Today was a truly inspiring day as a member of the audience at TEDxWestVancouverED!  Craig Cantlie, West Vancouver Vice Principal and teacher and TEDx organizer, was the master of ceremonies at this event that involved 14 dynamic speakers–and their presentations flowed together beautifully.  Kudos to the whole TEDxWestVancouverED team that also included Cari Wilson, Brooke Moore and Garth Thomson! (And thanks for taking care of us with gift bags, the tasty lunch and treats at break times!)

Here are a few big ideas I found resonating with me long after I got home:  (Please note: I compiled and typed up this up based on notes I jotted down during the event and did not intend these notes to be taken as a comprehensive summary of the TEDxTalks–I could never capture all that wisdom in a single blog post!)

LESSON #1: JOY MATTERS!

Dean Shareski proved that we must include joy as essential to living and learning—joy doesn’t have to be a part of a specific curricular area to merit serious attention.  It hit me in the heart big time when Shareski quoted Erica Bauermeister: “Adults need to have fun so that children will want to grow up.” Thanks, Dean, for bringing the joy!

LESSON #2: “WE BELONG HERE.”

Scott Slater talked about how learning environments are not just pedagogical decisions but a reflection of cultural values, and since we tend to anchor learning to experiences and places, those places should be magical…places to inspire reverence!  The experiential program Slater is a part of is a powerful model of a community working together in harmony with each other and nature.  I love their mantra: “We belong here.”

LESSON #3: INTEGRATE, INNOVATE, AND CREATE! (YES, EVEN IN MATH CLASS!)

Kelly Skehill is the high school math teacher you WISH you had!  She shared examples from her classroom of how she engages students and makes learning relevant with real world problem solving projects.  No doubt kids learn more in a math classroom that involves analyzing amusement park rides, designing waterslides, connecting concepts with heli-skiing, and planning their own “Dragon’s Den”-style pitches!

VIDEO BREAK: Sir Ken Robinson, “Bring on the Learning Revolution”

LESSON #4: MUSIC AND TECHNOLOGY IS THE FOOD OF LEARNING—PLAY ON!

Zoltan Virag, singing the praises of Christopher Smalls’ notion of “musicking”, proved why music is not a thing, but an action. Ever the consummate teacher, Virag taught the audience about cool new ipad apps for composing music and discussed the stunning array of creative 21^st century music tools that can empower all learners.

LESSON #5: DIALOGUE MAKES MEANING!

Wise grade ten student Lauren Bauman reminded us of the importance of supporting students in making their own connections and forging their own paths through exploring powerful questions in dialogue with others—ah, a young spirit after my own heart!  I’m with you on that, Lauren!

LESSON #6: BE A GUIDE ON THE SIDE!

Shelley Wright walked us through a beautiful example of how her students took charge to achieve a meaningful goal in a fundraising effort.  Now here is a teacher who wears her heart and intense care for her students on her sleeve!

LESSON #7: A SCHOOL IS NOT A BUILDING!

Ron Hoffart challenged audiences to rethink the design of learning environments and challenged us with the notion that “a school is not a building”.  It was fascinating to imagine with him more flexible learning spaces, garage doors between classroom spaces that open up with a button, and stylish and functional libraries that feel more like a Starbucks!  I loved his metaphor of how school libraries in the past were like grocery stores and libraries of the future should be more like kitchen—places where the ingredients come together and action and artistry happen!

VIDEO BREAK: Sugata Mitra, “School in the Cloud”

LESSON #8: ASSESSMENT SHOULD EMPOWER!

Gary Kern challenged us to consider to possibilities of new, creative and more responsive assessment models as ways to free up real life, real-time learning.  I loved his example of the NIKE FuelBand…makes me dream of new inventions for helping my students in their self-assessment process.  Thanks Gary, my students and I will have fun as we brainstorm together futuristic new assessment inventions—hey, you never know where this could lead!

LESSON #9: THE FUTURE OF POST-SECONDARY EDUCATION IS HERE…IN SQUAMISH!

David Helfand shared the vision and practices of Quest University—which I am now convinced has to be the future of post-secondary education.  Imagine: a truly liberal arts education co-created in intimate class sizes of 20, u-shaped desk arrangements, lead by impassioned “tutors” (the professors) who collaborate and co-mingle their knowledge to the benefit of students (instead of wall themselves up individualistic departmental glass towers) —and courses are delivered in a block system to allow for deeper immersion and focus!  I happened to stop by Quest last summer when I was hiking in Squamish, and let me say, it is easy to see why some have found this mountainous, lush green, wild flower painted setting close to loads of outdoor adventure possibilities a student’s dream come true!

LESSON #10: TEACHERS, SHARE WITH PARENTS—AND LOVE YOUR STUDENTS!

Chris Kennedy looked at teaching and learning through his eyes as a father of four. He made an impassioned call to teachers to find ways to share with parents and involve them even more in their child’s learning…and to just love the kids!  (This moment, I admit, got me a little teary eyed).  As the superintendent of West Vancouver, Chris himself truly “walks the talk” by connecting with the greater community through his own widely popular and personal “Culture of Yes” blog and his own impactful work connecting in and with his community.

LESSON #11: THE POWER OF MEMORY—YOU CAN HARNESS IT!

Tracy Dignum discussed learning, memory retention, and the power of sleep in moving memories from short-term memories to long-term memory.  Cramming isn’t the answer…we need students to experience, process and make sense of their learning in ways that are meaningful and that will stick with them.

VIDEO BREAK: Shane Kocyzan, “To This Day”

LESSON 12: RESTORATIVE JUSTICE PRACTICES—THIS IS HOW WE’LL HEAL OUR WORLD!

Katy Hutchinson’s powerful, beautifully woven story of courage, forgiveness, and restorative justice gripped the entire audience.  Hers was the only TED talk during which I did not take notes—I simply couldn’t–I was too in the moment, re/living her story with her.  I felt synergy with her journey and my heart went out to her and her children—I too recall the day when I was five and my own mother told me my father was killed.  My father died in a tragic helicopter accident—an act of human error or fate or God…I don’t know…I’m still processing that loss 28 years later.  Today Katy’s strength and decision to work to heal herself and others has lifted me in my own journey of healing. Thank you, Katy, for your tremendous gift.

LESSON 13: WE ARE IN GREAT HANDS!

Qayam Devji—Wow! What else can I say? This grade seven student is going to take the world by storm. Both Lauren and Qayam are great examples of intelligent, motivated and inspiring young leaders!  It was wonderful to hear Qayam talk through his planning and revelations in the process of putting together a TEDXKids event.  Best wishes to you in your tribesofhumanity.com venture!

LESSON 14: START WITH A FRAMEWORK—AND DON’T STOP EXPLORING AND SHARING!

Bruce Beairsto urged us to consider the power of a professional framework as a starting point for collaborative professional learning and action.  It was fitting to end the event with his call to not let the powerful messages of the day fade away as we left the building…Bruce—thank you, your call to action is one of the reasons I wrote and shared this blog post!

QUESTION: WHAT STOOD OUT FOR YOU AT TEDXWESTVANCOUVER ED? 

We all process events in our own unique way—I would love to hear from you about what TEDxWestVancouverED messages are still resonating in your heart and mind.  Please post any thoughts below…or share on Twitter at #TedxWestVancouverEd

I want to check back in and share some of the work going on in West Vancouver.  I last blogged about Some West Van Stories in November.

Director of Instruction Lynne Tomlinson got a boost for her most recent post on our district arts showcase – The Lighthouse Festival – when Sir Ken Robinson shared the post with his 167,000 Twitter followers.  Lynne highlighted the diversity within the arts at our schools:

The festival is indicative of the many programs offered in our district.  The variety of the performances provides a rich schedule of entertaining events as each teacher’s program is unique and highlights different aspects of performing arts.  We have enjoyed performances including: spoken word, theatre, choir, soloist, band, pop musical, flash mob and varied dance.

And she concluded, “This is public education at its finest.” – So true! It is great to expose the larger community to the great work in our schools, and give our students the opportunity to share their work with the “real world”.

Fellow Director of Instruction, Gary Kern, recently shared some of the initial feedback around our 1:1 Action Research.  There has been the good, the challenging and also the surprising.  Included on the surprising list from teachers:

• It surprises me that people feel that students having 1:1 access to technological devices at any time at school is anything but to be expected. Many have their own iPads, or iPods in their backpacks. At home, although they often must share devices with other family members, all of my students have access to technology almost anytime.
• How fast it is to find information (instant) when we are discussing things in-class
• How much having google images supports our ability to “see” what we are learning
• How many options exist/how many things we can DO with technology to show what we know or find things out
• For educators too, tech opens up endless teaching and learning opportunities that far-outweigh the frustration of slow Internet, missing chargers, and access denied messages!
• I was surprised when a teacher said, how can the students take notes from my lesson if they are ‘playing’ with their devices.  I figure the students take snaps and vids when they need to. A paradigm shift needs to be made here.
• It surprises me that children think that computers are smarter than they are. When they figure out that they are in fact in the driver’s seat of these powerful tools and that the sky is the limit, they begin to see and think over the rainbow!

Sticking with technology, Caulfeild parent Andrea Benton wrote a guest post on Principal Brad Lund’s blog sharing her thinking as to why she supports and encourages the use of technology in their school.  Her post inserts itself into the discussion of what is the right balance in elementary school.  She argues:

Some people believe that technology shouldn’t be in schools. For me, this is short-sighted.  Schools shouldn’t be teaching for today but should be educating students for the jobs of tomorrow. This includes project management, critical thinking, problem solving, teamwork and collaboration. Technology is here to stay and it is only getting more complicated.

