Virginia Tech: Where Do We Go Now?

Posted by Dorit Sasson Apr 20, 2007

I just found this site that might help you deal with the Virginia Tech tragedy that the University of Berkeley at California put out on the web earlier today.

Our students right now are scared, frightened, and too paralyzed emotionally and mentally to make sense of what exactly happened last Monday at Virginia Tech. Truthfully, I am too but sadly Israel has had its fair share of tragedy and I have dealt with it quite a few times with my students. You may say sadly that I am now an expert on it.

Dealing with stressful times on a national level is a trying lesson in the face of humanity. Dealing with it in the classroom is not any different. Students are human beings and they are indeed confused and unsure. These lessons are not 'normal'; they are stressful and disrupt the normalcy of school life. They need however, a different lesson that will give them an opportunity to share or at least to listen to others in relation to the sad courses of Monday's events.

This Virginia Tech shooting reminds me of how I have had to help students deal with tragedy on a number of occasions, the worst by far was last summer's war in Israel.

I followed my intuition during last year's first day of school. My twelfth grade students needed to talk about the two soldiers Dan Broyer and Haran Lev - graduates of the school who died in the war. I read to them a few personal entries I wrote in my journal during the war. We listened to each other. I asked them how they felt during the war and how they passed their days. I could feel a bit of tension lifted in the air.

I would assume the same would go for any student sitting right now in a US classroom. Sensitivity is the key. If they want to talk, let them. It's the best thing you can do for them as their teacher during a crucial and sad time like this. If anything, you will come to realize after the lesson how precious life really is.