Educational Discourse

This evening I was spending time do other things besides being online – parent things like going to hockey practice, reading stories, playing mini-sticks and yucking it up with my teenage daughters. It was one of those evenings of which I’ve spent plenty just being “home”. I didn’t have to rush off to a meeting or feel the need to check in with the online world.

Later on, once children were in bed and studying, I sat down to check in and see what was happening. Now dropping in on Twitter can be a bit of a shock as you may have to search to see what the conversations are all about. Because there are so many different things happening on mine, it sometimes takes me a little bit to familiarize myself with what is happening. As I was looking at the conversations, this one from jepcke jumped out at me:

How do you balance an insanely busy day/week & keeping up with Twitter?

I’m not sure. I know that there is part of me that wants to stay “up-to-date” with what is happening in the Twitterverse. Just like when I first began with my RSS reader. I was reading and reading, trying to stay caught up with all the things that were going on, trying to write on my blog and trying to do all the other things. I finally realized that keeping caught up wasn’t going to happen, not for a person like myself with children, community commitments, coaching commitments plus all the things that are related to be an administrator at a school.

The same thing started to happen with Twitter. I wanted to keep caught up with all that was happening, all the new ideas and tools that people were using and the things that were going on. It was the whole RSS reader thing over again. Fortunately, it has taken me much less time this go around to realize that I’m can’t be one of those people who seems to be on twitter and the internet all the time. In fact, I’m not sure that is the kind of impression that I want to give. As kolson29 twitted:

have to come to terms with my addiction to online world vs not wanting my kids there.

This isn’t the first time I’ve run across this. Seems it happens to many of us who are trying to find a balance between online and inlife. This can be very difficult for many of us. As we build our networks and PLN’s, we are seeing how important such things are for us and our growth. We are dedicated to what the net and the networks have to offer and are seeking out new experiences and new ideas. (Sounds like StarTrek should be playing in the background!)

There comes a time, however, that we run into the problem of balance. Late nights tweeting with cross-continent colleagues, early mornings trying to get things together for a podcast, a quick check-in on twitter to see who’s on and what’s happening. Evenings are full of all kinds of happenings with some new tool being shared, tried and discussed. All this time eventually affects other parts of our lives. Well, it did my life. Like many new things, I became distracted with the one while not paying attention to the many.

For the first time in weeks, I went for a run today during my son’s hockey practice. It felt great. Sure, I listened to a podcast but I was just listening to it, allowing the information to be part of my run (treadmill of course! It’s like -38C with a wind here!) Like I mentioned earlier, I spent time doing different things with my children. When I’m done this, I’ll be doing a bit of reading and then off to an early bed – a habit that I would really like to continue! I find that it is good to have regular sleep.

For so many of us, the work we do each day is not just a job; it’s a passion. We believe what we do is important and we are dedicated professionals. That’s why so many of us eat lunch while catching up on email or twits, spend a great amount of time online and search within our network for ways to improve what is we are doing. Because things are changing at a break-neck speed, many are working at a break-neck speed. But is this good for us? Is this a good example? If we were mentoring someone, would this be good mentorship? I’m not sure. I do know that I’ve noticed that my children need to given an example regarding appropriate use of many things and I’m not sure that, in my overzealous pursuit of “keeping up” I haven’t really applied the “walk the walk”. Yes my online PLN is important and I really do enjoy the discussions with other educators. However, it needs to be in balance with the other areas of life. If it begins taking time that should be used to keep that balance, then it’s time to take stock, reflect and shift accordingly.

And maybe, by doing this, I can be better at discussing various tools with my colleagues. Because I know the time it takes to find and learn and incorporate, I can provide an example of balance for them. Now, I know that many people comment that we need to “work with the willing.” Well, I don’t always get the willing with which to work. In fact, as a middle years teacher, most of my students fell in the “un” category. I didn’t give up on them – couldn’t. As a teacher leader – administrator – my role is work with all. So, somehow, someway I need to find ways to draw all people in. The willing are always so nice with which to work – I liked them as a teacher too! It was the students with whom I spend recesses and after school that, eventually, I really got to know and whom developed in ways beyond what we were studying.

