Happy Friday! I hope that everyone is well and staying safe. Please take some time to check through and read some awesome thoughts from Ontario Edubloggers.
Teachers Teaching About Things: Has The Needle Moved?
There’s no doubt about this in Matthew Morris’ mind and I’m totally on side with this.
His Exhibit A is the events that happened on September 11, 2001. He reflects on where he was and how little he was able to know about the events of that day. His Physical Education classes went on without blinking.
Certainly, a lot has changed in society since then. We can be connected to news constantly if we wish. This includes students in seats in the classroom.
So, when events like those that happen daily are almost immediately known by everyone they can’t be ignored. No longer is the advice given to Matthew at his Faculty of Education valid. Teachers need to be aware of all that’s happening around then and have skills to be able to address them, age appropriately, when questions come from students.
There’s no question here; the needle has indeed moved.
For those of you who think that Pav Wander is just a podcaster, click through and read this post. She and Chey Cheney use this space to share thoughts between podcasts.
In this case, it’s a recognition of people other than teachers, students, and administrators and their contributions to the smooth operation of the school.
She takes the time, in this post, to recognize the secretarial staff. They are constantly juggling priorities and continuing to make it happen.
It’s a nice salute to these hard working individuals and I’m sure that any that happen to read this post will be appreciative.
While Pav suggested hugs, we know that that’s not a reality right now but I’m sure that you can come up with something tangible and virtual that would be just as affective.
She uses the word “unsung” and I’ve never seen it used better.
Play with Your Creative Blocks
Oh, man, did I need this shot in the arm from Jessica Outram.
While I don’t consider myself a creative person, I do have a few good moments. She outlines and describes four things to attack this…
- Question
- Adapt
- Collect
- Act
I’ve done a great deal of thinking about this. I know that I’m not the type to be able to sit down and “be creative”. I find that I have to keep a list when I do find myself being creative. Then, in my not so creative moments, I can always turn back to the list.
I’m going to give some of her suggestions a shot and see if it can turn things around for me.
Rassembler les championnes et champions
Excuse me for this interlude…
La pandémie, c’est un événement marqueur dans l’histoire de l’humanité. Elle nous a enlevé beaucoup jusqu’à ce jour: sens de sécurité, un degré de liberté, et pour plusieurs, des personnes près de nous. En même temps, elle nous a présenté une cause commune: celle de remettre en question ce qui est vraiment important dans toutes les sphères de la vie.
This was one of the better observations about the COVID pandemic and what it has meant to education.
We all know that “experts” are a dime a dozen and for a few thousand dollars, they’ll speak to your staff meetings. Is that necessary? Joel McLean offers a better solution – surround yourself with the right people, right now. He advises to not attract the wrong people which I think is good advice but I’m not sure exactly how to do that. Maybe he’ll write another post. And maybe another one about how to handle it when the right people turn into the wrong people.
Collaboration has never been so important. People are always looking for inspiration for success. In the past, it took special events to get together; these days, a message on social media is all that it takes at times to get started.
On her EveryoneCanLearnMath blog, Alice Aspinall shares this activity. I recognized it immediately. I’d used it in Grade 9 mathematics as a statistics / probability lesson and in Grade 12 Computer Science as a nested sorting and graphing activity.
The concept is relatively simple and that’s where the genius lies. You just need to rob your piggy bank and do some sorting and arranging. Alice provides a link to a template should you want it. This should set the stage for interesting followup discussion about just what students are looking at.
As I read her post and reflected on my use of it in the past, I couldn’t help but wonder if we’re watching history.
- when was the last time you used actual money to pay for anything? Even going for a coffee, I’m a tap and go type of guy now
- when was the last time you used a penny? I suppose if you dig deeply enough into that piggy bank…but what a start for a discussion by letting students work with historical pieces of currency!
- the Canada / US border has been closed for a long time now. I know that if I look at the change in my pocket, there’s a mixture of currency from both countries. In Canada, they’re used interchangeably most everywhere. If you look closely at Alice’s picture, you’ll see some American coinage. Now that the border has been closed for so long, will that be a reality as we go forward?
But I am thinking … if we become a tap and go society, how would we modify this activity?
If nothing else, it’s always been a good activity for that spare change!
Only in education would Diana Maliszewski get away with a blog post title that has so many acronyms in it.
For the uninitiated, it’s expanded to be Ontario Library Association Super Conference 2021. I’ve attended this super conference a couple of times and presented there twice. It’s a must-attend conference for every teacher-librarian and librarian for sure but I would suggest that any educator that’s using any kind of material in the classes should go at least once. It’s amazing and I understand why teacher-librarians clamor to go every year.
Alanna King sent out this wonderful acknowledgement above to Diana’s summary of the conference which was obviously virtual this year. Diana does give a great summary and I’d suggest you click through to discover the nine sessions she attended and read her observations. It’s very complete including a large number of embedded Tweets which reads like a who’s who in teacher-librarianship in the province.
Create CHANGE in the Education System
I was a little hesitant to click and read this post from Nilmini Ratwatte-Henstridge.
Is this really the time to bring in some sort of new pedagogy?
But, I’m glad that I did because that wasn’t the point of this post. Nilmini is proud to be a brown educator and gives a quick summary at the top of her post.
- Educators have a responsibility to teach anti-racist perspectives.
- Create change in the education system by seeing skin color. Give a voice to individuals from diverse backgrounds in the field of education.
- All educational spaces and systems need to move towards change and learn and adapt to bring about systemic changes.
Then, she digs in and gives us a very personal summary of things from her perspective. This includes discussing where she grew up and the political reality of Sri Lanka.
This is a post that I most certainly could not write. But I can read and learn with empathy. Folks, this is an important post and you need to read it.
I hope that you can find some time to click through and read these blog posts and enjoy them for yourselves.
Then, follow these folks on Twitter.
- Matthew Morris – @callmemrmorris
- Pav Wander – @PavWander
- Jessica Outram – @jessicaoutram
- Joël McLean – @jprofNB
- Alice Aspinall – @aliceaspinall
- Diana Maliszewski – @MzMollyTL
- Nilmini Ratwatte-Henstridge – @NRatwatte
doug -- off the record 
Please share your thoughts here. I’d enjoy reading them.