At the ripe age of 43 (which might also be my waist size at this point), I decided it was time to put myself to the test and run a race.  After some "prodding" by my friend and colleague in my school district, I registered for the Abbott Dash to the Finish 5K Race.

Friendly Fire Peer Pressure

I have been going to the gym regularly in an effort to improve myself mentally more than physically.  And I have been feeling a difference.  It keeps me going back.  Having a partner in my office, Elvis, that pushed me to keep going has been a big influence, also.  

Only in my 40s did I begin running at anything close to regularity in my life.  I was inspired by the push for improved wellness by Principal Sarah.  I have grown to love the days I choose to run through the park rather than using elliptical machines in the gym.  The park is beautiful; the run is relaxing and refreshing.

What's really great about my exercising for better mental health experience is the new ways of connecting with the people around me.  I learn about the importance of stretching.  I talk about the improving state of mind.  When you are doing something new, surround yourself with people who are smarter than you are at that task.  You will be happy you did.

"... it's amazing what you can pick up if you hang out with bright people."
Ebon Upton, creator of Rasdpberry Pi
from article "Making magazines", page 98, The MagPi, issue 75, Nov 2018
​

My Only Competition

I ran the race.  I never expected to win.  My pace has consistently been about 12-12.5 minutes per mile.  Pair that with old knees and ankles, and there is no competition to be considered when thinking about my place at the finish line.

As I began the run at the start line, I started off fast.  I remembered wise words from Sarah about saving some energy for the uphill climb in Central Park, but I was pumped to be off and running.  I had my best friends tunes playing in my ears (see SoundCloud below).  I pushed past the moment I always get at the start of a run where it feels like I can't keep up with my breath.  I stabilized my breathing and my pace, and I was good.

At moments where I thought I couldn't keep running, I had other runners, folx on the side of the race cheering, some dank-ass break beats, and my desire to best my own time all working in unison to keep me from stopping to walk.  I finished this race with my best personal time and mile pace.  Unexpectedly, I ran an 11:37 mile.  Yeah, slow for some, but it was my fastest time since I started running (off and on) about a 6 months ago.  It was significantly faster than my time in the Run for the Wild at the Bronx Zoo about 8 years ago.  And no walking.  I was damn proud of myself.

All of this has me thinking about competitions in the classroom this morning.  They can be fun, but we need to help young people think more about how they can improve themselves, learning to compete against their own "pace" of work - whatever the task might be.  

Alfie Kohn writes frequently about the importance of intrinsic motivation and the research that shows that extrinsic rewards are ineffective at best, and at worst they are detrimental to progress and learning.  Dr. J. Stuart Ablon writes about this effect when working with young people to improve behaviors in his book Changeable. 

How can we create conditions for learning that inspire students to want to better themselves and value their learning experience, not a reward (i.e. grade) they might earn at the end?  

I would love to hear examples of how you have helped create conditions to inspire intrinsic motivation for learning.  How have you set the stage for students to want to learn more?

Last week, I shared an experience I had in Boston at a workshop called "Lessons for the Maker Movement from Reggio Emilia".  One of the Provocations at the end of that post has been coming back up in conversation repeatedly this week.  Maybe because it is the last one on the list.  Maybe because it makes an interesting statement that seems to push against our understanding of assessment.  I thank everyone who has engaged with me in conversations about this statement:

I shared some of my thoughts about this statement with School Leaders and colleagues in my district and with learning partners online.  I'd like to share one of my thought-vomits on the above statement.  This is taken from an online thread I contributed to in Change.School.

Assessing My Bread-Making

For the past few weekends, I have been baking bread.  Last week was my best loaf.  Each week, I change something about the original recipe I used to improve the loaf.  And I assess by eating it.  I am assessed by sharing it with friends who taste and share what they liked (or didn't) about my bread.

Today, as I washed the dough from my fingers and utensils, I wondered how this type of assessment fits into the statements I made above.  I am my own teacher.  I am learning and assessing in direct response to something I created.  I modify the next week, and try again based on the results ad notes from the previous week.  Then I eat and share more bread.

It is important for learners to be able to assess themselves during the process of learning something new.  In tuning into the point of it being the "teacher's problem", I realized that inauthentic assessment is the teacher's problem.  Assessment for the point of identifying what standards are met, what skills are gained, what box can be checked for proof to whatever governing body that needs evidence of working at a level that is deemed ready for a next level or grade, that's the responsibility of the educator.  Learning to assess yourself and your creations as good enough to share with others int he world, that should be part of the learning experience of the student.

