Teacher Checks the Label and Sees that it Fits
In a very refreshing article by The Washington Post, one teacher examines his own practices, and those of his colleagues, after his school is labeled “Low Achieving”. While I’m sure some will read this article and find lots to rail against, for this one teacher, at least, he is using it as an opportunity to make changes to face the current realities – not as he would like them to be, but as they are.
It’s refreshing to hear someone, anyone, take responsibility for something. His ownership of the problem does not excuse all of the other factors that happened to create the problems in his school, however, it does mean for that the one’s over which he has some control, things are likely to improve. And maybe that inspires the next person, and the next person, and before you know it – everybody’s rowing in the same direction.
March 24, 2010
Tags: Education, responsibility, T.C. Williams High School Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web 
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Ken Robinson Nails It In One Sound Bite
Ken Robinson gave a memorable presentation at TED in 2006, you can watch it below. The last story he tells is especially moving.
March 21, 2010
Tags: creativity, Education, Humor, Ken Robinson Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
File Under: We’re Going to Need a Bigger Filing Cabinet
I love people. I even love gamers. I know it’s the raging fad to get down on video game playing teens; however, young people today (like young people of every age) have heart and soul, even video game playing teens. Check it out.
March 4, 2010
Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
Citizen Seniors
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When somebody I meet learns that I am a high school teacher, a conversation like this often follows:
“I could never do that,” the person will say. “I would end up killing the kids.”
“No, actually the kids make the job worthwhile,” I’ll respond. “It’s all about the kids.”
“Still, teens are so rude these days. They have no respect for anybody. And half of them look like they’re on drugs or are angry at the world or something. I could never do it.”
While I agree that it takes a different kind of person to work with teens, it is unfortunate how many people who don’t work with kids, don’t know the truth about this generation of young people. Teens today, even the scary ones, often exhibit great compassion for others, and many are involved in service work, social action, and efforts to make the world better.
Recently the seniors at Gobles High School finished work on their senior legacy projects. The projects are self-designed and include both academic requirements (research, writing, interviewing, and presenting), and also some kind of community engagement project, which might be service work, volunteering, mentoring, raising awareness, or doing a project to improve some corner of the world. The challenge to the seniors is to “leave a legacy”, or a specific way they want to be remembered after they’ve graduated and gone out into the world.
Though I couldn’t possibly tell you about all the great work students did this year, a quick sample includes the young man who researched autism and worked with a younger autistic student at the school, and a presentation to his peers with a tear in his eye about how important it is to look past disability to see a human on the other side. Or the young woman who had experienced foster care as a younger teen, and focused her presentation and service work on the critical role of foster care in the lives of so many million children in our country. Or the young woman who has known too many teen mothers in her life, and researched and presented on the perils of teen pregnancy, communicating a message of abstinence, responsibility, and life. Or the young man who began weaving and selling handmade bracelets to raise money and awareness about shoeless children in countries ravaged by poverty and disease. Or the young woman raising money to support the work of missionaries to build a library in Africa. And on, and on, and on. And these kids stood loud and proud in front of their peers and talked about what it is they believe in and are working to make real.
As the adult in the room, the teacher, I listened to these seniors present and saw again that teenagers are some of the most important citizens in the world. They have such noble, romantic ideas about life, change, responsibility, and success.
So if you haven’t been around a teenager lately I hope you get a chance soon, especially if you find them to be a little scary. It is impossible to be cynical when teenagers start sharing the great love they have for others, and the great belief they have in the promise of the future we all share. In my experience, we’re in great hands.
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| Copyright ©2010 Corey Harbaugh |
March 3, 2010
Posted in: Tilting at Windmills by Corey Harbaugh No Comments
Giving Volunteers A Hand
If you want something to get done, ask somebody who is already busy. It’s one of those strange but true facts of life, and thank goodness. If the state of the world were left to the people who weren’t busy doing one thing or another, we’d be in trouble. Nothing would get done. It’s a great example of the 80/20 principle: 80% of the work gets done by 20% of the people. Just watch a road crew at a construction site next time you’re driving down the highway and you’ll see what I mean.
My mother-in-law and her twin sister both fit into the busy category. Whether it’s putting together car shows that raise money for local charities, planning and working behind the scenes at the Fall Festival, or generating thousands of dollars of revenue every school year for Gobles athletic programs in the concession stands, they are “can do” people, and they get it done. Consider the trouble that goes into making sure spectators have a bag of popcorn when they come up to the high school for the big game.
The work of the concession stand is not a three-hour job every other Friday night. It starts days before with generating a shopping list and making a trip to a bulk food store in Kalamazoo for nacho cheese, hot chocolate mix, pretzels with salt, etc., then cooking and preparing food for the better part of a day before the game.
