Positive Things Happen...

Before I became a teacher, I held down some pretty tough jobs.  One of the toughest jobs I worked was selling vacuums door to door.  I learned a lot from that job.  When you spend all day long traveling Southwest Kansas trying to peddle $1800 vacuum cleaners it is imperative to bring your Zig Ziglar tapes along for the ride.  If you don’t know who Zig Ziglar is, your homework assignment (due tomorrow) is to Google Zig Ziglar.  During this time of my life, I learned the importance of positive thinking.  Slamming doors and repeated “no’s” can wear a man down, and a positive frame of mind is necessary for survival.

Thankfully my vacuum selling days are behind me.  However, I thought the lessons of positivity would last forever, but I have recently found myself in a rut of negativity.  This year my teaching responsibilities have been particularly challenging.  I am dealing with a new breed of students who I have not been trained to tame.  My challenges have come from motivating and teaching a group of very diverse learners.  In each class that I teach, I have students who come from extreme poverty, struggle with learning disabilities, battle behavior disorders, and are English language learners.  Nearly every student in my classroom falls into at least one of these “categories.”  It is the changing face of this nation, and a challenge for teachers all throughout our great nation.

The challenges I have faced during this semester have pushed me to my teaching limit.  If I were a bag of chips, I would currently be the crumbs at the bottom of the bag; I still taste great and have nutritional value, but I do not pack the punch of a fist full of whole chips.  I have tried every engagement technique under the sun.  I have worked extremely hard to motivate, teach, and have an impact on these students’ lives, but I fear I have had little impact.  Again, I am facing a new breed of students.  I feel like a scientist trying to stay one step ahead of an evolving virus strand.  It has been a challenge.

Through this challenge, I have become extremely negative.  My wife will attest to that statement.  I can feel myself carrying my negative attitude home to my family.  It is not fair to my supportive wife and neophyte son.  They do not deserve the brunt of my negative reaction to my challenges at work.  What’s worse is I can also feel myself turning negative on my students.  I can sense the negativity seeping out of my body, and as the negativity comes out, I very quickly realize I am not being an effective teacher.  It makes me feel shameful and embarrassed, but I have been unable to stop the negative freight train.

The train has to stop now.  If I can stay positive humping around sixty pound vacuums from slamming door to slamming door, I can surely find a way to be positive working the greatest job on the face of the planet.  Negativity hasn’t worked.  It’s time to turn a new leaf.  Zig Ziglar said, “There has never been a statue erected to honor a critic.”  He’s right.  We live in a world which is already full of negativity.  Turn on the news.  Negativity.  Turn on a sitcom.  Putdowns.  Bullying.  Negativity.  I cannot control the world, but I can control my attitude; I can control the things that are said and done within my four classroom walls.  It will not be easy, but it is time I rewind the ol’ Zig Ziglar tapes and open the positivity tap.  Tuck the cynical Mr. Coffey back into to bed, and awaken the positive giant.  When you’re positive, positive things happen!

One Tough Phone Call

“Hello?  Mr. Johnson?  This is Justin Coffey.  I coach your son in football.  Look, I needed to call and tell you that your son has been injured in our football game today.  He was hit in the head on a kick-off return, and he can’t move or feel his legs.  We’re taking every precaution.  The ambulance is here.  They are strapping him to a backboard as we speak.  We are heading to the hospital here in Liberal.  I am going to ride with him and stay by his side.  Can you make it down here?”

I could never explain how difficult it was to make that phone call.  It still makes me sick to my stomach to think about it.  The entire time I was on the phone, I couldn’t help but think about how I would react if daycare called me with the same information about my son.  I tried so hard to be as upbeat and positive as I could, but, at the same time, I didn’t want to project a false sense of comfort.  The truth is I was scared.  And, the more I thought about my own son, the more I wanted to cry during that phone call.  However, that wouldn’t have helped the situation.

In the blink of an eye, things come into perspective.  All the plays we had practiced, all the preparations we had made, all the talk about winning suddenly did not matter in the least.  What mattered was the life and future of a young student who was only trying to help his football team.

The ambulance ride was unbearable.  It was dead silent.  My mind raced through scenarios.  My imagination took over.  I couldn’t help but dream-up worst case scenarios, best case scenarios, and the most probable outcome.  I would occasionally try to talk to the young receiver whom I had gotten to know over the past two months.  No conversation seemed appropriate.  It was a long ride.

