Wishful Thinking

This video popped up on my Newsfeed today.  Give it a watch.  It's pretty powerful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R45HcYA8uRA What would you write on the board? Everything I'd write has to do with my career.  It's hard to call them regrets, because I wouldn't change any of the decisions I've made.  I don't regret what I did in...

It’s Not Just Me

I had a chance to catch up with a high school friend yesterday. What started as a few random texts and an accidental butt-dial turned into an hour-long conversation catching up on major life events and commiserating about the challenges of adult life. At one point she commented on how nice it was that, even...

Mass Judgements and Media Hype

We live in a world that thrives on media hype. Forget the details and facts. Forget context, background, and objectivity. Forget innocent until proven guilty. Instead, a video/picture/tweet of something offensive goes out and becomes viral, and suddenly the public at large decides it's time to voice its outrage. I'm going to try to write...

Activism: Goofy Games and Guilt Trips?

I'm really bothered by social media based activism.  When did we as a culture decide we needed fads to inspire us to give? I've had this topic sitting in my mind for a while.  I wanted to pick a good time to post it - not in the middle of any frenzy where it could be...

Finish what you start!

Now that summer is here, I've packed up my classroom and submitted my grades, I need something to fill my time and mental stimulation (besides the inevitable packing for the next move).  During summers and lulls in the school year, I tend to rekindle my interest in crafty-type activities. When we were in Alaska, I started...

Change Happens.

Life is full of change, completions and beginnings, starting over and moving on.  I attended a college graduation party this weekend.  We had senior awards chapel this morning in school, and in a little over a week, those seniors will graduate high school.  This is the time of year that we celebrate all that.  This...

Let’s Fix it With a Petition! (…or not)

About two months ago, the principal made an announcement to the school informing everyone that he'd hired a former student to be a new English teacher next year.  Given my tentative situation as a long-term sub, all my students assumed that meant he'd hired another teacher instead of hiring me on permanently.  They came rushing up to...

Practical Education

"Are you going to teach us how to do taxes?" The question caught me off guard.  Taxes belong in a life-skills or applied mathematics course, not English.  However, I followed her logic and addressed her question.  We were talking about writing resumes (as part of their career research project), and in her mind she associated...

Dealing with Naiveté

I had already started writing this post when three students came into my study hall asking if they could survey some of the kids in the room.  As they circulated among the class and asked their questions, it became harder and harder for me to simply sit quietly and listen.  The survey was on racism...

The Tangents

Dear Students, I know what you're doing.  It's nothing new.  You think you're distracting me, skillfully diverting the teacher's attention away from the lesson and starting me on some tangential discussion.  You think you're somehow "winning" because we didn't get as far as I'd planned in the lesson. I love it.  You think I haven't seen...