From the Principal's Desk

Twitter Teaches Me Again

This one's not so much something I learned today, but something I re-learned with quite a specific example after having realized it a couple of years ago.

Namely, that Twitter can be such a powerful learning tool, not just because of the ideas of individual tweets, but because of the intersection of those tweets and twitterers.

Earlier this evening, I noticed a tweet from @TheGilch regarding an NPR item - it pointed out how Wordle had been used to take a look at two speeches, one from Khameini and one from Moussavi, in Iran.
I think Wordle's a neat thing, so I clicked on the link in @TheGilch's tweet, and read the full NPR post. Very interesting stuff - about Wordle, about what's going on in Iran, about Twitter.

So I retweeted @TheGilch's post.

At that point, two of my followers, @GardenGlen and @lbott, retweeted my retweet.

And @GardenGlen added the following comment:  "Great use of Wordle 4 comparisons".

I was interested because of the "neat" factor of Wordle, and the issues swirling around Iran.  To be honest, I wasn't even thinking about educational uses.  But @GardenGlen's comment was such an "aha" - Oh, holy smokes, what an AWESOME way to teach students to compare/contrast two sides of an issue, two speeches on a topic, whatever... I've talked with staff about using Wordle to let students see key themes in a piece of writing... but using TWO Wordles to compare/contrast?  Hadn't even occurred to me!

So here you have it...

• A really interesting item I saw because of a tweet from one person
• Two other people who may have also seen that same neat item because they follow me, and happened to be noticing my tweets at that particular time (I think one or both may also follow @TheGilch, but may have missed her original tweet due to timing)
• Those two people then retweeted the item out to an even broader audience - so who knows who else may have seen and thought about it?
• And one of them kicked the tweet around with an idea tying it to education and an awesome use with students... a connection that completely escaped me the first time around... but that I can't wait to share with some of our teachers.

Yes, the power of Twitter... who knew? 

I wonder if Ashton Kutcher retweets anything I could learn from?  ;)

What I Learned About Living Longer

Six ways to live longer, according to More magazine:

• Live a "boring" (aka conscientious) life
• Embrace your age
• Move to an older neighborhood
• Drink some coffee
• Add spices to your meals
• Hang out with happy people

I've got several of these covered, but can definitely do more.

And how's this for an odd fact?  People with lots of moles (more than 100) seem to live longer than those without.  Nothing I can do about that, but I'm working on getting more sleep, and I've got the whole wide-hips thing down pat.   ;)

What I've Learned Over the Past Week

In a tough economy, vendors are a whole lot quicker, and a whole lot more thorough, at filling purchase requests.  Understandably, they want to get orders filled so they can get bills paid.

Of course, it would have been helpful if I'd thought that through as we arranged for all of our purchases related to our new construction.  Here would be the typical thinking:

Certificate of Occupancy for one building: likely for June 15
Certificate of Occupancy for remaining buildings:  likely for July 15
Want items to arrive no later than:  August 1
Want items to arrive no earlier than:  July 1

Okay, so figuring (the old way) that it would take at least 8 weeks to get orders filled, you place the orders in early May, figuring everything will start coming in early July, and you'll be all set. 

But, just to encourage those go-getters, you say you'll start accepting deliveries as of June 1.  You figure, hey, most won't be ready then, but for those few who are, you can get their orders to arrive on campus and be accounted for.  So what if you don't have any room to store anything - there can't be THAT much that would come that early, right?

Oh, but you didn't account for the bad economy.  And so here's what you wind up with, on June 9, sitting in your cafeteria with nowhere else to go:

Did I mention that this is supposed to be a functioning cafeteria, since many of our programs operate year-round?

You have no idea how much I am hoping and praying that we get that CO as expected on Monday.

You also have no idea how glad I am that we're closed on Fridays in the summer - one less day for more stuff to arrive this week.

Now that I've learned this, I'll be sure to remember this the next time I'm involved in the construction of a new school.

What I Learned, Sunday edition

This information comes from More magazine, and is in an article specifically about brain function and memory in people over 40, so of course I'm interested in this from a personal standpoint.

"Brain" by Dierk Schaefer, available at Flickr through Creative Commons attribution

But I'm also wondering about the connections here for educators.

