photo courtesy of Miss Porter's School, Farmington, CT

IN THE PALE, SINKING LIGHT of a late-winter afternoon, I read Jane Kenyon’s February: Thinking of Flowers, and wondered if the biting wind, the endless, colorless sky and unforgiving frozen ground would ever allow the small, tender shoots of early spring another season, another chance. As spring arrives, tentatively and without great fanfare, slipping softly into being and rousing us from dreamless sleep, we see the promise of the eternal return, know the fecund scent of possibility and the slow waking to our own renewal. Isn’t this the mirror of the natural world in our own human experience: the length of dim light that provides a stark contrast in reflection to our own yearnings and desires? “A single green sprouting thing/would restore me…” writes Kenyon.

Across the field, small, tight buds of forsythia form on supple branches spilling onto the ground in ways yet to be revealed. Tiny white snowdrops emerge from the darkness of hard soil: a whisper; a raised eyebrow, an indication, a small but persistent voice—here! look! watch!— against the loosening hold of winter. So today when the sun extended itself into the invitation of evening and the evening takes on its own Eliot-like poetic resonance, I think of what I wrote to my friend after a particularly challenging stretch of days:  “I believe poetry can save the world.” I do. Poetry can save the world.

We are both healed and healing when we read poetry. It is in the elemental structure of language where we try to find our place, where word gives way to a reaching out into the larger world. As much as that process is what defines as humans, it is perhaps what we struggle with most resolutely to make ourselves fully human. The inexpressible nature of human experience that challenges us to come into being transcends language, yet the limited and limitless experience of being in a poem is one that expands and often confronts our understanding of what it means to be human. A poem demands an imaginative capacity to see the world differently, to experience “the world imagined” and envision—even for brief moments—another way to see ourselves and navigate a place on the face of the deep.

Poetry steers us into the world beyond object and category; it guides our eyes, our ears, and imagination toward the space around the object, the experience, and into the experience itself. Perhaps the most beautiful thing about poetry—about any art—is the empty space it creates for discovery, history, and vision.  Like painting or architecture, poetry asks us to explore the space around the poem, and in this construct, we are required to write ourselves, imagined, into the world as it might be. It is in our pursuit of the unknown that we discover what we know, or at least what we think we know. And poetry does that for us: it allows us to think about what we know, and it dares us to consider what we think we know in new or unencumbered ways.

I believe poetry can save the world because it has anchored us to our shared human experience since time began. Within the function and elasticity of time and history, poetry comes to meet us as an honored guest, the remote villager at the gate, an occasional tourist, an old friend holding a place at the hearth. Poetry is that thing to which we return to feed our dire human needs beyond food and water, aside from warmth and shelter; it is poetry that houses and harbors our human experience. Poetry dares us to do more, to be more. In poetry, we find possibility.

—Kate Doemland

Led by Chair Kate Doemland, the Miss Porter’s School English Department issues a Call for Papers to independent school teachers of high school English. Topics of interest include Modern Poetry, American Literature, British Literature, and Multicultural Literature. Papers will be shared at an academic conference held at Miss Porter’s School on May 13, 2010. For more information, including conference schedule, please visit www.porters.org/academics .

AllGirls is delighted to welcome guest blogger Jeff Harlan,  sixth grade English teacher and Director of The Dream Flag Project at Agnes Irwin, a K-12 girls’ school in Rosemont, PA. In the tradition of Tibetan prayer flags, Dream Flags elevate, honor and transmit gently on the breeze, the dreams, hopes, and wishes of young people the world over. (In addition to many states in the US, Dream Flags have been made and flown in China, Japan, Costa Rica, Canada, South Africa, Rwanda and Nepal.) Jeff and colleague Sandy Crow are the inspiration and energy behind this enchanting and heartfelt project.

“And according to Winnicott, this transitional space is the space of play and creativity — where love can grow, where teaching and learning take place, where art is made, and where culture is created.”

I loved this comment that Sally made in her last blog entry about Donald Winnicott’s writing. When I think of it, I think of those spaces we make in our classrooms where play, creativity, teaching and learning take place—almost by themselves. It’s the feeling we get when some lesson we dreamed up takes hold, and we know it really works.

