society
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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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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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Holden Caulfield Has Left the Building: Reprise
I’m not teaching The Catcher in the Rye this term, but I’m pre-planning next year’s course on novels about adolescence, and wondering whether to include it in the list. The post below, first published in June 2009, grapples with the possibility that maybe it’s not the best choice for today’s youth, at least not those in 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
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What’s a Teacher to Do? Paul Tough’s How Children Succeed
When Paul Tough’s new book, How Children Succeed, arrived in my mailbox, I opened it with great anticipation. I love Tough’s writing; his pieces on This American Life and in The New York Times have always impressed me with their warm, clear prose. What’s more, last year, an excerpt from this book, published in the New York Continue reading
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When You Are Uncool: Reprise
As promised, today I begin a Thursday series of posts from the archives – posts that have long since disappeared from view but that I still like. New readers may be encountering them for the first time; if you’ve been reading this blog since the beginning, maybe you’ll see something new in the post this Continue reading
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Who’s to Blame for the Student Strike Mess?
Until now, I haven’t commented on the madness happening in Montreal streets concerning tuition hikes. I haven’t commented because my feelings about the tuition hikes, and the resulting student strikes and protests, are, as a friend recently described his own, “nuanced.” I am not in principle opposed to tuition hikes in Quebec. I AM opposed Continue reading
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How To Be a Teenage Girl
If you haven’t yet discovered Tavi Gevinson and her webzine Rookie, it’s time you did. If you know any teenage girls, you need to send them a link to Rookie, because every teenage girl needs to think about the stuff Tavi Gevison and her writers think about. In her original editor’s letter, Tavi explains that Continue reading
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Too Many Books
The Husband and I are moving soon. The other night, we invited a mover over to give us a quote. He looked around and said, “It’s going to cost you a fortune. You have too many books.” I know what some of you are thinking. Never! Sacrilege! No such thing! These were not my responses. 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 