Collaboration at #ntcamp
Summer workshops are fun. You do them on your own time, connect with other teachers and learn in a stress free environment. Over the past week and a half, I was able to participate in a couple workshops, both presenting and participating.
This past weekend, I traveled down to Philly to participate in the first #ntcamp. It was fun. Not only was I able to feel like a 20 year old again as I started the road trip from New Hampshire at midnight arriving in Philly by 7 am, I was able to connect face to face with many people in my Twitter PLN and make new friends as well.
While at #ntcamp, I led a session to integrate active listening strategies into poetry writing with @butwait @kylepace @aleaness @debschi and @cybraryman1.
First we listened actively to a short Fantasy on a Hungarian National Melody by Franz Liszt and brainstormed words we thought of as we listened. These words were added in a collaborative brainstorm to a Wallwisher made on the spot by @butwait.
After some time, we started to put the words in an order that made sense and came up with a poem. The final poem can be found at http://typewith.me
Introductory Presidential Marching
Firm Regal Handshakes
Dashingly Dramatic Dance
Powerful Brass Procession
Culminating Celebration
Then @kylepace volunteered to narrate the poem into his iphone and uploaded it in audioboo.fm
Finally, I took our audio voice over and the piece itself and mixed them using audio editing software, Audacity. With this I was able to spread @kylepace’s narration through the duration of the piece. I uploaded it to share in soundcloud.com
And here is our final product.
Click here if Soundcloud player does not work: AL poem ntcamp
AL poem ntcamp by eliza_peterson
It was so great to collaborate with these people and come up with an audio memory of our mini collaborative project.
Here’s the Glog I made as a “handout” for the session.
Kind Words
“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” -Mother Teresa
A simple post today…
As I was scanning through the tweets of my PLN this morning, I came across this quote sent out from @iwisenet.
A thought like this is important to remember from time to time in all that we do, especially as teachers (even in the summer!).
All that we do, all that we say plays a large role in the lives of the people and children around us.
Have a great day!
What Has Twitter Done?
What has Twitter done
… To Me??
Twitter has changed me. I am on the computer all the time, sitting amidst a mess of papers, toys and half empty coffee cups, letting my kids run wild around the house so that I can get in “one more tweet!” I’m hooked! Addicted! Linking here, surfing there, replying, retweeting, dming at rapid speeds that are never fast enough – all because of Twitter!
BUT
What has Twitter done
…For Me??
Oh, so much. It has led me to meet so many amazing educators who share my passion for teaching. It has allowed me to get inspiration at all hours of the day or night. I have chats with educators from around the world who have introduced me to great resources, helped me to find answers to pressing (and not so pressing) questions and challenged me look at my teaching practices again and again. And today, it has led me on a summer road trip to Philly to finally meet some of these great people at #ntcamp!
At this point in my career, I do not know what I would do without the PLN I have built for myself through Twitter! Thanks ol’ bird!
Make Me a Guru
In the second section of Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love, Gilbert travels to India to study the discipline of Yoga. Early on in the section she takes the time to explain some of the important words used (that we can tend to take for granted).
“The word Guru is composed of two Sanskrit syllables. The first means ‘darkness,’ the second means ‘light.’ Out of the darkness and into the light. What passes from the master into the disciple is something called matravirya: ‘The potency of the enlightened consciousness.’ You come to your Guru then, not only to receive lessons, as from any teacher, but to actually receive the Guru’s state of grace.” (location 2404)
What a beautiful way to think of teaching … bringing your students out of the darkness and into the light … allowing them to learn in such a way that they become more enlightened and if we are to pass on, not just simply knowledge but a sort of demeanor. How much more impact it seems, then that we really do have on students. If I really think about this for a moment, it makes sense. Every encounter we have with children (and peers) determines whether or not they want to learn more from us or resist us. hmmm….
