004: Ordinary Days

This post isn’t tied neatly to a book chapter or research article. It’s simply something I’ve been noticing in my own life as I try to understand what it means to live, not only teach, in a more brain-informed way.

When I first started learning about neuroscience, I assumed it would change how I taught. I didn’t expect it to change how I lived. But somewhere along the way, I stopped asking only what my students’ brains needed and started wondering about my own.

What does my own brain need?

This morning, the answer looked surprisingly ordinary. I dropped my kids off at camp and preschool, drove down to our waterfront and walked four miles while talking with my mom. Afterward, I stopped at the grocery store, picked up a few healthy foods and made myself a really good sandwich.

Nothing groundbreaking happened. There wasn’t some magical moment when everything suddenly clicked. But I noticed that I felt calmer, more patient and more creative. My thoughts felt less scattered. I found myself thinking about my classroom instead of worrying about it.

And I couldn’t help but wonder: if movement, fresh air, nourishing food and meaningful connection help my brain feel more regulated, what happens when children experience those things regularly?

Maybe that is part of what neuroscience has been teaching me all along.

I’ve spent so much time asking questions about my students’ brains. How do they learn? Why do they shut down? What helps them pay attention? How do relationships shape learning? Those are important questions, but lately another one has joined them:

How am I caring for the brain that’s leading the classroom?

I’m realizing that preparing to teach isn’t only lesson planning or organizing materials. It is also preparing myself. Sometimes that looks like a walk. Sometimes it looks like getting enough sleep. Sometimes it looks like calling my mom, making myself a good lunch, getting my heart rate up for a few minutes or sitting quietly before moving into the next part of my day.

None of those things are especially impressive. But maybe that is part of the point.

As I’ve gotten older and especially since becoming a mother… I have felt an increasing pressure to perform my life well. There is pressure to be engaged with my children, adventurous, healthy, productive, successful, present, interesting and somehow rested at the same time. Then there is the additional pressure, spoken or not, to make that life visible online.

The strange part is that I don’t share very much of my own life. I have a relatively small posting presence, but a much larger observing presence. And I’m beginning to notice that observing other people’s lives can make me evaluate my own in ways that are not especially helpful or even truthful.

I might see someone taking their children on a beautiful adventure and suddenly feel guilty that I dropped mine off at daycare because I needed some space. I might see someone hiking and decide I should be doing something more outdoorsy. Someone else is resting, creating, exercising, traveling, cooking, organizing, or making a beautiful memory with their family and suddenly whatever I chose for my own day feels like the wrong choice.

I can never win that game because there will always be someone doing the thing I am not doing.

And maybe I’m starting to understand that my brain doesn’t need me to win it. It needs me to pay attention to the life I am actually living.

Did I need a quiet morning without my children today? Did I need movement? Connection? Solitude? Nourishing food? Did my kids need an adventure, or did they need a familiar place to play while their mom had enough space to return to them more patiently?

Those answers may look different from day to day. They may also look entirely ordinary from the outside.

A walk by the water. A conversation with someone I love. A few hours of childcare. Food that makes me feel cared for. Time outside. A little less rushing. Returning to my children more grounded than I was before.

I’m beginning to wonder whether I have sometimes overlooked the kinds of days my brain actually needs because they didn’t feel extraordinary enough.

Maybe a healthy life is built through more ordinary days than extraordinary ones.

But I also don’t want this awareness to stop with me. If I notice that a walk helps me settle, that a quick burst of movement helps me focus, or that a quiet moment gives me enough space to return more patiently, then I have to wonder what that means for my students.

Maybe modeling what we teach is not only about demonstrating kindness, perseverance, or a growth mindset. Maybe it is also about taking our own needs seriously enough that we learn to recognize and make room for those needs in children.

If I need movement, how can movement become an organic part of our classroom instead of something students have to earn? If I need a quiet pause before I can think clearly, where might children find those pauses during the day? If connection helps me return to myself, how can I protect moments of genuine connection while still holding high expectations for learning?

The goal is not to assume that every child needs exactly what I need. It is to become more observant. The more honestly I notice what helps me in my own life, the more curious I become about creating a classroom where children can begin noticing what supports them, too.

I’m also very aware that teachers are tired of hearing about one more thing we should add to our already full plates. That isn’t what I want this to become. I’m not imagining another regulation curriculum, another checklist, or a collection of strategies competing with academic learning.

This is not about asking teachers to do more. It is about wondering whether we can respond differently to the needs that are already present.

Maybe this is less about adding and more about noticing. If a few minutes of movement can help me think more clearly, could movement be woven more naturally into instruction? If a quiet pause helps me return with more patience, could small pauses be built into our day without becoming a whole new program? If connection helps us feel safe enough to think and create, how might we protect connection while still pursuing rigorous, meaningful learning?

I’m not suggesting that learning to regulate ourselves will close achievement gaps, fix teacher burnout, or solve the larger challenges facing schools. A walk and a sandwich cannot fix systemic problems. And I haven’t returned to my classroom yet with all of this new learning, so I don’t have outcomes or answers to share.

Right now, I have questions.

What will it look like to incorporate some of the things I’m practicing in my own life: movement, brief pauses, time outside, connection and attention to what my body is telling me, into a kindergarten classroom in ways that feel natural rather than forced? Will students sustain their attention differently? Will transitions feel calmer? Will they begin to recognize what helps them return to learning? Could greater awareness of regulation help make deeper learning more possible?

I don’t know yet.

For me, this is becoming part of what it means to live a more brain-informed life. I don’t want neuroscience to become another standard I use to measure myself or another identity I have to perform perfectly. I’m not trying to optimize every part of my day or become the picture of a perfectly “healthy” teacher.

I’m trying to become more aware of what helps me show up as a healthy, happy or simply honest, human at my job.

Because I don’t leave the rest of my life at the classroom door. The way I have been sleeping, moving, eating, connecting, scrolling, worrying and caring for myself enters the room with me. My nervous system becomes part of the classroom environment, too.

This is one of the human reflections growing alongside my research and classroom reflections: not a lesson about the brain, but an honest look at how learning about the brain is changing the way I notice my own life and the questions I want to carry back into my classroom.

Maybe brain-informed teaching doesn’t always begin with a new classroom strategy.

Maybe it begins by noticing what helps us return to ourselves and becoming curious about how we can offer children opportunities to do the same.

And maybe, sometimes, that begins with an ordinary Tuesday morning.