I pledge . . . Kindness, Respect, Trust

Well before last week's first day of school, our faculty - like other faculties at schools around the country - was already hard at work.

Ours were finishing up the summer reading we all did in common and on which our continuing professional development this year will be predicated (a provocative primer on the writing process entitled 6+1 Traits of Writing), they were ordering supplies by the reams, and they were redecorating their rooms.

In addition, our faculty were reflecting on how best to welcome students - new and returning - to their classrooms.

As we all remember, the first day of school can be daunting. There is rarely anything more traumatic for students than being introduced to the large person in front of the room, the person who, by the very nature of standing in the front, is in charge.

This year during our three professional development days preceding the formal beginning of school, we were reminded of what it is like to be a student on the first day of class. And the person who reminded us was, perhaps not surprisingly, a teacher who works with our youngest students - Laurie Kruger, Director of our Pre-Kindergarten and co-founder of Lake Tahoe School.

In her address to our faculty and staff, Laurie stressed attempting to place ourselves in our students' shoes by remembering some of the images we had from our first days of school. The images were funny, illustrative, and poignant: "stuffed animals," "lots of light," "a big swing set," "hugs," "smiles," "big hair," and "using the bathroom without permission" were just some of the memories conjured up

These memories evoked for our teachers a warm, inviting, and safe environment. Exactly the kind of classroom in which students felt welcome.

Laurie continued her exercise by posing a question to us: "As teachers, how are you willing to communicate to your students, not what they should do for us, but what we will do for them?"

This question led to us to reflect on what we were planning to do in order to ensure that our students felt warm, felt invited, felt safe, and felt welcome; what we were planning to do in order to ensure that our students did not feel as though our expectations could possibly exceed either their desires to please or their abilities to do so.

The following are some of the statements our teachers shared with their students on the first day of school:

• "I will respect you."
• "I will tell you the truth."
• "I will be glad to see you each day."
• "I will do my best to help you learn."
• "I will pay attention to your ideas."

Teachers then shifted the conversation to what student responsibilities would be. In second grade that conversation birthed the following covenant written on a 3x5 foot swath of red paper that is currently front and center in their classroom:

"We promese to be kind to eachother and our school friends. We will treat each other with respect. We will tell the truth and trust our friends. We will include our friends when we play. We will be helpful to others. We will listen attentively in class and respect our teachers. We will do our best."

This declaration was signed by all eight second graders and by their teacher, Heidi Breider.

As far as collaborating on the creation of a covenant that articulates the moral responsibilities we expect of our community - the willingness to model, to share, and to inspire the creativity, compassion, and courage that define Lake Tahoe School - it's a pretty good beginning.

--Steve McKibben
8/24/06