“The Best Medicine” by Michael Breault

We laugh a lot here in the Elementary. It’s how we deal with the serious side of education. We’ve been told to quiet down in the office on more than one occasion. I don’t think we’ve listened. We are serious when necessary (ok let’s face it, sometimes I have to work on putting on a serious face so that the kiddoes know “I mean it.”). But it’s all temporary… and that “serious” incident is indeed talked about the next day and laughter resounds through the building once again.

The office staff during lunch one day actually created a play with all of us as the characters, reacting quite differently to a fictional scenario. We were able to identify how each one of us would respond to a problematic incident. I should have written it down. It would be good to use here.

We know ourselves, our triggers and what makes us unique…and probably what allows us to work together so well. We’ve established a community within the community.

My being a newbie, I had to work harder at this, because I believe there existed some strong bonds before my arrival.

The strength in character allows us to nudge each other to look at things in a light, positive way while doing very serious business.

Our office community of support is vital to the smooth operation of the school. Students need to know that they can come to the office to responsibly report a problem (“Mr. Breault, I think there’s a party going on in the potty”), share praise in the form of a third grade recess booklet proclaiming Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Lincoln as the best secretaries on the planet (I better say of course here), or to try to resolve a problem with Mrs. McMahon (“ Mrs. McMahon, he’s at it again!”) And the day is filled with a variety of issues that we are able to deal with now and laugh later.

Our community of support is further strengthened by two nurses, (who are able to detect true sickness from math phobia ) Mrs. Millea and Mrs.Matson. Our two school psychologists, Mrs. Neafsey and Mrs. Vorrasi make sure none of gets too crazy but can sometimes be the triggers for silliness.

Our community members have one thing in common. We love our jobs and have a passion for what we do. We are here for children. To show our elementary children that adults can be kind, silly, patient, serious, responsible, frustrated, concerned, adventurous and creative. On some days, we are all of those things. Other days we only have the energy to be concerned.

But then we laugh.

The next day we have a renewed commitment to foster a child’s love of school, learning and laughter.

Did you hear the story about…?