Reflection on Stager Video

There are so many thoughts running through my mind currently that I am not sure where to begin. So this blog will probably sound random and rambling but it is all that Gary's video brought to mind.

First let me say a big thank you to Gary Stager for taking the time to try something new and creating this video. It truly opened up a lot of thoughts and reflection on my part.

Okay here we go. While I was listening to Gary speaking about his experiences about feeling smart and not so smart, my heart hurt for the young man made to feel inferior by his math teacher. It began me thinking back as to what I do in my classroom. Am I without conscious thought sending that type of message to a student within my classroom? It is something that needs to watched for and addressed. I want to be that educator that Gary talks about that opens the doors to the future not closes them. In fact, that is what my action research is all about so this video just reinforces those thoughts. When Gary was talking about the teacher that took the time to get to know him and allowed him to excel at the programming, I thought back to when I first started teaching. When I first entered the classroom, I was that teacher that reached out to students, that wasn't afraid to try new things and ways to engage students, and that was willing to go that extra mile for the students within my classroom. I truly think there were two reasons for this. First, I was working with a dynamic team of teachers, that had the opportunity to meet at lunch to discuss our common students and the challenges we were facing within the classroom. I was able to get tips and techniques about students from the educators with more experience. This gave me confidence in myself and trying new things. The second factor was that there was no state mandated test. We were still held accountable for what our students learned, yet the focus was on assisting the students in becoming well rounded individuals, not test takers. Over the past 8 or so years, the shift to ensuring that every student can score well on the test has taken that fire and risk taking out of the classroom. Listening to Gary just reaffirmed that it is time to take that risk to move in a new direction where my students are engaged and motivated.

The other part of Gary's message that stood out for me was the story about his college experience and the teacher's message about his potential lack of college success. It made me think back to my son's educational experience. Patrick was blessed and fortunate to find teachers within his high school years that went the extra mile, from making the curriculum content relevant to him to having students over on the weekends to study and look at calcus in a new light. Then there was his wonderful college counselor that sat with him for hours on end getting to know him and showing him the variety of types of colleges that were out there. Because this counselor got to know my son, she gently steered him away from the bigger "name recognition" colleges to the smaller colleges. This was because she knew that Patrick wanted the opportunity to get to know his professors, as he had gotten to know his high school teachers. He wanted the personal experience of college not the number experience of college. (No disrepect to any college out there or graduate from any college, just relating my son's experience.) Patrick selected the colleges to apply to based on size and feel. (We toured seven colleges, five of them East coast). When Patrick stepped on to the Dartmouth campus, he looked at me and said this is it. The experience, though short in nature, was one that brought him wonderful memories and the closeness with his professors that he sought.

To sum all this up: 1. It is up to me to determine how I engage my students and allow the learning experience to develop. I must move beyond the "norm" to the risk taking because that is what my students need to be successful. 2. Watch my words and actions carefully, you never know the full impact of what you do. 3. Be willing to admit my lack of knowledge to my students and learn together with them. 4. Leave the classroom management to the students, they will not allow those around them to disrupt their learning if they are engaged. (this will be the hardest part for me).

Thank you again Professor Stager for the time and the motivation to move beyond the "norm".

"Turtle" Learning Adventure

Okay. I have been working on this "turtle" adventure for over 20 hours and have reached the limit of my patience. I was finally able to get the turtle to create my single patch. It took me hours just to create a basic patch. When I see what the others within the cadre did, I don't even want to share my patch as it looks like a first grade drawing compared to college artists work. Despite this I continued to work on the patch to get it to work correctly. After hours of working on my own and wanting to throw the computer through the window, I finally sent out an SOS e-mail. I sent an e-mail to my cadre mates (God bless them!!) with questions as to what to do to get it to work. They responded promptly which was appreciated. I was able to speak with two of them over the phone and they were able to talk me through the glitches as well as explain the code for quilting. After speaking with them, I was able to look at the code for my patch and see my error and fix it. I then decided to give myself a break before trying to tackle the quilting. I was working on it for over four hours and still not getting it to work. So I sent out another SOS e-mail hoping that my cadre mates could point me in the direction of success. This time the help came in the use of the "google wave". Using the wave, I was able to communicate directly with one of my cadre mates and work on the problem together. We combined the "wave" with an e-mail and success was achieved. Or a least my version of success. Without the help of my cadre mates there would have been no success achieved as I would have just walked away from this assignment.

The feeling of failure in this adventure is great. My patch is basic and I can't even figure out basic code. The really hard part is that one of the next assignments in another class also involves programming and writing code. I am no looking forward to it with any sort of joy only with severe anxiety. The nice thing is that I now my cadre mates will be there to lend me a hand when I get stuck. I just wish I had the ability to assist them as they have helped me.