Everyone Needs An Oasis

And I have one and am blessed. When I am there I am a part of the oneness of all things living and non-living.

I think it was one of my Earthwatch Friends, whom I affectionately call Designer Girl aka Kathy G who teaches second graders in New Jersey (at least for now as she suffers through the Christie budget wars along with other dedicated teachers across the country) who first coined the term for my place between my classroom and greenhouse, oasis.
It is such an apt term.

When my life is dry and desert like, I can go to the oasis where there is water in the pond and drink cool water in my now new handcrafted metal patio chairs at the companion table shaded with a new blue patio umbrella. When the students are hormonally challenged or intrinsically unmotivated, I can retreat to the oasis and get renewed to enter the fray once again to challenge and to motivate and maybe even inspire academic inquiry and excellence in a world that increasingly devalues such things.

And like yesterday I can ride my new recumbent bike 22.6 miles and park it under the green ash tree at the entrance of the oasis and walk up the concrete path lined with rain collection barrels and marigolds and azaleas and two bushes with purple leaves whose name escapes me now on one side and climbing roses (given by the same friends who gave us Hero and Eduardo) and tomatoes and egg plants (started in the green house) and more marigolds and milkweeds (started in the greenhouse by one student and planted by another to provide sustenance for monarch butterflies) and more marigolds on the other.



And when I get to the oasis I heard a splash in the pond right after I spotted a frog resting on the new lily pad in the pond and thought how pleasant it is “for you to greet me here on a Saturday morning.” I sat and drank cool water awhile before going inside and greeting Benita, the bearded dragon, who is going through a no eating spell and Eduardo, who survived the Thursday “flood” in his space shared by the flower press operation in the classroom and greenhouse walkthrough and had to have new quarters in the classroom until the waters receded, and of all things see Mojo, our first hamster who was donated by Quaneckqua in Eighth Block Introduction to Biology, back in his cage (he had been on the lam for two weeks and kids kept inquiring about him and I left his cage on the floor with the door open and the “light” on like Motel 6 and just like that he was back as if nothing happened – now he is back on rodent row with Hero, the gerbil, and Mo, the one eyed hamster donated by Pet smart), and feed the fish who tested by biological tolerance on Thursday when I had to leave the poop filled filter in the sink to be cleaned on Friday morning during my conference period since I had no hot water from the microwave since the storm knocked out our power.

As I wrote initially, everyone needs an oasis.

And after getting the nine weeks test finally completed after letting other things get in its way earlier, I came back to the oasis for lunch (my usual lean cuisine heated in the now functioning microwave) and was greeted with new visitors. One was the green anole lizard caught in the classroom on Thursday by Courtney after another student spotted him in the windowsill. I showed the slide by one of my seniors who had mistakenly put him on his amphibian slide show and followed his internet citation to the specifics of his range and my students added “and in Mr. Banks’ classroom” with great pride. They wanted to keep him but I insisted that we let him go in the oasis


since I had spotted him there with his companion on earlier retreats. And there he was on the brick wall bulging out his bright red throat to impress his mate or ward off predators and skittered behind the now rejuvenating pampas grass. It was not much longer until his mate skittered by as well. And then to my great surprise a hummingbird found his wave over the top of the walkthrough and went to the feeder that had been there for almost three weeks and checked it out and flew off. I despaired that she would not return. Not to worry, hummingbirds along with lizards and frogs and the three new goldfish in the pond and tired biology profs need an oasis. She returned not too long later and sipped from all four stations of the bought feeder and ignored for now the homemade feeder by one of my seniors, Mia.

She made one more visit during my sojourn.

As this school year unwinds and as I go through other transitions, I will call on the oasis not infrequently for connection to the oneness of all, living and non-living, named and unnamed, motivated and to be motivated, dead and alive, hopeful and to be hopeful.

Everyone needs an oasis I pondered on my return trip in the blazing Saturday heat where I forgot sunscreen for my white now red chicken legs. They will need the oasis, too, as well as the rest of me and all things, great and small.

