Cupid Shuffle, Robots, Teamwork

To the right, to the right, to the right, to the right, 
to the left, to the left, to the left, to the left, 
now kick, now kick, now kick, now kick, 
now walk it by yourself . . ..”  

The music started jammin’; the dancers in their pastel tutus started groovin’; kids started clappin'.  No, this was not last month’s middle school dance, rather it was seventh-grade science class on Friday at 9:50 AM, rooms five and six.  The dancers involved, while directed by the seventh graders, were actually Lego Mindstorm robots.  The routines, expertly choreographed and programmed, were the culmination of a week’s worth or teamwork.  While programming is a valued skill that involves logical sequencing, problem solving, and some discreet knowledge about the language involved, the real value of last week’s “dance off” was in the work and lessons learned about collaboration and communication.  

About a week ago, I was touring the mother of a fifth-grade boy who was interested in how the middle school had changed in the short time that had passed since her daughter, a current ninth grader, first entered Stephens Hall.  We spent some time in my office talking about educational theory and then moved down the hall to see what was happening.  I love to give tours because it is a chance for me to show off what we do and who we are, something that is sometimes difficult to describe with words or numbers.  We entered Mr. McManus’s room at the end of the hall and found Meghan and Anna Kate standing in front of their seventh-grade classmates.  While the following is paraphrased, it is pretty close to what we heard:

Okay, everyone be quiet.  We've got to get rid of the chaos, so we decided to give everybody jobs.  If you don’t like your job, it doesn’t matter ‘cause you can switch.  We think Sydney should be leader.

As this was going on, Mr. McManus was sitting off to the side pretending to be disinterested.  The mom and I looked at each other, and I got a big smile on my face.  

Now I wasn’t in the classroom the previous day, but from what the girls told me, it was pretty ugly: people talking, no one listening, raised voices, frustration, nothing getting done -- sounds a little like Congress.  Mr. McManus, being a wise, experienced sage, let the situation play out. He trusted the process and didn’t jump in to fix things. This empowered the girls to take matters into their own hands and work it out.  Some girls became programmers, some costume designers, some DJ’s, some choreographers, and one a leader.  Some girls changed jobs as it became apparent that more work was needed in different areas.  They worked together.  They solved their own problems.

I spent a few minutes talking to Anna Kate and Meghan who had stood in front of their peers to attempt to make order out of chaos, and asked them what I thought was going to be a tough question:  “Why didn’t appoint yourselves leaders?”  They didn’t miss a beat and said that they chose Sydney because she is really good at being a leader.  They said that she listens well and can organize things.  Nice!  

The three other seventh-grade core groups also struggled through the process of how to get a large group to work together to reach a goal. Some were not particularly pleased with the outcome; however, if each groups' performance didn't come off perfectly, they all persevered and brought something worthwhile to the dance floor. So, as Cupid says, ". . . do your dance, do your dance."

On David Brooks and Emotion

A couple of weeks ago, David Brooks wrote an op-ed piece, “What Machines Can’t Do,” in the NY Times that describes human traits that should be valued now and in the future as these traits cannot be replicated by computers.  While Brooks is a political commentator, he is also a thoughtful observer of human nature.  In this article, Brooks writes that “The role of the human is not to be dispassionate, depersonalized or neutral. It is precisely the emotive traits that are rewarded: the voracious lust for understanding, the enthusiasm for work, the ability to grasp the gist, the empathetic sensitivity to what will attract attention and linger in the mind.”  If Brooks is right, and I believe he is, then as educators we must examine how schools can help these traits to flourish.

Voracious lust for anything sounds pretty scary to a middle school principal.  Do we really want a bunch of limit-pushing, hormone-pumped twelve-year-olds unleashing their Freudian ids into our orderly classrooms?  Well, maybe not all of teenage passion should be on display in schools, but Brooks isn’t talking about sexting or sticking it to the man; the passion that he describes is the passion of engagement, the passion of inquiry -- an unyielding desire to figure things out.