As I search for that balance, I realize that I am a mentor – to my children, my colleagues and the other administrators with whom I work – as well as the people in my PLN. I’d like to spend more time online but my RSS experience has taught me that it will come with a cost in many parts of my life. My wife may not need a WOW widow t-shirt but she was thinking of getting a RSS widow badge and I don’t want her to go looking for a Twitter widow hat.

These are times of enormous and rapid change for educators and students.  As a teacher, I still don’t want to give up on the ones who aren’t easy. While being an administrator in a Catholic school, one of the teachers I worked with commented about the number of students  we were receiving that needed extra help and adaptations. The teacher, jokingly, wanted to know if I had put an add in the paper asking for all students with problems to apply. If so, could I stop running the ad. I laughed. Then, somewhat seriously I said “The ad we have is the cross on our front entrance – it symbolizes what we stand for and who we are. So, no, I’m not going to take down the ad. And it should remind us of what we are called to do.” I often reflect on that conversation when I meet up with a difficult student or family or … If I had wanted to work with only the willing, I guess I wouldn’t have decided to become a teacher and, if I had wanted to work with only the willing staff, I definitely wouldn’t have become a principal. But they all deserve my best – which means that having balance and being a mentor is very important – especially during times of change.

Time for something else.

There’s a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon that has Calvin hammering nails into the coffee table. His mom comes in and freaks, saying “What are you doing?” Their is a pause and then Calving replies “Isn’t it obvious!”

Sometimes, this is how I feel when I’m working with the various tools that I use each day at school. I think it’s obvious what I’m doing, kind of like hammering nails into a coffee table. And it may be obvious to others who are using similar tools and doing similar work. However, I think that many teachers react like Calvin’s mom – in some type of disbelief and shock. It looks like we’re hammering nails into their coffee table.

So, I wondering, in the same vein of my previous posts, what 5 tools do you think would be the best to use with teachers so that they don’t think we’re hammering nails into that coffee table.

My list looks like this:

1. pbwiki – staff wiki of information and events with calendar of school-wide activities.

2. eye-jot – introduced to me by Alec Courosa – just something fun that teachers can do. It is amazing how you can get teachers using things just for fun.

3. Audacity – recording using the computer lab instead of tape-recorder. Students like wearing headphones and having a microphone!

4. Zoho business – introduction to online desktop. Slowly beginning to look at using online document sharing.

5. Google Earth – there’s just so much to do with this program.

Okay, I now pass this on to the following three: Julie Lindsay, Mrs.Durff, David Truss

They can choose to participate or this will die a quick and sudden death.

Things have not been going quite as I had planned. In fact, if I were to plan how they could go awry Monday , today would have been pretty much bang on. Okay. I arrived at school at my usual time, went to grab a coffee but it wasn’t ready yet so I go down to my office and began my morning looking at paperwork that I had ignored yesterday. (that was my first mistake, looking at paperwork so early) I proceeded to go talk with some of the teachers, stopped in the hall to talk to a few students and then back to my office to look at email. My normal Tuesday morning ended. What do I find but a reply to my email about a meeting today that I figured was in the afternoon. Nope – 9:30. Location – an hour away. Time now – 8:35. I didn’t panic but I also didn’t get my cup of coffee.

For the  next 20 minutes, I’m dashing around trying to get someone to cover my supervision, cover my class, be acting-principal (never have figured that one out. How come someone else who takes my place is acting? What does that mean when I’m there?) Then there is the phone call home to make arrangements for hockey practice and a few other after school activities. By the time I leave town it’s now 9:10 and I’m driving in fog so thick you can cut with a knife.

Why am I doing this? Oh, yeah, it’s for the kids and I love my job and I have payments.

