Sometimes the Lesson Is in the Interruption

Bird Droppings November 3–4, 2026
Sometimes the Lesson Is in the Interruption

Life has a way of arranging lessons we never planned to teach or learn. Over the past two days, I have been reminded repeatedly that the most meaningful experiences seldom fit neatly into a lesson plan, a calendar, or even the expectations we have for ourselves. I have been thinking again about Carl Jung and synchronicity, those seemingly unrelated events that somehow find their way into the same moment. Perhaps there is no mysterious explanation. Perhaps we simply become more aware of the connections when we slow down enough to notice them. Yet I continue to find that the pieces of my life have an interesting way of coming together.
Yesterday morning began with the sky, the lake, and my usual wandering through the countryside. There is something about those early hours when the world has not quite awakened. The deer, the birds, the changing light, and even the absence of a spectacular sunrise offer their own lessons. Nature does not operate according to my schedule. The deer do not wear watches, and the sun does not rise for my camera. I have spent much of my life watching, listening, and wondering. Perhaps that is why I have always believed that observation is at the heart of good teaching.
Over the past several days, my grandson Henry has provided more than a few reminders of that belief. Henry spent the night with us, something he managed to arrange with considerable persuasion. He is becoming quite skilled at negotiating with his grandparents. The agreement included a bath, though that was hardly a sacrifice since he loves taking baths.
The next morning, we looked through books, including one we had created together with illustrations and caricatures of Henry and me. He quickly noticed that Grandma looked realistic while he and I looked more like cartoon characters. His questions were genuine, and his observations were remarkably precise. I have often said that children see things adults have learned to overlook.
Henry had also been making a tractor-trailer from cardboard boxes. That simple activity brought back a memory from more than seventy years ago, a red metal Tonka livestock tractor-trailer my father brought home from a National Safety Conference in Chicago around 1954. That truck is still upstairs in our toy room. Think about that for a moment. A toy given to a little boy in Pennsylvania more than seventy years ago is still part of the world his grandson explores today. My father could hardly have imagined that his gift would become a connection between generations.
Henry was also selecting toys to take to his father’s new apartment. Many of those toys had belonged to his father when he was a boy. Watching that little process brought tears to my eyes. Childhood moves along, sometimes quietly, sometimes far too quickly. The toys remain, but the children grow up, have children of their own, and begin making new homes. Perhaps this is another form of synchronicity, or perhaps simply the continuity of life.
Meanwhile, I have been immersed in mathematics. At seventy-seven, I find myself once again a student, working through fraction models, division strategies, mathematical discussions, and journal reflections. I sometimes wonder how many people my age are sitting at a computer struggling with virtual pattern blocks and trying to understand why a particular representation makes sense. The fascinating part is that I am not simply learning mathematics. I am watching teachers and children think about mathematics.
One third-grade student, Siena, was solving a problem involving a turtle eating one-sixth of a cucumber each day for twenty-six days. She organized the sixths into groups, finding four whole cucumbers and two-sixths remaining. What interested me most was not the answer but the teacher’s questions. How did you do that? How did you get that? How did you come up with that? The teacher didn’t rush to demonstrate the correct procedure. She listened, asked questions, and let the child explain her thinking.
Another student, Ariana, worked through a problem involving bags of sunflower seeds and bird feeders. She found that two and one-fourth bags could fill eighteen feeders when each required one-eighth of a bag. Again, the teacher wanted to understand the thinking behind the answer. I keep returning to that idea.
For years I have described three approaches to teaching: parasitic, symbiotic, and osmotic. The osmotic teacher doesn’t simply deliver information; they create an environment where learning can occur through interaction, observation, questioning, and shared experience. Watching these mathematics lessons reminded me of classrooms I tried to create over the years, places where students could think aloud, make mistakes, and explore ideas without fear of embarrassment.