Most schools squelch this passion, the very thing that should be driving our youth.  School has become ruled by graphite-filled ovals on Scantrons, by squealing bells that signal the end to learning, by curriculum written by who-knows-who a jillion miles removed from any teenager’s first pimple.  Most folks would have loved to have Robin Williams’ character in Dead Poet’s Society as their teacher; however, a teacher like that, one who seeks to connect students with their own passion, will not last long in America’s controlled, assembly-line schools that have been cleverly and frighteningly described in this RSA talk by Sir Ken Robinson.

Schools that support passion are schools that have deliberately created a culture around passion.  It doesn’t happen by accident. These schools offer students a chance to plunge deeply into learning. They know that not everything in a standard course can be “covered” so they choose particular elements to examine thoroughly.  They frequently offer students the opportunity to choose what they want to read and write.  They serve up problems that make students’ brains wrinkle, problems that cause students to mentally engage because whatever they have seen or heard just doesn’t quite fit with their current understanding.  They require students to discuss and argue over big, meaningful topics like justice, love, revolution, and peace.  They ask them to solve difficult problems that take weeks or months of planning and trials.  They realize that passion doesn’t come from chasing the currency of school -- grades -- but that it comes from within each individual, so teachers offer formative feedback so students are supported in their attempt to try something different rather than thwarted by the prospects of getting a bad grade.  They offer students chances to let their spirits flow by asking them to paint, design, make films, take photos, sing, dance, and perform.  They give every student an opportunity to participate and grow in sports.  They require students to think about how they think and learn, so that they can more deeply understand their own passions and how best to explore them.

These schools are out there; in fact, I work in one.  However, schools that are grounded in passion will only flourish as long as educators are given the opportunity to display the passion that drew them to their life’s work.

Group Foresight and Action -- Mt. Fuji

What thirteen-year-old boy would voluntarily give up control and power to one of his classmates for the good of his group? I know three who did, as well as the one who accepted the others’ nomination and worked to govern the group judiciously.

Yesterday, I interviewed a group of seventh-grade boys who were asked to work together on a project that involved figuring out how long it would take to move Mr. Fuji.  Yes, it is an intriguing math problem, but for these boys it became a greater exercise in learning to work together.  Putting strong-willed, opinionated students together in a group is often a recipe for disaster.  Arguments, frustration, sarcasm, and hurt feelings are common outcomes.  Frequently the groups become so dysfunctional that one or two group members leave the group because they can’t control the outcome. 

This group of boys was different.  This group of boys recognized that they had a problem from the start.  They are all high achievers, willing to do the work of those who are less motivated to make the final outcome something that meets their own ambitions.  They are all willing to motivate others using leadership skills they possess in order to succeed.  Grouped as they were, they realized right away that they all were inclined to lead.  So, instead of fighting it out, undermining others, or giving up, they reached a pivotal decision.  They decided to give up control and choose one of the four to lead them.  What is amazing is that the leader didn’t simply emerge or usurp the power -- but rather he was unanimously selected by the others.  Truthfully, the leader probably could have been any of them -- what is significant is the foresight and collaboration that they exercised.

Sublimating one’s own will and voice for the benefit of achieving something worthwhile does not happen by chance.  I believe that these boys were able to foresee and remedy the potential problem because they have been asked to work together in groups with others since they were little kids.  Our students work together every day; it is an expectation.  I’m pleased that my school and faculty recognize that the skills needed to be successful and happy are just as important, if not more important, than content that usually reigns king.  I’m not sure how long it takes to move Mr. Fuji, but I do know that these boys have developed skills that are more important than moving a mountain.

