THE BEST THING I EVER DID IN MY LIFE

I met my son when I was a music teacher in the public schools. He was in second grade and enrolled just before Halloween, that October. He wasn’t my son, then.

November is National Adoption Month and I am getting this in just before the end of the month. But in celebration of the great time we shared this afternoon and the best thing I have ever done, below is uploaded a video and some photos from today. It is not easy to get him to stand for a picture, but we had a ball watching the video that we made together today.

“Did you know it would take less than one percent of the U.S. population to provide a forever family for every child in foster care available for adoption? November is National Adoption Month and we’re part of a coordinated effort between the U.S. Children’s Bureau, Ad Council, and Child Welfare Information Gateway to make the difference of a lifetime for about 130,000 children who deserve a family of their own.” www.adoptuskids.org

I met him when he was eight. Now, he is 22, getting his Bachelors and Masters degrees, simultaneously in engineering at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. A great young man.

No regrets.

The music my son was playing initially, while we were having some fun after sharing our meal together, was David Bowie’s “Space Oddity”.

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Uploaded by cutelisha

However, I was afraid that if I wanted to upload this to Youtube, it would be banned. And I had already tested some songs from Susan Tedeschi’s CD Just Won’t Burn for another Heath Ledger video tribute, so I put the song, It Hurt So Bad on and here is “our fun”.

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Uploaded by ilovemylifesblog

The picture at 2:28 is the day of his legal adoption.
We had just left the court room and were at JW's Seafood Grill
with his dad, and his dad's mom and dad.

His dad and I are no longer together,
but still help each other out,
when one or the other asked.

I sent food for his dad after our "little party".

Before we ate today, I asked Jonathan to say one thing he is grateful about life and one thing he is grateful for - about me... and I did the same for him.

He said:
I am grateful for your love, the way that you love me.... And for the understanding that you have for me not being able to talk to you, as I am studying and tutoring so much...

And I am grateful that I am able to do the work (in his engineering courses) - that I have the ability to do it (and so well, I added).

I said:

I am grateful that I have been with such great spirits lately. And I am grateful that Jonathan came to be with me, today.

It was a lovely idea and I thought he put "it" so nicely.

Jonathan's First Video - May 27, 1996

This is blocked in Germany due to the music we had playing in the background for Jonathan to dance to. This is when Jonathan was my student and visiting my home on Memorial Day. I gave him piano lessons at that time. We had planted a evergreen bush in the front yard and named it Jonathan.

9 Ways To Help Children in Foster Care

Map Quest for my area - Beautiful

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Rafa lost his third round-robin match
to Novak Djokovic 6-7(5), 3-6


Rafael Nadal of Spain reacts during the men's singles round robin match against Novak Djokovic of Serbia during the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena on November 27, 2009 in London, England. November 26, 2009Photo credit: Julian Finney/Getty Images Europe

17 pictures: Rafael+Nadal

Tournaments Website: www.barclaysatpworldtourfinals

Final
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Singles
2.30 pm London Time
9.30 am USA EST
Davydenko vs. del Potro

Online viewing ( for a fee): www.tennistv.com

You might try these links for free viewing:

www.atdhe.net

www.channelsurfing.net

Great Sources of Information

vamosbrigade.com

Sponsored by Babolat

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(I Ain't) Missing You Heath
Uploaded by mimccd
This tribute is about Heath's early films
Two Hands and The Things I Hate About You


A Very Young Heath in Roar
Uploaded by jopicca

I ordered both Two-Hands and Roar this week from Amazon. Roar came today! Two Hands is shipped and on its way.

A LITTLE STEP UP ON MY SOAPBOX

I was motivated to purchase these two dvds because mimccd and jopicca posted these two videos. Just wanted to say that ~ because of the battle over copyright infringement issues on youtube....and the problem of being able to post movies and especially, music on youtube. As I have said before the whole copyright issue and banning use on youtube-type sites is way behind the curve on utilizing the benefits of gaining sales by our use, not losing sales. Get with it, WMG, Sony Music, Warner Brothers, and whoever else is banning music and movie use on youtube type sites. Think outside the box

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GENOCIDE IS NOT OKAY

USE YOUR VOICE
TO CALL UPON OUR LEADERS
TO DO WHAT IS RIGHT
ABOUT SOMETHING THAT IS VERY WRONG

standnow.org
www.savedarfur.org
whilewewaitsudan.blogspot.com

www.henryjacksonsociety.org/stories

Sandra from Rhode Island, but pictured here, many years ago in Paris.

That is the Arc de Triomphe in the background.

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Comments Welcome

Thank you for stopping by.