Then Gilbert goes on to say,
“Such transfers of grace can occur in even the most fleeting of encounters with a great being.” (location 2407)
Imagine being thought of as such a great being, or teacher, that even a fleeting encounter with a student might move them in the progression of their learning.
Taking a moment to really look at these words in the context of education makes me think a little more about this ever so important profession to which I have dedicated my life. I want to become a Guru!
Guts and Love
I was reading excerpts that I had bookmarked in (@Thanks2Teachers) Richard Lakin’s Teaching as an Act of Love last night. There is one story that I keep going back to. It’s called “Sagging Up” in Math Class. It’s about how Richard takes on two math classes of 5th and 6th grade students who are disenchanted with math (to say the least) and turns the classes around so that the students are actually making deals with him to have math for homework.
The pure guts Richard shows in this vignette is admirable! What he did was toss the regular curriculum to the side, get books students had “done” in past grades and let them work through the material at their own pace with his constant support. The gutsiest part was when he told the kids they were not allowed to do any math homework. (“They had been assigned math homework every night since 2nd grade and obviously it hadn’t helped them.” pg 22.)
What came about from this? His students (there were about ten in each class) worked, saw themselves progress through the curriculum, improved their skills, enjoyed math and eventually wanted to learn and practice more at night.
But how did he come to make these gutsy moves? He showed them love by taking the time to listen to the kids. He asked them questions, let them tell him what went wrong in the past, what they needed now and he followed his heart.
He empathized with them, connected with them and ultimately showed them that he cared for them. He knew they had gotten lost in math and he showed the students that he was truly there to help them. And he did.
This is inspirational to me in so many ways. The love Richard showed to his kids and to his profession and the guts to go ahead and do what he felt was best for his students. We can all be reminded from time to time to teach with our guts and love!
The Importance of Collegiality
This past Wednesday, I went out with 8 other women, all but one are teachers , to an Italian restaurant to enjoy some great food and discuss the book we are reading together in our online book group . It was an amazing time! We dined, wined, smiled, laughed and dined some more… and then smiled even more! From the first moments of ripping off a piece of warm bread to the last lick of a cheese cake covered spoon, our evening was full of enjoyable collegiality.
And that’s the point!
This summer, one of my main focuses for my educational career was to read for pure enjoyment – just like we expect our children to do. Together with my sister-in-law, Kristina Peterson, I organized an online book club to read Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. (our wiki) It has been so enjoyable not only to read, but to interact with other teachers in online discussions about the book and our lives, and to meet face to face. (photos)
I mentioned already our fabulous Italian dinner meant to celebrate Gilbert’s trip to Italy. Besides eating (too much), we also did a little soul searching as we pondered, wrote down and reflected on the three things we wanted most out of life.
At the end of the month, we will be getting together to explore meditative yoga and to enjoy lunch and more discussion. Of course, we are also going to the movie in mid-August together as well. I am so looking forward to meeting again and again with this group of women as much as I look forward to the emails from wikispaces informing me that a new post has been made on our discussions.
Inevitably what we read, discuss and experience affects our teaching because it affects our lives. That’s important to remember as we work and play through the summer months. PLCs, PLNs, study groups, book groups, whatever your flavor, getting together with and enjoying the company of other teachers, whether you meet them in person or not, is an important part of being an inspired teacher.
How do you cater to your need for collegiality?
Don’t Let Your Cheese Get Moldy
In his parable, Who Moved My Cheese? (G.P.Putnam’s Sons, 1998), Spencer Johnson exposes many human behaviors as four characters (two mice and two Littlepeople) live in a maze searching daily for their cheese. Cheese is used as a metaphor for things we work for, need, and desire in life. It makes us happy.
The two Littlepeople find a cheese station filled with lots of cheese and they return to it day after day to enjoy the cheese that has become theirs. But then, one day they mosey over to their cheese station to find it’s gone! They are confused, angry and hurt. The disappearance of their cheese, this major change in their livelihood, has completely taken them by surprise.