The Big Problem - Real Life Requires Real Math

Solving real problems is messy.  Sometimes, we don’t even know what problem we are trying to solve, and it doesn’t become obvious until some investigation and discovery takes place.  We must decide what information is needed and attempt to get it, although it isn’t always available.  Sometimes there are so many variables that they distract or even confuse us from defining a course to follow.  And, frequently there may not be one absolute solution.  The solution that we reach may have corollaries or disclaimers, or it may simply be a best guess given all of our efforts.  I hope this is starting to sound like real life because it doesn’t make a lot of sense to devote a huge chunk of time in school to learning math that is not useful in real life.  And, if our students don’t get opportunities to use math in real life situations, then they will continue to see it as a boring, inert process that must be slogged through just to get to the next math course; or, even worse, as the way to a better score on the SAT.  Math is so much more than a way to get into college -- it is a way to view the world, and it gives us the ability to understand, seek, and find solutions to the world around us.

This week, we started working on one of what we call our Big Problems --  a real problem.  I told the students that I had been thinking about replacing the long, rectangular tables in our lunch room with circular tables.  Because our students are primed from years of practice as problem solvers, it took them all of ten minutes to come up with the following questions and comments in some small group discussions.  Although as a school administrator, I have thought of changing out the tables for a long time, I hadn’t considered several of their ideas as variables:

• Are round tables more ergonomical?  Forearms naturally form triangles when on the table.
• How big can a round table be to hold a conversation with someone across the table in our lunchroom?
• Does looking at someone when talking to them help conversation and relationships?
• Would there be more space to move between the tables?  
• What happens to aisle space?  Will it open the flow or restrict it?
• How would moving to round tables affect cleaning? How big can it be and still be easily cleaned?
• Storage? (We move our tables every day to clean the floor.)
• Will round tables hurt or help inclusivity?
• Will they fit in the lunchroom?
• What will be the cost?
• Will the cost be worth the benefit (if any)?
• Unintended consequences?
• Other stakeholders (the LS students who use the lunchroom also).

What kind of math tools will we need to pursue this problem?  Some things are obvious like measuring, performing simple arithmetic calculations, working with geometric shapes, and spatial reasoning.  However, we may look at hearing as a function of distance from speaker (this is an algebra class after all).  Or the number of seats available as a function of the circumference of a table.  We are going to have to figure out some way to apply a dollar amount to something that is not easily counted (building relationships) and this will definitely involve some statistical analysis.  We are going to have to do some data collection, analysis, and interpretation.  More statistics. Finally, we are going to have to reach beyond our collective knowledge base to get information and possibly even help.  

So, how does this assignment hold up to the teaching of skills that have become a fundamental element of our middle school:  collaboration, problem solving, communication  creativity, perseverance, grit.  We can check all of these off.

I told the students that if we decide that replacing the tables would be a good idea that we would present our findings to our Chief Financial Officer and other stakeholders.  We are not sure if the school will take our advice; this is the real world after all, and there are all sorts of other claims on school dollars than lunch room tables.  But, regardless of the outcome, the process of working through this problem will give the students and teachers some practice with the utility and function of math.   

Resilience

Every spring, science teacher, Andy Lammers, requires his students to design, build, and launch rockets powered by water pressure that must deploy a parachute to land an egg so gently that the egg does not crack.  The project is one of several dozen project-based learning opportunities that our students encounter in middle school.  A couple of weeks ago, I asked one of our eighth graders how his water-bottle-rocket launch went.  His casual, matter-of-fact reply, “not very good, but it was only our first launch,” may seem less than momentous, but, truly, those words are a distillation of a mindset and attitude that we we are purposefully instilling in our students.  Teaching our students to be resilient,  to overcome setbacks and know that some level of success will ultimately be achieved, is one of our most important tasks.

