Oh, What a Difference a Letter Makes!

This writing business is not as easy as it looks. For example, I asked my six year old son, a first grader, why he thought he got a C on last week's spelling test when he got A's on the two previous tests. He answered quickly and confidently, "These words had more letters!" Sure enough, the little man was right. On the last two spelling tests, most of the words were three letter words. On the most recent test, most were four letter words (the good kind, not the bad kind). That's a 25% increase in difficulty. One letter sure can make a difference.

That got me thinking about other situations in which one letter changed everything.

I worked with a grant writer once who missed something critical in the proofreading process and sent out a grant with this in the first line of the narrative (name changed to protect the angry client): "XYZ Pubic School District....". My guess is that he would have given just about anything for a strategically placed "L."

When I was a freshman in college I was helping my mother and stepfather move to a different house. My task was to pack up the kitchen and clearly label the boxes with the word "kitchen" and a brief description of the contents of each box. Easy enough. I completed my task as assigned and the boxes were all moved. The next day, at the new house, we were unpacking and I heard my stepfather laugh loudly and exclaim, "What the heck (he didn't say 'heck' but this is a PG blog) is in this box?"

My mother and I hurried into the kitchen to see him standing there with a box that said "kitchen" on one side and "bowels" on the other.

Breakfast was never the same again.

See? One letter can make a big difference.


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Read more A Writer's Journey.


Other posts that may interest you:


An Open Letter to Teachers

If You Can Read This, Be Grateful - Literacy is Not Universal

A Life in 140 Words or Less

My Email In-Box

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For thoughts and tips on grant writing, try The Grant Goddess Speaks.

An Open Letter to Teachers

Parent-teacher conferences for the first term are approaching. The whole concept of official parent – teacher conferences is a strange one to me. A very short block of time (usually 20 min. or so) is set aside to talk about my child's progress. To be more accurate, the time has been set aside for the teacher to talk to me (or at me, depending on your perspective) about my child's progress in the classroom. There is not time for many questions or for any real discussion, and there definitely isn't time for the parent to provide much feedback to the teacher on the parent perspective of the effectiveness of the teacher's strategies.

Like most parents, I will show up for my parent – teacher conference at the assigned time, sit in the tiny chair, listen to the teacher explain the marks on the report card, maybe ask a question or two, and then be on my way.

Here are some things that will be left unsaid during my conference (and probably most parents – teacher conferences):

1. My child is the most important person in my world. He is bright, funny, energetic, intuitive, and joyful. If you could see him how I see him, you would take a completely different approach to his education. Rather than checking off the standards that he has mastered and providing "intervention services" for the standards that he has not yet mastered, you would focus on his amazing strengths.
2. The most important thing to be nurtured in a child in the primary grades is a love for learning, not a checklist of standards. I am not at all against the teaching of discrete skills, but if it kills a child's love for learning, far more damage than good has taken place.
3. When you say negative things about my child, please remember that you are talking about the love of my life.
4. Please understand when I place more priority on family time than homework. The few hours I have in the evening each night with my child are precious. Giving up an hour or two of that time for homework that means very little to me and even less my child just doesn't make sense for our family. Besides, the research in the field is pretty clear on the fact that homework at the elementary level (grades kindergarten through six) has very little, if any, connection to academic achievement. Prioritizing family time over homework does not mean that I don't respect you or education. It just means that I have a bigger picture in mind for my child. Every day matters. Please don't punish my child for that.
5. Please don't find fault with me for continuing to bring the conversation back to my child and my child's needs. I fully understand that you have 30 students in the classroom and that juggling resources and schedules to address all of their needs is a monumental task, but it is my job to stay focused on my child. I hear lots of criticism about parents who are not involved in their children's education. Please don't find fault with me because I am involved.
6. Please be aware that I feel like I'm walking a tightrope between caring very much about my son's academic progress compared with other children and caring only about my son's progress compared with his own potential. At any given moment, either might be in the forefront of my mind.
7. If you have an issue or a concern about my son, please call or email me immediately.  Finding out about a problem weeks later is frustrating. Hearing about it from another parent in the community because they overheard you expressing your frustration to another teacher is intolerable. I want to hear from you.  I want open communication.  I know you're busy.  So am I.  But this is important.  We have to find a way to communicate.
8. If you need my help with something in particular, or if you think I should be working with my son on a particular skill or concept, please let me know.
9. I know the academic skills are very important, but most of the things I worry about for my son have nothing to do with academics - and that doesn't mean I don't care about academics.  I worry about his health, his safety, how he gets along with other children, his spiritual development, his character, and a million other things. How those issues intersect with his time at school (about 25%-30% of his life) really matters to me.
10. Please spend more time in your interactions with my son in building him up and encouraging him, rather than criticizing and finding fault. The world will start picking away at his self-confidence soon enough.  Please help me build it up for him.  Help me to help him see what a remarkable human being he is.
11. I don't know how many other parents understand this, but I fully understand that my child's education is my responsibility - not the school's, not yours. 

