To help encourage conversations and dialogue about PDF (Playtime, Downtime, Family Time), our topic/question for the dinner table is: What are you looking forward to most about summer? Enjoying Summer (Summer 2019) (This is an anonymous Google Form)
Over the past week our family reflected with occasions of both remembrance and celebration - my uncle’s memorial service in the Berkshires (visiting with family and friends with deep-rooted connections/relations with both nuclear and extended family), celebrating Katie’s mom’s 75th birthday in Falmouth (taking a sunset sail with relatives and friends on Katie’s side and having delicious coconut cake for dessert!), and celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary with Katie and the kids (dinner out at our favorite restaurant - Sweet Basil in Needham- see pics below)!
We are a school and community of learners focused on ‘Learning and Teaching’ (it sounds trite and very clear, but we need to keep saying it) - and as such, I firmly believe it is at the core of our mission to be intentional about this practice. Oftentimes the phrase is written/spoken/published as ‘Teaching and Learning’ - I think ‘Learning’ should be front and center. As part of my own learning and growth this summer, I have been reflecting via different means and focusing on a few aspects (these certainly are not siloed areas and are overlapping and interwoven in many, many ways with implications across several domains)…
- Practicing true intentionality and deliberation with self-care (walking, biking, yoga, and ‘stepping back’)
- Reading and listening (it is hard for me to unplug and step away)
- Mindfulness and reflections on our theme of Courage for 19-20 - what are the connections? What does courage mean? What does it look like? How can we embed it into our culture?
- Diversifying my own learning - how come I haven’t listened to podcasts before???? These are a few I am thoroughly enjoying…
- Sustainable change - what does support look like? What is needed? How can I/we support students and staff?
This year I aim to continue (during on- and off-time from the days of school) to foster connections, questions, thoughts, and discussion is by openly sharing reflections from Blake, posts, readings, and personal 'learnings' that reflect our work and growth. Below I am highlighting a little bit of each that directly and indirectly relate to our mission - innovation, the process of change, the needs of our students, and reflection...
Staff Reflections
One practice that truly helps me to enter this reflective and productive mindset each year is reading the responses from the prompts asked of the Blake staff as we enter summer...
- What was meaningful this year? What made teaching worthwhile? What mattered?
- Describe a positive interaction or experience you had with a student during this academic year.
- Describe or explain an accomplishment you attained or something you are proud of taking place during this academic year.
- Describe a particular student or situation during the school year who or that you feel you could have handled in a way that would have resulted in a more positive learning experience.
- How have you 'lived' our mission statement in your work and growth this year?
- What is an area that you would like to grow professionally?
- What have you learned this year from a student?
- What messages do you want to leave for our students? What do you want them to remember? (A humbling but important and centering question)
Some Recent Learning/Thoughts/Notes/Mindsets
Last week I was fortunate attended the NASSP (National Association of Secondary School Principals) conference in Boston.
(With highlights from sessions with Jimmy Casas - @casas_jimmy, Baruti Kafele - @principalkafele, Tracey Wilen - @traceywilen, David Guerin - @DavidGuerin, Tommy Welch - @PrincipalWelch)
- Opportunity to build community when you bring people together
- Always comes back to relationships
- ‘What is the biggest issue that we are currently facing in public education that is causing us to not get the results we aspire for when it comes to student achievement?’ - Jimmy Casas
- Do we have hope and faith that we can do things better? Do we address the status quo?
- ‘Underperformance is an issue in schools today, but failing to address underperformance is an even bigger issue’
- 'If you're not on Twitter as an educator, let me respectfully invite you into the 21st century - the learning is there 24/7' - Baruti Kafele
- Questions for reflection…
- Does this person understand my life? Does the speaker get this or is this theoretical?
- As you dig deep...is my classroom a better classroom because I teach it?
- Is the school better because I lead it?
- Does this person understand my life? Does the speaker get this or is this theoretical?
- Is my leadership driven by a Leadership Philosophy that has culminated into a Leadership Style which is now habitual and can be articulated?
