Our handshake had a rhythm to it, and I kept getting it wrong.
Every morning around 8:00, I stood outside my classroom door and greeted each student as they walked in. Most gave me a fist bump or a high-five. One student decided he wanted something unique to us and taught me our own handshake. I stumbled through it for the first few days while he patiently taught me again. By the time I got it right, we had not only gained a handshake, but also built something together.
For five years, four of them with 7th graders, I taught in a self-contained classroom at a Lutheran school in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. That means I taught every core subject to the same group of about fifteen students all day, every day. My only break was the occasional bathroom run while the principal or another staff member covered a study period. It was a world of daily drama and challenges. However, there were moments scattered about that made it all worthwhile.
The Morning
At the start of the year, my greeting questions were simple: “What’s something going on with you today?” As the year went on, I tailored them and made them more specific. I’d often follow up on something a student had mentioned days earlier, demonstrating I was listening and that I cared about them as a person, not just the material they had to learn as a student.
We started each day with a short devotion, as was the school’s practice, and I added the Pledge of Allegiance. As part of Milwaukee’s school choice program, we served students of different backgrounds, which sometimes included different faiths. Not once did a parent ask to opt their child out of the Christian aspects, and I even had a student tell me that they used the time to practice their faith while learning about Christianity. This was a sign of the trust the classroom ran on.
The Room
In one back corner, I built what the kids called the “reading lounge”: a rug, a soft chair, a small lamp, and a quarter divider that gave the space a semi-private feel.
In another corner was the recovery zone, or just “recovery,” as it came to be known. It was big enough for one person: a wooden stool and wall decorations the students added over the year. It had one purpose. If something triggered a student, they could go there to process it and return in a better place. Whenever someone used it, I followed up with them one-on-one later.
Jordan
I remember one student specifically. I’ll call him Jordan. He was dealing with a lot in his life and often struggled to hold himself together for a full day. We often worked on small strategies he could practice and use to refocus, address his feelings and emotions, or deal with conflict. In the heat of the moment, it was hard for him to remember to use them.
It was early December, and, in the middle of a lesson, Jordan exploded. At that moment, I didn’t know the details, but he shoved his chair back and got “all up in the business” of one of the girls sitting near him. As I started walking toward him, he turned to look at me. For a split second, I wasn’t sure where this was headed. Then, he went silent and walked to the back, sitting down in recovery.
When I got the class back on track, working on a problem, I asked her if she was okay. She laughed and said she was fine, and that he’s just too sensitive to comments. This told me the issue went both ways, and I’d now need to talk with her. As I continued on, Jordan stayed there for a good twenty minutes before returning to his seat.
When I talked with him during the noon recess, I asked him how he was feeling at that moment, while trying to get details on what happened. He shared that it was a continuation of something going on outside school and that she made some comments about it. As for how he was feeling, he said he was finally realizing what recovery was for. He said he was able to think of different ways he could fix the issue without “playing her game.”
The Work
Each day covered math, reading and language arts, social studies, and science, with study times mixed in. Over the week, students also had PE, art, music, and an elective. Most years that was an introduction to Chinese language and culture, inspired by the time I’d spent living there.
While there were many evaluative measures, the two most blunt ones were growth in math and growth in reading. Many students came into my class well below grade level in those areas, and closing those gaps was a daily fight.
Given the situation, I got resourceful. My American Revolution unit doubled as our reading and language arts unit, both built around the novel Johnny Tremain. Students kept a reading journal, tracking vocabulary for both subjects and answering questions that tied the novel to what we were learning in history, including where the fiction went beyond the historical facts. Two classes became one extended block. Unfortunately, math and science never found the same overlap.
To keep 12- and 13-year-olds focused, I broke up every long lesson with short bursts of movement: stretching or something silly to reset their attention before diving back in. I saw it less as a gimmick and more as survival—for them and me.
The In-Between
Transitions were a gamble. Moving fifteen middle schoolers to the gym, to lunch, outside, or to Friday assembly resulted in a deep unease about when the peace would collapse. Unstructured time required eyes like a hawk and reflexes like a cheetah. When I heard “Mr. Pickart, you better get him,” I knew conflict had begun.
The Cost
Nobody warned me about the work that started when the day ended. My dad was a high school teacher. I remember him grading at the dinner table during exam season. But he had prep periods. I didn’t—not with lunch and recess duty and being the full-time emotional presence for fifteen kids who each needed something different from me. So, grading and lesson prep happened at night and on weekends.
Even when combining assignments, like for Johnny Tremain, I remember having a stack of students’ journal notebooks, math assignments, and their science logs to mark and grade. By my fifth year, around Christmas, I realized that giving far more than I could get back wasn’t sustainable. I was pouring out all day, every day, and rarely refilled. That was a large part of what eventually burned me out. There’s no other way to put it.
But it had another effect, one I didn’t recognize right away. It gave me a stubborn determination to figure out how to reach every student. I read books, attended trainings like Love and Logic, and visited schools across Milwaukee to watch how great teachers built their rooms, ran their transitions, and pushed students to be better versions of themselves. I wasn’t where I wanted to be, and I knew it. I never stopped noticing what worked and looking for what was missing.
Looking back, I would take a more structured approach to workload from the beginning. I would assign less frequent homework with more impact while being honest with administrators from the start about what I could realistically take on.
What Remains
When I think back on those years, it’s not the grading or struggles I focus on. It’s the handshake at the door and a twelve-year-old revealing that he finally understood what recovery was for.
