January to June

We tiled. We painted on bonding agent, and we tiled. Every day it didn't rain, we tiled. Some days that it did rain, we tiled. I stopped wearing nice clothes to school and showed up in shorts and a top, so I could pull on my old overalls over my clothes, and tile. My overalls became more and more encrusted with cement. My students wore aprons every day, and they too became more and more covered in cement. Pale blue cement from the bonding agent mixed in.


We began with the negative space, the background, so that students could develop their tiling skills. Each morning, my first class would help me mix the cement. We'd gather up the empty buckets, trowels, spatulas (putty knifes), aprons, etc. and carry everything upstairs to the mural. We'd open the storeroom and bring out trays of tile, whatever color we needed for the day - beginning with mixed beige tiles for the background, moving on to bright colors for the figures and symbols in our picture.















As we tiled, we got better. Students learned to trim tiles to fit spaces, not leaving gaps. They learned to trim curves for the Haring-esque figures, for the basketball, for the hearts. They learned to sequence the orange tiles so our torch looks shaded and like flickering flames.

And I learned that I didn't have to supervise every minute. Some students had tiling experience, and could be a group supervisor. Other students seemed to be a natural at this, and they too became group supervisors.

I also found that if I started the class by asking students what area they wanted to work on, they were more willing to work than if I assigned tasks. And they were willing to get their own tray of tile and their own chair, rather than carrying out all the needed tile and all the needed chairs. They were willing to be responsible for Mr. Purple or Ms. Turquoise, or the English book, and would work on that one object day after day until it was complete.

So our mural grew and progressed. Our daily audience would comment and give us feedback - students, teachers, counselors, custodians, kitchen staff, principals - everyone would come by and tell us what they liked, or didn't like, or ask questions - the most common question being "When will you finish?" We didn't know. We just worked. We hoped we'd finish before the end of the school year.