That’s exactly what happened with our sixth grade girls in English class eight years ago when we first made Dream Flags. Our girls created poems about the value of dreams and their own dreams—for themselves and for the world. But we do lots of poetry writing assignments. This was just another good one, inspired by our reading of Langston Hughes poems. What made it take flight and create that transitional space was when the girls put the poems on fabric, created a visual space around them with watercolor, and then sewed each one to a line to imitate the form of the Buddhist prayer flags we had seen in a school assembly by National Geographic photographer Anne Keiser just a few weeks before. When the lines were hung outside, when the beauty they felt free to create fluttered in the breeze on a spring day as sixty silent girls quietly read and admired each other’s work, (When do quiet girls and spring go together??) that’s when my colleague Sandy Crow and I knew we’d stumbled on something that worked. Maybe it was a transitional space, and we didn’t yet know the word for it.

And, as it turns out that, it’s worked for many others as well. As soon as we saw how the form of this poetry—the art, the metaphorical connection of the dreams to each other, the public good it all did—was a way to build our community, we could see that it could connect us to others. And it has in more ways than we could possibly imagine.

The next fall, we made a web page and a flyer to give out at a local Philadelphia conference. We invited our fellow schools to join in and we thought a few might. But twenty-six schools joined us that first year—both independent and public–and the idea of connecting the Dream Flags in our gym just wasn’t going to work. A few phone calls later, the doors of Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts (home of the Philadelphia Orchestra) opened for us and we were invited to have our first Dream Flag Celebration right there with dozens of student poets reading their work, musicians improvising while they read, and with the connection and exhibition of more than 1,000 Dream Flags, all in one great line. This was a transitional space—a place to play and learn and love—that we never imagined and that we never in a million years could create by ourselves.

From then on, it’s been one opening of doors after another. This April, we’ll celebrate again, as will more than 90 schools in 36 states and four countries who are creating Dream Flags with us this year. Since we first started, a total of more than 50,000 Dream Flags have been created by students in K-12 from Alaska to Florida and from Nepal to South Africa. And we know it’s because teachers tell teachers about what happens when students look in to dream, look out to create, and find in the space between, something that transforms us all.

We’d love to dream with you too. Check out our web site and join us.

Yours dreaming,

—Jeff Harlan

Istanbul: a little girl connects with her grandmother. Photo by Collin Key.

Babies and toddlers cling tenaciously to their teddies, bunnies, security
blankets and loveys of every description. Imbued with the attributes of Mother, these transitional objects, as we have learned to call them (thanks to child psychiatrist Donald Winnicott) are powerful talismans against anxiety, especially when it is time to go to sleep.

I love the work of Winnicott and find it both intuitively “right” and also profoundly intellectual. Most dear to me is his concept of transitional space. I explain it like this —  You know how it is, when you meet someone — and you just click, within moments feeling deeply connected? You can be at a noisy party, and yet, you and that special person seem to exist in your own bubble of intimacy. You can hear the music and see the other partygoers, but still you feel enclosed. That is transitional space.

Winnicott posits that there is a private space (the psychic space within), and a public space, which is clearly outside us. And then, between us, is the place where we connect: the transitional space which is neither purely inside nor purely outside, but rather an enlivened between space. And according to Winnicott, this transitional space is the space of play and creativity — where love can grow, where teaching and learning take place, where art is made, and where culture is created.

I have been aware on occasion of a friend or lover holding a space open for me … almost as one might hold up a tent or a canopy. It’s like a balm. You feel the welcome and readiness to connect when the transitional space is held open for you. And feel the sadness when that space collapses.

Patsy Rodenburg, a renowned acting coach and voice expert, is an engaging speaker on the subjects of teaching, performing, presence, and intimacy. She has her own take on this material, a  focus on energy, and her own terminology for the  transitional space, calling it “the second circle.” For her it is the energetic space, the circle,  in which one is fully present in the moment. Right here. Right now. Engaged and connected. I  like conceiving of the present as a place. C.S. Lewis said, “The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received.” The transitional space or the second circle is the only place.

If you are grabbed by Patsy Rodenburg’s  Second Circle, I also recommend a shorter and very moving recording in the  TED collection called Why I Do Theatre.

Your comments are more than welcome. Sought after!

Anjimile Oponyo, selected by Madonna as head of new school: Raising Malawi Academy for Girls.

SOMETIMES, IF WE ARE VERY FORTUNATE, we meet the one person who will forever change the course of our lives. Working in the Planning Unit of the Ministry of Education in Malawi I met mine.

I met Nwanganga Shields, a Nigerian woman who was heading the World Bank team that was working on the Education and Health programmes in Malawi. I could not believe that this African woman had so much power; every time she sent a message that she was bringing her team to Malawi everybody in the Ministry was running around preparing for her visit.