I hope that one of the most important things to be said at the parent-teacher conference will not be left unsaid:

Thank you!  

Thank you for devoting your career to children.  Thank you for taking the time to get to know my child and his needs.  Thank you for the hours you spend beyond your contracted hours to prepare materials, communicate with me by email, and participate in training so you can improve your teaching skills on an ongoing basis. Thank you for hugging my son when he falls down, for encouraging him when he thinks he can't succeed at something, for helping him learn how to resolve disputes with other children.  Thank you for making your classroom a physically and emotionally safe place so I have peace of mind when I drop my son off at school every day. Thank you for caring.

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Do the Unexpected - Be a Running Cow

Several years ago, I was driving home from visiting a client in a rural area and I noticed a cow running through a field, playing with her calves. It was a completely unexpected sight. Seriously, how often do you see fully grown cows running in a field?

I did a little online research on the subject and learned that while cows can run, they usually don't run unless they are stressed (being chased, etc.). Yet what I saw was definitely not a stressed cow. It was most definitely a happy cow (and yes, this happy cow was a California cow). Here's a video of cows running for pleasure (well, at least that's what the folks filming it in the truck say it is - pleasure), so I know it's not unheard of for cows to run for fun, but I can definitely say that it was an unexpected sight for me. It was such an unexpected sight that I pulled over to watch for a while.

Of course, watching that happy running cow got me thinking. Clearly that cow didn't know that she wasn't supposed to run and that we all just expect her to hang around and graze until it's time to go back to the barn. But she ran anyway, not because she had to, but because she wanted to. And I'm pretty sure she didn't care that I stopped to watch or what I was thinking about her running.

When was the last time you stepped out of your comfort zone and did something unexpected just because you wanted to? I think we tend to get so caught up in what we are expected to do and how people will react if we do something unexpected that we miss out on many of life's great experiences. Just as some of the most beautiful areas of the forest are off the beaten path, much of life's beauty is found in the unexpected, and we can only see it if we step out of our everyday routine and thought patterns of what we are expected to do.

This reminds me of Robert Frost's poem, The Road Not Taken:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


So, promise yourself that sometime today you're going to do something unexpected that brings you pleasure.

Take the road less traveled.

Be a running cow.

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For thoughts on grant writing and grant writing tips, visit The Grant Goddess Speaks....

Surrounded by Writers

Writing is generally a very solitary act.  Not that all writers are loners, but when you are writing, the interaction is generally between you and the computer.  I try to think about potential readers as I write, but the conversation is in my head before it comes out on the screen.

So, here I am in Las Vegas at the Blog World and New Media Expo, and I am surrounded by writers. For the first time in quite a while, I feel connected to a community of writers.  Wow! It's quite a feeling.

There is a huge mass of folks here who write blogs about how to make money online, but there are also hundreds of other niches represented here. In the last two days, I have met people who write about fitness, aging, retirement, home repair, personal development, time management online gaming, faith, weight loss, and more. I haven't met any other grant writers yet, but there is still time.  Who knows?

I have collected a thick pile of business cards and I have handed out just as many. I have talks to writers from all over the United States as well as a few from the U.K., Australia, and India. We have all stepped out of our isolation to come together to share lessons, ideas, and resources.