During the ride, my player began to regain some sensation and movement in his toes.  I knew this was a positive sign, but I also knew that we were going to still have a long night ahead of us.  When we got to the hospital, I called dad again.  I wanted to let him know we had made it, and also let him know about the new developments and plan going forward.  The nurses at the hospital were great, and helped provide comfort to my middle school player as they took his vitals and started an IV.

Ten minutes felt like an eternity.  I asked endless questions of my player.  We talked about sports, family, snakes, sports, our futures, wrestling, fantasy football, school, and sports.  We became tight in those ten minutes.  I am pretty sure we will always have a tight bond because of those ten minutes.  After the eternity, a doctor emerged.  He talked to us about ordering a CT scan.  I think the conversation scared my friend still strapped to the board.  He was suddenly silent.

I was beginning to feel better about the situation.  His toes and legs were slowly gaining more sensation and mobility.  Once they finally wheeled my player away for the CT scan, I called dad again.  I wanted to keep him posted on the happenings.  Again, I couldn’t help but put myself in his shoes.  In the meantime, I was also trying to keep our Athletic Director and Head Coach updated on the status.

Eventually, my player returned to the Emergency Room with me.  We were back to the waiting game.  I continued to gain confidence about the situation because my player was getting antsy being strapped to the board.  He squirmed and wiggled trying to find some comfort against the hard plastic.  As much as he was struggling to find comfort, I found comfort in his movement.  We continued to share stories and conversations while we awaited the results of the CT scan.  I began to realize more and more that I was coaching a pretty neat kid with a long bright future ahead of him.

At some point, the doctor reemerged.  He was happy to inform us that the CT scans of the brain and neck came back negative.  There was no bleeding in the brain.  The neck showed no damage.  And, my player was happy to hear they could remove the neck brace and board that was strapped to his back.

It wasn’t long before the door to our emergency room opened.  Mom, dad, and brother came flooding into the room.  Seeing the look on mom’s face instantly brought me to tears.  Again, I couldn’t help but put myself in their family’s shoes.  In a moment, my mind went to my wife.  See, my wife and I have already been through a situation where our son had to be life-flighted to Wichita.  We’ve felt the emotions I could see on the faces of my young player’s family.  My mind flashed back to the weeks my wife and I lived out of a hospital room.  We shared tears, confusion, small celebrations, and very few hours of sleep.  It is amazing how strong you can become for a family member in need.

I tried to fade into the background and let this family share the love and relief with each other.  I wanted them to cherish this moment and engrain this instant into their mind, so they could always remember what is important.

We all get caught up in life.  We lose ourselves in work, errands, stress, fights, and emotions.  We say things we don’t mean.  We do things we don’t intend.  We put priority on things that aren’t important.  Being in that instant; watching this family share this moment, helped remind me of what is important.

In the end, my player was released from the hospital with a clean bill of health.  I only got to coach half of the seventh grade game, and I missed the entire eighth grade game, but we ended up winning both (our first wins of the season) thanks in large part to an onside kick recovery from one courageous receiver.  Hearing the news that we had won the game put a huge smile on my player’s face, but as I looked into the his eyes and the eyes of his family members, we all knew that it wasn’t important.

Football is a Game About Life

Middle school football.  We have just completed our first week of practice, and I am reminded of why I love this game.  When I started coaching it, I had no idea I would have learned so much.  I have experienced the strangest behavior while coaching middle school football.  I remember a moment last year, towards the end of a game; I turned around to find one of my players with his helmet off, crying his eyes out.  Confused, I said, “We’re winning, what is wrong with you, are you hurt?”  He replied, “No coach, I don’t know why I’m crying.”  I was baffled and a little bit embarrassed.  I didn’t know what to say to the kid, so I simply said, “Put your helmet back on.”  I thought to myself, at least no one would see him crying if he had his helmet on.

I never wanted to coach middle school football.  I began my coaching career coaching defensive backs at the varsity high school level.  I used to live for Friday nights under the lights.  The crowd, the competition, and the speed of the game would always get my blood boiling.  It was an exciting time.  It was also a demanding job.  Endless meetings, long practices, hours of breaking down film, and lots of time spent on the road would eat away the hours each week.  It was during this time of my life that I received a piece of news that would change my life forever.  Amanda was pregnant and our family was about to grow.  I made an easy decision, and asked to be moved to a middle school coaching position which would demand less time.  I never wanted to be an absent father, and coaching varsity football would have taken too much time from my wife and son.

