Don't be afraid to ask questions.

Teaching and Topic Sensitivity

Here is an interesting response to my 16 August blog which cited an article by Thomas Sewell and then asked, "But how biased is reporting in Middle Eastern affairs? And is it as biased as the Thomas Sewell article "Trashing our history: Troops in Iraq" claims it to be? How do we teach the war in today's news?"

To give readers an idea of how difficult it often is to answer such a question, I provided some links to various web-sites offering varying points-of-view on the subject of purported media bias and concluded with: "Not easy is it? Believe me, it rarely is...but it's all a part of the process that enables us to become informed citizens and better participants in a democratic society. "

I offered no solutions to the original article or questions, and sought to show how difficult it is for teachers to touch on subjects of great import that are often of a very sensitive nature. The following response to my blog is a case in point.

Hey El Duce
You're still in denial..... about Viet Nam... after all these years...
What happened, in the USA, during Viet Nam is called *democracy*....
Yet you still *can't* & I mean *can't* face the truth......
Back then our leaders lied... the pentagon lied.....
Eventually, the American People realized, they were lying....
Eventually the American People stopped the war... not the media....
Today you are spreading right wing, neo-con propaganda, (lies) on your blog.....
Eventually your students will realize.... you are lying....
It was not the media that killed 59,000 American soldiers, in Viet Nam....
It was liars like you.....
How many times, back then did I hear "The Viet Cong is in it's last throws".....
Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies............. You should be ashamed......
Was it the media that just frightened U.S. warships out of the Red Sea.....?
Nope it was *neo-con* lies..............
I knew you couldn't keep a clean blog....

Wow! Anyone ever listen to the meandering recorded speeches of Adolf Hitler or Benito Mussolini? As a teacher, you might ask yourself and your students the following:

• Have you ever heard such rhetoric before? Where and by whom? For what purpose?
• Can you guess the political leanings of this writer? How? Based on what I wrote and what he has written in response, why might he think as he does?
• Where do you think the writer's opinions come from?
• To whom was he speaking? Me or the author? Or both?
• Do his comments lead you to believe that he thinks the portion of the original editorial I cited in my blog was written by me and not Mr. Sewell? Why?
• Do you think he even read my blog, Mr. Sewell's editorial, and the web-links? And if he did, how might he come to the conclusions he presented in his response to my blog?

Now, imagine being a high school teacher and being faced with a response like this to a topic like the one I originally posited on 16 August. How--as a teacher--would you respond to such a diatribe without stifling honest, open debate and an opportunity to teach? Think about it...and think about what it must be like to be a teacher who teaches many such topics during the day. Anyone want the job? If you don't, be thankful for the many who do...and who do it well.

The Danger of WWW Research.

How often do teachers or parents tell their students to get on the Internet (the World-Wide Web) and research a topic such as a famous person, place, event, invention, etc? It happens all the time as the www has virtually replaced the use of available texts and library resources for so many of us doing research today. But do we warn and teach our students or children how to be skeptical users of the www just as we were taught to identify the author's point-of-view and question the value of the material we culled from research books? If we don't, then we had better start...or else we'll have no one to blame but ourselves when a student unwittingly brings us some "research" on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.--for example--from a web-site such as the one found at http://www.martinlutherking.org/.

This .org URL and the web-site itself makes it look like a historical treatise of the life and times of MLK, Jr., and claims that it is "A true historical examination." There is a quiz under the banner "Attention Students: Try Our MLK Pop Quiz," and the site offers sections titled Historical Writings, Truth About King, Death of the Dream, The King Holiday, Civil Rights Library, Jews & Civil Rights, and Suggested Books.

A quote from Newsweek magazine dated 19 Jan 1998 is displayed prominently on the home page and states: "That night King retired to his room in the Williard Hotel. There FBI bugs reportedly picked up 14 hours of party chatter, the clinking of glasses and the sounds of illicit sex--"

Further down the page is a link in its center inviting students to:

"Bring the Dream to life in your town! Download flyers to pass out at your school!"

Opening the link will show a page that states:

"Bring the dream to your school! This is the time of year many students are asked to write reports about Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement. Print out these flyers and pass them around your school. There are four flyers per sheet and include our website information."

