Conference thoughts and ideas

Cyber bullying Conference-
Thoughts and rants…

TANGENT: Choice. I.S. – Independent study. Creating a period at least once a week for student to do independent study of Choice.

Microsoft- Do something! Really that is what you are bringing?

Cyber bullying seems to be too narrow a topic! This is about personal responsibility and how we treat others. This seems to be one issue that religious schools do seem to have an advantage (not that I agree) but the have the dogma of their religion, like the Ten Commandments, that allows them to teach a framework.

How do we educate moral citizenry? Reflective questions do not seem to help intervene…

Who doesn’t bully? Why?
Students that are busy and interacting in things or with people that are passionate don’t bully.
Bullying comes from boredom and fear. Or the need for a resource, like money, food, or belonging.

Maybe a way to chapter the book would be problems? Or does that give into those problems rather than lead to the solutions. Gangs, teen pregnancy, bullying & Sports teams lesson.

Students (young people) are smart enough to see injustice and hypocrisy. Trust our young people. Teach them to see though the crap and believe in themselves. Critical thinking skills.

Why is there the perception that consistent and fair discipline is what students needed? Is there data to support this?

Test Scores & gay index

International Test Scores do not correlate to Anything!  Plain and simple.  Sorry Superman you can go back to the ice cave.

What does matter?  I am with Florida, the author, not the state.  Hyperpowers matter.  That is what we should be teaching.
Technology, Talent, and Tolerance!

I also appreciate Florida's use of the gay index. And living in Seattle is the perfect example.  This city is the world leader in technology.  It is full of talented people with terrific educations.  And it is extremely tolerant of others.  And it has a great gay population flourishing in this city.

My friend Mark Galbo, creator of the real "Rock and Roll Academy" in Telluride, always spoke of turning students from consumers to producers.  He was on to something!  It needs to go beyond music.  Education need to work with strengths.  Students need personal learning of their own choice and design.

And my last idea today is a little off the previous thread.
Coltrane saw the Circle of 5ths.. Some time you need to learn the basics or the rules in  order to improvise, change it, and make it better.  You need a data base to draw conclusions.  You need to memorize in order to improvise.

The five R's are tired!  School curriculum haven't changed and they need to.  The world doesn't have silo problems.  It has multi-level integreated problems.  It is time to create a school curriculum that doesnt' spend so much time seperating subjects.  Math is in every class.  What class don't you need English in?
I like the TED idea.  Technology, Entertainment, and Design

The Talent of Teaching

The Talent of Teaching = Empathy! or Theory of Mind!
The opposite of theory of mind = autism.  No social cues. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autism

Dunbar's number -  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number
The number of people that you can maintain a social relation ship with, guess what a good number for schools to use would be...  At high school maybe per class, but that would be max!
Middle School division = 150

Best empathy training = theater arts

What was a brain designed to do?

• Solve problems
• Survival
• In changing weather
• while in motion

Our traditional classroom are a  bad idea for brains and brain development.  That goes for cubicles too.

There is no none correlation to content and critical thinking skills.


We have been seduced by short term outcomes!  We live in a culture looking at the immediate.  Education is a long term ride, it should be a lifetime.  Not the hours spent in the walls of a poorly designed classroom.

Choice shouldn't be a choice.

First of all this school reform attention is painful to watch.  Same stuff different day.  I have been hearing about how we are falling behind since I started school.  Bunch of garbage.
The model is broken, deal with it.  I could say the same thing about the government and lobbyists, but that is a conversation for another day.  The school model is broken.  There is a reason Prussia isn't around anymore, time to say the same fore their model of education.  When someone wants to really take a look at change in education give me a call, I will do all of the work.

Here is a good article on Choice in schools.  duh!
http://connected.waldenu.edu/archive/item/606-making-room-for-the-self-in-school

What are you counting?

Looking at what is quantifiable.  We live in a culture that wants to manage what we can qualify with data.  So the choice is easy.  Change what you do? Or find ways to count the uncountable.  Get the data you need to do what you want to do?  Who are you accountable?

3 triangles: parents, students, teachers, maybe 4 board? or is that parents.  Get the real data!

Driving test scores and high stakes provides nothing.  Just more of the same the hamster wheel.  I f you are not watching the bottom, the minimum then you will be stuck with out it.  It is forgotten.  The wisdom of starting each meeting with safety concerns, I get it.

Next

Next post.  Gabriel book puts thoughts into my head, power of intention. Peace, rest, v. stress.  But back to the pyramid.  Basic levels stuff.  1st level must be set the SAFETY.  Got to have it to move.  Then the ego might be free to work, but better is up to know and understand,  Cortisol down..

This is crossing over all over the place.  How to make it mine...

Meeting needs...

Got to get back

I was slowly building some momentum and the start of school snapped it.  Oh well, no worries.  But I need to get the percolator back on the stove.  Get the book ideas flowing.  I might need to seek some higher sources, seems odd to want to get a book about getting a book out there.  But that is where it is going.  I have many ideas and can use my class as the spring board.  Cultural relfection.

language and voices, even diet and morphology?  we''ll ride out that hypothesis.