The move to middle school football has been challenging, but these young football players have taught me a tremendous amount about the game of football and myself.  I have learned a number of lessons, and I try to pass these lessons on to my young players.  For instance, I try to teach my players that success takes hard work.  Our youthful generation has a hard time grasping this concept.  So often they only see the fruit of the labor, but never see the hard work behind the scenes.  We watch the highlights on Sports Center, but no one ever airs the hours and hours of practice on TV.  The game of football is a great tool to teach this lesson.  We spend hours of time practicing tiny details of the fundamentals until our body is programmed to perform those movements without thought.  It is extremely rewarding to witness student athletes realize the rewards of hard work.  I hope they understand that this lesson carries over to all aspects of their life.

We also teach the importance of communication.  When seventh grade football players report to the first day of practice, they have very poor communication skills.  They are quiet.  They are shy.  They are scared.  And, many refuse to make eye contact.  We spend a good portion of our time as coaches teaching these athletes the importance of communication.  We also train them to utilize effective communication skills.  We ask them to speak up.  We demand them to look us in the eyes.  We force them to grow up.  You see, in football, communication is essential.  On each and every play, it is imperative to have all eleven players on the same page.  Football players need to be loud, and they need to be confident.  Believe it or not, but most of our players aren’t born this way.  Someone needs to teach them this life lesson, and I am excited that often it is me who gets to instill this important life skill.

Sometimes life can be so simple; other times life can be extremely complicated.  Amazingly, football is the same way.  In many ways football is a simple game.  On each play you line up opposite of an opponent, and on each play you compete to determine who is faster, stronger, or smarter.  It’s a simple concept.  We teach very simple fundamental skills that anyone can learn.  We teach players to start in a good stance.  We teach players to stay low.  We teach players how to keep their balance and use good footwork.  We teach players how to use their hands to gain leverage.  None of those skills are hard or complicated.  Yet, just like life, the game of football can become complicated.  There are twenty-two different positions, each with a different responsibility.  There are schemes, and game plans, and unexpected surprises.  Sometimes things go wrong, and you are faced with adversity.  As middle school football coaches, we constantly strive to teach our players to dig deep and overcome adversity.  We work very hard to ensure our players understand that when things get tough, we get tougher, we try harder, and work smarter, but we NEVER GIVE UP.  Because things may get complicated, but football is a beautiful game, and it is very simple.  I hope my athletes know that I’m not really talking about football.  I hope they realize that I am actually talking about life.

Another hard lesson I try to teach to my young middle school football players is to be tough.  In football, you are constantly bumped, bruised, and beat-up.  There are very few days where you feel “100%.”  Many times my football players come to me before practice and tell me they can’t go to practice because they are injured.  It is my job as a middle school football coach to talk with them and find out what’s wrong.  In almost every case, I have to ask this young athlete to be tough.  I need to explain the difference between being hurt and being injured.  I work to explain that football players are almost always hurt, but we need to be tough and go to work anyway.  From coaching middle school football, I have found that toughness is an attribute which can often be taught.  I wish someone would have taught a few of my co-workers some toughness.  We all know a few people in our lives that lack toughness.  All of us also know some extremely tough individuals who have overcome great obstacles, and they still show up for work.  I hope my football players can grow up to be like my tough friends.  It takes a great character to show up to work every day even when you are banged-up, bruised, and hurt.

Football is a game which was invented by the United States military to train troops in the art and strategy of war.  I wonder if the genius who invented the game of football purposely built so many life lessons in to one game.  I take my role as a coach very seriously because I know the role coaches played in my life.  I was fortunate to pick up on many life lessons by playing games as a young teenager.  Coaches played a great role in shaping my future as an adult.  I hope that I can have the same influence on my players.  I know that I continue to learn a great deal from these fine young athletes.

You Can Always Count on Change

School is officially in session.  The first day of school is always one of my favorite days of the year.  There is always a surplus of smiles on the first day of school, and the air is thick with excitement and anxiety.  I love this relationship between excitement and anxiety.  I think teachers and students feel this mixture of enthusiasm and nervousness because the beginning of a new school year always means change.

