personal
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Ongoing Open Call: What Should Change About School?
I’ve just begun reading Nikhil Goyal’s One Size Does Not Fit All: A Student’s Assessment of School. Goyal is an American high-school senior who has made a name for himself talking to the media about educational change, and although I’m not far into his book yet, I am already intrigued. I’ll write more on his ideas Continue reading
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Willing to Read and Write: Reprise
Last week, this post – first published in September of last year – spiked in my blog stats. It seemed a whole pile of people were reading it, but I couldn’t figure out who or why, although the search term “effort” had a corresponding spike. Maybe now, at midterm, teachers and students are being hard Continue reading
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How Literature Will Save the World: Reprise
Why should we keep reading? Why should my students learn to love reading? I began asking myself this question in 2010, and I keep asking it, of myself and others. Below, some of my initial thoughts on the matter. * Lately, I’ve been thinking about reading. Last summer I published a post in which I mourned Continue reading
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Arrows into Blossoms: Reprise
My meditation practice has fallen to the wayside these days. It would be wise for me to return to it. In November 2009, I was tired of a lot of things, and some Buddhist reflections were helpful. In particular, I spent time thinking about the writings of Pema Chodron, a tattoo of the Buddha under Continue reading
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Giving Thanks
Today is Thanksgiving Day here in Canada, so it’s time to give thanks for all my good fortune. Here are five of my job-related blessings. 1. A salary. Last week, I wrote a post about money anxiety. However, I took pains to point out that money anxiety is relative. Every two weeks, a paycheck shows Continue reading
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One Minute of Solitude: Reprise
We are six weeks into the semester, and I’m starting to pinpoint small classroom management issues and think about appropriate responses. Nothing major has arisen so far (fingers crossed), but whenever I am confronted with hints of passive-aggressiveness, defiance or rudeness, I start evaluating what I need to do: ignore? Confront? Defuse in some other Continue reading
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Things I Learned From Buying a House #2: Money Does Not Grow On Trees
If it did, I’d have a lot more than I used to, because I didn’t use to own any trees, and now I own six. Well, three trees, and two lilac bushes, and a cedar shrub. Nevertheless, money doesn’t grow on any of them. I have gone through periods in my adult life when I Continue reading
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Things I Learned From Buying a House #1: I Can Do It
You can do things you don’t think you can do. For most of my adult life, I said that I didn’t want to own a house. It was too much responsibility. I was willing to “pay someone else’s mortgage,” as people kept describing it, if it meant that someone else had to call the plumber Continue reading
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The Uses of Boredom: Reprise
An earlier version of this week’s reprint appeared in July of 2009. It tells the story of how and why I became a reader. And it asks: how do we learn to like challenging tasks if we live in a world where boredom is impossible? * I became a reader because I was bored. I Continue reading
About Me
My job is to teach people to read and write; aside from that, I like to learn things.
Classroom as Microcosm 