Hollyburn Principal Val Brady recently used her blog to nicely outline the WHYs and the WHATs to writing in elementary school.  Her useful post looked at the purpose of writing and what has been changing:

The philosophical underpinnings of teaching writing have shifted over the years. Developing student skills in writing is still important, but engaging students in writing for real purposes leads to joy in writing and at the same time develops communication skills that will serve students a lifetime.  Whether students put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard, engaging in writing for real purposes gives voice and structure and develops thinking ability.

For West Bay Vice-Principal Tara Zielinski, a lot of focus in her class has been on Exhibition - the final stage of the PYP experience for grade 7′s:

In one sense, it’s a rite of passage.  However, after having both participated in and led Exhibition for five years now, I know it is so much more.  There have been and will be moments when our students feel like I did on the zip-line platform – fearful, intimidated, and adverse to things they have not yet faced.  Writing a Central Idea and Lines of Inquiry over and over demands resiliency.  Collaboration requires reflection and metacognition. Interviewing experts takes organization and calls for effective questioning skills.  However, each year it is one of the most rewarding components of my job to observe and support our learners as they integrate the essential elements of the PYP and more than six weeks of intense erudition into a final presentation.

At Pauline Johnson, they have just been through the student-led conferences, and Principal-designate Chantal Trudeau shared her thinking around their power:

The student-led conference is a wonderful opportunity for the students themselves to take ownership of their learning and to show their parents and guests what they have learned over the course of a term. Students invariably feel pride in what they have accomplished. They feel independent, confident and important as they read their favorite stories, lead their parents in the calendar routine, show science experiments or Social Studies projects.  Research shows that student-led conferences is a method that better helps students improve their learning, improve parent engagement, and get higher learning results for our students

Ridgeview grade 7 teacher Cari Wilson shared the story of her students inspirational meeting with Molly Burke:

One of the big privileges that comes with being in Grade 7 is the ability to join your school’s “Me to We” group. Last week many students in School District 45 joined thousands and thousands of other students in Me to We’s “I am Silent” day. It is a day of silent protest and solidarity, designed to bring awareness to the plight of the millions of children worldwide who are not listened to. The children who have no voice.

This year, on the day before “I am Silent” day, 5 lucky Grade 6 and 7 Ridgeview students got a chance to meet Molly Burke, a remarkable young Canadian who although blind has found her voice and is using it to inspire young people.

And finally,  also with a large serving of inspiration, West Vancouver Secondary Principal Steve Rauh had his blog taken over by John Galvani a grade 12 student in a wheel chair:

I am John Galvani, I am 17 and I am in a wheelchair. For my Global Education class I organized for wheelchairs to come to my school. I wanted to spread awareness and education about what my life is like in a wheelchair by giving my class the experience of being in a wheelchair for the day.

I contacted BC Wheelchair Basketball Association and arranged for them to deliver 10 wheelchairs on April 10. Ten students volunteered to be in a wheelchair.  They went to their classes, recess, lunch and some even went to P.E.!

We should do this for all grades so that they can see and feel the challenges that people in wheelchairs go through everyday.

Lately I have been seeing a lot of what I do as being the amplifier of good ideas – whether that is done face-to-face or in the digital world, my job is to tell our good stories and connect and network them to others.    And, there are lots of good ideas to share!

1. One of your so called ‘friends’ or ‘family members’ reports you to ‘ethics’ in their local ‘org’ (otherwise known as throwing you under a bus in exchange for their ‘eternal freedom’) because you have said or done something contrary to some ‘real’ or imagined laws within the cult. Usually evidence that you’ve had an ‘aha’ moment and are onto them. Yikes!

2. The ‘Church’ culls your files (including any information in your ‘confessionals’ and ‘personal’ interviews and interrogates everyone you know for ‘incriminating evidence’ of your anti-Scientology activities. If they don’t recall such activities their memories are nudged into the right direction (squeal on your loved one or else).

3. All of the information is collected together and now goes to ‘OSA’ (Office of Special Affairs (AKA CIA headquarters) as you have now been adjudicated to be a ‘threat’.

4. A full ‘handling’ program will be written up which will include pulling in your ‘friends’ and family members and giving them instructions on what needs to be done. Such instructions are given under the threat of further ‘ethics or justice’ actions (punishment) for ‘non-compliance’.

5. You are called in under duress of ‘ethics or justice’ actions (whichever will terrify you into compliance faster) or your relatives are called in and ordered to go and ‘handle you’ under the same conditions of duress.

6. CONDITIONAL: (unlikely unless you really are a massochist). You report in the the ‘Church’ for your handling and are given a stack of super sekrit files all about ‘the bad guys’ who are either ‘religious bigots’, ‘bitter defrocked apostates’, ‘squirrels’ (if you’re in on the lingo), ‘hate groups’ or failing everything else some ‘Anonymous’ or someone being financed by ‘big pharma’. Meanwhile you are hammered about your ‘unethical’ or ‘suppressive’ behavior and threatened and badgered into getting back with the program. If at all possible at this point they will try to get you on an E-Meter. Easy to avoid if you just say you’re not a Scientologist so there’s no reason for you to hang onto their silly contraption.

6. KEEPING IT REAL: You tell the ‘Church’ in no uncertain terms to fuck off. Now they’ve got nothing. What are they going to do? Declare you? All they can do is continue to hound and pound any living relative into getting you to STFU and get inline with the program using continued threats.

7. Some go away quietly at this point wanting no further trouble. As long as their friends and relatives stay with the program and disconnect or keep you under control everything is fine and dandy. However some people choose to use their ‘God-given right’ to speak freely about their thoughts, feelings and experience regarding their experiences with the ‘Church’ and decide to do so. For some this is a vital part of the ‘healing’.

8. The OSA machinery goes into full swing. If you’ve made too much ‘noise’ and people are starting to listen to you OSA fabricates a story about you to feed to their sheeple so there is no chance they will start to wake up and leave. As ‘Members of the Church’ have very limited access to real world information (the reading of non-‘Church approved’ literature or media is strictly forbidden) then this is often enough to keep the ‘flock’ from straying. If you’ve been really naughty you may at this point earn yourself the golden ticket – an excommunication notice written on bright yellow paper and hidden in a drawer so no-one finds out they’ve done it – kind of defeats the purpose really but they take it out once in a while and proudly announce that they’ve discovered that you are part devil and part lunatic and THAT’s why you hate the ‘church’ (not because they tried to destroy your life or take your children away).

9. If you continue to be a pest for the ‘Church’ don’t be surprised to suddenly ‘discover’ some quote from Karin (big fat liar) Pouw (current puppet – erm I mean ‘spokesperson’ for the ‘Church of Scientology’) saying that you’ve been recruited by David Love or me or Marty Rathbun or some faction of Anonymous and you’re all being paid by ‘Eli Lilly’. Yup. they’re THAT insane. If you’re considered very high risk they will hire lunatics to film you, follow you, surveille you, send agents to make friends with and get ‘close’ to you and hack into your email and phone – all in a desperate bid to find your ‘hidden crimes’ and ‘sexual perversions’ (like anyone on planet earth is an angel and anyone else cares less). They demand that ‘friends’ or ‘family’ members still in ‘good standiing’ act as spies and report back to them on your activities in order to maintain their status.
The ultimate plan is to destroy you utterly – financially, emotionally and physically.
I have a first hand report from an ex OSA agent that the actual physical death of a ‘critic’ was cause for champaign celebrations among OSA staff members when he was inside.

10. You beat the ‘Church’ to a pulp simply by exposing them for the lying sack of shit scum bags that they are and they go off and sulk and stand in a corner calling you mean names. Meanwhile you find you have lost a high percentage of your ‘friends’ and possibly ‘family’ and worse you find you have been betrayed by people you once trusted. It can be heartbreaking. BUT you’ve made it out alive and sane and you suddenly find somewhere along the line that you’ve made new friends – REAL friends who have stuck by you through it all. And you realize you’re not alone. And it’s easy to fight back and win xxx

Posted from WordPress for BlackBerry with pride

DO NOT LET THE CULT TAKE IT DOWN!

We are Anonymous
We are Legion
We do not Forgive
We do not Forget

Expect us.

VIDEO:

Scientology – Why I got out

MORE direct links

Scientology – Why I got out

Scientology – Why I Got Out

Posted from WordPress for BlackBerry with pride

   I’m trying to maintain a positive attitude, but it’s not easy. That speeding ticket yesterday was a kick in the lug nuts, not to mention the wallet. I don’t know why money has to be such an issue in life but it absolutely is. Some find a way to master it, while others inherit more than they need.

The latter are usually the first to say “Don’t worry – it’ll all work out.” It’s easy not to have to worry when there’s a trust fund in place or a rich relative available to help bail one out of a cash pickle. I’d love to be able to count on someone when times get bleak, but I’m a one man band.

All I want is enough to not have to worry about stupid stuff like speeding tickets. Whatever the reason, it was my turn and I will have to pay up. I would guess I drive about five times more than the average driver, so it’s inevitable I’ll get more speeding tickets over the course of my lifetime.

Still, yesterday was not when I needed it. I’m trying to come out swinging this year and get my financial ship righted to get out of debt. I don’t expect any free rides and I’m willing to pay what I owe, but that one materialized out of nowhere and urinated my flickering candle of hope out.

Plus, it happened at the beginning of the trip to put a damper on the whole weekend. I tried not to think about it last night in Eau Claire and tonight in Shakopee, MN, but I couldn’t help it. I did this run for the money, and now not only won’t I be making any I have to pay out of my pocket.