Edquardo and Every Living Thing Are Welcome Here

Greg brings in Edquardo from my truck and lets me use his phone for a picture.



He joined our classroom community, which really extends to the whole school on Thursday. I looked up at break and there were thirty kids in my room giving him a greeting and the office staff, janitors and other teachers trickled in all day to meet him. Thank you, Edquardo, for helping me realize once again my mission to enjoy the wonders of this world and share them with others. I may be able to teach more content and influence more high achieving students in another school but nowhere on this earth could I have more fun than here at Velma Jackson where:


• One of my promise kids actually took up my challenge and sent an email to me to express interest in a weeklong summer camp (where I have been offered a scholarship for someone just like her)
• A student who failed my biology class last year brought 18 farm fresh eggs from her grandmother for the cookies I bake each day
• A shy big kid slips me a note to order five of those same cookies (chocolate chip) 4 2 morrow
• One student from my most rambunctious class who would not even listen long enough one day to hear about putting Lady down heard from another class who did listen and stopped me in the hall to say how sorry he was
• Another student fusses at me each day I do not get there early enough for her to check the rain gauge to enter onto the national network (www.cocorahs.org)
• Another student is making an artistic card to thank the Minks for donating Edquardo and needed another day to get it just right
• A star football player who has a great eye for spotting caterpillars helped plant planters for the nature trail and talked about how much he loved working in the greenhouse and wishing he had known this in middle school
• That same student is also one of the best caretakers for Benita (and kept her at his home over the spring break while I enjoyed my “eight days”)
• The Velma Jackson Foundation awarded me a grant to purchase two beautiful blue pots with golden bloom euryops plants to embrace the greenhouse entrance and begin and end the nature trail for which they awarded me another grant



• The 1.5 miles plus 117 meter nature trail around the campus will have beautiful planter boxes with different flowers carefully selected by me and my botanical consultant, Cindy Lu, at Home Depot at each 400 m (about quarter mile) mark on the trail
• Kids carefully put earthworms from the soil tended and tilled for flowers and vegetables around the oasis into little cups to be put into earthworm farm
• Students painstakingly gather flowers from the greenhouse and put them in the flower press to later be put on bookmarks that are given to each new classroom visitor
• Students grew tomatoes from seed and sold them in 1.00 and 2.00 varieties to their grandmothers, teachers and community members to total about $75.00 to purchase more potting soil and plants for the greenhouse and oasis



Grandmother will like these.



Mr. Cotten, our attendance officer, makes his selection.

• Students carefully pitchfork compost from old plants and pots and a star baseball player digs a posthole and sets a recycled post from the Dwelling Place and another puts up a lattice screen to soften it from my old dog enclosure



• Students design and put together hot air balloons from tissue paper and launch them from the front lawn of the school with great enthusiasm and then sit attentively (for a change) to learn about Archimedes and his principle that describes buoyancy of balloons and little rubber duckies in the bathtub and pseudo-gold Eureka crowns . .
• Students worry me to death about when we will have our next science club meeting and field trip
• Students still wear their DNA bracelets with the three bead tRNA codons match the letters of their name on their wrist weeks after we completed that unit
(http://www.genomicseducation.ca/educationResources/activities/)

This is where I live and move and have my being as a teacher confirmed and see quite to my joy one of my best academic students getting her hands dirty and planting merigold, milkweeds grown from seed by another one of my students (who almost threw away his senior year because of an impulsive fight), and zinnias and bachelor buttons.



Signing off to go to get energized at Wells and then to water the plants and feed the animals and every other new flora and fauna that is welcomed into the VJ fold.

Letting Lady Go

Another first last week - I took our Shelty to the vet to have her put down. She had been with us for fifteen years, and she was the smartest dog I have ever been around. In the photo it is like she is saying farewell and thank you for a good life.

She had been leaving spots of blood all over the house and the doc had said it was probably bladder cancer last Saturday. He gave her a round of antibiotics just in case. They did not work, and I planned to take her in Thursday after school. The principal wanted me to be at the faculty meeting with the superintendent (where he told us we would probably take a 2000 dollar pay cut next year). Not a good day overall.