She requested that I work for her, and with every meeting she gave me more challenging work — including me in the studies and giving me more responsibilities on the ground.

One day she said to me, “If you are doing this work without training then you need to go to graduate school.” She found a place for me at the George Washington University at the School of Education. The battle now was to convince the men in the Ministry to let me go.

She noticed that when we had meetings, I was always sent to go and inform the kitchen to bring the tea. One day as I stood up in the meeting she asked me why I was going to call for the tea when I needed to contribute to the meeting. She said this is the last time you are doing tea duty, you have a degree and you are going to graduate school. She asked the meeting if anybody had an objection, everybody was quiet. She said she would take it as agreement since nobody had objected. Nwanganga is an African woman and she knew that there was no agreement, the men around the table were just shocked and stunned.

After she left, I was called and informed that I would not be going to graduate school at the George Washington University — I was devastated. I believed I wanted an American education because I wanted to be like Nwanganga Shields, fearless, confident, knowledgeable and proud to be African. In all the time I knew Nwanganga, and even though she was married to an Irishman, I had never seen her put on western clothes! She was so proud to be African, even though her views and attitude were completely western.

I was so crushed to be calling Nwanganga to tell her that I would not be taking my place at George Washington as planned. I should have known this fearless, determined woman would not be stopped. Nwanganga immediately sent me to the British Airways office where she had a ticket to America waiting for me.

It took a month after I arrived, but she managed to convince the Ministry to allow me to start school. She helped me find a place to stay, she got me a tutor to learn even basic skills like keyboarding, and she got me a job at the World Bank so that I could continue to work on research projects.

Every time I was homesick or discouraged she would invite me to her house and cook me African food and remind me that it was important that I succeed for the sake of other Malawian women who had never been given the same opportunity because of the assumption that they couldn’t do it.

She not only inspired me to strive to be like her, she inspired me to fight to open doors for other women.

If this one woman had not made that decision to fight so that I could go to graduate school I would have never left Malawi. I owe that one woman my education. Because of her I have educated my own children, and because of her my daughters do not think they might go to graduate school, they know they will. And because of this woman, every time a woman tells me that she wants to do something and there is a stumbling block in front of her, I start looking for solutions right away.

Nwanganga showed me that you should stop at nothing to open a door for a fellow woman. My way of saying thank you to her is helping other women the way she helped me. I took the job as Head of Raising Malawi Academy for Girls because it gives me the opportunity to do for hundreds of girls what Nwanganga did for me.

What an opportunity, to be able to say thank you to Nwanganga over and over again.

I hope that one day, when Raising Malawi Academy for Girls is open she will come to Malawi and speak to the girls in the school and give them the same inspirational talks she gave to me.

—Anjimile Oponyo

In reading studies about self esteem in girls I have mentally  said “Dimmi, dimmi,” to myself many times. According to this study, and others too, the loss of self esteem suffered by white, Hispanic and Asian girls at adolescence, is in general not experienced by black girls in the US. They maintain their good self concept and appear emotionally stronger and more confident. There was something about these findings that seemed tantalizing to me.  I couldn’t explain it, or make sense of why it should be so, but it felt intuitively correct, based on my own experiences with girls in their early teens.

So when in researching International Women’s Day I stumbled across this footage of Maya Angelou, speaking about the women’s movement, instead of dimmi, it was aha. Oh. Yes. I get it.

I’d love to hear your reactions and responses.

When Howard Hanger’s two daughters were approaching middle school age, he knew they were entering a very important developmental phase, one that could have an enormous effect on their self esteem and confidence, so he started Hanger Hall, an all-girls middle school, just for them. 

When I first learned that, I have to admit, I wondered. Isn’t that rather extreme? Is this guy a fanatic of some kind? I mean, starting a whole school for his daughters? But yes, he was that concerned about making sure they had every possible chance to be educated in a place where they could feel comfortable as girls and empowered as young women. He wanted a place where they and other girls could be understood, and where they could shine,  grow, and claim their power as they moved into young womanhood; he wanted a school where the challenges of personal  growth and academic growth would be in balance.