And what do the flyers say?

One is in a business card format with Dr. King's picture and a message that states, "I have a dream..." Quoted nesxt to Dr. King's portrait is George Orwell: "In an age of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act." And at the bottom is a claim for "A Historical Examination..." and the address for the MLK web-site.

Another has the title of "The Beast as Saint: The Truth About Martin Luther King," and yet another is titled "Which holiday honors a liar, cheater, and traitor?" Can you imagine the outcry that would occur if a student--especially a younger student--downloaded one of these flyers and brought it to school to use as a source reference for a report on MLK, Jr.?

If all this seems as odd to you as it did to me, then you must scroll down to the very bottom of the web-site's page to find the following link in small print: Sponsored by Stormfront. And what is Stormfront, a student might wonder, as they clicked on the link. Imagine what they might think or be even more curious to explore when they find themsleves linked to Stormfront.org, a racist forum for what they claim is the "white nationalist community." Whoa!

The news is frequently filled with warnings of the dangers of the www--the chat rooms; blogs and vlogs; on-line gambling; and ready access to drugs, pornography, and predators. But the www also teems with ill-intentioned sites such as this one, and their easy accessability, professional appearance, and purposefully obfuscatory language make them especially confusing and--when combined with their undeveloped reasoning abilities--dangerous to the understanding of the average primary and secondary school student. As an educator, being aware of such dangers--and informing and monitoring our students as they explore the www--is yet another important task to be added to our already extensive lists of such tasks.

Too many bureaucrats use this word far too often!

Proof of Residency?

WARNING: The requirement to prove you are a resident of the State of Texas has been upgraded from irritating to ludicrous.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,166018,00.html

I, too, have had personal experiences with the type of bureaucratic mishandling of the proof of residency requirement faced by Carl Basham in the article at the link posted above.

One is when I recently received a postcard from the Texas Department of Public Safety stating that I needed to bring proof of my social security account number to them to renew my driver's license. There is no explanation as to why--after retiring from the US Army in 1993, moving from Europe to Dallas and declaring Texas as my home of residency, obtaining a Texas driver's license with my DD-214 ( Certificate of Discharge with my SSAN because the armed forces use your SSAN as your service identification number) and DD-2A (retired servicemember's ID card which has my SSAN on the front)--they now won't allow me to renew my driver's license without providing them again with proof of my SSAN. I would like to know what they did with the copies of those records I left with them the last time.

Another is a similar experience to Mr. Basham's when my youngest son tried to register for a summer class with the Dallas County Community College District. The residency requirements are posted at:

http://www.dcccd.edu/Future+Students/Admissions+and+Registration/Admission/Residency.htm

At the time, my 20 year old son--who had attended Texas school's since 3rd grade and graduated from a local high school with honors--had just completed his sophomore year of college at the University of Texas at Dallas. But when he went to register, the combination of his high school transcript, current college transcript, latest 1040A income tax return, and Texas driver's license--all of which showed his residency for at least the past six years at our home address in Dallas--were not enough evidence to allow him to be considered for the in-state residency tuition rate. It was not until we provided them a copy of our 1040 and driver's licenses did they allow the in-state tuition rate. Why wouldn't they accept the other documentation when taken together?

1. He had been out of high school for more than a year so his transcript was invalid because they said he could have been living anywhere for the past couple of years.
2. His college transcript was not an "official" transcript, but the one only he could print from the UTD system by accessing his account with them using his personal identification number and did not offer proof that he had been attending school in Texas.
3. His tax return was only for a summer job and not for a job he had worked for a year or more, so it did not prove his residency.
4. His driver's license, which contained our home address and was more than a year old, was considered by the registrar to be invalid because it did not expire in less than 3 years. I still haven't been able to firgure this one out.
5. He could not provide any rental agreements or utility or telephone bills as proof of residence because he lives at home while attending an excellent college just 2 miles from our home and his phone is on our family plan.