It is what it is, and I’ll shut my mouth and keep slugging. I’m working with a young kid named Dan Ronan this weekend and he’s got big time written all over him. He’s 23, and has spectacular upside potential. I was able to bring him along on this run and if nothing else at least I can enjoy a chance to mentor someone who appreciates it. I’m unbelievably impressed with his raw ability.

Dan lives in the Chicago area, and we crossed paths a few years ago at the Zanies Rising Star Showcase. He was only 19 then, but I could see his talent immediately. He’s stayed with it and is starting to come up the ladder and it was my pleasure to help him by including him on this run.

He’s got a great work ethic, and he’s a student of the game just like I was at 23. I see a big part of myself in him, but I think he’ll take it a lot farther than I ever did. He’s got a great look and an unusual delivery and I see him all over TV in the not too distant future. This kid is a big leaguer.

Hopefully, I can plant some of the nurturing seeds in him that comedians like Gary Kern, Kyle Nape, Danny Storts and others planted in me when I was his age. Those guys showed me how to be a comedian both by their words and their actions. Now it’s my turn to pay some of it forward. I don’t need a run like this for anything but money, but Dan needs the stage time to get his chops.

He came through with flying colors last night and tonight. He was nervous beforehand for both shows, and perused his set list like it was the winning lottery numbers. I used to do all that, and it made me smile watching him do exactly what I did all those years ago. Having a chance to act as a mentor to a talented kid like Dan is a treat, and I’ll focus on that. He’s got a very bright future.

And as happens in any intensely passionate love relationship, there have been amazing ups and downs and ins and outs and off the wall events I never could have expected or predicted. If I had known I was in store for this much intensity, I’m not so sure I’d have agreed to take the journey.

Too bad for me, I took it anyway. Now here I sit, decades later, looking back over the pathway I chose. From this perspective it’s super easy to see what I could have and should have done, but I didn’t have the luxury of this viewpoint as I made my trip. I did what I did with the information I had at a given time. Each and every mistake I made helped me learn what to do the next time.

And boy, were there the opportunities to learn. I made every possible mistake there could ever be made both on stage and off, and I even invented a few that had never been made before. I was completely clueless when I started out in comedy, and I had to learn by trial and error. The good thing was I wasn’t afraid to try. The bad thing was I had no plan and that lead to needless errors.

Had I only known what to do and when to do it, I would have had a much more productive and lucrative career. Unfortunately, there weren’t many who were willing to help when I started. But those precious few who were are still held in high esteem in my eyes to this very day. They gave me hope and inspiration more than anything else, but there were some useful hints thrown in too.

The people who helped me in my early years might not be household names, but that’s not the point. They were masters of their craft, and they did standup comedy because they loved it. They passed their knowledge and experience on to me, and I have in turn done my best to pass it along to others. That process is important to me, and if I help you all I ask is that you pass it forward.

Kindhearted mentoring comedians like C. Cardell Willis, Danny Storts, Gary Kern, Kyle Nape, Tim Cavanagh, John Fox, Larry Reeb and others were very instrumental in my early years. Even those who weren’t very nice taught me a lot whether they knew it or not. I was determined to get to where I wanted to be, and I wasn’t about to let anything or anyone get in my way. I had goals.

To go along with those goals, I also had a smart mouth. I thought I knew more than I did, and I paid the price for it – and what a high price it was. I didn’t know it at the time, but I sure screwed myself out of a lot of opportunities with just a few mistakes. It was painful, but I sure did learn.

One very important thing I’ve learned is that the learning process itself never stops for anyone at any level. Nobody ever ‘gets there’, and that’s both maddening and comforting. There are new things to learn on every level, but that’s part of what keeps things fresh and interesting for us all.

My reasons for serving as a mentor figure for aspiring comedians on all levels are many. First, I just think it’s the right thing to do. It’s simple human kindness, and there is far too little of that in any field in my opinion. I know exactly how difficult and intimidating the process of standup comedy is, especially in the beginning. I also know how great it feels to receive encouragement.

Second, I feel it helps comedy as a whole and I’m all for that. Better comedians make for better shows in the long run, and hopefully it will attract more fans for future generations. This isn’t the same world it was when I started, and there are more sources of entertainment than ever before. I have always been a fan of live performing, and doing that well is a craft that takes years to hone.

Thirdly, it keeps me close to the fundamentals of the craft. It’s easy to get lost in the shuffle of the daily grind of the business part of being an entertainer, but being around those starting out on their journey gives me a constant source of fresh positive energy. Plus, responsibility of setting a good example helps me to do just that. It keeps me on my toes, and helps maintain good habits.

Like I said, I am in love with standup comedy. I loved it before I ever did it, and when I did it I loved it even more. I dedicated my entire adult life to it, and even though I didn’t always receive exactly what I wanted how and when I wanted it I’ve found the good has far outweighed the bad.

If comedy were prison, I’d be a ‘lifer’. As long as my heart keeps beating, I’ll be looking to get on a stage somewhere to entertain a live audience. It’s who I am and what I do, and I would do it whether or not anyone ever paid me again. At this point it’s more than a craft – it’s an obsession.

I think for anyone to have a chance to be truly all they can be, there has to be that kind of solid dedication to the point of insanity. There has to be a NEED to be on that stage, and all the major stars in any performance genre share it. They want to be the best, and they give their all to do so.

I have definitely given my all, and continue to improve constantly as a comedian. The on stage part has not been a problem. My biggest mistakes were off stage, but that’s not the focus of what I intend to cover with my forthcoming series of articles. I might discuss off stage things at some point, but the majority of my focus will be on the nuts and bolts of improving one’s stage show.

There are more than enough angles to cover with that alone, and I will start out slowly and put my thoughts into bite size nuggets someone starting out can easily digest. Whatever I say comes from decades of firsthand experience, but I am always open to discussion and input on any topic.

All of that being said, I still need to make the following disclaimer: I CANNOT AND DO NOT CLAIM TO BE ABLE TO ‘MAKE YOU FUNNY’. It’s just not possible. Anyone who says they can is a flat out liar. Period. Nobody can ‘make’ anyone funny. My intent is to focus on the craft.

I use my years of hands on practical experience to dissect details of what I feel it takes to make the most out of an individual’s natural abilities. What I say comes with a lot of thought behind it, but there are exceptions to every rule. It all takes hard work, and for that there are no exceptions. Unfortunately, hard work alone is not the only requirement. There needs to be a plan of action.

As a follow-up to my “real-real” learning post (here), last week I had the chance to spend some time with four Sentinel Secondary students, Adam Mitha, Justin Wong, Jun Jeagal and Sailesh Suri, to hear a story, firsthand, of what this kind of learning looks and feels like.

Supported by their teacher, Joel Gibson, the four young men, former classmates in Joel’s Information Technology class, were inspired to develop an “App” for the school that could easily match any created by experts in the field. They didn’t get paid, they didn’t get school credit, but it was some of the best learning they had ever experienced. In my conversation with them, they expounded about the 300 hours of coding, developing and designing that went into the finished product that has just been loaded to iTunes here (it is a free download).

So, just why did they do it?  They wanted to leave a legacy for the school. They described it as a mostly an out-of-school project, but they loved it because they were doing stuff they wanted to do and were interested in learning about. They emphasized the role of their teacher, Joel Gibson, “saying, I believe in you, is the best thing a teacher can do.”  When Joel saw the group needed to obtain more technical expertise for some parts of the project, he connected the students to experts from within and outside the system. Along the way, he connected them to the school PAC and others who could help.

Of course, as I stated at the beginning of this post, we didn’t make it easy for them. We (the system), limited some of their access to computers, were slow to support them technically, and made it challenging to move forward. They said that it was a good thing they had Mr. Gibson to mentor and guide them, but also, that they were part of the hacker culture. The hacker culture, as they described it, is “doing things over and over again. At school, the culture is that you do it right the first time.” One student remarked, ”I had 30 failed projects before this one.”

I have been inspired by their inventiveness, determination and passion. How can we help students balance this kind of work with school, or better yet, how do we make this type of work systemic to the work of the school?  These four students were pursuing their passion, creating real work of value, and they were learning — for the benefit and reward of learning.

Often, this type of informal learning can be incredibly powerful. While our current structure does limit this “real world” opportunities, students like Adam, Justin, Jun and Sailesh, describe these as often the most exhilarating school experiences.

Be sure to download the fabulous Sentinel App:  HERE

Will students include more meaningful detail and perspective in their weBlogs by focusing on social issues as their ‘purpose for writing’ and will continuous feedback, in the form of threads, lead to deeper understanding of a given issue?

The classroom was both face-to-face and virtual, and teaching students I couldn’t see was new and challenging.  Teachers are accustomed to reading a student’s body language, and receiving cues from the class.  Half of the students were in front of me at Gleneagles, but the other half were viewing the class on-screen at West Bay via Lync, and it was a one-way video.  The students could ask questions, but I didn’t feel the same connection as when they are in front of me, in a room, or at least when I can see them on video.

Of course, the whole topic was quite new for the students as well.  We all agreed that even two years ago, there would have been no way we would be having a conversation about digital writing and blogs; what it meant to have a personal brand, and what kind of topics we would write about if we were going to share our ideas with classmates, or the world.  Out of the presentation came a number of excellent questions:

• Why do you blog versus using an alternative platform to share your message/knowledge?
• Where do you get your ideas/inspiration for your many blogs?
• How do you create an effective blog?
• Where/how do you find the time to blog so frequently?
• When you started blogging, were you inspired by anyone/anything in particular?  Do they continue to influence your thinking?  If so, by what/whom?
• Do you follow other bloggers and use their techniques/messages as a model for your own?
• How do you decide on the graphics, pictures, and links you embed when there seems to be so many to choose from?
• How often do you post?  Why?
• Do you believe the good connection with your readers is because of your transparency as a writer?