I decided to take her the next morning and asked for permission to be a little late for school. It turned out to be okay because Lady and I got to walk together and she had to be awakened with me putting the lease around her neck to go to the vet. All the pictures I got with her were farewell gifts from her.

She rode with me to the vet with her long snout in my lap and could not walk up the concrete steps to the vet so took the hill beside them. When we went in she was a lady as always and did not even whimper when he did a thorough exam. After looking again he said again she either had a bladder tumor or a tumor between her rectum and vagina. When I asked what he would do he would not answer but did not argue when I said my wife and I have made our decision even though the nurse had said I could take her for ultra sound to assure me I had done all I could.

He came in with a shot to relax her before giving her the lethal shot just as he had describe after my inquiry about what he would do. That is the only time she whimpered when he gave her that shot in the gluts. She very soon calmed as I leaned over the table and held her in my arms. Pretty soon I was pouring libations of my tears on her long snout and she was sleeping. When he came in with the final cocktail shot, she did not even stir when he shaved her left forearm for a clear shot into a vein. When he put in the needle and started injecting I think she was gone before he finished.

I came outside after letting him take care of her and found two rocks in the parking lot. I picked up an ugly flat brown one and a beautiful red quartz. I decided to keep both - one for life and one for death, one for mourning and one for joy, one for despair and one for hope, one for grace and one for judgement - the twin tandems that border and embrace the path of life.

I put them by my oasis fountain upon my return to school - punctuated by a stop at the MIll Store in Canton where I purchased two beautiful blue ceramic pots that I had written a grant for to enhance the entrance to the greenhouse and shout out school pride with euryops filling the air with golden blooms. She would like all these things.

Walk now in the light, Lady.

Eight Days

I am not a numerologist or interested in astrology, but I did have eight days of almost pure joy and sunshine during my spring break. I had anticipated it for so long and was more than a little doubtful that this new adventure would live up to my high expectations. As my wise professor once quoted from my Africa adventure thirty plus years ago, "If you have no expectations, you will never be disappointed." I have learned not to mind a little disappointment because I am somehow hardwired to have high expectations of life and of my students.

This trip was one that exceeded my expectations. That makes three (sorry more numbers). The first was what I simply call "17." It was my 4400-mile solo motorcycle trip in the summer of 07. I had always wanted to see the rocky coast of Maine that my hero, Rachel Carson, wrote about. I had read all of her books in college and always wanted to know more about her and see where she wrote her stunningly accurate and engaging books. I was not disappointed. I saw the house where she wrote Silent Spring in Silver Springs, MD. When I walked up the drive two chipmunks greeted me and in the back near her study a deer stared me down with quiet grace until I tried to take a photo. My skin kind of got goose bumps with her presence. I photographed every inch of the outside of her house and grounds to include the window of her bedroom where she was taken from us much to young in 1964. I found out later that when she testified before Congress about her findings in Silent Spring she was battling cancer very stubbornly and gallantly and privately - no one had a clue what she was going through on the inside as she stood fast for the birds and all of life on the outside. In the driving rain - on a motorcycle I might add - I finally got to see the summer home where she penned, Under the Sea Wind, I think, in Maine. The locals at the general store on Southport Island still remember her. On the porch of that house dripping wet, I had to clear my memory card to snap some photos of the terns on that rocky shore. I later kept from punching arrogant New Yorker guests who interrupted the kind clerk and me to preview which room they would pick at Newagen Inn where she also stayed and where down the lane her ashes were scattered on the waters by the rocky shore. They were two other fine ladies I got to visit also to include one of my dear college friends and her husband in Plattsburg, NY. I also got to cross Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont in one day and ferry ride across Lake Champlain to have a 30-year overdue reunion. So that was 17 in a brief.