I am happy to report that this is a heartfelt, grounded, and very useful book, by two people who clearly understand and enjoy girls of this age. Parents of tweens and young teenage girls will find this book insightful, reassuring and inspiring. It will be of benefit, as well, to teachers, especially those new to teaching girls of this age and stage.  A Precious Window of Time is optimistic, enthusiastic, and full of vitality. That alone gives it a certain charm; so many books about teens seem to be a maelstrom of distressing problems and crises, real or anticipated, and what to do about them.

The authors do address such fraught topics as drug and alcohol use, sexuality, and moodiness, but they do so in a warm, even-handed and realistic way. I like the sections on social skills, balancing structure and flexibility, friends and community, and the ongoing importance of play. After reading this book, you will not be wringing your hands and lying awake worrying, rather, you’ll feel energized and eager to be a great parent, and/or a great teacher to your girls, in whatever settings you interact with them.

It’s unfortunate that the book is a bit amateurish in ways; it needs the shaping hand of a good editor as well as a professional proofreader. The conversational writing style relies on a lot of dashes — I don’t object to that — but the use of hyphens where em dashes should appear is awkward and confusing. However, these objections are minor compared to the good heart, solid experience, and usefulness of this book.

A Precious Window of Time is available through Lobster Books. I recommend it  to parents  and teachers of middle school age girls. Homeschooling parents in particular might find this book a game-changer and a boon. I would be very interested to hear reactions from readers. I invite you to post here, in comments section of AllGirls.

Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon

Write a post related to Black History Month? The challenge for me is how to keep it short (and speaking of short, how did the short, cold month of February get chosen for this honor?) So I will not take on the semi-fashionable question of whether we live in “post racial” America (don’t get me started!) and I’m not going to take on the broad sweep of 400 years of unreported, undocumented, disrespected black history. For you young folks, yes, I even remember the olden days, back when we only had white presidents! And a whole lot more.

Earlier this month, Michelle Obama invited a group of schoolkids to the White House for an hour-long workshop, titled “Music that Inspired the Civil Rights Movement.” Social activist and songtalker Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, (you may know her as founder of the a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock) a Freedom Singer, talked about her childhood and learning to understand the meaning behind the protest song This Little Light of Mine (I’m Gonna Let it Shine).  The message is for everyone, and especially important for girls and women.

All cultures, all religious groups have talked about the phenomenon of light in the context of religious or mystical experience. Buddhists say that all sentient beings are imbued with a spark of inner divine light. Jewish mystics speak of the inner spark or the spark of God. The Koran, referring to humankind, talks about the little candle flames burning in a niche in the wall of God’s temple. In this clip I found on NPR’s website, Dr. Reagon says it so purely, “Think LIFE.”

This Little Light of Mine is easy, even for preschoolers to sing, but it is no baby song. It is strong, seasoned, and penetrates to the bone. When I was a kid, the school day started with the Pledge of Allegiance and a patriotic song. How much better it would be — exponentially better — to skip them both and instead sing “This Little Light of Mine.” Together. Let it shine.

Even though in 1992 Barbie said,”Math class is tough,” much to the legitimate horror of the American Association of University Women, after 18 years Barbie has finally mastered those equations and earned her degree in computer engineering; now she’s ready to take on the world.

She did take a few detours on the way, becoming both president of the United States and a Starfleet officer in 2000. In her younger days she tried ballerina and McDonalds cashier. But now she has found her true calling. We hope.

We are told that the Society of Women Engineers and the National Academy of Engineering were consulted in the kitting out of this latest Barbie doll. I believe that, but I suspect that Mattel tweaked the recommendations a bit. Like: a laptop with Linux has turned bright pink and glittery — and it’s hard to imagine a rookie computer engineer taking it to work. But, I have to say, on a quick look there actually are quite a few pink laptops IRL to choose from!  Barbie also sports pink (of course) eyeglasses, a smartphone with bluetooth headset and a seriously hunk-a-chunk wristwatch. Probably the geek’s delight: an enigmatic Tokyoflash, custom made in hot pink for her. Again, just guessing.

I imagine that the women engineers suggested a casual  pants outfit, more practical and realistic than a dress for computer engineer Barbie, never suspecting that pants would turn into skintight black leggings with silver sparkles. But hey, as long as she can do the work — right?

In order to increase the verisimilitude, perhaps a little accessory kit could be added: Dilbert cartoon book,  half empty bag of Cheetos, a tiny can of Mountain Dew, and some special makeup for drawing the dark circles under her eyes.

