letters to my class

Dear Students,

I’ve been lucky in my life to have lots of people–friends and family–who have always rooted me on. And they have supported me unconditionally. When I’ve succeeded, they’ve acted like they knew I would all along, and when I’ve failed they acted like they knew it wouldn’t last very long.

We all deserve this. 

You might already have lots of fans, but you can’t ever have too many. So count me as another one. No matter what you do, no matter how difficult it gets for you, I’ll always be cheering you on and expecting great things from you.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Humans,

One of my favorite bands has a new album out today. I’ve been looking forward to it all summer.

Looking forward to things, even little things, makes life a little sweeter. For kids it might be a little bit easier: you’re probably looking forward to Christmas, your birthday, or that upcoming family camping trip. 

Sometimes adults have a harder time of it. But looking forward to the little things makes it easier to keep on hoping for the big ones.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Workers,

Life is mostly grunt work.

If you want to be a great cook, get ready to wash a whole bunch of dishes. If you want to be a great musician, prepare to practice a lot of scales. If you want to beat that video game, you’re probably going to spend a lot of time dying and reviving at that one level with that one monster.

So we joyfully and mindfully do the grunt work so the big, beautiful stuff can follow.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Coloradoans,

I’m not from Colorado, but I like to know about the place I’m living. And even though the lines between Colorado and its neighbors are invisible, they’ve existed long enough that they just might mean something. And even though Colorado is an imaginary square in the middle of a giant land mass, I believe the people and the places in that square have melded together into a common place that we call Colorado.

Your task is to learn about that place–its history, its geography, its culture–because it is your job to create its future.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Hackers,

The other day I was scraping the gills off the bottom of portobello mushrooms, and I kept thinking, “Isn’t there some sort of hack to make this job easier?” And then I figured out the hack of all hacks:

Keep doing something over and over until you get good at it.

First we know exactly what we want to get better at, then we break it up into the important parts, then we practice those skills over and over. As we do that, we keep track of our progress towards our goals.

So while I improve at prepping mushrooms, you will use the same model to become better readers, writers, and problem solvers.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Skywatchers,

Today is the big day! The first time in almost one hundred year that a full solar eclipse will cross the entire United States. And here in Colorado we get to see over 90%.

Safety is always the most important thing. On most days, reflexes would make you look away from the sun before you could damage your eyes, but that won’t happen during a solar eclipse and you can do permanent injury to your eyes. So, when we are viewing the eclipse, you will be wearing your special glasses.

Let’s have a great day,

Mr. Heimbuck 

Dear Tinkerers,

I could pop a plastic pod in a coffee machine and hit a button. But it’s a lot more fun to grind and brew my own cup of coffee.

You could go to the dollar store and buy a cheap, plastic balloon car, which would probably break after two runs and end up at the bottom of your toy box. But wouldn’t be a lot more fun to make your own?

Today we’ll focus on making and improving and refining balloon cars. They might work or they might not, but we’re going to learn a lot more than we would by just opening a package.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Learners,

Last night I screwed up badly. I tried to make smash burgers at home and I filled my kitchen with smoke. I think I might even have set off my neighbors’ smoke detector. It was a disaster!

When disaster strikes, you have two options: 1) never ever even think about doing that thing again or 2) try again with some changes. I really, really like smash burgers, so I’m going to try again, but cook them outside next time.

If we have the mindset that we learn from our mistakes, then every disaster is a masterclass. And the biggest mistakes teach us the most.

Make a lot of mistakes today, and learn from every one,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Individuals,

Our class is full of different individuals–we have boys and girls, and tall kids and short kids, and youngest, oldest, and middle siblings. We have individuals from big families and little families. We have people whose families many different languages, believe many different things, and eat many different foods. We have students who were born in Thornton, Colorado and have lived here their entire lives and we have people who were born far away.

And our class is better for all of these diffferences. 

Because each one of us is an individual who gets to decide what kind of person we want to be. Our backgrounds are important and they make each of us unique, but we get to tell our own stories. What is your story going to be?

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck

Dear Students,

We want our classroom to be a peaceful place where everyone feels they belong. To do that, we made some great classroom rules. Those rules will set a tone of respect in our classroom.

We’re also learning at least four things about each classmate. As Meg Wheatley says, “You can’t hate someone whose story you know.” You’ll have disagreements, but you’ll have a strong enough relationship that you will solve any problems you have. 

Being classmates is an important bond. We are each responsible for helping the other achieve our goals. Together we’re better.

Sincerely,

Mr. Heimbuck