Yes, change is in the air.  The temperatures are changing, the leaves are changing, and the time I set my morning alarm for is changing.  Some of us embrace change while others avoid it at all costs.  In some ways I love change because it is exciting and it keeps me on my toes, and in other ways I am deathly afraid of the uncertainty.  After all, I have eaten the same lunch every day for over four years; I have rocked the same haircut for almost ten years; I’ve watched Jerry Maguire 7,826 times.  My wife gives me a hard time about my reluctance to change.  She tries to eat a different lunch each day; she likes to wear her hair in different styles; she likes to try different brands of toothpaste; and, she never watches a movie twice (unless you count A Christmas Story).

This school year is bringing change to me whether I am ready or not.  I have now made the full transition from teaching business courses (Accounting, Banking, and Investing) to math courses (Algebra and Problem Solving).  I am so excited for this change because I love math, and I have had many EXCELLENT math teachers in my past.  However, I am so nervous for this change because I am moving out of my comfort zone into the unknown.  To enhance my anxiety, our school district is making the change to Common Core Standards this year.  I don’t want to get in to too many details, but basically we are moving away from teaching the set of standards set forth by the State of Kansas, and we are adapting nationwide standards which are more rigorous and involved than our previous standards.  This change has flustered even the most experienced math teachers in our school, and has forced all the teachers in our district to rethink the way we are teaching our students.  I’m nervous.  Change can be scary.

My education and experience in business has taught me that change brings opportunity.  Since change is going to happen no matter how long I keep my eyes closed, I know that I better quickly open my eyes and search for opportunity.  Now that I think about it, this school year is going to be full of opportunity!  I have the opportunity to have an even greater influence on my students’ lives as I challenge their minds to new limits.  I have an opportunity to help my colleagues accept, adapt to, and embrace the Common Core Standards.  I have the opportunity to develop myself professionally into a more complete and impactful teacher.  I have the opportunity to make a difference.  Make a difference.  Isn’t that what it’s all about?  No matter what profession you have chosen, aren’t we all looking to make a difference?

It’s been said that change is the only constant.  Although I have control over the consistency of my lunch and my hair style (or lack thereof), change is happening all around me.  I’ve tried resisting change, and it only seems to make things more painful.  Starting today, I am going to embrace the change.  I think Charles Darwin helped to point out that the key to success, and sometimes survival, is often the ability to adapt.  I want to survive and be successful.  I better change.  I am going to adapt so that I can make a difference.  You heard me world, bring on the change!  But, I’m still going to have a ham sandwich on wheat bread along with twenty-three pretzels for lunch tomorrow.

It Takes a Village

Students have not even stepped foot in my classroom, and already I learned something in school.  I’ve always heard the cliché “It takes a village,” but I’ve never really bought in to the notion.  I have always tried to take responsibility for myself and my family.  I have always thought that I can raise my child on my own; thank you very much.  As a teacher, I’ve been trained and taught that it is solely my responsibility to ensure students are learning the intended curriculum with purpose.  That is my responsibility without regard to their background, their socioeconomic status, their family life, their intelligence, or their culture.  No whining; no complaining; no excuses.  No child left behind; that is my responsibility.  However, today I learned it takes a village.

This school year, I am moving from a “business department classroom” where I was blessed with computers for every student, to a “regular math classroom” with good old fashion desks.  I am excited by the new challenge, but I was not looking forward to moving all of my things (again).  Even as I labored to move my collection of books, folders, cabinets, and teaching supplies to my new room, there were some things I just couldn’t fix.  My new room had only one small board on which to write.  I had a projector, but no projection screen.  I had an EXTREMELY LARGE podium that I could not budge, let alone fit through a door, sitting in the middle of my room.  I needed help.

I don’t like to ask for help, but I sent two short emails.  I sent one to my principal and one to the head custodian.  A few mornings later, I walked into my classroom, and like magic, there were two new boards on my wall, and the enormous podium had vanished.  I was just about to complain to myself that I still didn’t have a projection screen, but just then my door flew open, and in walked two custodians carrying two ladders and a perfectly timed projection screen.  I wanted to stand up and hug those custodians, but I wasn’t sure they would have understood.


My two new boards!  Our school mascot is the Red Demons, so I have strategically placed the "all seeing" demon head above my boards.


Anyways, I could not have done those things by myself.  I needed help.  I needed the “village” to lend a hand.  Perhaps I could have survived without the new boards, or the projection screen, or a giant podium in my way, but I couldn’t have taught to the best of my ability.  I would not have been able to give these students my finest each day.