It is a different way to think about writing, and I often say that I think in blog posts.  When I sit in a meeting, I write my notes around themes that may later become posts; I can think of the visuals that might go with the words, and this is so different from only a few years ago.  I have started dozens of posts, which may or may not become a blog at some point, but they have helped me organize my thinking.  While I write about one post a week, I think about hundreds. It was great to hear students discussing the stories they would like to tell, because we all have stories; we all have our own powerful narratives to share.

Toward the end of the session, one of the excellent discussions was about commenting. I offered that when I comment on other blogs I try to expand on an idea raised by the writer, perhaps give a different point-of-view, or add additional information the writer, or other readers, may find interesting or valuable.  I am hopeful some of the students who participated in our session last week will do just that with this post — extend and reach out with all of your learning.  So, what did you find interesting/valuable? What are you going to do next?  What questions do you still have?

Thanks again to the students of Gleneagles and West Bay for your engagement.

Thanks also to Colleen Denman for session photos, and all of the teachers and administrators who were involved in organizing and setting up the session.

I have previously written posts on Principals as Blog Leaders (here), highlighting the blogs from our district leaders and leaders in each of our schools. I have profiled the 17 BC superintendents in Superintendents as Blog Leaders (here), who blog to keep their community current. More recently, I have shared a post featuring our dashboard initiative (here) in West Vancouver, and efforts to give students their own digital learning space. There has been amazing energy around students as blog leaders, and many of our principals and vice-principals have blogged about their experiences, including Judy Duncan, Principal, West Bay Elementary (here), Chris Parslow, Vice-Principal, Gleneagles Elementary (here), Scott Slater, Vice-Principal, Bowen Island Community School (here) and Chantal Trudeau, Principal, Cedardale Elementary (here).

That energy and excitement is spreading. Last week, I spoke with a gentleman with grandchildren in two of our schools. He told me that each child had a blog to show him and were genuinely enthusiastic about what they were doing. It was also the first time they had shown him their writing, and he commented on how they were so engaged, and how he was even able to connect through the technology.

Our Director of Instruction for Technology and Innovation has already covered the student blog-a-thon (here) and a summary from our Digital Literacy Support Teacher (here) gives a comprehensive overview of some of the work taking place with our Grade 4-7 students around digital writing.

I often remind people who are looking in from outside the district with skepticism, envy (or both) at our technology use, the ultimate goal is not to have students blog, it is to have students improve their literacy skills and have the ability to be digital writers, and to do things that would not be possible without the technology.  It is about students creating content to hyperlink to the world, to embed photos and video with text.  It is about students publishing, and then to have the opportunity to receive feedback on their work, review, edit and republish. It is about students producing work not only for their teacher, but for the world. It is about students having their own space to be creative and connect in new ways.  It is, ultimately, about students having greater ownership of their learning.

Twelve months ago, I never would have imagined writing about hundreds of West Vancouver students blogging as a way to share their learning.  It is so exciting to see the new learning students are creating, the teachers that are guiding them, and the parents (and grandparents) who are engaging with them. A slide I often use in presentations simply says, “The Kids Have Tasted the Honey”. Having seen the work presented by so many students this past fall, the viral nature of the growth of digital writing, that quote is so true.  This month, the challenge for students across the district is to publish 5,000 posts (see all the monthly challenges here).

I do want to highlight and celebrate some of the students’ digital writing. As our student blogs are on an internal system, I have copied the text of a few of them when they wrote about their neighbourhood:

Grade Four

Jenna, Westcot

I live in wonderful neighbourhood in West Vancouver close to my school. I live in a cul-de-sac. My neighbourhood has some trees in the background and is open and sunny.

The view from my neighbourhood is wonderful; you can see pretty much see the whole city. I get a view of downtown, the ocean, and the rest of Vancouver. It is very pretty in the night because I can see all the lights and the city looks like it is shining.  When there are fireworks I can see them quite well, and it looks beautiful. The fireworks look like a spurt of colour bursting out of the sky. I can also see the sunset from my neighbourhood. I love seeing the pink and purple sky in the morning and evening. I love the views I get from my neighbourhood.

In my neighbourhood, we sometimes encounter wildlife. During the spring we sometimes get black bears. They would either take someone’s garbage and eat in our yard, or poop in our yard. When we had a plum-tree they would come into our yard and eat all the plums. We have a big grassy yard so I guess the bears like it. Once a black bear tore down my neighbour’s shed and they had to call the police. They did not turn on the flashing lights but, just seeing the stripes on the police car, the bear ran away. I also get a lot of crows in my neighbourhood and they usually perch themselves on the roof or on the electrical wires.

 My neighbourhood is very close to my school. This is convenient so we do not have to leave my house really early. Also, on snow days or warm days we can walk to school which is really fun.

We have wonderful neighbours and we like to go over to their house and play badminton or tag.

This is why my neighbourhood is such a wonderful place to live.

Lauren, West Bay

I have a really cool neighborhood. My street is on a beach. I really like going down to our beach in the summer because the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks is really soothing. I also like living near the beach because I can watch all the boats sail along the coast. It’s really nice sitting on the couch watching seals bob their heads up and down. Once I even saw whales! Can you believe it? Speaking of animals, we see quite a few animals on our street. For instance we have a “Block Deer”. A deer that is so comfortable he walks through the tables of our annual summer block party. Amazing right? On my street it usually smells okay but for a few days now and then it smells like skunk. My family has named the skunk Kyle. We even tell stories about him. We have quite a good time with it. A few days ago there was a baby bear on my street. He was an orphan because his mom was taken away earlier in the season. Luckily he was saved by my neighbors, who found him up their apple tree and stayed at the bottom until the rescue center came and took him. They named him Apple. My favourite animals of all on my street are the raccoons because they’re so cute when they put their paws on the living room window. Watching animals is not the only thing I do in my neighborhood. There are lots of kids. In the summer we like to ride our bikes together and on Halloween after we go trick or treating our street throws a fireworks party and we all watch. I love my neighborhood. It always makes me feel welcome.

 Grade Five

Nicole, Caulfeild

In my neighborhood, we have a glorious view of the water. We are able to see ferries and cruise ships gliding by gracefully. One time we had spotted a Disney Cruise! We could see the water slide hanging off the side of the boat. It was a very cheerful and magical boat.

The wild life around us is amazing. Every morning during the frosty winter you will hear a woodpecker pecking against some sort of metal heater that we have on the roof. The woodpecker has a cherry red mohawk, and a slim black body.

Another type  of wildlife around us are geckos. They look like they have gradient patterns on their backs which make them interesting to look at. Some of them we’ve seen are emerald green and a night black. During figure skating camp in the summer every time we came home there were two gecko’s in between the rock wall of our garden. One of them is a baby gecko and the other is the mother. Their colours were amber and grey. they were not scared of anyone who walked by or looked at them with interest.

One night during the summer we spotted a black bear strolling up the sidewalk beside our driveway. We think it was a cub because it was quite petite.

Another type of wildlife we have around are chipmunks. When me and my family are swimming in our pool,​ you will see tiny chipmunks fighting over a tiny pine cone. (probably because it has fresh seeds inside it.) Although, when the pool is completely calm you see the reflection of them on the glassy water.

In our neighborhood, there is a rocky beach just down the street called, “Stearman” At that beach when I was little I used to collect only one type of shell which is kinda like a mini conch shell. Stearman beach also has a water fall going down the center of the beach leading into the ocean. It is a gorgeous rushing waterfall. Also at the beach I can feel the gritty sand squishing between my toes. It is very ticklish! The water is very cold in the Pacific Ocean so I don’t like going in it very often.

Sherry, Chartwell

My neighbourhood is a fantastic place to live, because it small, quiet, and very peaceful. There are never car crashes, babies never scream, and our leaves don’t make any crunching sound when we step all over them. The only time there is ever any noise is when someone comes to mow our lawn.

Our neighbourhood is very lively. To the North of our house are the Lion Mountains, which have just been showered with mounds and mounds of white, fluffy snow. To the East lies a pretty little park called St. David’s park. Sometimes in the summer, I even go blackberry picking there during late August, when the berries are ripe. To the South is downtown, where I can see the Seabus going back and forth between the two towns, and where I can also see the blazing fury of red, pink, purple, orange, and yellow when I’m watching a breathtaking sunset. To the West is a kind family of Iranians that sometimes help us plant and take care of our garden. Our entire family is very grateful for their time and effort towards our flowers.

Sometimes we get interesting surprises from the wild.  Birds, raccoons, and squirrels come to our neighbourhood to seek out food. Lot’s of mornings I have even woken up to the pretty sound of robins and sparrows chirping outside of my bedroom window.

During the spring, there are often flowers that bloom and grow early, like bluebells, dandelions, roses, and cherry blossoms. When it rains, the dewdrops reflect off of the sun, causing it to look like little, miniature rainbows sparkling in the sunlight. In the summer, there are even more beautiful flowers, and this tie the flowers are all the colours of the rainbow. In the autumn, the leaves turn red, orange, and yellow. When they fall, I often stick them in my scrapbook so I won’t forget that specific fall. And finally, in the winter eventually everything gets covered in a thick blanket of white snow, and the bright red and green holly sticks out of the astonishing white landscape.

My neighbourhood is a great place to live all year round, and I wish that the whole world were as peaceful and beautiful as it is. We have such a great neighbourhood that we should all work hard to protect and cherish it.

Grade Six

Eva, Pauline Johnson

I have lived in my neighbourhood as long as I can remember. My neighbourhood is quiet and remote, but if you scratch the surface you will discover many exciting things. By reading the next couple paragraphs, you will find out lots about my neighbourhood. You’ll find out about the people and the hill and the view from my neighbourhood. You’ll find out that there are good and bad aspects to my neighbourhood. When balancing the good with the bad, my neighbourhood is a pretty nice place to live.