It doesn’t occur to them that the cheese has not been taken away from them, nor has it just…disappeared. “Later, as Haw looked back on things, he realized that the Cheese at Cheese Station C had not just disappeared overnight, as he had once believed. The amount of Cheese that had been there toward the end had been getting smaller, and what was left had grown old. It didn’t taste as good.
Mold may even have begun to grow on the Old Cheese, although he hadn’t noticed it. He had to admit however, that if he had wanted to, he probably could have seen what was coming. But he didn’t.
Haw now realized that the change probably would not have taken him by surprise if he had been watching what was happening all along and if he had anticipated change.” (p. 51)
I learned so much as I pondered this idea, realizing how much this relates to our education system. To put it bluntly, our education system is getting moldy and we need to look for some new cheese! The signs have been there for quite some time. Our children are not equipped fully for the workforce.
I know there are exceptions and there are plenty of kids who “make it”(I’d like to think I’m one of them), but the world is buzzing with the issue of workforce preparedness (and I’d like to also emphasize the need to instill positive culture into our children). Our world is different. We live in a world of overflowing information. Change occurs in drastic measures daily and yet, our education system does not.
Johnson reminds us, “If you do not change, you can become extinct.” I would hate to see this happen to public education. Public education is too important! But there needs to be change. (Thankfully there are wonderful examples of this change across the country. Please share those stories!)
And then there is the issue of testing… that’s like taking a piece of molding cheese and putting it on a stale piece of toast. Hungry now? Well, neither are our kids.
I was reading an article from AFT’s summer 2010 American Educator which features an article called “In Need of a Renaissance” by Diane Ravitch. Ravitch is a former Assistant Secretary of Education (2005) who once fully backed NCLB. Now, she sees its ineffectiveness and is working towards change. (You can make your own opinion on how well she’s doing with that.) But, one thing is for sure:
She smells the mold.
This is thinking grandly, and you may feel very detached from the real goings on in education “reform” at the national or even state level. But we teachers have the ability to sniff out the mold. In fact, I believe we are the real proponents for change! We, the teachers, are the means for real reform. Teachers are with the children and families that make up our communities and teachers have the power to advocate for what education should be.
Change from the ground up can start in our own schools and classrooms. Johnson encourages us to “Smell the cheese often so you know when it is getting old.”
How do I take this and apply it to my teaching? I plan to look more closely and more regularly at what I do in my own teaching. Are the students involved? Motivated? Owning their learning? Asking me questions?
There have been times when I look out at my class and see that what I’m doing just isn’t good enough. Sometimes I need to change on the spur of the moment, sometimes it is something I need to plan for, and there are some times when find myself not changing.
“The more important your cheese is to you, the more you want to hold on to it.” Those lessons and activities that have worked so well in the past, the ones that I have designed myself, put so much thought and effort into…they don’t work every year, with every class and in order to benefit my students, I need to remember not to give every student the same cheese. It’s at those times where I’ll need to remember, “The quicker you let go of old cheese, the sooner you find new cheese.”
Teachers always need to be on top of their game and often that means change. Well, it looks like I’m going to have a lot of sayings going through my head this summer as I prepare for next year, but I think I can simplify it by posting a one word sign in my room – Cheese!
How do you know when your cheese gets moldy?
Cheese, Fear and Laughing at Yourself
Fear
The Unknown.
Taking that first step.
Fear
Can be debilitating.
There are fears in life and fears in education. A fear of trying something new, changing with the times, giving it your all (even if it’s different) and giving something time to work. Chances are, if your reading this you may not be one of those teachers who is seen as extinct and unwilling to change, but we all feel this fear with things here and there, and it’s important to reflect on that from time to time.
Fear is a theme addressed in a short story Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson, M.D. (G.P.Putnam’s Sons, 1998) This parable about four characters living in a maze, trying to find cheese is a very eye opening story that exposes some truths about human nature. One is fear.