The science teacher in me says that my adjustment of the bread recipe to coax more gas creation by the yeast would allow me to check off boxes about metabolism of living things, fermentation, and single-celled organisms from the Eukaryotic Kingdom of life we call Fungi.  I can check off math standards around measurement (Imperial, not metric) and combining fractions.  There are non-biological science content standards about heat transfer, specifically convective heat from air circulating in an oven and conductive heat as it moves to the center of a baking loaf, that I have explored.  Oh, and I am writing to an audience in a particular style and format.  This type of assessment is the teacher's responsibility.

But the creation and assessment of some dope-ass garlic toast?  That's all learner assessment, friends.  I'm happy to assess that kind of progress every weekend! 

What kind of personal experiences do you have that you assess?  I bet if you really look around yourself, you'll find you assess more than you think you do.

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?

I was inspired by a colleague in Illinois, Mark Heintz, who spent a year writing about his learning and teaching process for an entire year.  I'm going to try and do this myself.  I hope those that join me on this journey will learn something from this journey.  

This week, I spent the entire week in professional learning.  New York City has given education leaders an amazing opportunity to learn together this summer about Equity.  I have already taken part in Mentoring for Equity, Beyond Diversity, and in many equity-based conversations with my critical conversational friend, toni.  I knew I had more to learn, and I was excited to take part in the learning this week.  

Day 1 - Solving Disproportionality

My expectations were being fully met on Day 1 as I learned from Dr. Ivory Toldson about disproportionality.  I already had seen important data about disproportionality in New York City schools when I dug into the Calculus of Race article.  I learned a lot by examining schools' data in the Civil Rights Data Collection about Schools and Districts.  I had never seen this data source before, and excitedly examined a variety of schools from across New York City and in my District.  There are definitely stories being told in this data, and some of these stories are not pretty.

I am pretty intentional about defining words in education that we often take for granted.  When Dr. Toldson asked us, "What is the achievement gap," we had time to talk through what we thought was a best answer.  When he then asked, "Shouldn't we first ask ourselves, 'What is achievement?'," I was really happy.  I love to tackle ideas like this with colleagues.  You learn so much about your own beliefs and the beliefs of others when you start to challenge yourself to really define what you think you know and often take for granted.  

I spent a little time thinking about my "Why" in this work.  Why am I working to dismantle inequity and oppression?  What drives me to get out of bed, even in the deepest of Winter, on the most unfortunate mornings, to push through these days and still come in to work and do my best to lead education and schools to provide the best learning conditions for all students?  What gets you to work every day when it's -2 Celsius, sidewalks packed with dirty snow and unseeable ice, and you spill your coffee down your shirt before you have even left the house?  What drives you to want to do the work?

I was worried on Day 2 that I might not be that into Python coding.  I just wasn't able to engage myself in the work of practicing the code.  My frown has been turned upside down.  All that I was missing was my Raspberry Pi!

After a few missed days of learning, I reinvested in the process and decided to spend some extended time on the project to see if I could get into the learning flow.  I spent almost 2 hours hooking back into my Pi, reading through some of my older screenshots, and then continuing the Instructables Class on Raspberry Pi (see my previous post for the link).

I learned a lot of new code.  I learned about connecting the Python Shell to the Linux Shell in the Raspberry Pi so that I can code in Python and affect the overall system.  I pushed the "Conversation" code to interact in Linux, and I launched a video stored on the Pi from the Python Shell.  I was feeling excited again.

Now I'm pumped!  I was feeling energized and wanted to do more.  I was asking myself questions to learn more about the code structures, and I used my resources to find the answers to most of my questions.  I still don't know what stopped me from accessing the pygame.mixer to play sounds, but that is a task for another day.  I was able to access the Pi Camera through the Python Shell and take a few pictures.  I even coded for increased brightness.  It wasn't always a perfect code, but I learned a lot from practicing.

I'm already thinking of ways to use this setup once it is done.  Of course I will create a photo booth as the class shows, but I also am thinking about a portable document scanner to document learning from around my district.  

I also learned about dealing with my frustration and boredom.  Finding new ways to engage int he work helped me.  I think I might have also been helped if I were learning this with someone.  (If anyone want to join me on this journey, feel free to reach out.)  

I have also been very aware of mental downtime (AKA Distraction/Off-task) and how it helps processing of new information, as well as providing some needed breathing room to alleviate frustration.  Do we do this enough for students?  Is there something that can change about a classroom's culture to account for the need for mental downtime and percolation time? 

I spent time today introducing myself to the programming language Python.  After only about 30 minutes of reading and trying a few lines of code, I'm definitely still unsure of my python-ability, but it seems pretty intuitive.  Bear in mind, years ago I did use the Arduino microcontroller for a variety of projects in an after-school physical computing class.  I feel like this experience has made the reading of Python code much easier for me in this early stage of learning.