Then there was "10." I had been accepted for an Earthwatch mission to Arizona to collect caterpillars. I had decided not to go since we were moving and since I would have to miss three days of professional development and the first two days of school. It only took the first five minutes of a required three-day summer academy to convince me of one thing - GO! This blog started with those ten days. That experience inspired me to write an NSTA Toyota Tapestry Grant, which I received officially at an NSTA reception at the Philadelphia Convention on the eight days of wonder trip.

Now for the eight days. Day One: Boston. My buddy, Rob, delivered me to the airport.



(Not Hugh Grant's brother)

I was off to Dallas, yes, and then Boston. My Earthwatch friend, Jen Wren, and her friend,


Jen Wren and Holly

greeted me and we had dinner at the oldest restaurant in America, serving since 1836, the Union Oyster House. Day Two: The next morning I visited North Bennett School in Boston where my son may attend in the fall for piano tuning and repair. Then I took a six-hour train ride on a beautiful day with breathtaking views along the way to include the shore at New Holland, CT. I also met a delightful four year old

and her new friend from South Africa who was reading to her in the diner car.

Days Three to Five and a half were spent in Philly at the Convention and around town. I got to have a fabulous reunion with Earthwatch buddies Sassy and Designer Girl,

I had a marvelous behind the scenes tour at the American Museum of Natural History. I got to meet lots of new folks:



(I walked fourteen blocks out of the way to the wrong Sheraton - Rachel gave me water and understanding - Steven let me borrow his subway pass to go back and get my cellphone that I had dropped and "lost" there but kept by the railway guy when i called my phone.)



(This is what my knew chef at the hotel friend did when I said our president needs our help - the democrats and republicans just need to grown up and feel the love. Notice his hat.)

I saw lots of exhibits in the exhibit hall to include getting home delivery of the times and a "free" NYTimes blanket for my wife. Free Giordelli chocolates on the street corner




(From these coeds)




(After sharing my favorite chocolate moment on video and getting ten more chocolates, I met this guy who also has a March 21st birthday and is almost as young as I.)

Two Philly steak sandwiches at the Sports Bar since they put the wrong cheese on the first one, A nano technology workshop that has probably led to an all expenses paid one week summer institute in Amherst, MA where one of my astronomer mentors has designed a circle of the sun on the quad that I heard on the 365 days of astronomy pod cast in 2009 and which one of the labs Mr. Hamblin, the math genius teacher across the hall, and I tried together with my physics class on Friday.



Part of the Nanotechnology Lab. I am counting the number of drops in a 50:1 alcohol to oleic acid solution so we can measure the height of a one molecule of oleic acid skipping across the water and forming a perfect circle with its mates.

Video of circle dance from one drop of solution

Whew. I also attended a reception for all Tapestry Grant winners, did Bikram Yoga for 90 minutes in 105 degrees, met a gifted teacher from Alabama, and journeyed to New Jersey as my sister queried, on purpose.


The other half of Day Five and Day Six were spent in Millville, New Jersey.



On a hike we stopped by the lake (sunset pictured above) - Designer Girl, Sassy, and Nat Jat.

We had pizza on the lake at sunset with Designer Girl's husband, Rich the Judge, and Sassy and Nat Jat who joined us from PA where she is hopefully the director of a YMCA camp now. On the next morning, my birthday, and the seventh day without a cloud in the sky, I was taken at my request to the beach at Ocean City. Ah, the wonders of this world. And a lunch I had a wonderful chicken salad with my favorite ice cream milkshake - Breyers Cherry Vanilla - and with friends. Does it get any better?


Without knowing this my three friends gave me a quote that has been in my classroom for 15 years from one of my heroes, Albert, "Imagination is more important than knowledge."


The last hour MST of Day Six and Days Seven and part of Eight were spent in Albuquerque, NM where I joined my wife who received the Foundation Fellows award with 31 other excellent piano teachers from across the country to include Nelita True whom Donna and her students and I heard in recital at Millsaps last fall, pretty good company, at the annual Music Teachers National Association Banquet. That day we toured old town and saw a beautiful church that has having worship since 1704 or something and lunch where I had the best tamale I have ever eaten at Church Street Cafe. I also met the Rattlesnake museum proprietor who left teaching to do something not so dangerous - collect live rattlesnakes.