After becoming comfortable with their daily routine of going to one cheese station to eat their cheese, two of the characters, Hem and Haw (the Littlepeople) are struck with a horrifying surprise: their cheese is gone! But instead of moving on to find more, they get stuck in their own complex thinking. “Why is this happening to us?” “It’s not fair!” “Who moved my cheese?”
For quite some time, these two wallow in their own misery, continuously returning to an empty Cheese Station. But the idea of going back out into the maze frightens them. It is the unknown, getting out of their comfort zone. This fear makes them doubt themselves and it keeps them right where they are.
Sound familiar? Of course! That’s why this story is so powerful! We face these fears in our work and in our lives. Things change and we may not want to. We are in denial of change, we are comfortable with what we are doing (“It works just fine.”) or we tend to over think the situation which, in turn, keeps us right where we are instead of venturing out into a maze full of possibilities.
I see this often in education. A new curriculum is purchased, new administration comes in, teams are reconfigured, new people are hired and it overthrows things teachers have been doing for years. But it’s much more than a fear of change in the structure of things. It’s also a fear of the changing student in this ever changing world. And often teachers are stuck in what they are doing. “It’s always worked.” “These students just don’t get it.”
Sometimes I can get hung up by a fear of doing something different. Years ago, I had a group of middle school students that were not interested, not involved and not motivated by what I had been doing successfully with other classes. I dreaded the group and I knew they dreaded my class, but I plugged along and pushed myself to do what I had planned and had taught the other classes.
It was treacherous, but I feared changing what I was used to doing. Would I be able to pull something off? Would these kids respond to something different? Would I be wasting my time anyway? Why fail at something different? These kids were hard! Maybe I should just suffer through this one year and call it a wash. (Woah!)
I’ll never forget the ride home from school one day after having the class that just wasn’t getting it. It was one of those moments when I was in deep thought and all of a sudden I burst out and yelled at myself, “Of course they don’t get it! What are you thinking? You don’t get it!” And then I started laughing. The other drivers on the road must have thought I was a looney! Once I had that good look at how ridiculous I had been insisting that this class do things in a way that was not right for them, I decided to try something different.
Humor, or more specifically, “laughing at yourself” is one way Johnson illustrates to overcome your fear. After realizing “he had been held captive by his own fear,” Haw, one Littleperson does this and it helps him take his first step into change.
My moment in the car was my moment to laugh at myself. And it was the first step in me making change for that class. I decided to plan something different for them and to just do it. Instead of working traditionally out of the text, I forced myself to come up with other activities that were much more stimulating. After a short time, these students were actually enjoying themselves as they learned.
Not only did this positively affect this class, but it helped me evolve as a teacher. In fact, I ended up using more of the activities made for this class in my other classes with wonderful results.
Never underestimate the power of laughing at yourself and what you are doing (or not doing). Sometimes, when you take a step back, it seems ridiculous and that’s when you know it’s time for a change. Laughter can be the push you need to move away from the fear that immobilizes you.
“Finally, one day Haw began laughing at himself. ‘Haw, haw, look at us. We keep doing the same things over and over again and wonder why things don’t get better. If this wasn’t so ridiculous, it would be even funnier.’ “ (p.43)
Have you ever laughed your way out of fear?
I Love it Too!
One thing that I have learned from being in the non-profit world with an organization like Arts @ Large, that brings the art community together with the public school, is that you must have a passion for whatever it is that you do and that you what your company stands for. That is why attending this year’s Americans for the Arts Summit in June was an eye opener for me.
One day in March, I walked into the office and one of my bosses, Teri Sullivan, asked me if I would like to go to Baltimore this summer for an art conference. To be honest with you, after the words “Do you want to go”, I was pretty much sold on the idea. I mean being a college student, one doesn’t expect to be sent anywhere within the first couple of months of employment, so when the chance was presented, I was game.
