Thoughts As A Teacher

"You can't get there from here." I heard a story where a woman from the country got lost in the city.  She stopped and asked  a man for directions.  The man keep starting and stopping his instructions, confusing himself in the process.  Finally, after much frustration he blurted out; "you can't get there from here!" Sometimes we go down the wrong path with a lesson.  Maybe it's a PBL or Genius Hour lesson we have started with our class and don't know where we are or where we need to proceed to.  You really have two choices in a situation like that.  Either we can (easiest) 1) Give up and say "well at least we tried, maybe next year." Or 2) We can t ake a few steps back and try again from another angle until we get our bearings.  The later is the harder approach of course...but wouldn't we be modeling for our students the old saying; "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again (and it's OK to make mistakes)?...

“We must create interdependent relationships to be considered a team.” ~ Rick DuFour Relationships is the oil that turns the gears of collaboration.  In does not matter if the collaboration taking effect is between a married couple, a family, a corporation, a military unit, a group of educators or a group of students.  The stronger the relationship, the more effective the collaboration.  Unfortunately, many organizations (and Schools are no exception) spend very little time on relationship building (also known as "team building").   They feel that "people will naturally click" because they are supposedly working towards the same goal.   If a relationship is not strong; people will not trust each other.  When people trust each other a strong relationship is built.  People who trust each other allow themselves to be vulnerable to one another.  They let their guard down and share things with others in their group.  This breeds...

Urban areas have many problems such as overcrowding, crime, poverty, and pollution, but they have advantages as well, such as people's innovation and creativity. I believe that urbanization (which is the human movement from the rural or farming area to a urban or city area) has brought the explosion of innovation we have seen in the last century.   For centuries, people lived in rural areas until the Industrial Revolution.  In 1900 only 15% of the world’s population lived in urban areas; but 107 years later in 2007 over 50% of the world’s population does. 1  So what happened when human beings who for centuries only knew a handful of people their whole lives suddenly started interacting with hundreds?  Increased collaboration happened, that’s what.   Now, Collaboration is a “purposeful relationship in which all parties strategically choose to cooperate in order to achieve shared or overlapping objectives." 2  When people get together, the...

First of all (to hopeful clear up any misconceptions and false perceptions), I am in no way knocking Educators that were good at "doing school."  You know; the ones who got all straight "A" were always on the Honor Roll and graduated Valedictorian and so on.  My early life would not have been nearly as hard if I had done all that (or at least graduated).   Now that I've (hopefully) cleared that up... I was never good at doing "school" myself.  If I could get out of doing school work I would.  Homework was a terror at my house, especially math homework.  My dad would yell at me when I got a problem wrong (it was the 70s) and I got to the point where I would hide my homework (until my dad found out).  In middle school, I gave the teachers such a hard time, they started "passing me" just so they didn't have to deal with me the next year.  In High School my wicked ways caught up with me.  First I repeated the 9th grade, then after star...