My plan today was to bring my Raspberry Pi gear to the Saturday school where I was serving as a substitute Site Director for the day, and try to find 30 minutes to continue the Instructables Raspberry Pi Class that leads to my project goal of the Photo Booth (see Blog Post Day 1).  As is par for the course when I try to function without enough coffee, I completely forgot to pack my Pi.

I had my personal laptop with me, and I logged into the course to see if I could continue the learning process sans-Pi.  It really only required the use of the Python Programming language, so I went to work finding the software for download.  I also wondered if I might find more engaging tutorials outside of the Instructables Class.  Through my search, I learned about the history of Python (began in 1985) and that it was actually named after Monty Python, not the snake.

I also learned a bit more about myself as a learner.  Tutorials that are step-by-step guides on teaching Python through learning basic code do not engage me.  I learned how to get basic things to pop up like, "Hello, World!" and how to code for a basic conversation with formatted answers in response to inputs from a user.  I also learned how to write a basic mathematical formula calculating interest.  But it was SOOOOOO boring to me.

I'd like to say I know myself as a learner, and I like to learn by doing.  Let me jump into the mix.  The more abstract the task, the less I like it.  To cook something new, I will read a little, and then try the recipe.  When I was a teacher, I wanted to put stuff into practice.  I wasn't afraid of trying new things, and learning from the experience with my students.  We

With Python, I need to do more than recreate code with inputs and outputs.  I know, technically, that is "doing" something with code.  I'm sure that works for some folks, but it was frustrating me because I was boring myself.  As I'm writing this, though, I'm wondering if I would have been as bored if I weren't in a room alone trying this out.  Would the experience have been different if I were learning socially?

I am going to try and find more interactive, physical computing projects, or maybe I will breeze through the Instructables Class Python Intro Lesson and jump into the next one which involves coding for physical computing.  I feel like I need to see more than just a few lines on a computer screen.  I want to build something. 

I'd love to hear about your process.

• Do you know any great sites or YouTube channels that might inspire my learning of Python? 
  
• Do you have the same issues when learning code? 
  
• How do you combat the boredom I felt?  Or do you fight it at all?  Switch to a different project?  

I said I would try again, so I"m going for it!  I met with a group of Assistant Principals from around my school District this week.  We discussed our beliefs around learning, what it means, and what conditions are best for learning for our students and ourselves.  This prompted me to bring up again the 30 Days of Learning Challenge with them.

30 Days of Learning Challenge

Basic Challenge Rules:  Thinking about the discussion we had about conditions for learning, make one simple change in your school community or classroom that will bring your closer to living your beliefs.  Try this new condition for 30 days.  Document your journey in whatever way works best for you.  Share with colleagues during and after the 30 days for feedback and reflection.

Step Up Challenge:  Expand your learning journey by stepping up the challenge intensity.  Document your journey through a blog or other online posting to share your learning journey for feedback and reflection with a global audience.  Actively seek feedback from new readers, leaders, and learners.

Step Out Challenge:  Forget about school and education.  Learn something new you have always been curious about an interested in learning.  It could be a new cooking style, an instrument, a mindful moment, creating, coding... anything, really.  Practice this new skill for at least 30 mins a day for 30 days.  Document your journey for feedback and reflection. 
​

And so I begin again, with some new colleagues, on a learning journey.  The last 30 Day Challenge for me, I attempted to improve both my questioning technique for coaching (Basic+Step Up) as well as trying to learn American Sign Language (Step Out).  Scroll through my previous posts to see how that went.  It was definitely a fun experience.

For this 30 Days of Learning, I'm only going to focus on a Step Out Challenge.  I am going to spend at least 30 mins a day for 30 days learning with a Raspberry Pi.  I have a project that was started and never finished, and I have been wanting to learn more about these boards for a long time.

For Day 1, I am reflecting on the progress I already made with my Raspberry Pi photo booth project and planning next steps.  I already did a lot of coding in this one, so for today, I recap what I have already accomplished in my Photo Booth project.

I haven't decided if that is going to be the only focus of my work during the next 30 days.  I have been reading MagPi magazine and getting lots of new ideas to try.  I am also reading Lifelong Kindergarten by Mitchel Resnick, and I want to dig into Scratch programming.  Hopefully finding a way to connect Scratch and Pi together.  I also have a Raspberry Pi Zero to try out.  I am excited about what I can create and what I'm going to learn.  Looking forward to Day 2 tomorrow.