Triangle and peaks.

Just give!

On a personal note frustration is high.  I decide to take a month off of CF to work this issue out in my hip.  Two PT treatments later my lower back is in chaos.  Not happy, feel like I have regressed 2 years.  Wish me luck pulling out of this one.

Just Give!  Better than just do it.  To Give...  where does it fit in the triangle?  Esteem needs-yes, belonging-yes, to know and understand is even better.  It may go higher.  To function as a human with a higher aim in mind, that is the goal.  The proverbial kill two birds.

To create real change...  emotions move people.  

Internal and external

Internal and external motivation lie at the cusp of the line between ego needs and the need to know and understand.  The way to rise above ego and the new set of bigger, shinier rims is to change motivation from external to internal.  Rather than competing with the Jones next door, look to you internal guidance to help lead you.  I know I know the ego is loud and we want to have the nicer car than the Jones, but it will provide a clearer path to work on the internal dialog.
This step is HUGE and really is the major hurdle to change education.  If students, teachers, and administrators keep playing the game and handing out pellets for grades, etc, then the shift will not happen.  The change in education will come when students are brought into the circle to lead their paths, not follow the path that has been laid out.  That is ownership, leadership, and character.

BIG

Get Big.  Simple enough. 
There is this zen thing, "Want more, need less."  I get it intellectually, I do.  but it doesn't work for me.  I want a new car.  My 88 Jeep isn't cutting it.  I could go on, but it doesn't really matter.  The balance between greed and need is a tough one.  GREED AND NEED, good chapter title for esteem needs...
Wanting to lead a bigger life has many facets.  And cash is one of them. Being broke half way through the month is not the game I want to play.

Got to get going

Finish Chip's book Peak.  Good stuff.  I agree with it in a huge way.  I think Maslow provides a script for even more than he has alluded to.  Base layer.

Transcendance
Self-actualization
Aestetic Beauty
Need to know and understand
Esteem Needs
Need for belonging and love
Safety needs
Physical needs- food, water, air, & sleep

Schools needs to start at the bottom to assess their viability.  I would argue that schools that are working exist at the need to know and understand and above.  If a students is hungry they will not be able to work at their highest ability.  Don't get me started on sleep, a large number of middle and high schoolers exist right below zombie status.  We are a nation of under slept masses and we are reinforcing this lesson into our teenagers at their expense.

Tabata Tuesday with Green Face

Tabata work out this morning.  Didn't feel great and time showed it.  Eating primarily green face, clean paleo, cheat with coffee.  Sleep not great, kiddo been sick with high temp.  Stress high!  Not happy about all the drugs going into the kid! 
Need to get energy up.  Not too happy about sandblasting going on at work.  Need to increase food volume to keep energy levels and blood happy.

Working the Triangle into daily posts.

Sometimes I struggle for the post.  But it is time to start writing about the connections that I see in Maslow's Theory.  Chip's book offered some inspiration and now it is time to share my observations in the applicability of this theory to our lives and, maybe more importantly, in education.  I think there is applicability way beyond what we are doing now.  The surprising thing is how easy it is!  My 6th graders, get it and work with it. Thought sometimes I believe they are even getting a little jaded. 
The bigger concerns maybe how do we break out???  But that will be a for a later post, or maybe the conclusion...

worked the tri

Had a fun weekend and worked on my tan at the Danskin Triathlon.  It was great to see 5000 women of all ability levels get out and get after it. Inspiring. 


Bring family, groups and communities, the world together, for learning, education, higher ideas and ultimately healing.  Message of the highest healing authority. 
Plans to move forward...  find the new challenges.

Chip's Book Peak

This book is knocking me out.  I have been screwing around with Maslow's stuff for years.  Never really putting it to work, but I use it.  In my classroom, in dealing with people, co-workers, parents, and students.  Chip actually put it to work in his business.  Damn, I feel like he beat me to it!  I got to share my ideas.  Do I contact him and share what I have been thinking?

By the way,  I found out about this book from an amazon email.  I usually hit delete on those, not enough time.  I am glad I got this book.  It has me dreaming, thinking about more.  This is a big fat avenue for education.

That is a Motto - Jeremy Jones throws it down

Jeremy's Quote/Motto-
"A master at the art of living makes no distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion - he hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues with excellence what he is about and leaves others to determine, whether he is working or playing. He himself always knows, he is doing both."

About time

I think I needed to do this awhile ago, but something held me back.  Who would want to read my musings?  Who cares?  This isn't for them, it is for me.  I need to play big and get my ideas out.  A place to manage and grow the things and concepts I think about.  The things that inspire me.  The things that keep me up at night.  I get ideas, lots of ideas.  I put things together that maybe don't belong.  Know I am going to write about it.  I keep notebooks full of these ideas but it is time to take it out of the notebook and get it online.  To be accountable.  Keep growing.
-Be good.