The meeting was ….. – it was about technology use in the division. The coffee, when I finally got there, was pretty good and lunch was great – lasagna. I figured that things were turning out not to bad and I was going to get home in time for hockey pick-up. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I made a fatal error at that moment. Something that usually only rookie principals make. Something that I should have remembered. It’s Tuesday. Go home. Nope, not me. Not today.

I went back to the school. For some reason I do this when I’ve been at a meeting out of town. Even though I kept telling myself to just go home and go in early tomorrow.

We had 7 new students register in school. One who will need a full-time aide and others with some learning difficulties. Teachers are going on breaks already and the substitutes aren’t really ready to come in yet. I have a request for semester 2 timetable for a distance ed class and, well, I’m not even close to being done. And to make things really interesting, my office is now the football equipment room and old computer dumping ground for the moment. It’s only Tuesday!!!

See, if I’d gone home, I wouldn’t have known any of this until Wednesday and you kind of expect this kind of stuff on a Wednesday. I mean, it’s the day when many things take place because everyone is finally fully awake and recovered from the weekend. People are finally realizing that the paperwork isn’t in or they’re missing a form. Parents feel that all kids need to be back at school because, well, it’s Wednesday and they were feeling okay this morning. (especially after they threw up. Really. They did.) Teachers are realizing you had said you’d do something and are reminding you that you said you’d do something. (Thank goodness that by Thursday afternoon they forget because neither of you can remember what it is you said you were going to do.) Kids have been aggravating one another for two days and someone is going to get it and you might have to figure out who got what and who was really aggravating whom (even though this has been going on for longer than they have been in school and will only end with, well, probably old age and death) but you still have to work through things to make sure that everyone knows that you actually did something this week.

But oh no. I figured I’d just drop by and see what went on during the day. Thus I began my Wednesday work today and I’m not really ready for it. My body and mind are still in Tuesday and what I’m needing to do is really in need of Wednesday thinking. But I’m here so I’d better do something besides write this post. Post writing doesn’t really have a day. You can write on any day it’s just the content will be different depending on the day. Like if this had been tomorrow, I would have written about it being a typical Wednesday with all that was going on and what had happened.

All this has really messed me up but, as I work through this, I realize that if I’m already doing Wednesday work that means that Friday can be partly Saturday so I can leave early and begin my weekend Friday at noon. Hey, that’s sounding not bad. Wait, I have to go to a basketball tournament with my boys team which will not only make it impossible to leave early Friday but I have to spend Saturday with students so it really won’t feel like a Saturday.  Now I’m really down. I don’t think even an Aero bar is going to get me over this. What was I thinking when I booked that? It was probably in early November when all those stupid tournament requests come out and you figure “Hey, that’s sounds good. What’s the worst that can happen? What, will Tuesday really become Wednesday?” and you laugh it off. Every year the same thing happens and yet I don’t remember. I think that when they took out my heart and my sense of humour (you have to have those removed to be an administrator. True story. Mine are in a jar on my desk so I can show the kids when they come in.) they also removed also done a bit of a nip and tuck on my longterm memory so that I only recall things after I’ve committed to them. (Probably why I sit on so many committees.)

I was blocking it out and not thinking about it but now I end up thinking about it all because my Tuesday ended up being a Wednesday.

Better get at planning semester 2 and figuring out where I’m going to put all this stuff stacked in my office. And to think, I’m the guy supposedly in charge around here. Can you imagine what Thursday must be like;)

My resolutions for this year are pretty straightforward because I’ve decided that I need to focus on a few things and do them well instead of the usual list of 10 that I don’t really do at all. My #1 resolution is to take care of my health. I’m reading RealAge by Michael F. Roizen and looking at how my “habits” are affecting my body and my life. I not promoting this. Instead, it is a read that is giving my ideas about my health and the choices I make. #2 resolution is to blog/write frequently even if it is a short post. Sometimes I have so many ideas I want to discuss that I am not sure which to follow and end up doing none. Since joining Passionate Teachers and Fireside Conversations – both educator Ning sites, I have decided to dedicate a portion of my morning to writing/commenting. #3 is spending more time with my family. To do this, I will have to prioritize what I am doing and learn to really stick to my schedule. #4 – the last one – quit talking about web2.0 and starting implementing it with my staff, students and other administrators. First step, setting up sessions with teachers to explore. Second, putting teachers in contact with other teachers. Finally, begin doing presentations to others about the everyday uses of the technologies.