From day one of the summit, I was embraced by people from across the nation that live, breathe, read, write, paint, dance and more, all in the name of the arts. People who would literally cry at the drop of a dime if you told them that art will be taken from our children’s school. People who would form an angry, yet very artistic, mob to march to the local government’s headquarters to demand that funding for the arts is continued. These warm-hearted people are about empowering the arts at all cost. The people that I met at this conference are more than passionate about the arts; they are all in love with the arts.
After figuring all this out, I spent at least ten minutes a day during the trip wondering, “Why would they send me?” Why would they send the 21 year-old, communications intern to this nationally known arts summit to represent our growing Midwest organization. And then (ironically, on the plane ride home) it all came together- I was sent on the trip because I am the young 21 year-old intern.
In order for me to ever truly be the best-suited candidate for this position, I would have to know and love the arts the way everyone at the summit did. Everyone here at Arts @ Large has the arts and education on the brain 24/7, and if I am to ever really become apart of this team, I will need to realize that I too am in a love affair with the arts. Realizing the role that Arts @ Large plays in spreading that feeling into art education and what that means for children is easy to do when you figure out that everyone is really connected to and through the arts.
One Word
In Elizabeth Gilbert’s New York Times Bestseller, Eat, Pray Love, she and a friend discuss the fact that every city -and every person- has a word. Rome’s is “sex”, the Vatican’s is “power,” New York’s is “achieve” and L.A.’s is “succeed”. When the friend turns to Elizabeth and asks “what is your word” she struggles to answer, and only later on in the novel does she discover her word. (Join the book group to find out what it is).
While turning this idea into a discussion question for the Eat, Pray Love book group, I decided I would try and also turn this “what is your word” idea into an end of the year project for my freshmen honor’s classes next year. I asked my husband his opinion and while bouncing ideas off him, he asked what I thought the word for the class of 2013 would be. “Heartbreak” was the first word out of my mouth, and “sadness” was a close second. Teaching this freshmen class was just that – heartbreaking and sad.
In February, we lost a freshman to suicide. The pain that class felt was palpable, and lasted right up until the last day of school. Unfounded accusations ran rampant that the student was bullied, and even after the parents issued a statement that the student had been dealing with depression his whole life, the rumors continued. Then, a couple of month’s later, tragedy hit the freshmen class again. We lost another student to a fatal car accident.
As a new teacher, I was at a loss as to how to help these students. Even the veteran teachers I work with were at times at a loss for words. We dropped our units on Romeo and Juliet and Antigone because we knew the pain was still so fresh. But it still seeped in. We were told that we needed to name what happened- that we needed to use the word suicide and not dance around the issue or romanticize what happened. Each time I said the word, I felt like I was piercing the hearts of my kids. I felt like I was treading water, even more so then usual.
So I joined a yoga class. Mostly because I wanted 10 minutes where I would just relax and not think. Detachment is one of the principles taught in yoga. Through this detachment, we are asked to “relinquish our need for control, thereby allowing creative solutions to emerge from the wisdom of the uncertain”. We were asked to also try this in our own lives. Easier said then done, if you asked me, but I decided to try it with my students.
I sat down and had a long talk with my kids. I discovered that the deaths most affected my special needs kids. I asked them what we could do to better help the climate of our school. The said they wanted to raise awareness about bullying by selling anti-bullying bracelets. So, that’s exactly what we did. We ordered 300 blue and white bands that said “Be Your Own H.E.R.O.” on one side and “Help Everyone Reach Out” on the other. They sold out in 1 week. We also started a Facebook page and have over 200 members. It was an amazing experience.
On the last day of school, many students popped in to say their goodbyes. While watching these mature, young adults leave I realized two things. First, the word for this class is in fact not “heartbreak” or “sadness” at all – but “strength”. And second, I think I may have learned more from them then I thought I did.
What is your word?