It is self-evident that for students to overcome obstacles, they must encounter obstacles at school -- and the obstacles that they encounter must be real, valid, and purposeful.  Also, the obstacles must be stiff enough to create cognitive dissonance, but they also must be ones that can be scrambled over, pushed aside, or blown up.  In many schools, some students experience academic obstacles every day that are too huge to even attempt to conquer, and then some students rarely experience even the smallest setbacks.  Differentiating to provide learning opportunities that challenge each student at a level where success can be achieved through perseverance is not too difficult, but it takes a recognition that developing resilience can be a more important goal than learning subject content.  If teachers plan lessons believing that the foremost goal is for students to learn resilience and the secondary goal is to learn subject matter, then the methods employed will be different.  Project-based learning, Paideia seminars, and writing workshops are examples of methodology that offer opportunity for all students to be challenged, while still learning content and skills.

Students must also be given the opportunity to improve or change in order to develop resilience.  To accomplish this, there must be chances for the student and others (peers, faculty, friends, family) to observe trials and attempts, and there must be the opportunity for do-overs.  To be most effective, there should be no stigma against failing other than the recognition that the student needs to improve and the recognition of ways that the student can improve.  When true formative assessment becomes institutionalized, it changes the entire dynamic of a school community.  Schools become focused on learning, not “playing school” to achieve grades and other clumsy attempts to quantify learning.

I have referred to the words written on the whiteboard in my office several times in my writings:  reflection is the key to change.  While reflection is somewhat inherent in all formative assessment, it needs to be given a bigger role.  Students need to be required to analyze and make judgements about their attempts and struggles either in writing, discussions, videos, drawings, or charts.  They should do this both individually and with others, formally and informally.  They should observe what others have done so they can apply learned techniques to their attempts, but they should also be encouraged to try new, inventive ways to solve problems and express themselves.  This freedom to be creative and innovative can be institutionalized when divergent thinking is recognized and rewarded.

“Not very good, but it was only our first launch.”  What if we could teach every child in this country to have the attitude inherent in this statement -- to know that immediate setbacks will be overcome, to find problems and look for solutions, to aim for long term success, and to know that it will take work and struggle to achieve something worthwhile?  

Learn to Program - Starting with Scratch and Minecraft

Last week, my sixth-grade son and his classmates were asked by their science teacher to design a program in Scratch (a beginning programming language developed by MIT) that depicted the water cycle. When he was in the fourth grade, I introduced my son to Scratch, and he has played around with it occasionally over the past two years. He and his classmates had fun with the project, and even those who were totally unfamiliar with it learned some basics of programming.

Yesterday, my son downloaded a new "protocol" into Minecraft. Like many boys his age, Minecraft has become the first thing that he turns to on the weekends.  Along with playing on Minecraft with other folks, my son is in the process of creating his own city that is really pretty complex.  While he was engaged in his city planning, I asked him if he had been able to transfer any skills from his extensive Minecraft experience to Scratch.   Here is his off-the-top-of-his-head response, without looking up from his laptop:

• 3-D modeling
• coordinate grids 
• I can go in and change the code a little to make it do what I want. 

I don’t think anyone would consider my son a computer geek.  He plays sports after school; he practices piano; he has sleep-overs with friends, he reads the Sunday comics; he occasionally washes his mom's car; he eats constantly; and he programs a little.  In the future, my son may decide to study and learn more sophisticated programming, or he may not. The important thing is that he knows that he can, and coding is not some mysterious operation that only geniuses can accomplish. He can do it; anyone can do it; everyone should.

 

All Things Piratical

photo by Tanja Mamas

One of the best things about being a faculty member is that I sometimes get to learn from and with our students.  This occurred recently when I was asked to become a member of the pirate chorus in our middle school musical, The Pirates of Penzance, Jr.  As a student, I shunned any opportunities to be on stage.  Like many young people, I was terrified of appearing foolish to my peers.  Over the years, I conquered those fears and often relish the irony of being the assistant principal who does goofy things like disco dancing in the hallways, so I was excited to join the fun.  

