The ultimate goal of the educational system is to shift to the individual the burden of pursuing his own education. This will not be a widely shared pursuit until we get over our odd conviction that education is what goes on in school buildings and nowhere else. Not only does education continue when schooling ends, but it is not confined to what may be studied in adult education courses. The world is an incomparable classroom and life is a memorable teacher for those who aren't afraid of her.~John Gardner "Self-Renewal" (1964)
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Rummaging...
This morning I ran across one of my notes, jotted down on a single sheet of blue steno paper, the words faded from age. It was stuck in the pages of a book I read in high school I pulled off the shelf again the other day. It's a reminder that school reform is nothing new.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
A New Beginning...
New Years has passed me by but not without my annual dose of reflection on the past 12 months of life.
Yes...time has passed and we're back - hard at it inside the walls of schooling. As I struggled with my own harsh self-evaluation of hurting people's feelings this past year, I discovered something author David Allan calls disintegrated self-trust. Listening to "Getting Things Done" (abridged) over the holidays was exactly what I needed. David Allen talks about the word "stuff" and makes meaning of your life. It's about stuff becoming unmanagable and you don't even know it...and I could relate. It reminds me of what Thomas Friedman describes in his awakening of "The World is Flat".
But before the book, I reached out for help from my slow-growing network of people leaders, and the network came through thanks to my twitter friend mikesansone. He pointed out that it would be bad form to delete a post but that it would be better instead to post a part 2 or some sort of follow up. I hope I have.
In 2006, a team of classroom teachers PK-12 were given time away from their teaching for a half a day a month to participate in Kal-Tech leadership training with their technology coordinator and Kal-Tech mentor. We were on our way to a new landscape and we were blazing the trails for instruction in educational technology and trying to share this passion with district staff. It's only been two years and the landscape has shifted already. The more we learn, the more we want to learn and we've found learning is empowering. It helps us change the world one byte at a time. We believe this learning can be used as a catalyst for building supportive communities of practice by studying together, using inquiry, exploration, and real-world questioning to help children learn. So is the mission of the LTT.
In the audio book Tribes, we should heed the words of author Seth Godin who draws out the differences between Crowds and Tribes when he says: Tribes have a passionate mission - not just a common idea...they're not about stuff - they're about connection.
USD 352 technology planning has always strived to build an innovative model for creativity & innovation in the classroom using technology as a catalyst for learning. But horizontal to this philosophy, it's imperative we build relationships with students to help them understand the power of learning.
Yes...time has passed and we're back - hard at it inside the walls of schooling. As I struggled with my own harsh self-evaluation of hurting people's feelings this past year, I discovered something author David Allan calls disintegrated self-trust. Listening to "Getting Things Done" (abridged) over the holidays was exactly what I needed. David Allen talks about the word "stuff" and makes meaning of your life. It's about stuff becoming unmanagable and you don't even know it...and I could relate. It reminds me of what Thomas Friedman describes in his awakening of "The World is Flat".
But before the book, I reached out for help from my slow-growing network of people leaders, and the network came through thanks to my twitter friend mikesansone. He pointed out that it would be bad form to delete a post but that it would be better instead to post a part 2 or some sort of follow up. I hope I have.
In 2006, a team of classroom teachers PK-12 were given time away from their teaching for a half a day a month to participate in Kal-Tech leadership training with their technology coordinator and Kal-Tech mentor. We were on our way to a new landscape and we were blazing the trails for instruction in educational technology and trying to share this passion with district staff. It's only been two years and the landscape has shifted already. The more we learn, the more we want to learn and we've found learning is empowering. It helps us change the world one byte at a time. We believe this learning can be used as a catalyst for building supportive communities of practice by studying together, using inquiry, exploration, and real-world questioning to help children learn. So is the mission of the LTT.
In the audio book Tribes, we should heed the words of author Seth Godin who draws out the differences between Crowds and Tribes when he says: Tribes have a passionate mission - not just a common idea...they're not about stuff - they're about connection.
USD 352 technology planning has always strived to build an innovative model for creativity & innovation in the classroom using technology as a catalyst for learning. But horizontal to this philosophy, it's imperative we build relationships with students to help them understand the power of learning.
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