Divided attention

This Monday was a tough day at school.  We are nearing the end of the semester and I had several frustrating conversations with students about grades (one student cried when she discovered she “only” had an A). I felt disappointed in my students for approaching the class in such a transactional way, but worse, I was disappointed in myself for not responding with less agitation and more calm.  I came home feeling grumpy and frazzled, wondering whether for the next class, I should open with a short conversation about reveling in the process of learning, rather than fixating on outcomes.  And then that made me sad, because I felt I must not have been doing a good job of underlining each of my classes with this sentiment.  I started in on preparing dinner as my family members came home, one by one. 

My husband came home first and, like a teenager who just needs a place to dump their unprocessed thoughts, I unloaded the day’s frustrations with him in a torrent of words, hardly allowing him a chance to respond. I felt some of the knottiness in my chest loosen. Next, my daughter arrived, her cheeks still flushed from touch practice, and while she ate her snack at the kitchen island, I chopped an onion.  She talked about her day absently, at the same time flipping through an old comic book that had been left on the counter the previous day. The weight at the bottom of my stomach lightened a little.  Finally, my younger son came home, slamming the front door and going straight for the fridge. After guzzling a large glass of milk, he surveyed the ingredients I had assembled and asked what I was making for dinner, nodding in approval at my answer. I hadn’t realized my shoulders had been hunched until I felt them relax.

At dinner, I shared very generally with my children that I hadn’t had the best day at school.  In response, my son – who, when he was much younger, used to come down to dinner, scan the table for what I’d made and announce, “There’s nothing here I like” – ate voraciously and repeatedly told me how much he was enjoying the food I’d prepared. He asked if I could help him with a project for his Mandarin class after dinner.  Now that he’s 16 and my place in his mind is several rungs below sports and friends, I readily accept any invitation from him. Later, we “worked” on his project, but in fact, he distracted me with silly jokes and anecdotes and funny videos on his feed.  I went to bed that night feeling less occupied by the disappointment I’d felt in myself. 

Every morning, after writing in my journal, I read a few pages of my morning book (different from my bedtime book and different from my daytime books for school). The next morning’s chapter was from playwright, Sarah Ruhl’s Lessons from My Teachers, about “divided attention.”  She writes about how divided attention – as opposed to the undivided attention we often aspire to hold – can be especially helpful when parenting teenagers.  For example, talking to them when you’re driving, so that you’re not holding direct eye contact, or simply being near them and doing something else, not talking at all, because your presence is all they need.  Ruhl teaches playwriting at Yale and writes that divided attention is also a powerful way to connect with students because you maintain privacy and boundaries, while still allowing freedom for their ideas and thoughts to develop.  How astonishing to land on this lesson at exactly the moment I needed it!  But perhaps even more astonishing was that I’d just experienced the magic of divided attention from each of my family members – and especially from my son – the night before. I had shared how I was feeling with him and instead of addressing it head-on, he gave me his divided attention, showering me with praise about last night’s dinner and inviting me to work alongside him, making me feel needed in just the right way.  Sometimes, we are better when our attention is wider, without the heat of laser focus, but with the coolness of a softer, gentler gaze. 

I returned to school feeling lighter. Instead of circling back with students for conversations about not being grade-obsessed, I proceeded with my end-of-semester plan of celebrating student writing by sharing a few slides I'd made, compiling the beautiful lines they'd written this year. I'd designed it so that each of their lines appeared in different colored bubbles, like inspirational quotes from unknown writers. One student read her own quote aloud, without remembering she was the one who had written it. A few students started copying down what their peers had written, planning to put it up on their bedroom walls. They stared at the quotes like stargazers looking into the night sky, searching for answers.

I didn't need to remind my students to revel in the process of learning – they remembered it themselves.