Little Things

 "It's the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen"

-John Wooden

There is no doubt about it: I'm a big picture guy. I love talking about big ideas and dreaming about what the future could look like. It fires me up. Where I struggle is in the minutia of getting there. I am not, by nature, a super detail-oriented person in most situations. When I am in a situation that requires a hyper-focus on details, it is something that I have to really focus on doing because it does not come naturally to me. I wish this were not the case because I whole-heartedly believe in what John Wooden is saying in the quote above. I truly believe that the only way to accomplish the big picture stuff is to get the details right.

I have a big picture idea of the kind of culture I would like to see take hold here at Sullivan Middle School. I want a school where teachers and students enjoy working together, where respect is the norm, and everyone truly loves walking through our doors. I think we are seeing a lot of that this year, but over the last week, I've been really focusing on details. While we have very few students who are overtly disrespectful to staff (yelling, arguing, rolling eyes, etc.), I see dozens upon dozens of passive disrespects every day, and those are the details that we have to address in order to get to that big picture idea. Here are some examples:

1. Most mornings, Mr. Walk and I stand in the middle of the breezeway reminding students to walk on the right hand side of the hallway so that traffic can flow in the other direction as well, and every morning, I watch students move to the right just long enough to get past us and then spread back out to take up the entire width of the hallway. They don't roll their eyes or argue, but their actions clearly aren't respectful of the direction we are giving them nor are they respectful of the students and staff attempting to go in the opposite direction.

2. When we dismiss students from lunch in the Commons, we routinely have significant amounts of garbage discarded on the ground and left on tables. Students know the expectation is to clean up after themselves, and when this expectation is given, they do not stand up and yell that they won't do it, but they do not do it all the same. It isn't overt disrespect, but dropping cups, wrappers, and milk cartons on the ground and leaving them there for someone else to clean up is disrespectful toward the person giving the expectation to throw away their own trash, and it is disrespectful to the person who ends up cleaning it up after they leave.

3. When students are in the hallway during classes, they know the expectation is to walk quietly. When they are reminded of this expectation, they do not argue or behave in anyway overtly disrespectful, but they do continue to talk, which is disrespectful to the person who has to constantly remind them of the expectation and disrespectful to the students distracted by the noise they are making in the hallways outside the classroom.

The list of micro-disrespects could go on, and I am sure many of you are reading this and recalling situations that arise in your classrooms daily in which a student is not grossly disrespectful, but is nonetheless showing a disregard for what is expected. In the past, I feel like these conversations turn to more ways in which we can make expectations clear, but I believe that is missing the mark. The expectations are widely known. Our students all aced an expectations quiz in the second week of school. I also don't think the solution is to just nail students with consequences for every minor infraction, every word uttered in the hallway, every mask redirect. That only creates an atmosphere of contention and resentment.

I believe that the answer is in really digging deep into the idea of respect because I don't believe that our students view these actions as disrespectful. Their understanding of respect, in most cases, is not fully formed or refined. For many of them, they view avoiding gross disrespect as showing respect. They don't understand the nuance of non-verbal behavior, that moving back to the left of the hallway after passing the superintendent is not practically different than saying "whatever", rolling their eyes and moving to the left. The verbal retort and eye roll certainly raise the stakes, but in both situations, the expectation is disregarded, which is the heart of the matter. Really, insert that into any expectation being ignored. Dozens of times per day, we give students directions that they ignore, but so often, they ignore it quietly and without fuss. If we throw in an eye roll and a "whatever", it gets our attention, but the passive disregard for expectations does just as much to sow a culture of non-compliance. 

I don't believe that the vast majority of students understand the disrespect inherent in these small actions, nor to I think they have ill-intent; therefore, repeating expectations and leveling consequences will not solve the problem. We will be covering the concept of respect in Tribe Time in a week or two, so we will have the chance to start that conversation, but I believe it is incumbent upon all of us to make that concept a focal point of our conversations with students going forward. When I look at our TRIBE acronym, it is hard for me to discount the notion that respect is really the key to all of it. We only feel the need to be trustworthy as an outgrowth of our respect for the truth and for others. We only feel the need to improve ourselves if we possess enough self-respect to do so. We only have the personal courage to pursue integrity if we respect the idea of right and wrong. We are only going to engage in the activities and institutions for which we have respect.

We are off to a great start, but like so many things, we can plateau without reaching our ultimate goal if we do not keep pushing in and looking for those small things in which to improve. 

Bonus: Send me an email with your ideas on this topic. The first three staff members to respond will receive a Tribe Token, good for one free beverage from the Coke machine in the SMS lobby.