You can make your own conclusions about what I think about New Neutrality...

"Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.":  I have mixed thoughts about the video media connected to my post this week. It is a corporate ploy. It is seemingly not an "honest" documentary of an event; rather, it is edited for emotional effect and charged with bias...

"Fairness is what justice really is.": But, the message is one I agree with. It deals with access to resources (in this case, digital ones). I am a supporter of open access to the internet in the public school I teach in. I praise the 1 to 1 initiative that has placed Chrome Books in every student's hand in our school. I support finding funding options to bring reliable internet to our more rural and financially strapped families. I believe the internet has enabled such a paradigm shift in the ways we tap information and knowledge that the benefits will propel the dreamers, and inventors, and curious learners to spaces we have not even begun to imagine. I realize we will face new obstacles, but it is as we deal with them them that we will continue to grow as a species.  Our capacity to learn, record, and share what we have learned with others—and even the future—has always been what moves us forward. The digital revolution is just that, a revolution that must be allowed to reach its full potential just like our students and... for ALL learners...

"Ethics and equity and the principles of justice do not change with the calendar.": Equity (not equality) is central to what I believe needs to be practiced in our public schools. One size does not fit all, and yet, when we dedicate money in the public sphere, we so often try to offer equality in order to "be fair." It is when we try to do what I believe to be truly right by our populations in the movement of funds, other resources, and access, that the public debate becomes so mired in jealousy and anger which is often focused on groups traditionally marginalized in the public sphere...

"Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you.": While it may be a little contrived, watch the next video and imagine yourself as an eager learner, or your children as such. Imagine that these learners trustingly show up to life eager to succeed, mindful of their own interests, but always aware of "the others" around them. Ignore the corporate sponsorship (Sprint) and just imagine what might feel "true" about the story they present. Our schools should be places that level the playing fields, not by holding some learners back, but by propelling each to reach their full potential...

Life lived equals wisdom only if it provides us with perspective...

Like many of my colleagues in the arena of history teaching, I ask my students why we should study events of the past. I encourage them to ask others, and think for themselves. I know that many of them do not really care (yet). I know that they will ask their moms and dads, or a brother, or uncle Bob and jot down the first answers they get without asking "but why?". I know they will arrive with at least half their answers: "So that we do not repeat the events of the past."

BLECH! It's too cute an answer. It is also a little different and less helpful than Geroge Santayana's oft referenced answer: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." [I am still not a fan of this answer, either. I think it confuses the impact of the average individual and the vastness of global events.]

For most of us, the macro events of world history are not in our span of control: I will not stop the next terrorist attack on the US, let alone half way around the world; I will not be able to stop the early stages of the next genocide; I will not be able to stop child labor abuses in developing nations as they try to satiate my desire to own inexpensive "cool stuff". [Please don't misunderstand me here. Individuals matter! Some matter such that they affect the path of millions, directly and dramatically. But for most of us, the effects of our presence are much more subtle and indirect.]

So why do I study the events of the past? If I study history, I might glean some patterns in our collective behavior. I might learn how others successfully navigated the hope crushing aspects of tragedy. I might learn for how others celebrated great moments in order to improve my own dance. I might change my own behavior to help respond to such moments in micro actions. The great and terrible will continue to happen in the flow of human events, but HOW we respond to them may change. So maybe the cute answer is on to something... We cannot necessarily change the course of events that have happened (duh!), but we can learn how we might respond to these moments. History provides us with the perspective to become better people! And we need good guides who can help offer the wisdom that perspective observed can provide.

"I knew a teacher who taught fifth grade for 38 years. She was absolutely phenomenal—the teacher you wish your own children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews could have. Her spark and energy never gave out. One day I asked her how she managed to stay inspired. She replied, "This is my 38th years teaching fifth grade, but for these students, it's the first time around." -- Todd Whitaker in What Great Teachers Do Differently: 14 Things That Matter Most

Each new lot needs to be given the time to learn the lessons that might seem obvious to those who have been around a while. Each veteran needs to remember that each new lot is there for the first time. The young ones provide raw energy and openable minds. The veteran can offer perspective. Perspective is a tool, a blessing, an eye-opener, a gift offered to those who see it for what it sheds light on. Perspective can be a game changer leading to innovation, compassion, insight. It might, in the right moments, help unlock those individuals who are global game changers. But it can, for everyone, help allow all of us to become better people.

Here is a relevant scene that I have loved since the day I first saw it. It is a scene that I would copy in each class if I could script my moments as well as Hollywood and My Captain. Enjoy.

Telling a story...

A Story about a Teacher:

Once upon a time in a small town at the edge of the northern wilderness there was a teacher who was eagerly looking for answers to the many questions that had been piling up as the years past by. Years ago—when this teacher was taller, stronger, and more handsome—he had answers to most every question he heard. When he did not have good answers for the hardest ones he made up responses in order to buy time for his further cleverness. But cleverness didn't help him much...

"Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.

"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."

"And he has Brain."

"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain." 

There was a long silence. 

"I suppose," said Pooh, "that that's why he never understands anything."1

The teacher had good intentions and a compassionate heart (which some say is still the case), working hard to have answers for all his students' questions, and even answers for the questions they were not asking.  But we all know what road is paved with those intentions, and a compassionate heart does not prepare young men and women for the ways of the world. So one day the teacher grew tired of trying to be Rabbit, and began trying to act a little more like Pooh.  (He-he, that guy said "Poo"). [Sometimes Tigger gets in the way, sorry.] Little innocent ones thirsting for story and attention showed the teacher the need for a better way and he began reading from the beginning again. 

The Beginning.

Pooh somehow stumbles upon the right answers that validate the questions that Piglet is often asking. I am not sure I will go as far as to say that Pooh has "skillful means" like a Zen Master's penetrating koans, or the cutting commentaries offered in something like Samuel Clemens' "simple" story telling, but Pooh stands out, nonetheless, as a greatly quotable sage of the 100 Aker Wood.

Later on, when they had all said "Good-bye" and "Thank-you" to Christopher Robin, Pooh and Piglet walked home thoughtfully together in the golden evening, and for a long time they were silent.

“When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last, "what's the first thing you say to yourself?"

"What's for breakfast?" said Pooh. "What do you say, Piglet?"
"I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today?" said Piglet.

Pooh nodded thoughtfully. "It's the same thing," he said.” 2


So... here I am being silly, looking for wisdom, quoting Pooh, and looking for the history connect to "today". I know it has something to to do with balance; the silly, knowledge, innocence, relevance, what I teach, and how I teach it. The new part of the script for me is to stop relying just on good intentions and a compassionate heart, and to really search for a "purposeful how." 

Rudyard Kipling and Graham Greene have written some things that help to anchor my perspective in how to connect my desire for story with how I am a teacher. Kipling wrote, "If history were taught in the form of stories, it would never be forgotten." 3 Graham Greene wrote, "A story has no beginning or end: arbitrarily one chooses that moment of experience from which to look back or from which to look ahead." 4 My colleague, Drew Gibson—an excellent story teller of his own right, who might be pleased to share company with Kipling and Greene—tells me that you need to know where you want to end up with your story in order to know how to tell it.

Lesson 1. In order to tell history as a good story (I can jump in anywhere, mind you), I need to know where I want to end up before I can tell it correctly.

Thanks, few readers, for allowing me to think out loud in front of you all. Your opinions are always welcome. :)

1. A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh
2. Ibid.
3. The Collected Works
4. The End of the Affair