If you have ideas or projects to challenge a novice maker like me to build, please share with me.  And be sure to give me feedback on the work I do as I progress over the next 30 days.

I have been trying a lot lately to put myself into a place of learning something new outside of what we would consider a traditional learning environment.  I have been pushing my learning and reflection on a professional goal of improving my questioning.  I am a solution guy.  I like digging through my brain, finding answers and things to try out to see if they can be answers.  But that is not the best way to coach.  Coaching through questioning is a goal and one I continue to work on.

I also tried to learn something completely new - American Sign Language.  I wanted to see how far I could get in 30 days, and I think I did pretty well.  I tried to share my learning in a new way using videos to try and engage people in either learning with me, correcting my sign skills, or both.  I did get a friend into the conversation, but I have let ASL fall to the side as I began digging more deeply into my work of transforming school.  Check out one of my video blog posts HERE.  

My full-ish journey is documented in #30DaysofLearning blog posts that only made it to day 24.  Yeah, yeah, I know, "Boo!  Boo!  You couldn't make it 30 days?!?"  I'll try again soon.  I just started a new position, and I'm a bit taxed on time lately.  Yeah, yeah, I know, "Boo - No Excuses!"  Anyhoo...

Last night during a coaching session in Change.School, I was speaking with leaders from the US, Canada, and New Zealand while being mentally prodded by the hosts, Bruce Dixon and Will Richardson.  I have been engaging with national and international school leaders for more than 10 months now.  We talk about ideas for rethinking public education so that we are engaging students in our respective districts in a learning environment that is relevant to our modern world and preparing them for our uncertain future.  (A special thanks to Robert Schuetz for prompting this post.)

All of our conversations are pretty thought-provoking, but last night I began to talk about my own Learning Story a bit more.  Will has been adding an interesting hashtag to some news articles that are shared online - #newcurriculum - and I can't stop thinking about some of these ideas.

One new topics that has me perplexed and constantly reading is Cryptocurrency.  What a freaking tough concept for me to grasp.  I like to think myself a pretty smart guy, but the establishment of a completely virtual currency that has seen unprecedented growth in value while using a style of programming called blockchain to ensure it is secure is pressing the limits of my brain power.  I'm trying to get it.  Apparently you can mine coins.  Apparently people can steal your computer's processor  to mine for them.  I read articles about it often on Medium for whom I can thank for nearly all my knowledge about cryptocurrency.  I can't thank their writers enough for the knowledge I have gained, and it still isn't enough for me to feel comfortable talking about it, but I am learning.  Still very, VERY confused, but learning.

And this is the learning story I am using today to make a few points:

1. I didn't use a pre-designed cryptocurrency curriculum to learn about Bitcoin and its brethren.  I used the writers of Medium to learn from.  I may be hitting up some videos soon, because I need to learn in a different way to figure this stuff out.  BTW - if you get IT, please share IT with me.  
2. Our current curricular resources are not giving students the opportunity to explore knowledge relevant to them or their lives.  Cryptocurrency, big data and analytics, internet security, modern agriculture, urban agriculture, green technologies, and hundreds of other relevant-to-our-modern-existence topics are mostly ignored by curriculum writers.  As a hypothetical example Will and I discussed last night, we give 100% of students in a class a course in Geometry, of which maybe 2-3% might use in their lives, and the remaining 97% will likely forget.  I mean, seriously, it's not even connected to something relevant like 3D Printing.  When's the last time most of us used Geometry you learned in High School without just using a computer to compute answers for you?

We need to be talking about this stuff, friends.  We need to be talking about this stuff with our students, helping them to lead their own learning in a meaningful way.  There are still big questions to be asked about how to make this a reality in our current system, but if we never start talking about it and asking questions, things are not going to change.  

The world, however, will continue to change without us taking part in it.  I'm not interested in becoming obsolete.  I don't want that for the young people I serve.  I'm ready to talk about it.  The work of change continues...

Before I write about this week's Name That Tune in American Sign Language Game, I want to write a little about Day 19.  I spent some time at work on Saturday checking in with my District's Saturday school and stopping in at a Parent Engagement event at another school.  I spent some time at the event with my FABULOUS co-worker, toni.

She doesn't really know this yet, but she is fast becoming my questioning coach in my learning journey.  She has an amazing talent at framing even the most awful things in brilliant ways, usually through questioning moves.  It really blows my mind how talented she is in this arena.  