There are not many kids in my neighbourhood but there is an interesting collection of adults that live near me. There is one guy that carves native designs in cedar. He has carved a canoe out of a cedar log, a whale on his front door and he even made an eight meter totem pole that stands in his front yard. There is also a guy who has a red corvette that makes a lot of noise in his garage. There’s a really nice family that lives next to me. Their kids have grown up but they have a really cute dog named Millie and a playful bunny named Bruno who keep me company sometimes. I also have a war veteran as a neighbour who lives with his wife. They are really nice people. The whole group makes up a diverse set of neighbours

My neighbourhood is far from the city on top of a huge hill. There’s up sides and down sides to that. The down sides are that it’s hard to walk home and you are kind of cut off from the community below. The up side is that you get a nice view of the city and the ocean and sometimes you get so much snow that you can’t go to school.  Way up here, we can enjoy all that nature has to offer.  We get the birds chirping in the morning, we get the bear cubs in the spring and in the autumn we have trees bursting with colour. All this gives us a great advantage over living downtown.

My neighbourhood has an amazing view of the city. From up on my hill, we are so high that we are above the fog and can see the fog lying on the city below . Also we get to see beautiful sunrises and sunsets, the lights of the city at night, the dark rain storm clouds and we can clearly see the lighting storms. The only thing we can’t see is the fresh snow on mountain because we are actually on the mountain side.

You just read about the up sides and the down sides of my neighbourhood. I hope you think that the people are cool as I do.  I think if you saw the view and the nature you would find it magical. I hope you enjoyed reading about my neighbourhood.

Sarah, Pauline Johnson

My neighbourhood is fun and vibrant.  I will tell you all about living somewhere where you can walk to the ocean and why I’m lucky to live in my neighbourhood. I will also tell you about a wonderful park and my memories there, plus my place in Whistler.

In my neighbourhood there’s a park named Westridge Park. There’s a nice tennis court, it seems like nobody ever plays tennis there except for me and my mom. In Westridge Park there are tons of trails to walk around in, my friend and I like to collect all the BB’s while we walk. There are also creeks and streams, on a hot summer day I walk over to Westridge Park with my friend and splash each other with water. The waterfall is awesome; I love hiking up it but believe me it isn’t easy.

I think that I’m lucky to live in my neighbourhood because there are nice people and lots of activities to do. I’m lucky because I live pretty close to the ocean; it’s about a 20 minute walk. It’s a nice walk winding through the streets. When you think about it we’re lucky because there’s clean water and fresh air. Everybody has to go to school, but in some countries they don’t even have schools!

I have a cabin in Whistler as well. Our family loves to ski and we go up there every weekend in the winter and sometimes in the summer. I love Whistler because it’s pretty much always snowing. It’s nice to wake up when it’s snowing and drink hot chocolate getting all excited for the day ahead. I feel lucky to have a place at Whistler because on the drive there, there’s a Tim Horton’s, who doesn’t like a timbits on a long drive?

I told you all about Westridge Park, why I’m lucky and my cabin at Whistler. I hope you enjoyed reading about my neighbourhood, and just think about… do you feel lucky to live where you live?

Kate, Pauline Johnson

Bark! Bark! I sit up and look at my clock it’s 5:30 in the morning and I am once again woken by the sound of barking dogs. I try to go back to sleep but the noise continues. My house is right beside a dog park so in the morning I sometimes awaken to the sounds of barking, growling and once in a while it even sounds as if two dogs were fighting. You have to agree it’s not the nicest thing to be woken by. As I said my house is beside a park and in that park there is a high school. How come kids in high school are always throwing parties? What I’m saying is that in the morning I’m woken up by dogs and at night I can’t sleep because they are doing fireworks as loud as someone’s heart beat after watching a terrifying movie! Let’s say I sometimes have trouble concentrating in school the next day when I can’t stay awake! If you read on you will find out everything about my neighborhood. 

I have talked about how I see and hear lots of dogs. There’s one dog that constantly shows up in my front yard without an owner. Its name is Ellie you’re probably thinking I’m talking about a stray dog but Ellie does have an owner. Since my house is situated right beside a park I have seen a lot of animals some of which have even been inside my house. One animal that I see and hear a lot of are raccoons. One time at 8:30 at night I was reading my book when all of a sudden my cat starts to hiss and my dog is running around downstairs chasing something. I wait in bed thinking of all the possible things they could be chasing. At that very moment I knew that a raccoon was once again in our house. The sly raccoon had gotten through the cat door and had begun to eat the cat’s food. The raccoon had definitely underestimated my cat and was soon chased out by my cat Tommy. I doubt that raccoon will ever come back. Another animal that I see around my house is an adorable barred owl. I don’t see him very often but when I do it’s so fascinating because I know most people haven’t seen one in their natural habitat. When there in their natural habitat they’re so happy and they will do their birdcall and everything. Why go to the zoo when you can see one in your own backyard? The last animal I’m going to write about is bears. I have never seen the bear that lives in the dog park but he’s almost always there (unless he’s in hibernation) but about three weeks ago my mom told me that the bear had been captured. Anyway when the bear was still here he would eat all of the berries and he even went through some of the garbage cans. Of course he did this all at night and if the next day someone went to go pick some berries and they found that they were gone they immediately knew they had been eaten by are neighborhood bear. 

Imagine it as a beautiful, sunny, warm summer day what should I do? Go play soccer in the park with a bunch of my friends go swimming in the creek. Around my house there are so many things to do. I already told you how I live beside a dog park and that in that dog park is a high school. It’s not like my house has a wonderful view of the ocean but I still love where my house is. It is on a dead-end street we never see cars unless they accidentally turned on to our dead-end street. Which means it’s a fantastic place to bike, scooter, roller blade or even play a game of basketball, soccer or any other sport without having to watch out for cars. A lot of parents worry about their children going on to the street to play but no one in my neighborhood worries about their children getting run over by a car since no cars come down our street. Because I live beside a dog park whenever I want I can go and play soccer in the dog park on a grass field with real goals that are actually the right size. It isn’t very fun playing soccer with the size of nets that 5 year olds play with. In the summer blackberries, huckleberries, salmonberries and lots of other berries lots of people don’t even know what salmonberries are! Most people think they are a type of poisonous berry. I think I learn lots more than the average person about nature just by living beside a dog park.

You have all heard how homelessness is an enormous problem in Vancouver in this paragraph I’m going to tell you what I think my neighborhood could do to help the homeless. My neighborhood hasn’t done anything to help homelessness and I think these are some ways my neighborhood can help. I have noticed how in my neighborhood lots of people go on vacation more often than needed even in all of West Vancouver I would say most people have traveled outside of Canada. I think if everyone in my neighborhood went on one less vacation they could give some money to buy homeless people a warm blanket and a pair of comfortable clothes. In the summer my neighborhood had a garage sale if we did that again but this time gave all of the money to a homeless shelter. It would make a big influence in homeless people’s lives. Because pretty much in garage sales it’s giving away objects that you don’t want, why not give it to a good cause instead. Another idea would be to every year everyone in my neighborhood could each donate 20$ to the North Shore Lookout shelter.

Thank you for reading my blog I hoped you learned lots about my neighborhood and in your neighborhood you can also try to make an effort to help the raising number of homeless people in Downtown Vancouver. If you ever want to see wildlife instead of looking in the zoo try finding them in their natural habitats.

Grade Seven

Mollie, Irwin Park

My neighborhood is the perfect place to live. Our hou​se is in a great location for our family. We live in a very environmentally friendly and green location an it is also in a private and quiet place.

Among all the neighborhoods in West Vancouver, I think mine is one of the best.  We live in the Bayridge area, close to Caulfeild Village. To begin with, we are close to many schools, including Rockridge, so I can walk home from high school if I go there. If I did not want to walk home, there is a bus stop right in front of our house! Also, there is a couple of elementary schools that I could have gone to including West Bay and Caulfeild Elementary Schools. Another great thing about my neighborhood is that it is close to Horseshoe Bay, so it is very convenient to go for a nice hike by the water, go for lunch or go to Bowen Island for the day. Lastly, there are lots of little things that are good about my neighborhood like we are a ten minute walk to the beach and we are conveniently close to the highway for going to Whistler on weekends. This is why I like the location of my neighborhood.

Something else that I love about where we live is that it is a very natural environment. We always see wild animals going in and out of our backyard! These animals range from bears, deer, raccoons, skunks and many types of birds. I like seeing animals in our backyard because it shows that we are still at the boundary of an urban forest and that West Vancouver has a wild side to it. Another thing I like is that we have many creeks in our neighborhood where fish come back to spawn in the autumn. Yet another quality that my neighborhood has is that we have two magnificent parks. They are both very natural, not used by many people and fun to explore. You can find secret stashes of blackberries and salmonberries, build tire swings and tree forts. These again are some of the many reasons why my neighborhood comes out on top for me!

Last of all, my neighborhood is so great because it is private and quiet. Also, our lot is great. First of all, we have one the largest properties on our side of the street, which is the north side. Not many people in West Vancouver can have as big of a property as us. My favourite thing about my neighborhood is that it is so quiet. There are never many cars going by at night or in the day so I can have really good sleeps and go for runs safely in the day.  Lastly, because of the size of our lot we have lots of privacy when we are playing outside.

I have listed a number of reasons why my neighborhood is the best. It is quiet and private, very natural and in a great location. It is amazing to think that all these things can be found in one location.

