07/2026, The Lesson of 1000 Cranes

In an Alaska Native village, a young man’s tragic death brought about a global, viral, arts-based, social media, suicide-prevention initiative and taught me the importance of showing up as a human first. 15 years later, I’ve put this knowledge to work in my classes and it has profoundly changed the way I teach. When I first started in the classroom, I cried in my car every day after school, exhausted, defeated, feeling like I was failing all of the children. Then I remembered,

Show up as a human first.

It didn’t matter what was on my job description. It didn’t matter what anyone was expecting me to do. What mattered was that I was showing up and being with people in a deep and authentic way. That was the bulk of the work. The rest was having a clear sense of the vision of our ideal learning space and path to understanding. Teaching became less about standing and yapping and more about guiding and exploring. I still use these hard-won skills in my classrooms today. They are the key to turning my workplaces into joy factories, accelerating learning for my students, and helping everyone look forward to coming to school everyday.