I have been trudging through Mary Shelley's Frankenstein for a while now.  Man this is a tough read for me.  But it is one of Dwight's favorite books, and I am going to finish it, no matter how long and painful the process is.  As always, when I was feeling frustrated with the read, toni maneuvers me to a better place with questioning:

Now, suddenly, I'm seeing this book in a new light.  What songs would be sung?  Which topics would make for a good comedic tune to engage the audience?

I appreciate you, toni.  You rock my world.  If you want to read some of her words, check out her blog, Gold Tokens.

Now, on to Day 20's Name That Tune in ASL, week 3.  This week's tune is dedicated to toni and a conversation we had this weekend while musing over the families that joined us for our weekend event.  I hope to hear more from people about this one.  

And take a minute to appreciate someone today.  Someone that helps you to be a better version of yourself.  Someone that makes you smile and laugh.  Someone that helps you shift perspective and see things differently.


As always, if you can't get to YouTube, you can see this week's video on Vimeo by clicking HERE.

I'm back, trying to connect with folks online to share my learning process with American Sign Language.  The video below is me trying to sign the first verse of a song that I hope some will recognize and try to guess.  I will also share the answer to last weekend's video challenge.  Scroll past my video to see the music video from Week 1.

If you have trouble watching YouTube, please see this week's video on Vimeo by clicking HERE.

I heard an interesting line recently:

I won't care if you aim high and miss.  I will care, though, if you aim low and hit.
(source unknown)
​
I have been on a learning journey ever since I stepped into the role of a learning leader.  I have had really exciting moments, but also periods of feeling frustration and futility.  As I walk this path, I have tried to be clear about what I believe learning can and should be.  My vision for this, and my messaging of that vision, have grown and evolved over time.  They will continue to grow and evolve in the future.

Being an agent of change keeps me thinking, processing, questioning, and learning.  I am driven to improve the conditions for learning for students.  I believe young people can be agents of their own learning path.  I believe we can learn from and with each other.  I believe when the conditions are set for these things to be possible, young people can and will rise to the challenges presented to them.  I believe that I still have more to learn and share.

I am feeling excitement as 2017 draws closer to its end.  This was a tough year.  I am still aiming high.  I haven't hit, yet.  I keep aiming high, sharing the message for changing school, building a tribe of people that believe we can do better.  I believe we will get there.

What do you believe?  Have you made a difference for someone this year?  Are you taking risks and trying new things?  Are you aiming high?

The work continues, friends...

Another day of rest and recuperation as I try to rid my body of the flu that afflicts me.  The biggest benefit to days like these is that I get to read more.  There has been a book that I have been working through for a little while as part of one of my special "rituals".  

Some people say I'm a little OCD.  I like my rituals and routines.  I have been trying to start some new ones this year - especially around learning.  Some have taken, like my desire to learn ASL; others have floundered, like my desire practice one new thing every day from a selection of six new skills to learn (ASL, building Raspberry Pi projects, Spanish language, 3D CAD design, painting, and banjolele).  Honestly, how do kids do this every day?!?  I can barely take 30 minutes on something new and making in meaningful enough to remember, but six just seems impossible.

One new ritual of mine is taking time on the weekends to make a cup of coffee, and stay in the kitchen, sit in a bar stool, and read a book by the window to the landlord's backyard garden.  Normally, I'd find myself in front of my computer within 5 minutes of the first cup.  This was a habit I wanted to break.  So I picked a good book that I had been wanting to dig into, set it on the counter top, positioned a chair at the ready, and spent some quiet time to myself with coffee and the morning sun reading a book.

Beyond my desire to use @CarlosAGLive 's work as a basis for my work with young people, it also took me on a journey through my own stories.  The questions I wrote to ask students, I also asked myself in that quiet moment with my coffee and sunshine.  I remembered the first time I realized what "race" was.  Moments when "manhood" was defined in positive ways and negative ways.  I was reminded of stories where I presented myself as a male role model in positive and negative ways.  I looked inside myself:  at my stories of who I am, where I came from, where I have gone, and the steps and missteps I took along the way.  There were tears and giggles.  There was awe and shame.  And there was some really good poetry.  I must re-read and dig even deeper next time.

On this day, I think what speaks to me most is the idea of forgiveness.  Thinking about all the reasons you must forgive yourself for your mistakes and regrets, and all the others you must forgive for the wrongs they may have intentionally or unintentionally visited upon you.  We are imperfect creatures.  I am happy to be more aware of myself, how much I've changed and grown, and an awareness that there is still more to do.  The work continues...

Today was Christmas.  I typically celebrate this holiday by spending time with and sharing gifts with my friends.  But ugh, this year, I am sick.  I spent a lot of time in the previous week with students, teachers, and families, working closely together to bolster the strengths of a school community.  But in the process of this work, I took on someone's germ and became sick.  