Sarah, Ridgeview

Rain drops cool, snow falls soft, but sunshine is a welcome break. Streams trickle and rivers roar, as away the ocean tides shrink, and as my skipping stone sinks. West Van is a haven of dappled light and shade. Forests hide squirrels, as garbage cans conceal raccoons.

In my yard, there are regular visitors, ones that I feed scraps of bread or leftover food. I always have an animal waiting outside for a meal.  Sometimes the seagulls fly up from the beach to join the crows and sparrows perching in the pines. No matter what small creature comes, they leave with full bellies.

Another great thing is all the remarkable trees that stand guard over the inhabitants of this outstanding place. The wispy white clouds and the sometimes dazzling blue of the sky inspire my poetry, and my writing. Crying seagulls circle over the sandy beaches, waiting for the moment when a scrap is tossed and when they all dive down, big feathery lumps. Here the heart is always full of the sound of the tide and the blue of the sea. The mind empties then sets itself free to wander through the maze of thoughts and to delve into your imagination. Inspiration is everywhere. The very wind calls me to join it, to spread my wings and soar, to leave the world behind.

 I learned to imagine at a young age. At night I would clutch a blue marble, waiting until it settled comfortably into my hand. I would close my eyes and see myself at a cliff with the world spread before me, and then I would unfold my wings and jump. In my dreams I would glide, free of all my worries, and I would remember how it feels to fly, so when I wake up I just have to close my eyes to leave the world.

West Vancouver is a place of beauty, of comfort and safety, of nature. I know how to embrace the wild, flow with it. I hoped that maybe one day I could do something to make it even better. May all the people who pass through come with love and leave loved.

Will, Irwin Park

I think that my neighborhood is the perfect neighborhood to live in for many reasons. People move here because it has so many benefits that other places may not have. Going to school in my neighborhood makes you loads of friends, and the neighborhood is a very kid friendly area. Each person is unique, and together they form an interesting and fun place to live in.

A morning in my neighborhood starts with rays of sunlight pouring through my window. The glittering blue of the ocean reflects off my canary yellow walls, creating an emerald glow. In seconds I am aware of all the sounds around me. The faint barking of our neighbors’ dog and the zoom of cars whizzing by are the two that I can always count on. I look out my window to see the ocean, reaching out with its long arms to the laughing shore. I have always said that the air is so much more fresh and salty due to the ocean, and anyone who has visited Dundarave will notice it right away. I look into our yard, and see the play fort which has doubled as a castle, a spaceship, and a boat. The fence behind it still has a huge hole in it from our bear encounter (that bear sure was grumpy!).

My neighborhood is full of interesting people with interesting personalities. I think that it is these people who make my neighborhood so great. But there are also funny animals that live around me too. One could write a book about the animals in our neighborhood! For example, at least once a week a random cat will roam into our yard, hoping for a can of tuna. We named this cat Minerva, after the cat shape shifting teacher from the Harry Potter series. Another good example would be our neighbor’s dog. Thanks to him I never need to set my alarm clock. At 7:30 every morning it sounds as though he is attempting to drown out a lawnmower!

One thing you will notice as soon as you come to Dundarave is that everybody is friendly and seems to know each other in some way or another. My neighborhood proves that it is a small world after all. You may find out that you sister’s friend’s mom is the aunt of your buddy in Grade One! It sounds confusing, but you get used to it after a little while.

My neighborhood is like the perfect place to live. As we live near the water, we always see the ocean glitter as you take a walk down the Seawall, and the sun cheers up even the gloomiest feelings. A lot of kids live in my neighborhood, so I have a lot of friends. In the summer we find the beach a perfect hangout, as the pier serves as the world’s best diving board. The adrenaline rush that the jump gives you is like nothing else. Hitting the water stings, but will go away when you feel the cool water on your skin. I think that the beach is the best thing about living in Dundarave.

Overall I think that I live in the greatest neighbourhood. All the amazing people are so nice, and so are the surroundings. The nature that surrounds the neighbourhood is bright and vibrant. People come to Dundarave just to take pictures of the scenery! Dundarave is like a patch of Heaven that fell down to earth, and I feel that I am so lucky to live there.

To varying degrees, the three most common elements I am hearing right now around new and evolving instructional and classroom innovation from teachers and schools involve inquiry, technology and self-regulation. Many school communities are talking about classroom design–what the schools of the future will look like and, for some, the future is now as they look at pedagogy and the spaces required to maximize these visions. There is more, of course, but these elements seem to dominate the conversation that only a year ago was often described as 21st century or personalized learning.  The direction has not changed, but the vision has become more precise, more tangible.

Inquiry

A worry around inquiry is the term’s overuse to describe anything that involves asking a question.  There are a number of definitions as they continue to be refined in different contexts, but I like the one from the Galileo Educational Network that sees it as:

. . .  a dynamic process of being open to wonder and puzzlement and coming to know and understand the world.  As such, it is a stance that pervades all aspects of life and is essential to the way in which knowledge is created. Inquiry is based on the belief that understanding is constructed in the process of people working and conversing together as they pose and solve the problems, make discoveries and rigorously testing the discoveries that arise in the course of shared activity.

Inquiry is a study into a worthy question, issue, problem or idea. It is the authentic, real work that someone in the community might tackle. It is the type of work that those working in the disciplines actually undertake to create or build knowledge. Therefore, inquiry involves serious engagement and investigation and the active creation and testing of new knowledge.

I wrote a full post last spring on inquiry available here.  While the term was previously reserved for the world of International Baccalaureate, it is taking hold, in varying degrees, in all of our schools.

Technology

There is no shortage of work taking place in our district, or other BC jurisdictions around the ethical use of technology to improve student learning and engagement.  Last week,  the Minister of Education, the Honourable George Abbott, listed a five-point plan around educational transformation in British Columbia (here) that  included Learning empowered by Technology as one of the key principles. There is amazing innovation happening with technology in a number of areas in West Vancouver. The work at Caulfeild Elementary is an example of this, and has been interesting to follow as they have launched their Inquiry based Digitally Enhanced Community (IDEC). Principal Brad Lund is writing a regular blog (here) keeping the local and larger community updated on their journey. Following up on the larger journey in our district, the Digital Literacy blog (here) is an excellent up-to-date resource on both the micro and macro efforts around using technology to fuel student learning.

Self-Regulation

Dr. Stuart Shanker has brought self-regulation to the masses. He has been a regular presenter in British Columbia, as mentioned in an earlier post on his work  here, and spent two days in West Vancouver at the beginning of September, that included him speaking to all staff. We are hoping to have him back soon, and have dedicated some time from Moray McLean, one of our occupational therapists, who will support each primary class in our district over this year around work in self-regulation.  Jody Langlois, Director of Student Support Services, has also shared thoughts on this through her blog here.

Beyond all the Shanker momentum, MindUP  is another example on the same theme of self-regulation. What started with training for one school staff  has spread to several, with more training to be scheduled soon. West Bay Elementary Principal, Judy Duncan, recently blogged (here) about her school’s experiences.

The conversations on the elements of inquiry, technology and self-regulation are a marriage of pedagogy and environment. Of course, in a world of increased student ownership and personalization of learning there will likely be more diversity rather than less to what a classroom should look like. Some may question the concept and purpose of the ”classroom” itself. And, while this is an interesting conversation, we need tangible shifts we can implement now. As we imagine classrooms for the very near future, it will be interesting to track the place of these three current tenets in their design.

Two metaphors I often hear our Director of Instruction, Gary Kern, evoke while discussing our work with technology are the faucet and the pool.  They are ones I find myself repeating more, as we explain the work we are doing with digital literacy.

In a typical district, school or class, the adults control the supply of technology that students use to support their learning.  While the district may have invested millions to support all students with digital literacy, in some classes the technology faucet is turned off; in others it is a slow drip, while others have it open wide.  We are trying to allow all students some steady flow of technology to support their learning — regardless of a particular school or class.  And, while some will enhance the experience, all students will have basic access.

In K-3, all students in West Vancouver have access to Dreambox (I have written about this program before here).  In some classes it is part of the school day, but all students can access it from home, and all parents can access the analytics to see the areas where they can support their children.  In Grades 4-12, we are just beginning to explore what is possible with student dashboards. Gary Kern, recently wrote about them here.  All students have email, instant messaging, storage, and a series of other tools which allow them to collaborate in a safe environment.  All students can actually instant message the superintendent (and four have so far).  We are not turning the technology faucet on full, but we are creating a steady stream for all students.  Students can explore how they can ethically use digital tools to support their learning.

It is difficult to teach kids to swim without getting them into the pool.  And, this is also true of being good digital citizens — we can’t teach digital citizenship without giving students a safe digital space to experiment, learn and grow in. Again, the student dashboards are part of the latest effort to teach our students to swim in the digital world.  And better yet, we know that when we get into the water with  the kids, it is even easier. We also know we need to continue to support administrators, teachers and parents in the digital world to be more comfortable swimming in the water with their kids.  While some take the approach that the technology pool, although very inviting, is closed with large, raised fences around it — we are taking a different approach.  We want to be able to say that all our kids know how to swim safely.

Turning on the faucet for all children and jumping in the water with them does challenge the status quo.  Giving all students access to some technology and expecting all students will have some ability to navigate in a digital environment is not the norm.  If we believe what Coquitlam administrator, David Truss recently wrote, that education is going to be increasingly open and distributed, we need to support students for this world.

There are times when I wish this fall looked more like last fall – it would make life easier but, of course, it would not be the right thing to do.  It will continue to be exciting to see what happens as we open the faucet and jump in the pool with our students.

As a follow-up to The Digital Coalition which considered the power of our network to lead the evolution in K-12 education, I want to focus on one of the most common presentation themes – our own children.