"Human learning is primarily subtractive. It's controlled forgetting, learning how to forget in a smart enough way so that you can focus on what's left in your cognitive landscape... Recently we've learned that most midlife memory fading isn't about memory after all. That is, it's not about retrieval mechanisms. It turns out that what middle-life brains have a really hard time doing is blocking out unnecessary information."

I wonder if this is a skill our schools can teach our students, who - because of the rapid pace at which things come at them - may experience this challenge well before midlife?

"The type of stress that most harms the brain arises when you feel a lack of control over negative situations...It arises when you can't control when or how often the stressor hits you and when you can't control its severity once it arrives. ..research has shown that when people do feel in control, they can have a negative experience without being stressed [which in turn boosts memory]."

Connections to school and to our students are multiple, and obvious, with that.

And finally,

"The bottom line is, aerobic exercise boosts brainpower, including the ability to pay attention to things and get back your capacity for controlled forgetting."

30 minutes, three times a week.

And with that bit of learning, I'm going to get off the couch and go get some exercise...

What I Learned - Saturday June 6

Okay, so I already knew this, but still, it was a good reminder.

Having your email server down at work is both a curse and a blessing.

Went in to work today to get things done in a quiet office, and discovered right away that the email server was down.  Curses!

I got a lot done, anyway, without being fixated on my inbox.  Got some documents written, organized some items in my office, analyzed some data printouts, prepared some of our construction-related orders, signed a bunch of papers.

But I also had to keep adding to my list of emails I needed to send, related to all of these things, once the server is back up again.

Grrrr.

I guess it's probably a good thing, to have email out of commission every once in a while - allows you to focus in on other things. 

But only once in a while.

What I Learned Today

Today is the first day of our Summer 2009 term.  Wow.  Hard to believe it.

I was thinking yesterday about those conversations around the dinner table, the whole "what did you learn in school today?" approach that was part of my life growing up.  We didn't label it as such then, but it was a form of reflection, by learners, about their learning. 

So today, the start of our new term, I've decided to start a series of "What I Learned Today".  How regular will this series be?  Who knows - I've not got the best track record for regular and consistent blogging.  But we'll see how it goes.  Much of it will be simply for my own good, my own acknowledgment and growth.  But hey, if it provides any thinking or ideas or feedback from others, that's a happy bonus.

So what did I learn today?

Today I learned about Florida's updated School Improvement Plan template.  It's more complicated than prior templates - they do seem to get more and more complex every year! - but it was also helpful to learn of the ways in which the district offices will provide assistance in the completion of the plan.

There are some interesting pieces to it - a request for a narrative of the history/background of the school (a nice touch, I think, as it makes the plan, and the school, more than merely its numbers and test scores); the addition of information about how the school pursues the Continuous Improvement Model (Plan/Do/Check/Act); and a section on the implementation of RtI, which is certainly going to be a key focus for all schools this coming year.

One of the unfortunate things about the plan is that, because of its complexity, it's very long.  That's unfortunate because it makes it difficult to use the plan day-in, day-out, with all staff familiar with it, as something to guide improvement.  In response to that challenge, our district leadership has developed a far-more-simplified, School Focus Plan, that will flow from the SIP and be something that could be used with all staff, on a regular basis, to keep us focused on our targets.  I was pleased to see that document - I think it will be a useful template for us.

And so, with the wrap up to the 08-09 year, with the feedback from staff in our end-of-year meetings, and with the data on the performance of our students, we now turn our focus toward 09-10, and what we'll do to continue to improve our students' achievement and success.

An Urban Legend

Today I heard someone say she was "winding down" the school year.

Say what?

Teachers are working hard to get final projects, assignments, and topics out, back in, graded.  Students are scrambling to turn in work, make the grade.  Clubs are holding year-end events.  We're prepping for end of year awards, banquets, activities, graduation.

Everyone - students, teachers, staff, administration - trying to maintain sanity, and stay focused and sharp, as eyes turn toward the summer.

Checking in inventory, wrapping up accounts, analyzing incoming test data, collecting textbooks. For some, getting summer term plans ready, students registered, materials in place.

Throw in a once-every-seven years reaccreditation visit, and a once-in-a-career major facilities move, and I think the phrase "winding up" is more appropriate.

Does anyone really get to wind down a year?