I have had a couple of brief cameos in past plays, and I expected my pirate part to be a quick wave and laugh.  However, I attended my first practice a couple of weeks before the performance date and was startled to find that I actually had to sing and act in several numbers.  While I am egocentric enough to be in our middle school play, I’m not quite so needy as to have to recount my struggles learning lines or figuring out drama jargon.  I will simply say that I spent a lot of time working on the play over the past several weeks, and my wife and kids are grateful not to have to listen to “A Rollicking Band Of Pirates We” in the car anymore.

I had always known that working on the play was a special thing for the students involved, but I never really realized how special.  After a couple of weeks of practices, a dress rehearsal, and an actual performance, I felt like I was accepted as just another one of the actors.  The students and I joked together, chatted at times when we should have been listening to direction, sang the silly warm-up riffs, drank imaginary “pirate sherry,”  put on lipstick, and stood side-by-side on the stage.  A student and I got to take a few swings at each other in a fight scene, and he had a blast pretending to pummel me.  (I think he may have taken a little too much joy in this).  

From being a regular cast member, I got to understand the team spirit involved in the production.  I have heard all about egos and prima donnas in acting circles, but there was none of that happening on our set.  The tech crew, actors, directors, costumers, and make-up “moms” all supported the primary mission, and all worked together to put on the best play possible.  What is so amazing to me is that everyone knew their respective parts so well that the play would have been a success without any adults present during the performance.  This is not to discount the wonderful direction of Mandy Bean and Beth Heinberg, the costume work of Susan Mycroft, or the talents of tech master, Mike Congleton, but rather to extol their great leadership by bringing a group of middle school students and a bumbling administrator to a place of independence and competence.

This play is a brilliant microcosm of the skills we value in our middle school.  While there may be some external motivation like applause, the students’ participation as a member of the crew or cast is voluntary.  Most of the students like it because it involves them in something that is much bigger than themselves.  We challenge our students to get involved, to form relationships, to achieve something of value, and to gain confidence and strength of character.  It is difficult for me think of a better venue for them to practice and gain these attributes.

I received a professional and personal gift this year by being allowed to become a student in my own school.  If anything, my involvement with Pirates of Penzance, Jr. raised my respect for what we accomplish on a daily basis within our community.  And, yes, Elizabeth, I will shave off my scrubby beard!

Learning Math

I would bet that my middle school (junior high) math classes were quite similar to the way you were taught math.  I watched the teacher work problems on the board and then I was given problems to practice.  I frequently rushed through my homework in an attempt to get it done as fast as possible so I could head to the tennis courts or shoot baskets in the driveway.  After a couple of weeks, I was given a “unit test” which was supposed to assess whether or not I had learned the material.  Having some natural ability in math, I usually scored well on the tests.   

However, school is not where I really learned math.  I learned math on my summer car vacations adding up miles on creased, fold-up maps; and by figuring the amount of gasoline our lumbering Buick Estate Wagon gobbled up on trips to the Texas coast.  I got pretty good at predicting arrival times based on our average speed and distance left to travel.  I learned to compute with fractions by helping my dad and older brother refurbish a hulking wooden sailboat and build a two-story fort that protected our back yard from neighborhood rapscallions.  I learned probability by playing cards and dice games, which eventually led to me reading Scarnes New Complete Guide to Gambling when I was twelve-years-old.  It is a pretty heavy read for a seventh grader, but I made some pocket money in my teens because I knew the odds in blackjack.


So, where are our kids really learning math today?  At Carolina Day School, they are learning math in school.  Surprise.  They are learning math because they are using math.  

In eighth-grade, students play with motion by building and zooming balloon-jet cars across the floor.  They plot rates of change on graphs and understand that slope is more than just a line on a page in a book.  In seventh grade, students measure and cut popsicle sticks to form specific geometric shapes.  They create these from scale drawings, and, in addition to getting practice with angles, they learn that precision is sometimes critical.  Our sixth graders design and run their own experiments and determine what types of graphs and charts best display the generated data.  Analysis and use of data is crucial to our students’ understanding the world around them.