In about 24 hours, though, this community of writers will separate.  People will board planes for destinations all over the world. By Monday, we'll be back in front of our computers again, writing alone.

But we'll still be connected.  It's a virtual connection that we'll use to share ideas, encouragement, and resources until it's time to get together again next year.

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Read more A Writer's Journey.

Follow me on Twitter!

Other posts you may like:

If You Can read This, Be Grateful -- Literacy is Not Universal

Dealing with Change

Writing about Regrets

My Secret Late Night Pleasure

A Life in 140 Words or Less

If You Can Read This, Be Grateful - Literacy is Not Universal

If you can read, it probably seems like everyone can, and it seems like literacy is no big deal.  In reality, it is a very big deal.  One in seven U.S. adults can't read.  Let that sink in for a moment. That's about 14%.  In a group of 100 people, about 14 of them can't read. On a global level, 774 million people are illiterate and two-thirds of those are women.

I'll admit that I have taken literacy for granted. My mother taught me to read when I was 3 or 4 (she says I taught myself, but I'm not sure I believe that), and I can't remember not being able to read. Not only can I read, but I read well (and in more than one language), so I have access to more printed material than I could ever consume. These days, though, I am keenly aware that there are millions of women in this country and abroad who can't read and, as a result, don't have the opportunities that I do. I am now profoundly grateful.

Literacy is not just about economic opportunity.  For many people it is about survival.

Twenty years ago, I was teaching a bilingual (Spanish-English) 4th grade class in southern California. It was that year that I learned how much literacy really matters.  I had a young girl in my class that year named Elena.  Elena was a very bright girl with excellent literacy skills in Spanish. Her command of spoken English, however, was very basic, and our school district had very specific guidelines English reading. One of the criteria was the achievement of conversational fluency in English. As a new teacher, I was following district procedures by not including Elena in my English reading group, but I was working with her intensively on developing her English conversational skills. 

Until my first meeting with her mother in October that year.

Elena's mother met with me to find out why her daughter wasn't learning English reading. I carefully explained the district's transition procedures, and I showed her Elena's assessment results.  Based on her current level of performance, it was likely that Elena would begin transition in 5th grade - next year. I was arrogantly confident that I was on the right track with this student, and that I was doing the right thing.

Then, this articulate and kind mother began explaining her situation to me.  Elena was the oldest of 6 children.  Her father abandoned the family in Mexico two years before, so Elena's mother was a single mother in a new country, living with friends, working as a janitor in an industrial complex.  She spoke almost no English herself.

She was calm as she told most of her story, but her voice cracked as she started describing her other children. The youngest was rather sickly, she explained, and while she had medical insurance through her job, she couldn't read the written instructions provided by the doctor.  Then she started crying as she pulled about 6 prescription bottles from her purse.  She put them on the table and looked up me, speaking very slowly and deliberately.  Elena needed to be able to read English NOW so she could read the instructions on the prescription bottles.

I got it.  For the first time in my life, I really got it.  Literacy (in English) for this family was about survival.  It was about keeping a child alive. I felt ashamed.

I promised her that Elena would be reading in English within a few months (that was definitely a young teacher's arrogant promise). In the short run, I could help her by translating the labels of those prescription bottles into Spanish and taping the translations onto the bottles.  I told her she could bring me anything else she needed translated.  She did.  We became good friends.

The next day I sat down with Elena and we made a plan.  I moved her into my English reading group (secretly, so my principal wouldn't know I was breaking district policy) and I started working with Elena after school using a variety of literacy development approaches. She worked hard and she made excellent progress in both her conversational English and her English literacy skills. We practiced with the things her mother needed her to read - medicine labels, over the counter drug labels, cleaning product labels, the TV Guide (for her younger siblings), notes from teachers of her younger siblings. She was reading by Christmas.

She and her mother were very grateful, and I learned some valuable lessons. I never took my own literacy for granted again, and I never held a student back from learning something they wanted to learn after that. I became a believer in teachable moments, and I took district instructional policies as guidelines, rather than directives (I don't recommend this to all teachers, but it worked for me).

My first administrative job was as director of a family literacy program.

Literacy matters.

If you can read this, you should be very grateful because millions of people can't.