Because I was sick, I spent the holiday alone at home.  And even though I was snotty and hacky, I still had a pretty good day.  I read a book that was recommended, but I'm not sure I'm going to like it.  I cooked something from scratch.  I learned some new signs in my ASL journey.  And, because of a gift from a friend, got a chance to learn something new.

Can I start one from seed?  What if I went to a local nursery, could I pick one out of the crowd and craft on my own?  What bonsai style do I like the most?  What about that style speaks to me?  How do I create a space in my apartment with better lighting so I can do work like this?  Oh jeez, do I actually have time to add this into my day?

The gift has me learning and questioning.  I have also been thinking about my gifts to others.  My gifts to my friends and family often bomb.  I've really never been good at gift giving.  I try to listen over time to things people bring up in conversation, but I never feel sure about what I am gifting, relying on the old adage, "It's the thought that counts."  

This year's gift-giving got me to thinking about the gifts we give each other on occasions like holidays, birthdays, and other special life events.  I find the things that mean most to me are memories and ongoing experiential learning and doing.  How can I give more experience and learning opportunity, rather than just things?  Isn't that more important?  The time together and time spent doing something worthwhile?  

Learning and rethinking the act of giving a gift helped me to identify what I find important in that act.  What's important for you when giving a gift?  The look of joy on another person's face?  Creating a gift yourself?  Something deeper, more meaningful?

I skipped a day.  I know I promised to write about every day.  But I was really sick this weekend.  I didn't think that writing about being a couch jockey that spent his day hacking and snotting into a tissue would make for a good story, so I decided not to write about that stuff.

I'm not back to 100% just yet, but I thought I could share something that I have been working on for a little while now - American Sign Language (ASL).  I asked myself how I could take my learning from this solitary activity that I do at home to something that is more social, and the video below is what I came up with.  So enjoy, and please play the game.  Take a guess.  And help me find some ASL buddies.

If YouTube is a problem, you can also watch the video on Vimeo by clicking HERE.

Following this, I went into manic moving mode.  I have relocated my life to Brooklyn.  I learned a lot about what is important in my life during packing.  It was quite the purge.  But I also realized how dearly I held to my heart certain items from my past.  It was a time to revisit my journey to and in New York City and as an educator.  

Really interesting to me, though, was my experience with the moving company.  First, I learned that I will never move myself from one home to another without using movers.  These guys were impressive in their efficiency in moving my life to another borough.  I watched the foreman use boxes in ways I never would have thought to help move odd items and breakable glass table tops.  I was amazed at how little I think about cardboard as a versatile maker product.  

Shortly after my move, I was able to host my first real gathering of friends, including my wonder friend Beatriz, who was visiting from Oakland.  This was soon followed by a gathering in Brooklyn to celebrate the union of my friend toni and her new husband.  I learned how much I enjoy the company of others, both at my home and in my new neighborhood.  These interactions were severely lacking, for years, at my old home in East Harlem.

The highlight of my Summer of Learning, though, was my trip to Amsterdam.  Experiencing new cultures and traveling the world is a new part of my life.  I had every intention of trying to meet up with an educator while in Amsterdam to learn about their school system, but I arrived at my hotel and realized it was Gay Pride Week in Amsterdam.  I decided to embrace my vacation and ignored anything work-related.  

I had morning coffee and pastry by a canal each day.  I spent time in the afternoons on themes of science or culture.  I walked the city and enjoyed everything.  A random shop asked me to come in for a free facial - why not?  I walked by a random restaurant playing good music - I loved the food.  The bartender helped me find a great beer cafe with a new favorite IPA.  I walked a museum for 3 hours, and found I liked still life paintings, especially banquets.  But I was really surprised how much I loved monkey statues and a devious look from Cupid.

Amsterdam helped me to learn a lot about how I appreciate art and the things that help me to relax.  I can't wait to go back and visit the Jopen IPA factory in Haarlem, among other places to visit.

It's been a month, exactly, since I have had a chance to write.  That's not entirely true.  It's been a month since I made the time to write.  It's been a weird realization, getting anxious when I haven't shared thoughts online about learning and education or from some random series of events in my life.  I am, however, glad the anxiety is there because I do not want to stop writing.

I allowed life to get in the way a bit.  Here are a few fun and interesting things I have done recently:

• The first cohort of Change.School (CS1) ended.  I really grew to love and appreciate this community of education leaders.  I made some amazing connections and continue to share ideas.
• I embraced a balanced personal and professional life, and I went out of town for a beach trip during Memorial Day weekend.  I had an amazing time on my first visit to Fire Island.
• I worked my butt off during the heat wave last week into yesterday, walking at least 7 miles a day, sometimes 13, to ensure that my middle school students were registered for their high school credit exam.  Last crew took their exam today.  So proud of them all!
• And I found a new apartment in Brooklyn.