Learning has little use unless you can do something with the knowledge.  Doing something implies action, and CDS students do much more than sit in class absorbing facts and algorithms. They build, observe, compute, design, record, analyze, and judge -- and in doing these things, they actually learn math.

Charette - Learning Through Process

                                     -  video created by Julie Daughtry

As a part of the Future of Learning (FOL) Institute at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, a small number of the 200-plus institute participants volunteered and were selected to participate in a charette.  When asked to volunteer for this experience, we were told little about the process other than the fact that it would involve designing an artifact to represent the learner of the future.

While others may define a charette to fit their own needs, our experience in charette could be defined as a small group working together over multiple, intense sessions to design and construct a product through collaboration.  The process was valued equally, or perhaps more, than the product.

The success of the charette was achieved by the intentional and thoughtful planning of our facilitators, Justin Reich and Arzu Mistry, along with several FOL Fellows.  The sessions were an outstanding example of excellent teaching and reinforced my belief that great teaching occurs as a result of great planning.  While what happens in a classroom has been referred to as art, that art only occurs when the teacher is constantly engaged in the creation of the experience.

This charette experience focused on the process of creation.  Daily elements of scaffolding were put into place before we began our design work.  The intention of the scaffolding was to prepare us for the process that we would undertake during that specific class period.  The best example of this scaffolding was prior to the session when we were asked to develop our design elements.  We were asked to create something in five minutes given a concept and a medium.  We all randomly chose slips of paper from two piles; my medium was a sculpture and my concept was “tension between old and new.”  I had five minutes to think of an idea and make something.  The limited time forced me just to do something without thinking.  Most of the time this is the exact opposite of what teachers try to get students to do, but in this case the purpose was for us to generate ideas.  It was freeing not to have to think about whether the idea was good or bad and just do something with it.

The other effect of this small exercise was that it lowered tension and stress for me.  Justin told us that we didn’t have time for good ideas, we just needed to jump in and do it.  This removed the expectation of judgement by others.  We were all in the same boat, individuals creating something under impossible constraints with little or no expectations.  Many of the products of this brief exercise were creative because the exercise forced us to get out of our normal analytical minds and access the creative parts of our mind.  One of my partners stated that before the charette she thought she was not an artist and after it she thought that she was an artist.  I had the same feeling as I accessed and employed my “creative mind.”

There were many other short scaffolding sessions before and during our work.  All of them were purposeful, and, for me, effective.

The other element that focused us on the process was forced reflection.  At different points of our work session, we were asked to reflect on how we felt or what we were doing in front of a camera.  This was done in two different ways, one was in the “confessional booth” where we responded in front of a camera to a written question without anyone else present.  The other method occurred when we were filmed responding to oral questions in the middle of our design work.  Perhaps Arzu and Justin were really interested in documenting the process, but the effect for me was that it forced me to look inside myself frequently throughout the process.  The filming was essential to this process as it made my reply spontaneous.  I didn’t have time to craft a response.  While I don’t remember specific revelations in design that occurred as a result of this process, I do remember feeling less stress and more focused afterwards.  I was never asked to look at my recorded reflections, and I don’t know if anyone ever looked at them.  This made and makes no difference to me as the value gained was in the moment.

The final essential element in process was getting outside input into our design.  There were a couple of formal review periods where people outside of the charette were invited to question us about our process and design.  There were also informal reviews done by Justin, Arzu, and the Fellows.  The reviews were always done by questioning:  Have you thought about this?  Why did you do it that way? What are you trying to express?  What about the use of color?  Why did you choose wood as a medium? Getting input was crucial to the process.  Nearly every time someone interacted with us it changed our design to some degree.  At the very least it forced us to think in deeper and broader ways about the design.


While I have believed in Constructivist learning for years, participating in this charette gave me a personal understanding of the process that I previously lacked. To be a student in a classroom where process was central to learning deepened my appreciation for this model and will give me a framework to build upon.