One of the really strange parts of our conversation with the registrar was that they would have accepted a letter of employment on letterhead stationary from a company with a Texas address stating he had worked there for a year as proof of residency. I asked if they called to verify such letters and was told they did not. When I mentioned how easy it was for any semi-technically literate teenager today to create such a letter and offer it falsely as "proof" of empolyment, the answer I received from the registrar was a shrug and a blank stare.

My son's and Mr. Basham's aren't the only cases of such bureaucratic tomfoolery. One of my teacher's had a similar experience with her son and the Dallas County Community College District. I only wish the registrars who so diligently guard the doors of our local community and junior colleges were in charge of our borders. After my experience with them, if they were, the illegal immigration problem would undoubtedly not be much of a problem at all because nobody would ever have the requisite identification they would need to be allowed to enter the country--unless, of course, it was a letter of employment on forged letterhead stationary that nobody would bother to verify.

If you don't advocate for yourself, who will? Ask if you don't understand; it's expected by your teachers.

How do we teach the war in today's news?

Thomas Sewell asked the following question in a recent Town Hall editorial:

Has the education in our schools left us so ill-equipped that we cannot see through even the most blatant hypocrisy of today's press in their reporting of such events as our war in Iraq?

Is today's reporting of our war in Iraq a re-creation of the media's role in the Vietnam war, where American victories on the battlefield were turned into defeat on the home front by the filtering and spin of the media? Even the current Communist rulers of Vietnam have admitted that they lost militarily in Vietnam but hung on because they expected to win politically in the United States -- as they did. Will the warring Iraqi factions who do not support a democratic society do the same?

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/printts20050810.shtml

But how biased is reporting in Middle Eastern affairs? And is it as biased as the Thomas Sewell article "Trashing our history: Troops in Iraq" claims it to be? Here are some pertinent links to get you started on answering this difficult question yourself because, as is the case in America, you must research the question, form an opinion, and then be able to defend it.

• New Mexico Media Literacy Project--the largest and most successful independent, activist media literacy project in the United States. http://www.nmmlp.org/
• Mideast media coverage watchdog. http://www.honestreporting.com/
• Writers Debate Media Bias, Iraq Coverage. http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1834539
• Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting--a national media watch group offering well-documented criticism in an effort to correct media bias and imbalance. http://www.fair.org/index.php
• Ohio State University Communication Research News. http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/talkbias.htm
• Media Bias in Iraq. http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001000753
• Media Bias (Wikipedia). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_bias

Not easy is it? Believe me, it rarely is...but it's all a part of the process that enables us to become informed citizens and better participants in a democratic society.

Why blog?

Imagine creating a blog for your course(s). What would you do with your blog?

When deciding if, how and why (not necesssarily in that order) to blog with students, teachers might consider four main structures:

• Teacher posts--Blogs where a teacher posts announcements, links, and news items and no one, I mean no one, replies.
• Teacher posts - Students respond-- Blogs where teachers post as noted above, but students repond in the comments section after postings. Discussion occurs, but it is mostly in response to a verbal prompt from the teacher.
• Teacher and students post and all respond--Blogs where students post and teachers post and everyone responds to anyone at anytime.
• Students maintain own pages--Blogs where a class home page is a clearinghouse with links to "Member blogs" and students maintain their own pages. Students and teacher read and respond to all from the writer's blog. The downside here is the time and energy to maintain all the sites.

Here are some examples of blogs in education.

• Chris Burnett publishes 8th grade student work on her classroom blog: http://www.visitmyclass.com/blogs/burnett/
• Jim Rusconi's showcases how a blog can act as a place to present ideas for professional development and stimulate discussion: http://novemberlearning.com/blogs/JimRusconi/
• The Seton Hall blog is an online meeting place for the current group of Executive EdD students at Seton Hall University in New Jersey: http://novemberlearning.com/blogs/setonhall/
• “The Secret Life of Bees” blog. Even the author joined in this literature circle: http://weblogs.hcrhs.k12.nj.us/bees/
• The Galileo Li-Blog-ary features all the school library has to offer, plus offers specific notes to individual classes working on research topics: http://www.galileoweb.org/galileoLibrary/
• Ms Jackson posts science homework, assignments and tests on a weekly basis: http://www.glnd.k12.va.us/schools/ghs/teachers/cjackson/archives/week_2005_01_02.html
• This is a school blog from Lewis Elementary in Portland, Oregon: http://lewiselementary.org/
• Will Richardson's journalism class blog: http://central.hcrhs.k12.nj.us/journ2/
• See how a class from Colorado Springs teamed up with elementary students from Uzbekistan to create an International recipe exchange: http://www.connectuz.net/index.php?showtopic=81

If I had only gone to kindergartern...