- ‘Do I ensure that my staff utilizes a variety of instructional strategies that onsider the different learning styles, ability levels and social-emotional needs of my students in student-centered, culturally-responsive, culturally-relevant and EQUITABLE learning environments?’
- We can’t afford to be the same person we were yesterday…
- We need to grow each day…
- We need to learn each day…
- Same is true for students…
- We need to grow each day…
- Multimedia is the new text (multimedia literacy skill)
- 85% people are visual learners
- People prefer learning from YouTube to books
- 85% people are visual learners
- ‘If standardized test scores are your school’s top priority, your mission is more about adults than it is about students.’ - David Guerin
- Will Richardson - have permanence in the learning
- Shift from ‘What if?’ to ‘Why not?’
- Can we be an ambidextrous organization?
- Innovation, Interruption, Disruption starts at the top
- Structures are important
- Allow mistakes
- Structures are important
- Allow difficult questions that do not have answers
- ‘In teaching, you can’t do the Bloom stuff until you take care of the Maslow stuff.’ - Alan E. Beck
Some Posts that Resonate
Here's What Teens Say They Need
by Jody Mayberry in ASCD Express
Mayberry is a math teacher and this past spring asked her students this question: "What do you need from schools to feel supported both academically and socially?" The findings are summarized within her post - they certainly provoke thought, reflection, and discussions. I believe that question is one we should continually be asking of our students and families.
Finding #1: Teens want explicit proof that the adults in their lives know them as individuals.
Finding #2: Teens want easily accessible resources.
Finding #3: Teens demand authentic, meaningful work.
Finding #4: Teenagers crave human interaction.
Finding #5: Teens want the opportunity to fail.
Whether the thoughts of my students or your own inform your practice, remember: if we're really doing what's best for teens, then we need to listen to their voices. Just asking teens, "how can I help?" or "what do you need from me?" is the first step in determining what teens need from schools.
Teachers in June
by Michael George (@GeorgeBloolight)
George’s post highlights the importance of summer for all educators - a chance to recharge and refresh so that we may be present for our students throughout the year.
Teachers, treasure your summer breaks and guard them with your life. Fight every effort to chisel away at this necessary break from the action. Take a vacation if you want, or stay home and binge Netflix if that floats your boat. Cross projects off your to-do list or take the list and toss it into the trash. If you are feeling burned out, take advantage of your district’s employee assistance program (if there is one) and take things out with a professional counselor. Take naps in the middle of the day. Every one of these indulgences is like depositing money into your savings account for a rainy day, and once you have your emotional reserves built up you need to ration them out carefully during the year. After all, the next chance to truly recharge won’t come for another nine months.
The Game of School vs. The Game of Life
by AJ Juliani (@ajjuliani)
Juliani’s post holds up a mirror, asking us to reflect on the modeling we are doing for our children - challenging us to note and recognize the parallels of our actions in ‘playing the game of life’ as students ‘play the game of school’. As Ted Sizer always noted - The Students Are Watching Us.
The Game of School Rules: Make the adults at school happy, and the adults at home will be happy.
If you are anything like me, you often wish that school wasn’t a game. That the grades, the year-by-year system of steps, the achievement measures, and all of the rest of the pieces of school that make up this “game” would go away and the focus would go back to what is best for each learner in that moment. However, I’m often blind to the fact that our students are not only playing this game of school, but they are watching the adults in their life play a game as well. My daughter is always watching me, and looking up to me, not for advice, but to see what I’m doing and how I’m living my day-to-day life. My actions and attitude towards my work, and towards my learning, have a direct impact on her view of the world and learning. I can’t forget that.
GENER(aliz)ATIONS
by Alfie Kohn (@alfiekohn)
We hear comments about ‘kids these days’ very frequently and it has always rubbed me the wrong way. Kohn’s post speaks to this phenomena and the importance of stepping back, avoiding sweeping generalizations, and gaining perspective. It is one I will be sure to reference and come back to for myself and with staff and families in the future.
