I love getting out into the community and finding new things to do and new connections for young people.  There are so many resources available to support learning, and to support good fun.  

New Community Resource and a Bit of Science

This was a pretty low-key week.  It ended pretty spectacularly for me, though.  I had an end of Friday meeting scheduled with our District community partner, the BioBus.  I have used them in my time as a science teacher, and have been happy to help support their strong connection to our school district. 

To build upon this partnership, my BioBuddy colleague asked me to meet with her at the Lower East Side Ecology Center and learn about their space.  The BioBus and LES Eco Center have partnered together for some time.  I walked through my district to get to the Eco Center so I could see what it was like to travel there by foot.

Walking over the foot bridge, I was met by a nice little park space with paved courts and lawns.  There were a variety of landscaped areas and others a bit overgrown.  The park space extended right to the East River beneath the Williamsburg bridge.  At the water's edge is a large, red brick building where the Eco Center is housed.

I entered the Center and found myself surrounded by various aquaria and other habitats.  My excitement level grew when I noticed a BioBus microscope set up in a corner of the room.  My science-y brain went into overdrive, and perhaps sensing I was already not in planning mode, the educator from the Center decided it was a good time to tour the space.

I found myself revisiting knowledge I had acquired in my days of working with NYC's biggest little zoo, the Staten Island Zoo.  I was observing aquatic animals living in aquaponic habitats.  I learned about an invasive species of crab and got to see a spider crab up close.  I learned about the oyster toadfish, glass shrimp, and other natural NYC denizens.

A New Ecological Issue

In our conversations around the Eco Center, I learned that once ceramic tiles are fired and glazed, they can not be reused.  I had no idea that this was a problem.  When tiles are pulled from homes, unless they are used in mosaic tiling or other art installations, they are typically unusable and end up in landfills.

The Eco Center serves as a site for the Billion Oyster Project in NYC.  They have oyster baskets hanging in the East River where they grow oysters for the BO Project.  These baskets end up as habitats for other organisms.  We pulled one basket up, and I was able to observe the growing oysters, as well as some baby oyster toadfish, a few invasive crabs, and some glass shrimp.

But the ceramic tiles caught my eye.  I asked how they were being used, and we brought one in to the microscope.  The surface was covered with a variety of organisms.  Bryozoans created a network of cells on the surface of the ceramic tile.  Once these organisms died, their exoskeletons remain on the tiles and serve as substrate for other organisms to colonize the tile.  It was an interesting way to use a resource that otherwise might end up in a landfill.

Microscopic Fun
Perhaps the most fun was exploring the structures of living things we found from the oyster basket.  There were hydroids, one of which had caught a Daphnia in its tentacles.  WE zoomed in on the eye of a Daphnia and were able to see its golf-ball like structure.  There were nematodes and flatworms, and copepods, oh my!  (see pictures below)

The visit wasn't all about microbiological good times.  After seeing all that I had seen that afternoon, we panned time to bring science teachers from across my district down to the Eco Center to have these same experiences and to help them plan the same for students across all of our schools.  

How do you use community resources as a space for inquiry and curiosity?

Side Note:  I finished the painting from last week.  It is no masterpiece, by any means, but I was pretty damn proud of myself for finishing something that looked vaguely like the photo that inspired it.  I'm excited to try again.  See the reference picture and painting below, if interested.

This past week, I was inspired by two pieces that caught my eye.  The first was an article on Medium.con by Rafranz Davis describing why she chooses to Tweet about something she cares about (#BTSArmy) and not always about education and EdTech.  It is important to remember that educators are more than a brand or a single line of expertise.  We have interests and passions in other areas, and we should be able to explore those interests and passions.  

I also found myself perusing books on Amazon by Seth Godin.  I already read Linchpin, and I was thinking about getting another to read.  I was caught by the sub-title of Godin's Poke the Box - When was the Last Time You Did Something for the First Time?  

When was the last time I did something for the first time?  I decided it was too long, and it was time to start learning something new for fun.  Some of these forays into learning over the past few weeks have been based in my own interests and passions, others are things I thought I might be interested in, but just never took time to meddle with.

Unfinished 'Bots and Builds

I have a bad habit of starting really cool projects to build, and then working on "contractor time" to complete them.  I have been building a Raspberry Pi photo booth for about a year (as written about HERE, HERE, and HERE).  More recently, though, I was inspired by one of my favorite 'bot builders, Simone Giertz.  I wanted to build a ridiculous robot.  I asked my colleague, toni, "If you could have a robot to do any stupid or ridiculous task for you, what would you want it to do?"

"I want it to unroll toilet paper for me while I'm in the bathroom."

YASSSS!  That was exactly the kind of ridiculousness I was looking for!  Of course as soon as I heard this idea, ideas for a robot came flooding into my mind.  And so began the conversation, planning, sketching, and prototyping of the Pussy Cat Toilet Paper Pusher.  

While this is unfinished, it gets me thinking and reading about things I normally might not venture into learning.  I wasn't super interested in creating a feline form, but the Ridiculous Challenge hooked me.