Beside(s) Content

“Developing content knowledge provides the foundation for acquiring these skills, while the skills in turn are necessary to truly learn and use the content. In other words, the skills and content knowledge are not only intertwined but also reinforce each other.”

http://www.hewlett.org/newsroom/news/national-research-council-report-highlights-importance-deeper-learning


Of course great teachers have always focused on teaching students to communicate, collaborate, create, solve problems, and innovate.  Great teachers ask students to work together through project-based learning to enhance all of these skills.  In our school, it is commonplace to walk into a classroom and see students working together to design a road trip across the US, or build a tower out of straws that can withstand an earthquake, or make a claymation video to bring awareness to a critical problem facing the environment.  None of this is news to anyone who sees and values great teaching.

The problem is that while these skills are discussed, written about, and extolled, they remain a minor part of most schools’ curriculum, behind content.  Unless individual teachers value these skills, they don’t get the attention that they deserve.  Even teachers who appreciate these skills often let them play second fiddle to content.  After all, content is what is in the textbook; what is assessed; and what parents, students, the State expect to be taught.  While the system doesn’t deny that 21C skills can be taught, it certainly doesn’t promote them or make it easy.  That needs to change -- now.

Every student and parent can tell you the subjects that define school -- English, history, math, science, art, PE, foreign language.  What would a school look like that raised the awareness and place of 21C skills to stand on equal footing beside the subject areas?  What if instead of asking a student how they did on their algebra test, parents asked how they did on their metacognition today (and it didn’t seem weird)?  What if administrators created a schedule that made it easy for teachers to plan lessons that gave students the opportunity to work and reflect on 21C skills?  What if a school decided to report on student growth on 21C skills in addition to mastery of content?  What if students knew they were supposed to develop their ability to innovate, rather than it being an unnoticed by-product of a project?  All of these what ifs are doable and pretty easily, but they won’t happen unless we (students, teachers, parents, administrators, the State) change our collective minds about what students should learn in school. 

Parallel Thinking

Two months ago conditions changed in my personal life that made me realize that I needed to shore up my credentials in order to be ready for the future.  I applied to and was accepted into an online Masters in School Administration program at Western Carolina University.  This masters program is designed primarily for public school educators who wish to work as administrators within the North Carolina State school systems -- a different path than I'm traveling.  As the start of the summer session came closer and closer, I kept feeling more and more apprehensive, not the type of nervous excitement that I got when I was driving to Sewanee from San Antonio in 1976, but more of a nervous anxiety driven by dread.  Something clearly was not right.  So, I had an informal meeting with two trusted friends, and they both told me to punt.  I punted, long and deep.  I think that I may have punted out of the stadium altogether.

My friend and colleague, Sam, made a podcast that focused on my situation and what he saw as the solution.  It will take you about twenty minutes to listen to, but it will be worthwhile.

How Should You Go to School?

At about the same time that Sam was making this podcast, I was typing this email to him:

Hi Sam,

I started extending the idea that I talked about in Missy's office to be an "experiment in higher education."

I am going to design my own masters program (maybe I will not use this term), using a template of courses derived from the best schools in the country.  I will create a blog to document my course work and reflections.  My coursework will be self-study, intensive workshops, on-line classes, collaboration with others who find their way to me from my blog, and ongoing dialogue with selected mentors.  I will ask my mentor/advisers to accredit and validate my coursework.  In the process, I hope to explore from the inside the new type of education that we know is going to influence the future world of education. 

I think we were both a little shocked when we read/listened to each others' ideas.  Parallel thinking with Sam Harrelson is pretty scary for me, and I'm sure it must have been scary for him to be thinking like me (but in an altogether different way).

This summer I will start my experiment in higher education, and I hope that you will be a part of it by reading my blog, offering suggestions, asking questions, and being a fellow traveler in pursuit of learning.