It got me thinking.  How much do we rely on others?  Is there anyway I could do my job without my principals, the counselors, the custodians, the lunch ladies, the paraprofessionals, my colleagues, the librarian, the nurse, the secretaries, the workers who built this beautiful building, the school board, the coaches, the parents, the tax payers, the police…?  The short answer is no.  It takes a village.  This entire village is working towards one goal.  We are all working together to give these students a chance at living a meaningful and fulfilling life.  We are all trying to make good on the promise that this is the land of opportunity.  No one has promised happiness, but these students have been promised the right to pursue happiness.  We ALL want to set them on that path.

Now that I understand that it takes a village, I can’t help but think about the victims of the recent tragedies which have taken place in Colorado and Wisconsin.  I am a student of statistics, and I fully understand that there will always be outliers in society.  I also understand that as a population grows, so too does the number of outliers.  However, as a human and an educator I wonder where “our village” went wrong with these violent gunmen.  What influences were missing from these sick peoples’ lives?  I’ll probably never know the answer to that question, yet it still haunts me.

I heard someone speak recently, and he talked about how a leader is someone who has influence.  I like that thought.  It’s simple.  Do you have influence over someone?  You’re a leader.  In our village, we all have influence over someone.  I think a good mantra to live by would be, “Be a positive influence.”  I am reminded that I am a part of this village.  My words, decisions, and behaviors have influence.  I am a leader.  I better be a positive influence.  After all, it takes a village you know…

Back to School

As summer comes to a sweltering end, I look ahead to the impending start of school.  I am just about to embark on my fifth year in the classroom.  I haven’t exactly taken a straight-line route to the teaching profession.  After graduating from the University of Wyoming with a degree in Business Administration, I have worked a number of jobs mostly in sales and management.  Despite having some success, I was never able to find the satisfaction I was seeking in my jobs following college.  I found that my favorite aspect of management was training my new employees; I also witnessed the career satisfaction which found my beautiful wife (she’s a kindergarten teacher).  In addition, I have been fortunate to be the product of a long list of quality educators, and those teachers of my past also helped shape my decision to jump careers.  Changing careers to a high school teacher is not as easy as it sounds.  I have endured three years of graduate courses, countless hoops, three separate two-hour tests, and a few tears in order to earn the title of a “highly qualified secondary teacher.”  Despite the obstacles and detours, I made the second best decision of my life (the best decision was asking Amanda to marry me).  Education has turned out to be my absolute dream job.  I have never been so happy, and I have never felt such satisfaction.  I am extremely happy and proud to call myself a teacher!

However, that’s all water under the bridge.  What I need to focus us right now is ensuring I am on top of my game.  I am about to open my door to 71 young impressionable minds who are looking to me to guide them towards a successful and meaningful life.  All of these students will come to me from different backgrounds.  Some will come in speaking broken English.  Some will show up from extreme poverty, happy to be back to school so they can eat.  Some of my students will have complicated family dynamics, including deceased and incarcerated parents.  Some of them will understand the importance of education.  Many of them will not.  And still, all of them will be looking to me.  I better be ready!

To make things tougher, I need to compete.  See, somehow I need to collect (and maintain) the attention of each of these 71 brains for eighty-two minutes at a time.  This task is getting tougher and tougher.  Facebook, video games, movies, television shows, smart phones, advertisements, drugs, sports, peers, hormones, texting, and money are all competing against me for their attention.  I have to admit that those are pretty fierce competitors!  I better make sure I’m ready!

Did I mention I am also a coach?  I coach middle school football and wrestling.  A perk of becoming a teacher is that they allow you to coach sports (and they even pay you extra)!  One of my favorite parts of the day is being dismissed from the classroom and heading out to help challenge young athletes to develop their athletic skills and abilities.  It’s like getting paid to play!  But, coaching can also be very serious business.  I am tremendously excited to begin a new season!

It all starts VERY soon!  I’m excited, nervous, anxious, happy, sad, and optimistic.  I am hoping this blog will give me an opportunity to air new ideas, share hilarious stories, seek wisdom, vent frustrations, and allow you a peek inside room M140 at Dodge City High School in Southwest Kansas.  Please feel free to offer advice, encouragement, suggestions, ideas, or stories of your own in the comment section.  For now, I need to go.  I have got to GET READY!!