But being a student again has also reminded me how frustrating learning can be. I spent considerable time trying to manipulate geometric shapes on a computer screen. I knew what I wanted to accomplish, but the technology did not always cooperate. I found myself thinking about the children who become frustrated when the tools we provide get in the way of the thinking we hope to encourage. There is a lesson there for teachers.
Sometimes the obstacle is not mathematics. Sometimes it is the way we have asked the student to demonstrate understanding. I thought again about my son John in eighth grade. He had been moved into another mathematics class after difficulties with his gifted mathematics teacher resigned. His new teacher questioned how he solved a problem. Only later did John recognize that he had approached it using calculus. He eventually earned fives on both AP Calculus examinations.
What might have happened if his mathematical thinking had been dismissed simply because it did not follow the expected procedure? How often do we confuse compliance with understanding? These thoughts have been running through my mind as I try to finish my own assignments. Deadlines, journal entries, problem sets, reflections, and projects fill the space. I understand the importance of accountability, but I also recognize the tension between completing an assignment and genuinely exploring an idea.
I have spent fifty years trying to help students discover that learning is more than producing the expected answer. Now I am experiencing that tension from the other side of the desk. Life outside the classroom has not been particularly cooperative either.
Yesterday, exhaustion caught up with me. Poor sleep worries about an approaching IRS letter, and the ordinary demands of family and school left me feeling overwhelmed. I struggled to concentrate on things I ordinarily enjoy. Then I took a nap, using my CPAP, and woke up feeling remarkably different.
The problems had not disappeared. The letter was still coming. The assignments were still waiting. Yet my ability to face them had changed. I sometimes forget that the mind and body are not separate entities. We can become so absorbed in our responsibilities that we overlook the simplest requirements of being human. Rest matters.
This morning brought medical appointments, a blood draw that bruised my arm, and a frustrating adventure involving hearing aids and insurance coverage. I’ve had my hearing aids since 2017. They are nearly nine years old, and replacement parts are no longer available. The price of new hearing aids was staggering, and the insurance benefit wasn’t what I understood it to be. After considerable frustration, I returned to the people who had originally helped me. They got my old hearing aids working reasonably well again. They are not perfect, but I can hear. There is something rather symbolic about that. Perhaps hearing and listening are two very different things. I have spent much of these past two days thinking about teachers who listen to children, grandparents who listen to grandchildren, and the importance of listening to ourselves when exhaustion tells us we have reached our limits.
Henry reminded me of that during an earlier mathematics activity. After counting marbles and exploring different ways to represent eighteen plus seven, he eventually announced, “Do it by yourself, Pop Pop.” I had pushed beyond the point where his curiosity was carrying out the activity. That was not a failure of learning. It was a lesson in teaching. Sometimes the best teacher move is to stop.
I have been thinking about the sanctuaries I tried to create in my classrooms over the years. The sofas, aquariums, animals, music, and opportunities to talk were not simply decorations. They were part of an effort to make students feel safe enough to learn. Perhaps what I was really trying to create was a place where someone would listen. As I finish these thoughts, I am reminded that the past two days have been filled with apparent contradictions. Frustration and discovery. Exhaustion and renewal. Old toys and new beginnings. A grandfather teaches a grandson and a grandfather learning from children on a computer screen.
I am still trying to finish my mathematics assignments. I am still waiting for answers to questions that have nothing to do with fractions. I am still watching the sunrise, looking for deer, and wondering about those little connections that seem to appear when least expected. Perhaps Jung would have found something interesting in all of this. Perhaps John Dewey would simply have reminded me that education grows out of experience. And perhaps Henry would have told me to put the computer away and come play. That suggestion may hold more wisdom than we sometimes realize. The lesson is not always where we planned to find it. Sometimes it is interrupted. So, for today, CARPE DIEM, and as always, please keep all in harm’s way on your mind and in your hearts, and please always give thanks, namaste.

My family and friends, I do not say this lightly,
Mitakuye Oyasin
(We are all related)
docbird