Game day the prep work is underway in the concession stand long before athletes are on the field: there are shelves to be stocked, weenies to roast, drinks to chill, popcorn to pop, and systems to get ready for kick off. Then finally, long after the spectators have gone home and the lights of the stadium are dimmed, the work finally finishes when the dishes are done, the floor is swept, cupboards and coolers are restocked, and everything is back in place.
I can’t imagine what the school would have to pay somebody to do all that work, but we couldn’t afford it. And they do it for free, out of a sense of helping make our schools better to the tune of thousands of dollars every year. This is money the athletic program needs to run programs at the school that doesn’t have to come out of other budgets for things like paper and text books and those test forms with the bubbles on them for the #2 pencils. Every little chili dog helps, and somebody has to make them, serve them, and clean up the mess afterwards.
In this day of budget cuts and financial woes, volunteers like Carol and Susan make a huge difference. And there are untold dozens of others around here who fit in the busy volunteer category, who are making a difference for the programs and organizations that are the backbone of life as we know it. During Homecoming week I knew I could call on a neighbor for help with digging out a mud pit, and that he’d help if he could. And sure enough, he and his wife took time and trouble to do something that helped a couple of hundred kids have a great experience at Homecoming. Years from now nobody will remember who dug the mud pit for the tug-of-war, but these young people will surely remember the fun they had that evening.
It’s easy to feel powerless about the financial challenges facing the schools and other important, under-funded organizations. What can anyone of us do alone? It would be great if everybody could just write a nice fat check to the schools and be done with it, but this community is a little short of Rockefellers.
I suggest that making a huge difference doesn’t really require doing anything more than rolling up the sleeves and pitching in where you can, just like that small percentage of very busy people already doing 80% of the work. Who needs Rockefellers when you have people willing to give a hand? No amount of money can buy the spirit of community, and serving others is priceless.
Copyright ©2010 Corey Harbaugh
March 3, 2010
Posted in: Tilting at Windmills by Corey Harbaugh No Comments
Private vs Public
Working at the Chicago Public Schools has given me an opportunity to see the best that public education has to offer. Unfortunately, I’ve also seen the worst. Similarly, being a parent of a K-12 aged daughter has given me an opportunity to be the best kind of public school parent, and also the worst.
Given my perspective and experiences, on which side of the battle between public and private school education do I fall? Unable and unwilling to judge any parent trying to make their way in this world and do right by their children.
Because of the recession, kids are leaving private school. – By Katharine Mieszkowski – Slate Magazine via kwout
March 3, 2010
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Munching on Lotus
Here’s a fun visit to a dream utopia of an educational “what if”. It’s too simple, which is why it will never happen…at least not until they find a way to make it seem much more complicated.
February 2, 2010
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The Real Digital Divide: 5 year olds vs 10 year olds
This excellent article outlines exactly the experience we’ve been having in our house. My 6 year old is better able to navigate online and new media than her mother…and expects everything to be a touch screen. And she gets far less time “online” than almost any other child we know…maybe 1/2 hour to an hour a day… more sometimes on weekends. (this includes TV, games, computers, iphone (ours not hers)) Still her ability to navigate it all is a wonder to see and an experience I’m sure is shared by every other parent.
January 25, 2010
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The Best Text Message Decoding Website, For My BFF’s
I love this website! And if you, like me, are texting illiterate, then this website is for you! Billed as the largest list of text message short hand and internet acronyms, it will help you unlock the secrets hidden in the text messages you receive and more importantly the ones you found while snooping on your son’s cell phone.
Have a look, then start using them at random in your own online messaging.
Till then, remember this:
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January 25, 2010
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Do You Know Where Your Kids Are?
Finally an answer to the age old horror film question, “Do you know where you kids are?” They’re online….like you. Send ‘em a text and tell ‘em you love them. Better yet, text them and tell them you “pwn them”.
January 25, 2010
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Bill Gates, Optimist Putting His Money Where His Mouth His
One of my favorite items in Newsweek is the My Turn section that features first person stories by everyday folks…like billionaire Bill Gates. Still, his passion for education cannot be denied.
January 25, 2010
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The Power of Networks (of the Personal Nature)
The New York Times had a great week this week. There are 4 or 5 great articles I could link to. Each one, in its own way, I believe, supports the philosophy of our work at Wavelength. Perhaps none better than this one Your Friends Are Making You Fat. This article pulls together so many things we talk about at Wavelength. The importance of networking. The benefits of humor and positivity. It also talks about the Sociogram, an exercise Wavelength uses in its Learning Communities Workshop. Read it and share it. After all, you’re actions ripple across your relationships in strange and lovely ways.