Tuning In My Inner Artist

I have an apartment full of random supplies for making a variety of things in life, from sewing to robot building to painting.  I decided it was time I tried my hand at being a painter.  I selected a picture from the Hortus Botanicus Amsterdam.  I got most of the background in place, and my next step (probably tonight) is to get the flowers on the canvas.  (Picture of actual flower below, not my painted version.)

First, I no longer want my walls as bare they are.  I want pieces on the walls of my apartment that represent my ridiculous tastes and interests, and then I want them spread through the apartment along the ROYGBIV color spectrum on the walls.  

Beyond this, I have been thinking about the process for my first efforts into the painting world.  I am going to try again to paint this same picture, hoping, of course, to improve upon my first attempt.  I will add pictures of each attempt to paint this flower after each is finished.  

Baker Maker

I spent this weekend diving into the world of baking.  I am trying to cook more for myself so I can stop eating all the processed foods that are shoved into our faces at the grocery stores.  So with flour, water, some oil and a lot of time, I took a chance and tried to bake my first loaf of bread.

I love the connections between cooking and science.  And baking takes the cake in science connections (see what I did there).  Watching the dough bubble away with the fermentation of sugars by my yeasty friends made me really happy.  My kitchen smelled great.  I used some whole wheat flour in my flour blend, and the bread came out a little dense, but it came out, friends.  Warm, with a crunchy crust, chewy interior.  I'm pretty damn proud of that loaf.

Circling Back

Balance in your personal life is important.  Sometimes educators forget that they are more than their classroom selves.  I did for a long time.  Exploring new ideas can help you get unstuck from yourself when you're in a rut.  It can help you learn something new about the world and about yourself you might not have known was there.  

I enjoyed doing these new things for the first time.  I am going to enjoy circling back to the Pussy Cat Toilet Paper Pusher.  I hope toni can deal with my delayed completion time as I play with other new skills and ideas.

And thanks to Rafranz and her passion for the Bangtan Boys, I enjoy listening to BTS now.  I'm not necessarily BTS ARMY material, but more than a few of their songs have a thumbs up in my playlist.  I'm always happy when they come up in a random shuffle of music.  

When is the last time you did something for the first time?

When I first started teaching, I was given advice like, "Don't smile before November," and "Don't let them into your personal life," and other lines that are essentially shared to ensure that you keep your emotional distance from the young people we serve.  Sad thing is, I followed this advice for a few years before I figured out that for best learning conditions you need bring your authentic self to the work.

I saw this Tweet today...

I have learned not to turn myself down.  And, friends, I'm pretty effing loud.  So is my music.  I have been able to make some real, genuine connections with young people.  It changed me as a teacher, helped me grow as leader, and made me a better person.  

I miss working directly with young people.  My new role in my district has me most often working with school staff and district instructional leads.  On some occasions, I am blessed with moments to work directly with students.  

One little guy in particular used to light up my darkest weeks.  I first met Doc when I served as a substitute Principal for a week last year.  He was in 3rd grade, and he was quite the handful.  Doc had difficulty working through angry emotions, and he often reacted loudly and quickly when he could not maintain his calm.  The first day I met him, Doc had lost his temper and run out of class.  When I found him, he was 10 feet up a chain link fence in the back of the school yard.  He came down, calmed down, and we worked through what he needed that day.  And I met him every day after with a smile, a willingness to listen, and bit of my humor.  

We became closely connected over the week I spent at his building, and I continued to check in on him throughout the rest of the year.  We became pen pals, delivering short letters through his school's mailboxes.  When I went to visit, I was greeted with a huge smile (most of the time), and it always replenished my spirit.

Wednesday this week was the First Day of School for students in New York City.  I was bouncing on the way to work so excited to see my pen pal after a long Summer, kinda hoping that he would have already written me a letter.  I reached out to his Principal to advise that I was coming by for general check-in on Day 1 and to say hello to Doc.  "I'm sorry, Bryan.  I just got notice yesterday that he is transferring to a school in the Bronx."

Devastated.

I knew it might be the best thing for him as he was having trouble adjusting to life in the school in my district.  But it didn't stop me from feeling a seriously depressed moment.  That really caught me by surprise.  

The downside to authentic connections with young people we serve is a profound sense of loss when they are no longer connected to us.  It hurts.  This also means it was a strong connection and a relationship that mattered.  I wouldn't give that up for anything.

Relationships do matter folx.  They matter from Day 1.  Doc and I learned a lot from each other.  It is important to remember how much we can matter to someone.  Doc was growing, changing, and improving over the last year as I mentored him.  I am proud of the progress he made and sad that I won't be directly working with him anymore.  I am confident, though, that he will take some of that connection and learning with him to his new home and school and keep growing.

In my search for a silver lining, I also realized that I have time for a new mentee.  I'm pretty excited to see who might need a smile, an adult willing to listen, and a little bit of humor.  

Do you bring your authentic self to classroom?