In front of the church.

Day Eight my friend picked me up right on time at the airport and treated me to coffee and conversation as he and his wife graciously listened to my adventures (and received a few little happies from my trip).

Now that is exceeded expectations. Life is good.


P.S.


Driving toward my next adventure - notice I am not texting and have both hands on the wheel.

Letting the light shine

Kenya Davis, Ferderica Cobb and Jon Luckett

I know I have been doing this awhile and yesterday was a big clue. The younger teachers were beside themselves anticipating spring break and the kids were ready and the young principal thought he had it in the bag when the opening bell sounded.

For me it was another day to enjoy and savor – seriously. A few weeks ago I got a profound sense of my finitude – not anything particular happened – I did my usual morning reading and meditations and journals, I did my usual school preparation, I did my usual greeting of the classroom animals and checking of the greenhouse plants. I did my baking of two dozen big cookies for sale to finance ZOO 122 and greenhouse. Then sometime on the way home from school – it was like the road to Damascus or something. A very strong sense of my own finitude and limited time here came over me. A very strong sense of how much I needed to continue to share the wonders of this world with others and to share the light and not hold any in reserve also came over me.

I have been doing just that. I ordered some little pots with seeds and planting peat pods and seed packs the other day. There is a different color pot and different seed for each month. Instead of lining them up along my window just for me – I decided to start giving them away. It has been a huge treat for me. Sometime I may share the details.

In the midst of all this, I have found a new friend of the classroom, Elaine Towner, and she has introduced me to two 4H people who will help me get the teaching resources I need for Zoo 122 and Greenhouse.



On Wednesday she drove three of my students, Kenya Davis and me to the University of Mississippi for the annual Junior Science and Humanities Symposium (a 6:00 am departure). It was my first time in six years to go, and I was delighted to see the quality of student presentations are still extremely high. Eight research papers are selected from across the state and the students present them to a panel of four judges and their peers, teachers and parents. We have hope for our students presenting in the future. As a mandatory part of the trip I took them to Square Books and they were very impressed as was I.

See if you can find one of Faulkner's famous references

Tuesday I will be leaving for the National Science Teachers Convention in Philadelphia and enjoy a reception for the Toyota Tapestry Grant winners, lots of great food and sights and workshops and a reunion with three of my Earthwatch buddies. Sunday, my birthday, I will leave for Albuquerque to see my wife get a national award at the National Music Teachers Association convention. A week from Wednesday I will have a whole lot more light (and photos) to share.

In the bleak midwinter

Just as the purple pansy pokes up from the snow in the planter by the greenhouse in the midst of the gray, dreary skies, I got great news via email last week. Yes, as the song goes in the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan, earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone, snow had fallen . . . That is pretty much how it goes many days at VJ. Everyone who cares about learning and kids knows all the unnecessary hard as iron obstacles to growth placed in our way by life circumstances and sometimes well meaning leaders. It is in this setting that good news came which makes it great news. I received the Toyota Tapestry grant to collect caterpillars all across Madison County, and my students will be leaders and mentors for other students in those other, oft mentioned, oft awarded schools.

Toyota Tapestry Grant

And as if that was not enough, I got a call on the intercom to see a parent first thing Thursday morning. I thought the worse and wondered who wanted to discuss what I had done to their poor child. I was wrong - in the bleak midwinter, I met an enthusiastic parent who brought her daughter's supplies for our Haiti relief effort. She was gone from school on a field trip and told her mother, "You make sure you get these to Mr. Banks." I was stunned. I had fussed at my classes not because they had not or could not bring anything to help our sisters and brothers to the south who are still living in tents. I had fussed at them because they said they would and did not. As if that were not enough the parent came to my room and got the full tour of the plants and animals and was as enthusiastic as I and said, "You make a list of everything you need and do not hold back, and we will make sure you get it next year through 4H and the PTA." An angel just showed up at my room in the bleak midwinter and hope continues. Further she helped fill out all the paperwork so that her daughter (pictured with the largest tomato on the right) could participate in the regional science fair and even enlisted her VJ graduate daughter to help.