Baby Boomers were originally lumped together based on the fact that there were a lot of them (the birthrate having spiked after the War) and that they were lucky enough to come of age during a relatively affluent period. The idea that all of them — or, for that matter, all Gen X’ers or all Millennials — are also distinguished by a common political or psychological profile, a set of values or tastes, is an entirely different proposition. It’s an idea that rational people should view with a generous measure of skepticism if only because each of these labels refers to something on the order of 80 million people.
Rarely do older folks pause and say, “Wait a second. If these snide truisms about young people that I’m confidently repeating aren’t all that different from what our elders said about us, might that be reason to question their validity?” With respect to the specific claim that “kids today” are spoiled and their parents permissive, I had fun a few years ago digging up multiple examples of how people were saying exactly the same thing about the previous generation, and the one before that, and the one before that, and the one before that. I conducted this backward journey through the decades in a book called The Myth of the Spoiled Child, which also challenged the reactionary narrative about helicopter parents and kids with inflated self-esteem that has become the conventional wisdom.
The specific accusations leveled at today’s teens and young adults — that they’re entitled, overcelebrated “snowflakes” — are particularly ugly, empirically unsupported, and often animated by a political agenda. But my larger point is that we should be very cautious about offering any generalizations about an entire generation. And by “we,” I mean all of us, including Millennials, lest they eventually start to sound like their elders in slinging calumnies at Generation Z (or whatever we end up calling the next cohort).
Eight Tips To Slow Down Summer
by Kris Felicello (@kfelicello)
This post by Felicello is one I have shared in the past - it offers 8 tips for how we, educators and families alike, can slow down the pace and our heads in an effort to enjoy, relax, regroup, and refresh for the coming school year: Create a Summer Bucket List; Create a New Habit; Read; Reconnect; Day Trip; Play the Notice Game; Learn Something; Do Something New.
If you are not in the education field, you may begrudge teachers for what you see as a two month glimpse into retired life, but, for us in the field, we know when you do it right, you often leave it all on the field so to speak and need time to reinvent yourself for the challenge that the next school year and next group of students will bring. No matter how much you love teaching or being an administrator, no matter how much you love kids, the challenge of changing lives, and/or of inspiring the next generation of leaders, you would be hard pressed to find an educator who doesn’t wish they could slow down the clock to make summer last just a little bit longer.
We have settled into the summer mode, the relaxation and good vibes of summer and its inevitable end is far enough away that the negative nellies are not yet signaling its impending doom. It is not too late, you have the opportunity to slow down your summer, to make the most of it. From one educator to another–I know how hard you work; I know how you lay yourself on the line each and every day. You deserve a long summer that will get you ready to do battle and fight the good fight for our kids come September.
I need to keep reminding myself that there are many summer days and nights that lie ahead and to cherish them - time with family and friends at Blueberry Hill Farm in the Berkshires, the Falmouth Road Race, swims at Farm Pond, gardening, yoga, cooking, dips in the ocean, and 'making time for nothing'. I am sharing some quotes that I share each summer that help me to #slowitdown and #leantowardsyes - I hope they can do the same for others...
Summer is the annual permission slip to be lazy. To do nothing and have it count for something. To lie in the grass and count the stars. To sit on a branch and study the clouds. -- Regina Brett
Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. -- Mark Twain
Summer afternoon-summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language. -- Henry James
Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time. -- John Lubbock
Aaah, summer - that long anticipated stretch of lazy, lingering days, free of responsibility and rife with possibility. It's a time to hunt for insects, master handstands, practice swimming strokes, conquer trees, explore nooks and crannies, and make new friends. -- Darell Hammond
As I share each year at this 'midpoint of summer', I hope everyone enjoys a relaxed, restful, reflective, and fun second half of summer, full of both 'everything and nothing’ at the same time. Stay tuned for the 'Opening Letter' to all Blake families in mid-August. And, as Kris Felicello shared at the end of the post referenced above...
There is no reason a late August day can’t be just as much summer as a late June one. Don’t start the countdown; just enjoy each day for what it is.
I look forward to the work that lies ahead for all of us.
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Take care.
Nat