.) I decided to do the assignment myself so that I could model my process for them and give them my ideas for one of the body paragraphs. This was my "quickwrite" in response to the poem...

communication in a time to talk. there is a time to talk and a time not to talk, I am always telling the students. I know I am right. I also know they are adolescents and all they want to do is talk. good for them. but something will happen to them as they grow. they will mature, they will calm down, and yes, the impossible will happen, they will begin to talk less. eventually they will grow up and make their own lives away from their parents. they will get jobs, maybe get married and have kids. they will laugh at how busy they thought they were back in school. in school they had time to read, to play sports, to take ballet class, to ride horses, to surf....and they still managed to get their homework done and do plenty of talking. as grown-ups they will become a little burnt out maybe. become caught up in the rat race of life. their jobs and their kids will take a lot out of them. talking to their buddies.....will slip further and further down on their priority lists. and you know what....if they talk too much now, the opposite might oddly be true 20 or 30 years from now. friends are important. relationships are important and not only our family relationships. I do find, as a grown-up, that I have to force myself sometimes to connect with my friends. It isn't that I don't want to, it's just that I have so many important priorities. Other times I might be in the middle of something when a good old friend calls. I might think for a second "I have to do this and that..." but I quickly realize "No. What I really need to do is talk to my friend."

(This is a good start, I think. The kids seemed to like my free-form thoughts and wrote very productively for the remainder of the period. I also read them the body paragraph I constructed from the above and something made me bow when I was done reading it all. They actually clapped! Polite Catholic school kids!)

Nutty Lucas again....

Lucas made a gun out of Tinkertoys today. No, I am not thrilled, but I have decided (after much listening to grown-ups with experience) that boys often have gun fascination. I am trying not to comment at all on his gun-love...keeping it neutral and hoping it will fade away...eventually? At bedtime, Lucas went searching for his "gun" which he wanted to have by his bedside. He told me his gun's name was "Oldy." Apparently it was an old gun. He said that Oldy knew to only shoot bad people. "Good!" I piped up, seeing something positive to reinforce. "But sometimes he forgets," was my son's reply.

: /

I found out that there might actually be people other than my father that care about what I write.

Despite the fact that these people are my sister and our long-standing family buddy, they still count. A blogger has to start somewhere. Kathy and Louis, this one's for you. (I intend to make a big announcement on my facebook page that I have posted again!!!!)

This is going to be a nice random expression, very unlike the five paragraph essays that are haunting me at night as I prepare to return to teaching after a two year hiatus. Expository writing, narrative writing, persuasive writing, response to literature.....

Lucas learned to ride a bike today. I think I can safely say I have never seen the child so thrilled. He was beaming. Thanks to Daddy for teaching both kids to bike. Lucas had demended his training wheels off a few months ago....Daddy had reported back that the boy was nowhere near ready and promptly put them back on. Well the begging had begun again..."Mommy, WHEN are you going to take my training wheels OFF?!!!!" Daddy tried again today and was amazed (I think Lucas was too) at how easy it was for him. Child development is so wacky. All of a sudden my little Mama's boy is so mature and ready for everything! He started soccer this past week and begins preschool this Thursday. Everyday he is saying that he starts school tomorrow......he knows it starts in three days but he is just really ready and wants it to start....I couldn't be more happy. (This is the child who has stated he wants to marry mommy and live with mommy forever. When he was two, I think it was, he used to hug me tight and say "I'm keeping you here F-EVER!" (Not sure I'm doing those phonetics right...someday I will learn how to put a little sound byte on here...)

Emilia has met her first grade teacher and sat in her first real desk. (She sat at a table last year, much to her disappointment.) I guess we all have reason to be thrilled about now!

I have spent the whole day going through all my old papers, lessons, assignments, ideas, from my seven years of teaching. That was kind of cool. So many ideas, so little time (and such little skill at managing it.....I WILL improve in this, however.)

Okay I am going to run. Dad, we have to get together and plan the next installment of Bongy and Trabby. Mom, are you there? Kathy and Louis, a new title for you! Did you look that book up, Louis?

:) Tracy

The other dude's name was Bongy-head.

That's pronounced BONG-EE HEAD. He is the main character, according to Lucas. Tonight Bongy Head and Trabby Aches terrorized innocent movie go-ers throughout the world. What will these nutty characters be up to tomorrow?

:) Tracy

Grandson inherits odd knack for nonsense words

My dad was a bit put off by my last post. Funny how words can be interpreted in different ways, we agreed. I thought I was being funny. But if anyone else worried about me, rest assured I am fine. I kind of enjoy my child-dominated existence. :) Or perhaps I can convince you with this.

Clearly, creativity takes many varied forms. Despite knowing this, I have always wondered about myself, do I possess the creative gene or not? It has been somewhat of a life-long pondering. I know I AM creative. Really, I AM! But I suppose when faced with another's *different* creativity, one sometimes feels left out. For example. My father has a knack for nonsense words and names. I was always pleased and amazed at the crazy inventive names in his stories. And I have just never been able to do it...make up those nutty names. I like to think of my lack of creativity in certain areas as mental blocks. I really believe this theory, too. I can make up silly names. I CAN! I just want to so darn badly that, well, ironically, I can't.

Enter my four year old son, Lucas. If there is a gene for this, he has it. Tonight when I asked him to pick a bedtime story, he screamed "TRABBY ACHES!!!!!" Trabby aches, as anyone who has spent any serous time in our home can tell you, is one of Lucas's words. It can mean whatever he wants it to mean, and this is one of the things I love about his words. Tonight, of course, he wanted me to make up a story called "Trabby Aches." So I did, although truth be told, this awesome story-telling on the spot is ALSO a talent I don't feel I excel at. Again, I so WANT to be good at it, however, that I always give it the ol' college try. Today the kids helped me a lot and I was happy to take all their suggestions. I will not tell the story here (I did promise Lucas I would write it all out on a huge piece of paper but, well, uh, bad Mommy) but it was a school story that centered around Trabby Aches, another charater whose name I already forget, Miss Goudeleh, and Mrs. Buppy, the principal. How much do you love these?!! I guess I have to admit, now that my son has the gift, that I just do not. I am going to go to the bathroom to cry now. (J/K, Dad!)

:) Tracy

Kids suck the life out of you.

And there you have it. This small nugget of wisdom just popped into my little head just now. Such a little kernel of truth. I sit here, after another long question-answering, fight stopping, redirecting, nutritious meal making, hair washing, counting-to-10 day, at the computer, brain dead, realizing what my problem is. Ha ha ha! I swear I can see my life at the end of the tunnel somewhere there, I *swear* it!!!

:) Tracy

Here ya go....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_English_language

and (whoa!) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinity

Not sure that helped.

:)