More Super-Meme-Tag Fun

Tag-meme.  You're it.  Mmmm....

While I'm frustrated (he smiles) that David Warlick managed just last night to tag Chris before I posted this entry, I'm gonna roll through that and just enjoy seeing the Practical Theory tag-meme hand-off soon.

Thanks to Carolyn Foote who authors the "Not So Distant Future" blog (and lives and oversees a public school library in Texas, as well) for tagging me the other day. 

Pleased to see that she had been tagged by Karl Fisch who put together one of my absolute edu-joys of 2007 (the "2020 Vision" video -- hint, go watch it now...and pass it along!  BTW, I'm bringing it with me to Germany and to Holland in the next 3 months to show various school architects...and push their thinking, in the process!).

My 5 things (you may not have known about me) tag list:

1. My wife, Karla, is the adult I hope to one day grow up and become.  My son, Beckett, is the child I hope to also one day become. Both are the very reason I get up each day.
2. My first 'teaching' role came when my parents volunteered me to be a summer camp counselor-in-training for a United Cerebral Palsy sponsored called Camp Capella in central Maine.  I was 14.  I was frustrated I couldn't stay home and hang with my buddies, watch TV, play soccer, climb trees, think about girls.  I was also scared because I'd never been around someone in a wheelchair or with MS or with Downs or who could only 'blink' their words.  Then things changed.  The kids won me over.  Showed me how far the human spirit could go.   And kids in wheelchairs who were set 'free' in the lake.   Hooked me forever.  I went back by choice the following year. And the next.  And have always been thankful that this is where it all started. 
3. A few years back, I made a promise to thru-hike all 2,200 miles of the original Appalachian Trail before I turned 40.  I have approximately 3 years and 115 days to get a pair of decent hiking boots on and park the car on the front end in Georgia.  And figure out how to get that 5-month sabbatical from work and home.  This dream ain't over 'til the walking stick snaps or even if I blow out my 40th birthday candles first.
4. The tipping point moment my view and expectations of teaching/learning changed -- or pushed me over the edge -- came the winter/spring of 1999 when I co-led a 8,000 mile cross-country creative writing trip in a 40-foot RV across the U.S. with 8 high school students and a fellow English teacher.  This was a true 'down the rabbit hole' moment for me, and everything that has followed professionally has been delightfully skewed by this trip/experience.  The trip had 5 major rules:  1) No back-tracking and no maps, unless safety deemed either necessary.  2) Use only the Blue Highways (think William Heat-Least Moon, if you're unfamiliar), unless safety deemed either necessary.  3)  Only local restaurants and NO fast food, except one occasion in New Mexico where the kids 'won' a trip to Burger King.  4) We'd read Walt Whitman's entire Song of the Open Road poem word-for-word aloud each morning no matter where we were (a laundry parking lot in Mississippi, watching porpoises wave dive on a beach in Florida, on rock-outcrop on the Texas/Mexico border, watching the sun rise near the Bright Angel trail at the Grand Canyon, at the Circus/Circus casino RV park in Vegas, etc.).  5) Let the kids decide where we go.  At any moment.  And as long as we could get back to our school in Dayton, Ohio by the end of the 4th week, this rule was burned in stone.  If we were at an intersection in the middle of nowhere and a student said, "Turn left," we turned left.  And we all discovered how profoundly powerful America was because of those sudden choices, and how open to discovery we were as well.
5. 4 things pulled me into the world of 'school design':  1) I was frustrated as a young teacher that the 4 concrete walls of my classroom prevented my kids from being as powerful as they could be.  I began to wonder what was possible if you could design it from scratch based on the power of students and a real focus on learning rather than bells.  2)  While at Columbia University's Klingenstein Summer Fellowship for young teachers I wrote "School Designer" in the margin of a notebook I was keeping as I worked through the program's ideas.  I had NO idea what that meant.  But the phrase stuck with me. 3) While doing graduate work in a program based on 'school design', I had the opportunity to work closely with Meg Campbell as she was starting her charter school in Boston.  The Codman Academy Charter Public School has continued to be one of the most impressive success stories in the world of urban education I've run across anywhere in the world.  Truly.  Amazing.  4)  My wife did a national search to become a principal for the first time...and that brought us to Texas 3 years ago.  I left my teaching position in DC and was suddenly given a chance to dive into the world of architecture fully. A firm that specialized in K-12 school architecture took a gamble on me and gave me a tremendous opportunity to learn the basics from the CAD desk out, work with school district leaders, and meet national leaders in the industry.  Then DesignShare asked me to join their team and the learning curve really got steep.

Okay, my tag-you're-it-meme list: DK, the "reflective teacher", Kim, Neil, Diana, Steve, Jeremy, Doug, and Robert.  (Yeah, I know, it's more than 5.  C'est la vie!  Oh, and I just noticed that Chris tagged both Kim and me, so that makes the list slightly smaller.)

Comments

[Karl Fisch]

Have you read A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson? I haven't read it yet, but I just gave it to my Dad for Christmas - it might give you some tips for your little hike . . .

[Whitney Hoffman]

I'm really impressed by your blog!
Learning and education have long been a passion of mine, enhanced by my two kids. My own podcast and associated blogs are about kids who struggle in school or have diagnosed learning disabilities, and how parents can help these children succeed.
I think one of the biggest failures schools make is that they don't teach children "how" to learn-they just keep lobbing more and more material at them, hoping it will stick. However, things like "how short term and long term memory works" is not so complicated kids can't understand on their own- and this is information they need to be successful students. Yes, it may be "strategies" but if we never give kids the tools they need to be successful, what the heck are we trying to achieve, anyway? Go tell your average kid to "Study" and they have no clue what this really means. No one gives them directions on how to study, the best and most effective ways to learn material, etc. Why????
Anyway, so we have hit the 6 mo mark at the LD Podcast, exploring issues ranging from how to spot developmental delays and act on them early; how kids can be both gifted and have learning disabilities, and January with be our ADHD month. Stop by and check us out!
Whitney Hoffman
the LD Podcast
www.ldpodcast.com

[Jeremy]

Hey!
http://lifestylism.blogspot.com/2006/12/five-things-you-didnt-know-about-me.html
I already did this and tagged you three weeks ago -- don't you check links in any more?
: )

I'm humbled reading your excellent response to this challenge (and the responses of some of the others I've seen), which makes me wish I had taken the assignment more seriously. Perhaps I'll try again. Fascinating stuff.

And one other note: I've been neglecting to comment here lately, but the quality of your stuff just keeps going up. I've got so many of your posts saved in Bloglines right now that I will officially never get to them all. Keep up the good work...