Other great articles in the New York Times this week include:
When a Parent’s ‘I Love You’ Means ‘Do as I Say’
High-Five Nation
Time Magazine also had a really interesting article about the way dogs learn
The Secrets Inside Your Dog’s Mind
September 16, 2009
Tags: Education, Humor, networks, sociogram, Wavelength Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
Great Networking Websites
September 4, 2009
Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web, Professional Learning Communities No Comments
Swine Flu…Wake Me When It’s June
Dr. Gupta offers advice to parents on H1N1 – CNN.com http://bit.ly/zYvV4
September 2, 2009
Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
From the “Even if it’s True I Don’t Believe It” File
Good Morning. Today is opposite day. Up is down, left is right, and right is wrong.
The Teen Brain: The More Mature, the More Reckless – TIME http://bit.ly/3UGWFk
September 2, 2009
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First Picture of a Molecule
I’m not a science junky…but this is pretty cool. Next, scientist hope to use the microscope to see something even smaller…a teacher’s paycheck.
Single molecule, one million times smaller than a grain of sand, pictured for first time | Mail Online http://bit.ly/3BmSwz
Single molecule, one million times smaller than a grain of sand, pictured for first time | Mail Online via kwout
August 29, 2009
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Adversity Can Lead to Higher Performance
In today’s New York Times, Harvard researcher Shawn Anchor says adversity can lead to significant growth spurts for some. In the article he was referring to the economy and the stress of starting up a new business.
“…factors, combined with the lack of a steady paycheck, often-inadequate health insurance and the sheer emotional stress of being unemployed, may prevent many people from setting out on their own.
But research on what is known as post-traumatic growth has found that some people become more resilient when faced with adversity, says Shawn Achor, a Harvard researcher. Creativity surges, he says, as they adapt to a new situation.
“Their brain is actually learning at a faster pace than when they are not challenged,” Mr. Achor says. “As a result of this, some individuals, the accidental entrepreneurs, they are the ones who in the midst of crisis actually respond with growth.”
I believe this to be true in my own life and think it’s another great reason not to be too quick to rescue students when they are struggling.
August 28, 2009
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Education Week – Digital Education Worth Checking Out
Katie Ash blogs about the intersection of digital media and education for Education Week and links to great articles on the web, as well as, provides valuable insights and strategies for educators embracing technology in their schools. Check it out.
August 28, 2009
Tags: computers, digital, education week, katie ash, new media, technology Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
Early Education Just Got Easier
August 20, 2009
Tags: babies, children, early education, Parenting Posted in: Foraged Media - The Best of the Web No Comments
One for the Books
One of the things I like best about doing Wavelength shows is that every performance is a unique event made possible by that particular combination of Wavelength actors and audience members. And even though as performers we know what we’re going to do and say (for the most part), we never know what’s going to happen. It’s a truism about live performances in general and about Wavelength shows specifically that the audience is the single biggest influence on the success of a show. That educators enjoy our keynotes and workshops really says more about them than it does about us. For instance, the way an audience laughs at a joke or scene changes what we the performers are doing on the stage. We feed off of the audience and try to give back the energy we receive.
As educators, you probably experience this in the classroom. Ever been in front of a classroom of students when they’re really into what you’re teaching; how energized you get and how easy it seems? Sometimes they do all the work. It’s the same for us. Case in point, I am currently finishing the last leg of a long travel day back to Chicago from Texas, and I am still laughing thinking about Deborah G. from Royce City, TX.
Now it is not uncommon for us to meet wonderful educators who come up on stage for the audience participation part of the show (our favorite part of the show by the way) and it is usually the case that they get the biggest laughs of the show. [Please note future volunteers, the secret is to just be yourself...volunteers who ham it up are not usually as well received as volunteers who just go with the flow]. However, Deborah G. joined the Pantheon of Wavelength volunteers today with a story that had everyone in tears of laughter.
I can’t do justice to what Deborah said that had us cracking up so hard, so I won’t even try. What I can tell you is that at one point, while Deborah was on stage, I looked around and everyone in Wavelength had completely lost it and it was pandemonium in the audience. I believe those moments are spiritual; hundreds of educators laughing together with, and not at, their colleagues. They have a special healing and bonding power that extends beyond the moment and throughout the rest of the school year.
I think I can speak for Wavelength when I say it is an honor to share those moments with you. We like making you laugh and wish to thank Deborah and audience members like her for making us laugh just as hard.
August 20, 2009
Tags: audience, Education, in the moment, laughter, spiritual, Texas Posted in: Notes From the Road No Comments
