The importance of one minute

It takes only one minute to change a student's day.

It might not even take that long. Make sure that it's a positive change.

All day, every day, these kids are surrounded by people telling them what to do and that they aren't doing it well enough, and rarely telling them how to do it better. I can see it in their faces as they move through the hallways. They walk smiling with their heads held high past some teacher's rooms, then stare at their shoes passing others. The practices we try to put into place in our lesson plans to help the students grow academically are not put into practice in our hallways to help them grow in the same way.

There will always be plenty of people working in a school playing the role of the drill sergeant to get the kids in line with all of the rules. If there's a reason for everything, then the reason I'm here is to help the kids smile and be confident.

If I can do this in a minute or less, then there is no excuse for not doing it.