Now that we’ve rounded the bend into August, it’s starting to feel like those leisurely summer days are waning. I don’t know about you, but it makes me more determined than ever to make the most of the weeks I have left!
Here are some of my best tips for doing summer right.
Travel
I am a true homebody at heart. I’ve worked pretty hard to make my home a place that I love and it can take some serious prodding to get me to leave it.
But every time I do I remember how revitalizing and nurturing travel can be. There is nothing like exploring a new place to remind you that you are a citizen of the world. There are so many people out there, with different perspectives and interesting lives. We need to take the time to remember this!
And considering our place in a global context is a really important perspective for teachers to have! The last thing we want is for our students to think of us as fuddy-duddy school marms who don’t understand the modern world.
Outside
I highly recommend spending as much time out in nature as possible in the summer (says the teacher who is currently sitting inside at her computer — ahem!)
I remember learning about the importance about nature in my teacher training, and I confess I didn’t really get it. (How’s that for some Waldorf teacher blasphemy?!). I mean, I grew up in the city. Wild nature was a rarity in my experience and most of the plants I saw around me had been planted there by humans.
But if I really think about it, it is experiences of wild nature that have led to the most moments of true wonder in my life. You know wonder — those moments that take your breath away and create an opening for new discoveries and perspectives? Those are the moments that we are constantly trying to bring to our students. How can we hope to create them if we don’t experience them ourselves?
When I try to think about the moments of wonder I’ve experienced, many of them were in nature.
- the rich sensory experience of salty sea spray (licking my lips while my hair gets blown everywhere)
- gazing at the azure blue of Crater Lake on my recent trip
- the moment when rain turned to snow while I was hiking in the Cascades
- swimming in a cool mountain lake (and then basking in the sun afterwards)
Oh gosh, can I even bear to finish writing this post? I want to hop in the car right now!
Reading
Reading expands our horizons in a completely different way. We can’t explore the entire world every summer, and we certainly can’t explore it from another person’s perspective. This is why books make up such an important part of the summer experience.
A good book can create entire worlds in your imagination, causing you to view your own world in completely new ways. When we get lost in a book, we gain new perspectives that can shed new light on our own circumstances.
And looking at our reading from a more analytical perspective, we can better understand how WE can activate the imaginations of our students. What are the tricks and techniques that writers use to help you create images in your imagination? That’s what we’re trying to do with our students, after all.
Home
And, of course, in the middle of all of this exploration, we need to recognize, appreciate and care for home. During a typical school year, the house gets neglected. We spend full days in our classrooms and a lot of our space-tending energy goes towards that room. We might be lucky to get a couple hours of home maintenance in on a Saturday morning.
So make sure you set aside time to do some practical home care in the summer. I know that in the summer I often even look forward to cleaning out the shed and sorting through my closet.
Give your home the attention it deserves this summer and enjoy the experience of spending quality time in a soothing environment.
What are some of the ways you make the most of your summer? Share in the comments.
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