No surprise though, learning has been on my mind.  I was escorting a young lady in middle school to take a high school exam today.  She is quirky, but so great to talk with.  On our way to the test site, I was asking her about her high school plans.  She plans on being a Marine Biologist, and by taking her high school classes early and testing out of them, it will allow time to take Marine Bio courses a year earlier, and have time for AP classes, too.  My, my, she is driven.  I asked her, "Why Marine Biology?"

NK's Story
When I was younger, I was SCUBA trained and certified.  On a trip with my family, we boarded a boat that took us miles out to sea.  We stopped over water that was 12 meters deep, but it was as clear blue as the sky.  I slid into the water, and about 6 feet from me was a whale shark.  It was so much bigger than I thought it would be!  I swam next to it, and touched it, but it's so huge that I didn't even register to it.  As I swam beside it, I just, disappeared.  I knew, in that moment, Marine Biology was what I was going to make my life's work.

"Wow, [NK], that sounds amazing."  So many pictures were flying through my head, so many possibilities for new adventures.  I began thinking about getting SCUBA certified myself.  NK was, of course, full of information to guide me toward learning this new skill.  She also was insistent that the experience would change me.  

How do you say no to that?

How can we say no to kids being able to drive their own learning?  How can we not believe that kids can drive our learning?  Help them explore passions and interests - both their own, and those they don't know they don't know.

Are you learning anything new right now?  I know that I am working my fingers to death trying to learn to play the banjolele.  I'm able to play 3 chords now, and I can kinda switch between them.  Now somehow, I have to figure out when I can fit in SCUBA.  Apparently, it is going to be worth it, or so an expert told me.

I have been told by friends that I can get a little OCD about things.  My friend, Dwight, once came to my apartment and found a notebook of data about my use of toiletries and other household products.  I was collecting data about my usage of the products to see if I could accurately predict when I would need to order more of that product.  (Short answer - Yes)  

In the days of VHS and CD collections (showing my age here), my collections would be sorted alphabetically by title or artist, and in the case of CDs, within each artist the discs were sorted by album release date.  My closet has clothes hanging in the ROYGBIV color spectrum, and within each color there are sub groups of long-sleeve-with-collar, long-sleeve-without-collar, short-sleeve-with...  I think you get the idea.  

I recently noticed that the microwave of my apartment will always bring the warmed product to the front of the microwave if I set a time that ends on any 10 second increment.  This makes it easy to pull the warmed product, typically a cup of coffee, right from the front of microwave.  Reaching to back of the unit is more difficult, especially with it hanging over the oven.  It's hard to reach.

At work, the microwave seems to have no set pattern for how fast it spins.  I'm sure there is one, but I have yet to figure it out.  Thinking that most microwaves today have a "30 sec" button, I would think that it should at least end at the front on those increments of time, but it never happens.  Why?  It seems like such a simple thing to make possible.  

We take many aspects of life for granted, until they don't serve our needs.  Then we are left wondering, "Why?"  I have been working with a wonderful group of educators in Change.School for the past 4 weeks.  I am learning that there are many aspects of school and learning that I take for granted:

• People that resist change are still people, and like me, they have assumptions, fears, and beliefs that guide their work
• When I talk about "student-driven learning", everyone I'm speaking with has the same ideas and definitions of what that means (along with so many other edu-jargon words)
• New ideas about the purpose of school and learning in our modern contexts are easy to get others to buy-in because they make sense to me
• Is anyone trying to talk to actual kids about these ideas?  I know I am trying.

Recognizing our assumptions and biases can help us to start important conversations and stop taking things like these for granted.  We need to have common language before we have discussions about our beliefs about school and learning.  We need to understand that people (including young people) are coming to the table with their own beliefs and assumptions, and they are worth understanding.  

I probably won't get a meeting with the manufacturers of my work microwave.  I will continue to search for a time pattern that will get my coffee cup to the front of the microwave every time.  I'm going to find an answer to this problem within the context of the microwave where the problem exists.  But if I am ever shopping for a new one, you can bet I'm going to drive a sales person crazy as I test the rotation vs. time of each unit.

 I decided to do something I haven't done in a LONG time.  I gave myself a #MakerSunday day of building and learning.  It has been a while since I put things together and wrote out some code.  And I wanted today to be a challenge, so I took out a #RaspberryPi and started downloading the Operating System.  