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Read more A Writer's Journey.

Dealing with Change

"The world never stands still. It is a constant becoming. The face of the earth – as well as the face you see in the mirror – offers clear evidence that all is flux and change…" – Robert Collier

I know that the world is always changing. I am always changing. You are always changing. There is really no such thing as a static or non-changing state of living. Even so, sometimes the changes come so fast that they leave us reeling, grasping for stability, reaching for the familiar.

I grew up in a home where chaos and unexpected change were the norm. While psychologists would say that the home I grew up in was dysfunctional, it prepared me very well for facing times of rapid change. When I was a little girl, one of the few constants in my life was you wouldn't know what would happen at home on any given day. The unexpected was the norm.

So it shouldn't surprise me that in this time of economic tribulation and rapid change, I find a strange bit of familiarity in rolling with unexpected changes. What I learned from it as a child is that "this too shall pass," the sun will rise tomorrow regardless of what has happened today, and life goes on. I also learned that the harder I struggle against the change – the harder I fight it – the more pain I cause myself. On the other hand, the more I accept the change, the easier it is to adapt quickly and the more I am able to enjoy the unexpected upsides of even the most seemingly negative situations.

My mother taught me that my happiness rests squarely on my own shoulders and how I choose to view the world, the people around me, and the changes that happened in my life. I can waste time fighting the change or blaming somebody else for causing the change, or I can dust myself off, enjoy the new view and re-chart my course. For the most part, I choose the latter response - Not because I have no choice, but precisely because I do have a choice. I choose to be happy.

What's your choice?

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Writing about Regrets

I came across a blog recently called My Biggest Regret Ever. Folks anonymously send in a brief description of their biggest regrets and the blogger posts them. Some of the regrets posted are simple, but most are deeply touching.  Many are heartbreaking, particularly because most of the respondents are young people.


Here are a few  recent posts:

"My biggest regret ever is pretending to be happy.  Every day I try to please people and act happy with my life.  Truth is, I’m not.  I hide behind my shyness and I regret it every day."[Female, 15]

"My biggest regret ever is living most of my childhood life filled with lies and frustration.  It took me more than 3 years to build the courage to confront my parents to tell them that I’ve been sexually abused since the age of 5 by my uncle. Honesty, I feel so relieved that I’ve gotten to talk to my parents about it, although I did tell my mom when I was drunk =/.  I still feel happy that my family loves me for who I am and that I’ve made my family more aware of what is happening in my life. Advice to everyone out there that experiences the same issue, please think about all the people that care for you and that you’re not alone." [Female, 17]

"My Biggest Regret ever is letting a boy finger me while I was in church.  I didn’t think it through and now I just feel God and my grandparents have no respect for me.  I have no respect for myself for doing something like that.  I can’t even stand walking into church anymore." [Female, 16]

"My biggest regret ever is being afraid of commitment my entire life.  I’m nearly 35, and there are few people in this world that I’ve ever felt close to.  I am letting life, and the best things it has to offer, pass me by." [Female, 34]

"My biggest regret ever is trusting you.  I trusted you and you betrayed me.  You made me feel special, but how many “special bonds” do you have?  Seriously, you are nothing but a pathetic man who’s just scared of being alone.  A cliché, that’s what you are."[Female, 18]

Each one that I read made me stop and think, and wish I could reach out to the person posting it. I hope they found a small measure of comfort in putting their secret regrets in writing, even if anonymously.

I try to live my life in such a way as to have no regrets, but I don't know if it's possible. People make mistakes.  People make choices.  Sometimes we make choices that we wish we could make again, but you can't turn back time.  All you can do is go forward from where you are and try to live fully and well.

Sure, I have some regrets. Some I can share publicly and some I can't. Some of those events have led to changes in my life that have turned out to be wonderful blessings, so I can't really regret them anymore.  It's funny how life can be like that, isn't it? Most of what we experience is temporary. Holding onto regrets just makes them last; it gives them a life far beyond what they deserve.

I prefer to try to hold onto my happy moments - the joy - more than the regrets.

If writing about your regrets anonymously helps you let go of them, by all means, write away. But then talk to someone. Learn that you are not alone.

Then let go.

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