I first encountered the approach in a discussion by Will Richardson about five years ago and, since then almost every presenter I see, hear, or read  about educational reform, evokes the example of his or her own school-aged children at some point during the presentation. I saw it last fall when Brett Conkin explained what attracted him to take on the TEDxUBC project, to our District Principal of Technology and Innovation, Gary Kern, who speaks about his three school-aged children. And, in many of my own discussions about system change, I often reference my own kids.

There’s a very good reason why we do so. It boils down to this – we are deeply concerned that, left to the natural progression of such things, it will take 10 to 20 years to bring about the changes we believe are needed. At that rate, our own children will not benefit from the change. This is the urgency that is driving many of us.

Yet, this urgency for change is not currently reflected in the larger community. After all, we have an outstanding system and we have a familiar system. Parents see a system that closely resembles the one they attended as a student and that is reassuring. I know I am reassured by the similarities in my kids’ schooling to mine, but I also realize that their world is vastly different from the one I graduated into 20 years ago.

We – many of us who blog and tweet on the topic on a regular basis – are between the ages of 35 and 50 (yes, I know this is a sweeping and slightly exaggerated generalization). We are established in our careers, many of us have moved into positions of teacher/administrative leadership and we have young families with children in the system now. We applaud the systematic evolution of the educational system, the growing student engagement and the increased relevance in learning.

But if it doesn’t happen quickly enough, our own kids will miss out on the benefits.

It is this that drives a lot of our urgency. I am a bit selfish — I want the system I believe in, and envision for my own kids. I also want it for your kids; and all kids — but it is not okay with me if it takes another decade until we embrace digital devices in schools, it is not okay if we continue to perpetuate schooling as a 9-3 activity, and it is not okay for me as a parent to not have greater engagement.

I know we are in the midst of something big. And to be clear, there are amazing things happening in our schools. That said, it is GO time, for our kids, and for all kids.

The title comes from a mantra we often hear with produce and other food products.  Wikipedia describes it:

Local purchasing is a preference to buy locally produced goods and services over those produced more distantly. It is very often abbreviated as a positive goal ‘buy local’ to parallel the phrase think globally, act locally, common in green politics.

I have been thinking about this a lot lately in the context of our work in the digital world.  I wrote recently (here) that while I continue to be influenced by many thinkers outside of British Columbia and Canada, more and more I am connecting with local voices.

While I love the learning that is free of borders, I feel it is very important to support B.C. educators who are beginning to put themselves out there in digital space. There seems to have been an edu-blogging boom this fall in British Columbia.  I have created a rule for myself that I will try to comment on at least five blog posts for every post I write, and comment more on B.C. educators’ writing.

I am not quite sure why we have a huge increase in local educators writing on the web, but it is great for education in B.C.  We are using social media to connect around ideas, at a point in time, when there is so much discussion about learning and schooling and how a high-performing system like ours should move forward.

I listed four local bloggers in a previous post – but I want to list all the local bloggers who are adding to the conversations.  I am sure I will miss some (particularly, in the teachers’ category), so please add comments to point me toward others, and I will update the post.

The parameters of my list — blogs by active educators in the K-12 sector in British Columbia who have posted in the last 30 days.  I know many teachers have class blogs, but this list is not intended for blogs used with a class of students, or as a news site, but rather to share ideas with other educators and the larger community.

District Staff

Scott Benwell, Assistant Superintendent, Fraser-Cascade

Larry Espe, Superintendent, Peace River North

Rick Fabbro, Assistant Superintendent, Surrey

Tom Grant, Superintendent, Coquitlam

Chris Kennedy, Deputy Superintendent, West Vancouver

Brian Kuhn, Director of IT, Coquitlam

Doug Sheppard, Assistant Superintendent, Delta

Jan Unwin, Superintendent, Maple-Ridge / Pitt Meadows

Principals and Vice-Principals

Terry Ainge, Principal, Delta Secondary, Delta

Aaron Akune, Vice-Principal, Delta Secondary, Delta

Cale Birk, Principal, South Kamloops Secondary, Kamloops

Gino Bondi, Principal, John Oliver Secondary, Vancouver

Joe Campbell, Vice-Principal, Seycove Secondary, North Vancouver (ADDED)

Remi Collins, Principal, Kilmer Elementary, Port Coquitlam

Dean Eichorn, Vice-Princpal, Burnsview Secondary, Delta (ADDED)

Grant Frend, Vice-Princpal, Garibaldi Secondary, Maple Ridge (ADDED)

Cindy Gauthier, Principal, Vancouver Learning Network, Vancouver

Mark Heidebrecht, Principal, Gibsons Elementary, Gibsons (ADDED)

Gary Kern, District Principal, West Vancouver

Chris Wejr - Principal, Kent Elementary, Agassiz

Teachers

Paul Aiken, Coquitlam

Jaki Braidwood, Comox Valley

Jeremy Brown, Port Coquitlam

Moira Ekdahl, Vancouver (ADDED)

Errin Gregory, Lillooet

Starleigh Grass, Lytton (ADDED)

James Gill, Coquitlam

Bryan Jackson, Coquitlam

Phil Macoun, Nanaimo

Jacob Martens, Vancouver

James McConville, Coquitlam

Gordon Powell,  Richmond

Al Smith, Kelowna (ADDED)

Zhi Su,  Vancouver

David Wees,Vancouver

Jen Whiffin, Coquitlam (ADDED)

Others (ADDED)

I feel like I need to add another category for several blogs related to education in B.C. that are not written by currently active B.C. educators

Christina Campbell, Education Reporter, Vancouver Observer

Lesley Edwards, Retired Teacher-Librarian, North Vancouver

Heidi Hass Gable, DPAC President, Coquitlam

Janet Steffenhagen, Education Reporter, Vancouver Sun

David Truss, Princpal, Currently in China on leave from Coquitlam

Finally, a shameless plug. The Culture of Yes has been nominated for the Best New Edublog 2010.  You can click here to vote.  This site is also a great place to find other interesting blogs to follow. Thanks for all the ongoing conversations.

The program comes from the primary classes of Maria Yioldassis and Leslie Dawes and has been supported by the school and by our District Principal of Technology and Innovation, Gary Kern. 

This project exposes students to digital text and introduces them to reading online in a school context.  It also allows students to collaborate and share their experiences with other students. 

The teachers have students read digital texts they find on two popular sites, Starfall and Tumblebooks.  Both sites provide text at various reading levels and accompanying visuals.  Once students finish reading the books, they make brief comments on what they read, a process that can first be done in class, and then be repeated at home (see screen shots below). 

Some of the findings from this initiative include students having become self-confident in navigating through their e-books, choosing an appropriate book, reading the book, and then sharing what they have read through the website.  This process has been replicated at home and also during choice time within the classroom.

Teachers have also reported an increase in student confidence with online material; an increased awareness of what others are reading, and an overall sharing and appreciation of books read.

This very simple idea is spreading in West Vancouver. This fall, professional development days focussed on digital literacy; a number of teachers throughout the district have become comfortable with creating similar class spaces for their home reading programs. Many who are very interested in using this technology in their classes see this as a wonderful entry point – it is not an add-on as home reading is already going on. In addition, it allows parents to participate; it gives students greater ownership of their own learning, and it models the collaborative skills we want to build in students throughout their schooling. 

What we are finding is the entry point for most teachers with a digital presence is as a one-way communication: informing parents and students of upcoming calendar items, class news and homework.  What is exciting about this Home Reading program, something we are calling a ”next practice,” is how it engages students and families with the technology.

There is still a lot to explore, particularly with our youngest learners and how best to use technology to support their learning, but projects like this one are very exciting.

Thanks to Gary Kern, Andrea Wilson and Deb Podurgiel for your assistance and the entire Students Live team for all the inspiration.

Here are my slides, and below is the text of my talk with the videos:

It is a real pleasure to be here. There is a lot of excitement and anticipation in our province right now regarding education and future possibilities. Often, when I speak, I show provocative videos, talk about the changes we are making and need to make – today is something different.

I am going to share a story today that helps illustrate what I think 21st century learning, or personalized learning, could look like.
A story not about what we could do, or should do, but what we did do.

The Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games were an amazing experience in our city, province and country.

With the Games coming to our city, many in education worried the Games would come through our city and it would be a missed opportunity to engage our students. Along with my colleagues, Audrey Hobbs-Johnston and Gary Kern, and with the support of Christina Adams and the Vancouver Olympic Committee, we created Students Live!

Students Live! was the opportunity for 25 students to be student reporters for the Olympics and Paralympics. Describing the program as a student reporter program does not do justice to what it really was for the students, and for the adults it was an absolutely transformational experience. It was starting with a blank slate and creating from that.

Here is a CBC story that gives a little more on the background of the event:

So, it was an absolutely amazing experience. The students attended events on an almost daily basis, participated side-by-side with international journalists, and experienced the Games in a way that was the envy of all their friends. And this was all great.
What we learned were lessons that transcended a sporting event, or a moment in time.
It started with a competition to select the students. This is not surprising, but as students opted in, there was much greater buy-in. We know when we have an application on a course, the numbers interested usually increases. Students were asked to write a blog post, create a photo journal, or otherwise use web 2.0 to show how and why they would be good reporters for the Olympics.

For most of the close to 80 applicants – this was a new experience. While we often talk about how well-versed students are in technology, in this activity, which targeted those with the greatest technology skills – the act of writing a blog, or otherwise creating digital content for a public audience – was largely new.

What we saw in selecting students, and throughout the entire process, was that good writing and strong communication skills still matter. The tools have changed, but the best writers who captured the biggest audiences, and quickly built huge followings, were those who could communicate, while the weaker writers – no matter how adept they were with the technology struggled. Much is made of technology, and how our text messaging generation sees writing as less important – I actually have never been part of something where it was so evident how important good writing is.