"I DREAM THINGS THAT NEVER WERE AND SAY WHY NOT"

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I was called in by the principal for teaching this song to my students in my first few years as a public school music teacher: Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream. From then on, I was forbidden to teach this song to the children.
Above it is sung by Simon and Garfunkel. Uploaded by JudeOrEleanor
Sung here by John Denver

The lyrics

Last night I had the strangest dream,
I never dreamed before,
I dreamed the world had all agreed,
To put an end to war.

I dreamed I saw a mighty room,
The room was full of men,
And the paper they were signing said,
They'd never fight again.

And when the paper was all signed,
And a million copies made,
They all joined hands and bowed their heads,
And grateful prayers were prayed.

And the people in the streets below,
Were dancing around and around,
And swords and guns and uniforms,
Were scattered on the ground.

Last night I had the strangest dream,
I never dreamed before,
I dreamed the world had all agreed,
To put an end to war.

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Text at youtube by the singer derkman:
Recorded in 76 languages, this has become one of the most enduring and treasured peace songs. Possibly the very best anti-war song ever...a strong argument presented sweetly and with reason. This song was written in 1950 by Ed McCurdy and has been recorded by many artists over the years including The Weavers, John Denver, Simon and Garfunkel, Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Johnny Cash and Garth Brooks.

"My brother (Robert F. Kennedy) need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be rememberd simply as a good decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. "Those of us, who loved him and who take him to his rest today pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will someday come to pass for all the world. "As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him: 'Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.'" Edward Kennedy

HUMANE HUMANS NEEDED

On the first day of the new school year, all the teachers in one private school received the following note from their principal.

Dear Teacher,

I am a survivor of a concentration camp. My eyes saw what no man should witness:

Gas chambers built by learned engineers.

Children poisoned by educated physicians.

Infants killed by trained nurses.

Women and babies shot and burned by high school and college graduates.

So, I am suspicious of education. My request is: help your students become human. Your efforts must never produce learned monsters, skilled psychopaths, educated Eichmanns.

Reading, writing and arithmetic are important only if they serve to make our children more human.

As I am reading my journals that I have written since 1969, I came across the quote which is shared above. I had written these words in my journal after I heard it at a music teachers workshop. I attended these workshops on Saturdays. This particular workshop was titled Creative Drama, Sound, Sight and Movement taught by Mavis M. Serries of the Waltham, Massachusetts Public Schools.

Reading it today moves me, as much as it did the day I wrote it down in my journal. It is from Haim Ginott's book, Teacher and Child. It is the book's epilogue, page 317.

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Uploaded by geornata

Your children are not your children,
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but are not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
Kahlil Gibran

More notes from Haim Ginott's Books
can be found at eqi.org/ginott.htm

Haim Ginott's most famous quote:

I have come to a frightening conclusion.
I am the decisive element in the classroom.
It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
It is my daily mood that makes the weather.
As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous.
I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.
I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.
In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated, and a child humanized or de-humanized.

Between Teacher and Child

Haim Ginott died at age 51 years old and his wife, Alice Ginott, wrote about him:

‘He wanted to learn how to discipline without humiliating; how to criticize without destroying self-worth; how to praise without judging; how to express anger without hurting; how to acknowledge, not argue with, feelings; how to respond so that children would learn to trust their inner reality and develop self-confidence.

“What is the goal of education?” he would ask, “When all is said and done, we want children to grow up to be decent human beings, a ‘mensch’, a person with compassion, commitment, and caring.” How then does one go about humanising a child, making a “mensch” out of him? Only by using “menschy” methods: By recognising that the process is the method, that the ends do not justify the means, and that in our attempt to get children to behave in a way that is conducive to learning, we do not damage them psychologically. Also, that we do not talk to children in a way that will enrage them, diminish their self-confidence, inflict hurt, or cause them to lose faith in their competence and ability.’ (p.10)

Haim G. Ginott (1922-1973) was a teacher, child psychologist and psychotherapist, who worked with children and parents. He pioneered techniques for conversing with children that are still taught today. His book, Between Parent and Child. The book stayed on the best seller list for over a year and is still popular today.

Teacher and Child

Ginott, Haim (1972)

New York; Colliers Books Macmilllan Publishing Company

The book primarily comprises a series of very short sections with a point to make about a humane way of being in the classroom and stories to illustrate. Each feels like a springboard for an enquiry focussed on ‘How can I improve what I am doing and live my values more fully through my practice?’ which would enable the enquirer to theorise their practice, to tell the story for how they account for themselves and their learning, recognise themselves as contradictions and progress; a quick and provocative read and good resource.

The next page of this journal has these words by Charles Silberman, from his book, Crisis in the Classroom:

Thinking alone, does not make a human being human. Feeling is also needed.

What tomorrow needs is not masses of intellectuals, but masses of educated men...men educated to feel and to act as well as to think.

Other links:

alice-miller.com

Emotional Intelligence

How to help a suicidal teen