I am working on a project outlined in the Instructables Raspberry Pi class.  I knew I wanted to build today with some guidance, and I knew the end product was a photo booth.  It sounded fun, and I had all the parts - no more excuses, get to building!

The biggest part of the day was spent exploring and learning about the Raspberry Pi.  The instructions allowed me to learn about what the code meant that I was typing in, something I never got from some of the "gaming" code learning in my Pi-Top.  I learn by doing things that happen in the real world, not on a game screen.  I'm sure there are others that learn through gaming, but it's not my thing.  (To be clear, I do love the Pi-Top, just wasn't the right tool for me.)

​I did learn the basics of Raspberry Pi set up, including a few screw ups with formatting the disc and uploading the Pixel OS.  I worked through them, fixed my formatting, uploaded, and got into setting up.  In minutes I was online thanks to the Raspberry Pi 3's built-in WiFi.  I quickly learned basic command lines, file making, and getting program packages for operating the camera module.  

Next thing I know, not only am I able to capture screenshots of my work, but I'm capturing selfies!  By the end of my Raspberry Pi time for the day, I had merged 5 pictures into an animated GIF of myself (appears at the end of the post).  Oh the time I'm going to waste with this new function.

Like many students, I learn by doing.  I need to interact with new information, make something with it, and play a little, to make the learning stick.  I will continue my work on this project, and then try to create my own program once it is all done.  I have a goal for the completion of the project, and a goal to make something new using what I've learned.  

I also have been anxious to share this experience.  I caught myself HUGELY smiling as I executed the program that caught my image.  Even more after moving the program to a new file, and then typing the correct command to find and execute in the new directory.  I feel accomplished, and more than a little geeky happy today.  

This experience must translate to schools.  Students, like I did today, find instructions online for anything new they really want to learn.  They are adept at sharing their learning through video posts and now even Live Video.  Having the space and time to make something from scratch, program it to do what you want, and then share with others - it is immensely empowering.  How do we set the stage for more experiences like these?  It doesn't take a programmable piece of hardware to make something new and with purpose.  Embrace the curiosity and creativity inherent in our little humans and let them make.

Some mornings just don't go the way you anticipate.  No matter how prepared you are to face the day, sometimes life just gets in the way.  Friday morning, my barrier to starting the day was the Windsor tie knot.

Since high school, I have always used a basic tie knot - the Four-in-Hand.  It was simple, fast, and it was easy to adapt to my tall body length.  Recently, I have been experimenting with new knots.  I see wider knots and bow ties in a variety of media, coupled with really good-looking suits.  Makes me want to change up the wardrobe.  In order for this to happen, I knew I would need to learn some new knots.  

I began with the bow tie.  Thanks to great sites like Gentleman's Gazette, I quickly conquered the bow tie.  It still takes a few tries, but I've pretty much got the basic bow tie down.  Recently I decided it was time to move beyond my high school tie knot and learn a new one.  I chose the Windsor knot.  It gave a nice, wide V-shape to the knot.  But, unlike the bow tie, it is taking me some time to discover the right starting length for this knot so that I can end with a tie length appropriate for my gigantic frame.

Friday morning, I must have tied my tie at least 7 times.  With each failed length or ill-shaped knot, my face reddened and my frustration grew.  I nearly gave up and almost opted for my go-to Four-in-Hand.  But I pushed through the frustration, and kept trying.  Eventually, I landed on a complete Windsor with a length that was almost right, and decided that I just needed to leave (at this point I was starting to run late to work, making me even more frustrated).

As the day progressed, I began thinking about how easy it would have been to give up and just go with the old knot.  I was surprised at how frustrated I was trying to accomplish a task that less than 24 hours earlier was as easy as pie.  I reminded myself that you don't practice something until you get it right, you have to practice until you can't get it wrong.  Frustration is part of learning something new.  I was also reminded of some lessons from Seth Godin's Linchpin:

1. If my lizard brain is telling me to stop doing something because it's too hard, I must tell myself to push through and try again anyway.
2. Sometimes you just have to get moving.  It doesn't have to be perfect - you just have to "ship."

I also started thinking about education.  Do we give space and time to allow students and staff to feel frustration with something new?  And then be there to support them and keep them moving forward?  Do we allow imperfect products from students and staff to get shipped so that we can offer feedback for a better version?  How can these ideas become part of our everyday?  Can we embrace frustration as part of learning and imperfect products as a step to something better?

I'm gonna keep up with the Windsor until it becomes second nature.  But maybe tomorrow, I'll try and get one started a little earlier in the morning, just in case I don't get it right, again.