Illustration by Inga Moore from The Secret Garden
Recent Reflections
I will be taking on two sections of writing in the coming year—the 5th and 6th grade classes. Although this change does involve saying goodbye to 3rd grade literature (actually heartbreaking), I am elated at the opportunity to teach writing, and to teach older students.
On the first day of literature class, poetry is an exciting preview of what is to come. On the last day, it is a perfect bow to tie on the experiences we have shared.
It does not take a gifted child to read and enjoy Shakespeare. Like most things in life that are worth having, enjoyment of Shakespeare is attainable for anybody who is willing to put in the work.
Lost on a Mountain in Maine is the narrator’s true account of when he was lost on Mt. Katahdin in Maine for nine days. And, more than any of the episodes he recounts, the thing everyone remembers most is Donn’s character.
I was recently given the opportunity to guide my 3rd grade homeroom class through the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California on a field trip.
I adore revisiting the stories that always have something new to offer, even after reading them as many times as I have. Just when I think I have reached peak enjoyment of a novel with a particular class, the following year’s group always shows me something else that can be understood from a close reading of the same old, beautiful words.
Robert Frost is the greatest poet of the 20th century. While there are several other contenders, Frost’s work rises to the top. Balancing expert use of form with a masterful command over the English language, all of Frost’s art is suffused with the tender tone of a sensitive heart.
This “word dump” allowed my students to just get all of their thoughts out and be okay with organizing them later.
After the crazy fun of Halloween, the month of November feels like a happy, cozy, cold month, and I like to lean into that feeling in my classes.
By encouraging this personal connection, we bring the values of some of literature’s most admirable heroes right home to the hearts of our students, and it makes them stronger.
What goes unnoticed at many other schools, and in a lot of discussions about education, is the boundless value children gain on a spiritual level when they read great literature. You cannot quantify this value—but you can see it in their eyes when they light up over a book they're reading.
Without hesitation, Karana jumps off the ship as it leaves, despite the hands of everyone she knows trying to hold her back. Knowing full well what it could mean for her own survival, she returns to the island to protect her brother—to stay with him until the ship returns.
The beginning of the new school year always comes with a trillion and one things to be excited about. But for now, these are the things sitting in the front seat of my mind as we head into the 2025-26 school year (tomorrow!).
Earnest readers of the trilogy fall in love with a massive, complicated, gorgeous world, and then watch helplessly as it reels toward destruction.
I’ve gone through our shelves at home and pulled out some of my kids’ favorite books to share with you.
Abel’s Island by William Steig is about a mouse who gets blown across the countryside by an insolent storm, and ends up on an island in the middle of a swift stream where he is marooned for a year.
“White Fang is not a puppy anymore,” I said to my class. “He is very much set in his ways. What could possibly be strong enough to change him?”
“Love,” said my students.
“So often, I struggle when grading assignments because I come across answers that are not wrong, but could be a heck of a lot more right.”
“Well, my friends, I am on strike against myself. I am at war against my worries. I am picketing my peccadillos.”
Just like my career was born from my resentment of my own education, so was “Pressed Rose Classics” born out of my resentment for cheap re-prints of beautiful works. Now, I am self-(re)publishing beautiful classics in affordable, pleasant-to-read paperback form.
My students as young as 4th grade are now giddy over Shakespeare. So, I thought I would share some Shakespearean moments from class with you.
Some short stories from the classroom about how literature brings joy in many and varied ways.
The Poetry Periodical
“It is possible to be struck by a meteor
or a single-engine plane
while reading in a chair at home.”
The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me,
And I cannot, cannot go.
I was angry with my friend;
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.
Before man came to blow it right
The wind once blew itself untaught,
And did its loudest day and night
In any rough place where it caught.
As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
High, high in the branches
the seawinds plunge and roar.
A storm is moving westward,
but here on the forest floor
the ferns have captured stillness.
A green sea growth they are.
While I’m on leave from teaching, I thought it might be fun to share a more personal post here: the poems that my four-year-old son loves most, and even requests as part of bedtime story reading. If you have little ones, you might enjoy sharing some or all of these with them, too.
Oh, the wild joy of living; the leaping from rock to rock,
The strong rending of boughs from the fir-trees, the cool
silver shock
Of the plunge in the pool’s living water, the hunt of the bear,
And the sultriness showing the lion is couch’d in his lair.
I spent the class period sharing with them three aspects of poetry that make it special, different from other forms of literature, and necessary to the human soul.
In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,
My daughter is writing a story.
Hope is the thing with feathers—
That perches in the soul—
And sings the tune without the words—
And never stops—at all—
Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide
The gray sea and the long black land;
And the yellow half-moon large and low;
And the startled little waves that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep…
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
I have a passionate love of poetry, and I get to share it with my students all the time, but I also want to share it with you. Sign up for my mailing list so you can receive beautiful poems in your email inbox.
Pressed Rose Classics
Grace Steele & Tending Roses
My name is Grace, and I think of myself as a metaphorical gardener. I try to sow seeds of beauty wherever I go, so that I might prevent weeds from growing there. As Frances Hodgson Burnett says in The Secret Garden, “Where you tend a rose, my lad, a thistle may not grow.” My favorite way to tend roses is through sharing literature, and especially poetry. Here on Tending Roses, I hope to share beauty with you.
I am a teacher at a small private school in California. That is where I like to do a lot of gardening, in the figurative sense. I have the best husband in the world and three beautiful children. In my spare time, I love to spend time with my family, read, write, take care of our exotic pets, and make crafts.
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Glittering Caves is a treasure trove of insight to anybody who is curious about The Lord of the Rings.