Observations from Horton Hatches the Egg

When you become a parent, your perspective changes about many things; what songs are okay to play on the radio, the number of air bags in a vehicle, criteria for choosing a restaurant...even your perspective on children's literature.  For example, I used to think it was funny in Judy Blume's Tales of a 4th Grade Nothing when Fudge swallowed Peter's turtle.  When I recently read it with my seven year old daughter, I was wrought with angst and empathy for that poor mother, imagining what I would do if one of my children swallowed a turtle.  Don't even get me started on Robert Munsch's I Love you Forever!  But, the topic of today's enlightenment is the brilliant Dr. Seuss.  If you haven't had the pleasure of reading his work as an adult, I suggest you do, you'll be better for it!

Last night I was reading my 4 year old daughter Horton Hatches the Egg.  If you don't recall the story, I will summarize:

A lazy bird is sitting on her egg wishing she could be elsewhere enjoying life.  Horton the elephant happens by and the bird convinces him to sit on her egg for a short while as a favour.  Horton agrees to do it.  The bird flies off to Palm Beach and is gone for 50 some days.  Horton keeps his word enduring all kinds of tribulations.  The bird returns just as the egg is hatching and wants the egg for herself.  the baby comes out with a trunk, ears and tail of an elephant and is proclaimed an "elephant bird".

Why is this important?  Well, last week, following the May long weekend, Saskatchewan teachers walked off the job for 2 days.  For parents like me, this was inconvenient, finding childcare for our children.  A colleague of mine who works in a core community school described returning to school Friday as a disaster.  You see, for many of the children she teachers, parents are unable (for a variety of reasons) to provide the supervision, care and even food that many of us would consider to be necessities.  Many of these children spent the long weekend and the 2 days off school on the street, in the park, around the neighbourhood with no schedule, no routine, no childcare and for some, no food.  The return to school brought with it lots of baggage and issues to deal with.

For many of these children, their teachers are their Horton.  They are providing these kids with a warm, safe place to be and encouraging them to learn, grow and develop.  At the end of Horton Hatches the Egg, when the elephant bird emerges, Dr. Seuss says, "it should be, it should be, it SHOULD be like that!"  If it was, there would be some students walking around looking more like their teachers than their parents and maybe then it would be easier to see the influence teachers have in kids lives.  But, look carefully and you will see it. Read the comments people left on my last blog post: what makes a teacher special is not the content he/she teaches, it is the relationships he/she builds with the students.  Its the environment of trust he/she creates, it is the way he/she interacts with and values the students he/she teaches.  Good teachers are Hortons, they honour their commitment to the profession and honour the students in their care:

"I meant what I said and I said what I meant, a teacher is faithful 100%"