The first day we met with the students we focused on the social media we would use and how we would engage the community with it. A quick survey of the room showed every student had Facebook, with little evidence of any other tool; some had YouTube and Twitter, but not much else. It also became clear that while the students were quite good with technology, they had absolutely no idea how they could leverage technology to build an audience.

While students had friends and connections, they didn’t have the first clue on how to turn these friends into an audience, and then how to grow their audience into influence – they had never contemplated using the tools in this way. This is key – while the students may have been native to technology, many had no idea on how to really use it to build community. Of course, we created what was then called a “Fan Page” – so, this was mid-day on a school day and we challenged them to get 1000 followers.

They were able to do this within hours – all during a school day – you want to believe students are not really on Facebook during the school day.

What the students learned, was how they could get Facebook to work for them – when combined with Twitter and their blog, they had a megaphone to their network.

About face-to-face meetings – we could never have done what we did virtually, if we had not first built community face-to-face. I am more convinced now than ever, online is absolutely best among people who have the context of face-to-face relationships.

So once we started – what happened:

First, it was like an “Ah-ha” moment – mobile technology was a game changer. Those with smartphones had a huge advantage. They could take photos, post to Twitter and Facebook, and just simply connect in real time. The less ability students had to perform all of these functions in the moment, the more they were challenged. And yes, it was reporting, so real time was really key to the project, but what we saw was more than that. Amazingly evident was just how key it was to be able to publish live. Students who had to wait to find wireless internet access fell behind. The other key was video.

The best writers stood out, and photos were great – but those blogs building community all included video. What a great lesson for the classroom and the need to build video into our work.

It was also clear students loved to look at each other’s work – not in the “mine is better than yours” way – but “yours can help make mine better”. It was amazingly non-competitive, but students commented afterwards the biggest impact on improving the quality of their work, was their ability to see other students – other models of what could be done. Everyone commented their work improved because 1) it was public and 2) they could read and learn from each other.

The students also loved publishing for a public audience – they had never really contemplated audience before. What they knew was about was writing for a teacher – now they were writing for an audience, and the better they wrote, and the more interesting their topic, the larger the audience. There were students who had up to 100 comments on a blog post. They combined excellent writing, with leveraging their network, and with a savvy use of social media. In our debrief, students said it was actually frustrating going back to school because they had seen what was possible with real-world learning, publishing for a public audience, building community and they had to return to what school has always been – it felt less relevant than ever.

While it is true the Olympic Games were a unique experience, and it will be difficult to duplicate the experience with less exciting events, the lessons transcend the Games – mobile technology can change learning, good writing still matters, using social media needs to be taught and should not be assumed, networks are essential, and once students get the taste of the real world, it is addictive and they will want to go forward, not back.

The entire experience was also profound for the adults involved. For all of us, the experience felt more like what we have often thought of as a team, and less as a class. Maybe it was because we didn’t have rows of desks, and because we asked more questions than giving answers, or because when the students were stuck we asked one of them to be the project leader and to get a team to solve the problem. It absolutely felt like learning, and it felt like everything we hoped school could and should be – but often it didn’t feel like class – it felt like we were in the flow.

It was reinforced students will build their own networks. Sure, we guide them, support them and stand beside them – but they can build their own networks. They can get 1000 members in a Facebook Group and then figure out how to turn these members into a network, and they can ask “the real world” to assist them, instead of just playing in a simulated world in schools.

I was exhausted! Just because I was not at the front-of-the-room teaching did not mean that it was easy; teaching is still hard. Sometimes as a large group, sometimes as a small group, sometimes one-on-one, all hours of the day and night – we were learning and working together. It was a fundamental change of the role of teacher and student. We were their supports, their adult mentors – but didn’t have the answers. The students found teachers in this project, not blocked out as in a schedule, were more important and necessary.
Adults are amazing. There is a world full of adults who want to help students in all professions, just waiting to be asked.

In reflecting on this, I was reminded of the recent TED Talks by Sugata Mitra, who spoke of the network of grannies waiting to assist. Right now, we have only really engaged a small number of students through work experience in this real-world mentorship, but have found in this project every adult asked was willing to help. Yes, it was the Olympics – but there is an untapped resource waiting for us to engage them.

Finally – the adults were reminded that we need to trust the process. We always want to jump in and solve problems – we are good at that. Sometimes you need to let students work through situations, skin their knee and be there beside them to offer support.

Working with the other teachers and the 25 students was the greatest teaching experience of my life. I saw what I wanted for my kids, and for all kids – real-world learning that takes advantage of the latest in technology – but is not about the technology at all.
In the end, what the students liked the most was they had the permission to play. Actually, this is also what the adults liked to – we would often ask, “Can we do this?” – like we have been trained to always find a way and a reason not to try, not to experiment. We all also loved the freedom, choice and responsibility. While students and adults spent much of our time in the virtual world during the project, these bonds have flowed over into the face-to-face world – and we are all still connected.

We are on the verge of big changes in education; we need to listen to the voices of the students, rethink the roles of teachers, and build systems that create powerful real-world learning opportunities.

Thanks Everyone.

When I spoke at Opening Day for our district in early September, I described how technology, sustainability, and transparency are three themes that are underlying the work we do, and will continue to be very influential for all operations in our district.  Gary Kern, our Principal of Technology and Innovation, in speaking with our Board of Education last week, also emphasized the role of sustainability in his work as he described our district’s technology strategy for this year.  While we don’t want to limit a discussion on sustainability to printing and paper consumption, it is clearly part of our commitment in this area.

Until the past couple of years, our efforts in school districts have been to make printing more convenient.  What started as photocopiers in the office, spread to multiple copiers in schools, then to printers in computer labs to, in some places, printers in most rooms and at many work stations.  The cost of printers came down, and the need for convenience drove changes.  Until coming to West Vancouver three years ago, I had spent the previous decade with a printer on my desk.

The paper tide has been shifting.  While printers have come down in price, we have become increasingly aware of the ink and paper costs that eat-up supply budgets in school districts, and sustainability has moved to the forefront of discussions.  At the same time, technology has allowed us to digitally replicate activities which previously had been limited to being done on paper.

Today our school newsletters have moved to being almost exclusively digital.  Even with a conservative estimate of 30 pages of newsletters sent home with each child in a given year, this savings is over 200,000 sheets of paper.  This year we have also begun to move permission forms to the digital environment.  In addition to the savings in staff time, just at school start-up alone, we are photocopying 30,000 fewer sheets of paper because of this one change.  These changes in our business practices will only continue as our websites continue to evolve as our primary communication tool with our students, parents and community.

As teachers experiment with virtual classrooms, we are seeing more teachers taking advantage of “hand in” boxes that allow students to submit assignments and teachers to assess work without a paper copy ever having to be made.

So, back to the quote that led off this post, “printing will continue to become more inconvenient”.  Over the next few years we will have fewer copiers and fewer printers.  Resources that have been spent on ink and paper can be redirected in schools to other needs.  I suggested on Opening Day that we could reduce our paper consumption by 20% this year.  When we look to hit print on our computer, or use the Xerox, we should be always asking ourselves if we are doing this because we need to do it, or because we have always done it this way.

I don’t know why I enjoy teaching so much, but I totally do. I hated school. I remember counting down the hours of almost every day, and the days of almost every year, hoping it would all be over. It wasn’t the learning I couldn’t stand, it was what and how I learned.

I wanted to dive in to what I wanted to know, and most of that wasn’t what was on their agenda. Algebra and geometry couldn’t have been any more painful, and biology had only one redeeming quality in that there happened to be all the best looking girls in that class.

Creative things are what I enjoyed, and there weren’t nearly enough of those to begin to satisfy my needs. I remember in seventh grade we had a science project assignment where we had several weeks to complete a presentation on a topic. For whatever reason I picked the human heart, and I really got into it. I wanted to make mine the best presentation ever.

The actual topic didn’t make any difference at all. I wanted to focus on the show part of it. I remember making up all kinds of colorful drawings to show and my uncle suggested I make an audio presentation complete with background music and call it ‘A Tour Of Your Heart’. That was all I needed to hear, and I was totally in. On presentation day, I let it rip.

I’m not sure if it was so much that the other kids enjoyed it, but I remember applause as I finished. It was completely different from what everyone else did, and it entertained the class. I didn’t have to say one word, I just stood there pointing to the graphs and pictures I had arranged, and my voiceover with music behind it sounded great, at least in memory.

Maybe if I heard it now, I’d be embarrassed by how excruciating it was, but at the time I blew everyone away with it. The teacher gave me an ‘A+++’ and I don’t think I ever got a grade like that for anything else I ever did. Isn’t that what they give butter? I don’t know.

The point is, I really loved doing those kinds of things, but put me in front of an algebra book and I was through. I didn’t care then and I don’t now. I’m sure somebody has a need for it, if only algebra teachers to torture future generations. As for me, I’m done with it.

What made me think of all this was that I received several emails today thanking me for the comedy classes and graduation show last night at Zanies. They were a fantastic group and I really enjoyed them because they got what I was telling them. Seeing the light go on in a student’s head is very satisfying and I really enjoy seeing them go up and get laughs.

I guess it’s a lot like a sports coach. I know everyone in my classes doesn’t have to like me personally, and I don’t really care if they do. I want them to LEARN something, and if they do that, the personal part will follow. Seeing the students’ growth is very satisfying.

The mentoring part is satisfying too. I know how much I revere the memories of all my comedy mentors from C. Cardell Willis to Gary Kern to Jimmy Miller, and hopefully I’ll be able to occupy that special place those guys have in my heart in a whole lot of others.