Despite my best efforts to pack it in, I keep getting called back to the greatest opportunity (not the easiest or most lucrative) to help get kids excited about and keep learning for a lifetime about the wonders of this world. Yes, even in the bleak midwinter it is still teaching.

P.S. The telescope is ready for night viewing and a solar filter is ordered for day viewing.

Life after death

First row: Shiquita Watkins, Alicia Martinez, Kiera Draine, Arshunti Perry
Second row: Tevin Grayson, Mr. B., Alexander Pan (exchange student from Austria),
Jonathan Luckett
Full album
The cosmic forces have forgiven me, perhaps. Maybe Sister III's soul was not severed with body. Three events seem to confirm these hypotheses. Or to say it another way, three signs of light come forth after the sad snake situation.

First, I emailed the director of Rainwater Observatory at French Camp, Jim Hill, to see if he would come by and make a recommendation for a possible telescope location at our remote site. He graciously agreed and came by and looked over our grounds and gave a recommendation. Jim Hill is one of the most knowledgeable and gracious people I know about astronomy and life. He like I is all for convenience and the best location is about thirty meters from the greenhouse door. He gave a great compliment to my very introductory biology class(one of three where they put kids not ready to take Biology or the all important state test) that he was escorted into 20 minutes before the bell by the assistant principal, "Is this an AP Biology class?" I guess I will quit calling them boneheads.

In this ultra frugal business of education you never hesitate to ask. He had mentioned grants in his very informative free newsletter (check out www.rainwaterobservatory.org). I boldy asked if with his grants there was anyway he could get us a telescope. After a thoughtful pause, he said they had an eight inch Cassegrain that they were not using and we could use it.
Call it a gift, a loan or whatever - VJ is getting a telescope. As I told Dr. Robinson, the assistant principal, "we are going to have it going on out here." Our principal said we would have to get a picture of that and signed off on a PO for a solar filter and battery pack to get it up and running for both nighttime and daytime viewing. He also gave me permission to go pick it up on the afternoon of our next staff development day, February 15. Go, Mr. Mumford.

Second, one of my introductory biology students came in one day to class (to say she has issues would be great understatement) and was looking at one of the contest posters I have had on my wall since August. One caught her eye and I said why don't you do a research project. To my great surprise she was very interested. One thing led to another and she saved the application form to a jump drive during class, read a preliminary experiment from a Strive to Thrive Lab manual I had gotten a grant for and is planning a workshop for science club members and their parents to carry out her research. Pinch me - am I dreaming or awake?

Third, I finally summoned up enough courage to take some of our students to the Mississippi Mathematics and Science Competition at Mississippi College (in another lifetime and school, I took kids there for ten years and we did quite well). I wanted to go last year but there were just too many obstacles - personally and professionally. I have kicked myself all year for not giving my top physics student who had a 32 on the ACT and is a freshman at Harvard an opportunity to compete last year. I promised myself not to do that again. I kept my promise this year and seven of our students participated (two backed out at the last minute). Four participated in the team competition


VJ Team2010

that is still low tech with questions on an overhead projector and with answers wtitten on pieces of paper. Only the captain is able to raise his or her hand with the answer. Spotters determine who was first, second or third up. We left at 8:30 (thirty minutes late) but still got there in time to take the test and got back at 5:40 in the evening of a Friday - it is not an easy road. (I did get to share my MIC project with the bus driver who has three daughters, and she was interested). And the students watched both the team finals and the awards ceremony with interest. None of them made the stage, but I remind myself and them you have to start somewhere. My first year as cross country coach we only had three runners (five are needed for a team) for our first race. Three years later we won fourth in the state. The same was true for academic competitions in my career.



Blast to the past

Indeed life goes on and hope resides at VJ.