Okay! Enough with poking fun. I would now like to say something in support of Barbie. Ahem. She can be something of a ditz, has certainly had some issues with making up her mind about a career (she has had over 100 of them) but keep this in mind: over the long haul, Barbie has been pretty consistent about being gainfully employed. That’s a lot more than you can say for those Disney princesses.

BTW: the binary code on Barbie’s laptop screen reads: Barbie. Over and over. In ASCII. I could tell you were dying to know.

Billie Holiday

You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation.
—Billie Holiday

Never limit yourself because of others’ imagination; never limit others because of your own limited imagination.
— Mae Jemison, astronaut

I know God will not give me anything I cannot handle. I just wish he didn’t trust me so much.
— Mother Theresa

The happiest excitement in life is to be convinced one is fighting for all one is worth on behalf of some clearly seen and deeply felt good.
— Ruth Benedict

My grandfather told me there were two kinds of people: those who do the work, and those who take the credit. You should try to be in the first group because there is less competition.
— Indira Gandhi

If high heels were so wonderful, men would still be wearing them.
—Sue Grafton

I do not weep at the world—I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife.
—Zora Neale Hurston

Success didn’t spoil me; I’ve always been insufferable.
—Fran Liebowitz

I am prepared to sacrifice every so-called privilege I possess in order to have a few rights.
— Inez Mulholland, suffragist

I was born to swing. That’s all.
— Lil Hardin Armstrong, bandleader, 1930s

A study recently published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that female elementary school teachers who suffered from math anxiety could instill negative gender-biased stereotypes in the girls they teach.  Really? Now that’s not good! From my own personal experience (not statistically significant, I know) as a young girl it never occurred to me that boys could be better in math than girls, never mind that they actually were.  Maybe my teachers suffered no math unease, or maybe I simply just loved math no matter what, or maybe my parents both valued math as much as they valued reading and made that quite obvious at home.  As a young student, the only thing I objected to was a boring teacher or one who was unfair.  I don’t remember any who demonstrated angst of any sort; perhaps they hid it well.  But, let’s assume for a minute that the research is conclusive and that there really are girls out there identifying with their overly math-anxious female teachers to the detriment of their mathematical future.

To use math terminology, success and confidence are directly proportional.  One of the most loved and competent teachers I have ever known taught first grade for over thirty years.  When asked to identify the most profound indicator of student success she replied, “It is amazing to see what kids can do when they think they can, compared to what they can do when they think they can’t.” How true this is for all of us.  I received phone calls from two of my sons last week; both had just started up new courses, one an undergraduate -level mathematics course and the other a graduate-level course about security in the Middle East.  Both guys remarked that their professors were fabulous, and went on to explain that what made these men so extraordinary was their robust, self-assured delivery, which made them absolutely convincing.  Confidence matters!

So what about math education for girls?  Girls need confident, competent women around them every day from the time they first set foot in a school building.  We have come a long way in our understanding of math anxiety, girls and math, and gender differences in learning, but we must still have a way to go if this research is accurate.  I send a big thank you to every elementary school teacher for helping our girls build the foundation they need to succeed in this modern, technical world.

And, for those teachers who are anxious when arithmetic time rolls around, I encourage you to do something about it.  Like your own students, you must be confident about what you do to be the best you can be for the kids.  If this means diving into another math class at the local university, do it.  If it means signing up for a summer math program for educators, do it.  You owe it to yourself and to the girls you teach.

For the parents out there, look for signs that your girls are losing confidence in their math ability and address it.  If you, yourself, disliked math in school or thought you were terrible at it, consider keeping that to yourself (let’s face it, you don’t tell them everything you think or did).  Don’t give girls license to dislike math, don’t let them think it is only for boys, and don’t let them fall behind.  The National Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM http://www.stemedcoalition.org/) initiative is funding programs in our schools across the country to promote these fields; the premise being that we cannot compete as a nation unless we produce top-thinkers in these disciplines.  Now, more than ever, we need the female perspective in design and research.

Girls deserve a solid mathematical foundation.  As a math teacher at an all girls’ school in Massachusetts, I see first-hand that a single-sex environment could be the answer for many of our students.  Here the best math student is a girl, the most outspoken math student is a girl, and all of the kids in the BC Calculus class are girls.  But, for a typical young woman in high school, the boy sitting next to her in math class can influence her in ways I won’t even begin to address.  The bottom line:  If she has a strong foundation and believes in herself, she’ll have what it takes to succeed in mathematics and the future will be a better one for all of us.  Let’s do what we can to make sure this happens.

—Sally Reid