Something Reassuring

Listening to the filter bubbling away in my grandson’s aquarium this morning was a soothing experience, sort of like coasting on sounds, like being lulled along while the rest of the world dashes after something or other – and it made me more determined than ever to provide a similar sort of reassuring atmosphere in the background of our earnest work in English class this year. I don’t have an aquarium in the classroom, but perhaps the overall serenity that I try to maintain with my students can be a kindly setting for our minds and hearts as we study stories and poems. My students and I always try to avoid raised voices, sudden movements, and eruptions of any kind – sort of like strong but unruffled rivers – and maybe that will make it easier, this year, for all of us to be as constantly put at ease as I was this morning, listening to the melodies of Noah’s small filter in the next room.