Taking a Break

Hope everyone's enjoying their Spring Break.  I'm at work this week, along with a dozen or so others, and am working hard to catch up on my overly-long to-do list, while also trying to wrap up our furniture and equipment orders for the second phase of construction, due to be complete in July.

I haven't yet had a chance to publicly recognize here on the blog a number of people who've achieved some remarkable things lately...

The GED graduates, from LWIT and from other programs throughout Collier County, ranging in age from their teens to their eighties, who persisted through challenges to meet an important goal for themselves.

Our fabulous teacher, Anne Fredette, who was recently named Collier County's Postsecondary Teacher of the Year.  Her dedication to her students, and her work with our incredibly generous partner, Moorings Park, is inspiring to all who witness it.

One of our high school teachers, Richard Ponton, who has put together a fantastic video about LWIT that we'll be using in lots of ways (look for it here, soon).

It surely is quiet (but productive) around work this week.  Looking forward to seeing all of you back again, next week... probably sporting some great tans.  :)

Never Gonna Give You Up*

* With apologies to Rick Astley

One of our teachers had one of those treasured educator experiences yesterday, and she was kind enough to share it with me.  She had received a letter from a former student - a student who was by no means an "easy" student to teach, one who had in fact given both this teacher and others quite a challenging time in terms of behavior, engagement, and all-around efforts to reach him.

In the letter, he shared his current situation, which unfortunately is not a good one.  But his letter showed a mature ability to reflect on his choices and actions, and it showed the intelligence we all knew he possessed despite his actions and performance in school; his letter thanked this teacher for her efforts with him, despite the challenges he had presented to her and to others.  He shared that, despite his current situation, he was taking steps to try to improve his life, and he specifically reflected on some things he was doing that were a direct reflection on the work he had done with this teacher.

We can never give up on our students.  Never, never, never, never, never. 

They may give up on us; they may give up on school; they may give up on themselves. 

But our job is to be sure that we never give up on them. 

This doesn't mean turning a blind eye to their faults, or not holding them accountable for their actions (and, in fact, sometimes doing so is the strongest message we can send that we are not giving up on them). 

It does mean, however, that even when we have one of those days when a student has driven us past the last bit of our patience - and, no matter who we are, we eventually get those experiences with students - we have to handle the situation in front of us the best that we can; go home that night; shake the negative or discouraging elements of the experience off; reflect on how we can proceed forward; and show up in school the next day, ready to start fresh.

We never know WHEN it is that a student will turn things around; we never know WHAT it is that will make a positive impact; we never know exactly HOW it might be that we can help make that positive impact happen. 

But signing on to be an educator means signing on to being an eternal optimist - we believe that what we do can positively shape the lives of our students. 

There are days that's hard to remember; there are students with whom that's harder to keep in mind.  But it's part of our obligation.  It's part of our mission.  And, it's a huge part of what makes teaching the amazing, life-changing profession that it is.

The Learning Shark

Over the course of the past couple of weeks, I've been reading segments of our postsecondary reaccreditation self-study; participating in an accreditation site visit for our postsecondary culinary program; visiting classes; and reviewing lots of lesson plans.

And I am reminded once again of the fact that no one has good ideas or strategies for everything, but everyone has good ideas or strategies for something.  There are areas of excellence, and those who could grow professionally from that excellence, all over our campus, among all our faculty.  The first year teacher who is a model of self-reflection and uses that to improve her practice; the second and third year teachers who know how to develop differentiated lessons to meet the needs of a range of learners; the experienced teacher who can help a student take a practical, hands-on experience and not only master it, but use it to develop more abstract knowledge; the teacher with decades of experience who builds a class around projects that develop students' judgment, critical thinking, and evaluative abilities.

The challenge, as always in education, is to see that the time, place, motivation, and opportunity are there to share and learn from one another's excellence.  As written in WWBDAW, "Consider the shark, who must constantly move forward or die. He must keep moving through the water, so that the water will move through him, bringing him oxygen, keeping him alive. So too does your organization need to keep moving, or it will die. Learning is endless, and the more you know, the more you realize how much you don't know."

Building a learning organization that is that way by design, not by chance, involves growing one shark at a time into a learning shark, while at the same time getting all the sharks to swim together.

Hmmm, not sure I like the analogy of "swimming with sharks" that this post just grew into, but I think you get my point.  :)