That’s it. 4. Each one requires that I pay attention to details – something that isn’t a strong trait for me but will be essential if the use of technology is to become a norm for our students. It will require teachers overcoming their fears about technology and doing things a bit differently but, unless these steps are taken, things will continue at the glacial pace they are moving. I want my daughters to be exposed and use the skills they have developed outside of school in their daily school lives.

People often have goals/resolutions but they don’t take the time to get to the specifics which undermines their goals. So, for me, each of the goals above will be fleshed out and be broken down into smaller, achievable goals. As my friends, I hope that some of you will call me on these goals and help me to keep them. I’ll share my specific goals using google docs if that helps.

2008 is indeed my year!

I’ve been looking at my blogroll and realize that it hasn’t changed since I first began blogging. I have spent time getting things organized on the blog and trying to find a voice for myself. I know that I often scan the blogroll of other bloggers but I just didn’t give much thought to my own. Tonight, I’ve been visiting different blogs and scanning their blogrolls. What impressed me was that on many of the blogs, the contents of the rolls are no longer just educators or those speaking on educational matters but people from all walks of life. This made me wonder if, as educators, we have reached a new step in our “learning”, beginning to expand beyond what we do and looking for people who have the same interests and hobbies or who catch our attention beyond our teaching.

missprofe has a very interesting post on when she begins to get back to the “groove” for school. I know that I posted my thoughts earlier this summer but I’ve found that those thoughts didn’t quite go as planned.

As a school principal, I have come to realize that summer holidays is just a time when students are not present. I’m not doing the paperwork or the other things that are connected with school administration. Instead, I find myself doing things that will allow us to achieve our goals for the upcoming year, planning out our staff pd times dealing with goals and looking at what we might be able to do for those students that are not engaged by school.

As the third week of holidays come to a close, I’ve spent very little time actually at the school, other than to check in to see how the renovations are going and to discuss getting our football field seeded and watered. Otherwise, I’ve been occupied do construction. This doesn’t mean I haven’t been thinking about school or, when I have the chance, doing some reading. But, it wasn’t how I actually saw my summer going. I was going to take time to do a bit of planning, focus on some key areas and slowly work through them, using the tools I’ve found to assist me in doing this. I was hoping to begin using my flickr much more and begin to build a catelogue of pics to use along the way. It hasn’t happened.

This is like my blogroll. I did plan to add to it and keep it up to date. I thought it would be a great idea to add new blogs and remove those that I don’t really visit anymore. However, like so many well made plans, life seemed to get in the way of such things and, on the importance scale, it soon fell off. Now, it’s not like my planning for next year isn’t important but I realized that there were other things to do this summer and, with all the time I put into various initiatives during the year, I just found that it wasn’t important at the time. As administrators and leaders, it is sometimes difficult to remember that we, too, need time for other things outside of education. That is why I was so impressed with the non-educational blogs that I’ve run across throughout my reading. They were refreshing king of like the people I’ve been working with these past three weeks. They’re non-educators and have reminded me that there is a world outside of education that isn’t necessarily caught up or even interested in school change. They see that things are changing but don’t necessarily see an immediacy to change what is going on in schools. They’ve been teaching me a great deal these past three weeks!

With this, I’ve decided that I should update my blogroll – it won’t be tonight or tomorrow so don’t be looking right now. It will take some time as I decide which blogs are on the “essential” list and which, although good, can be removed or maybe recategorized. Maybe I’ll have to do a bit more “research” to see how others are dealing with this. If you have any ideas or thoughts about the whole blogroll thing, I’d like to hear from you.