Educational Leadership

Titles do not equal leadership. Titles establish a chain of command, and that can get you as far as compliance, but it will never get you true commitment.

Leadership is a topic of interest that lends itself to often raucous debate no matter what your chosen profession. Much like the nature v. nurture arguments of the psycho-sociological world, arguments for and against the importance of either the born or the learned aspects of leadership can be made for any case study on the topic.

Leadership was an on-going topic of discussion and reflective thinking for everyone in a leadership position during my time with the Department of Defense, and the discussion continues to this day amongst professionals of all professions. Based on my experiences and the consensus of survey results from many who have both led and been led, interpersonal skills are more critical to good leadership than technical know-how. Taking that idea into consideration, the traits of good leadership can be summarized in the following 12 points.

A good leader:

• Keeps cool under pressure
• Clearly explains missions, standards and priorities
• Sees the big picture; provides context and perspective
• Can make tough, sound decisions on time
• Adapts quickly to new situations and requirements
• Sets high standards without a “zero defects” mentality
• Can handle bad news
• Coaches and gives useful feedback to subordinates
• Sets a high ethical tone; demands honest reporting
• Knows how to delegate and not “micromanage”
• Builds and supports teamwork within staff and among units
• Is positive, encouraging and realistically optimistic

This summary outlines what was and remains expected of the leaders directly responsible for the lives of their charges and the defense of our nation and its ideals. After more than three decades of experience in the government, public, and private sectors of education, I often wonder why we are so hesitant to ask no less of those so-called "leaders" responsible for educating and developing our future citizens?

"Fahrenheit 451" could become a reality if we allow it. Let your elected officials know how you feel about your right to privacy and your use of the library.

Boomerang Kids

Boomerang kids is the term given to those students who leave high school, attempt college, and return home within a year or less because they were failing and either dropped out or were academically released by the school.

When pondering the issue of boomerang kids, one must remember that America offers opportunity, not guarantees. It is amazing to me how so many people fail to grasp this very important concept and how many schools fail to even teach it. To carry this concept a bit further, the American higher education system also offers a variety of opportunities--the opportunity to learn and the knowledge that learning is a personal responsibility demanding drive, hard work, and realistic aspirations from the learner. It offers no guarantees...except that it is available to all who (1) have the aptitude and (2) can find a way to fund it.

In today's educational arena, parents, educators, and legislators spend a great deal of time and effort in trying to quantify and chart the myriad factors that determine educational success in the hope that we can then better predict the outcome of our student's learning. A continuous chain of standardized testing beginning--strangely enough--even before entering kindergarten, an on-going clamoring for a "more rigorous" curriculum, and a structuring of our student's lives in and out of school to the point they are entering adulthood without really having experienced childhood are all attempts by society and our educational systems to guarantee our children are successful in school and life. In my opinion, however, you have a much better chance of predicitng the roll of a pair of dice...and this is why.

In my years as a teacher, administrator, and leader, I have seen students with nearly perfect SAT scores attempt college and fail, and students with SAT scores most colleges wouldn't consider to be acceptable for college level work try and succeed. I have come to call this the "Bubba-Gump" factor, a tribute to the still important and often undervalued virtues of self-worth, hard work, humility, citizenship, and honesty so poignantly portrayed in the Academy Award winning movie, "Forrest Gump."

As educators, we are often faced with the concerns of anxious parents, faculty, and administrative boards who want to know where we failed these boomerang students and how we can guarantee the success of those now following. But we must ask ourselves, did we fail them or did they fail themselves when they chose to:

• not use the skills and knowledge we helped provide them;
• not heed our warnings and advice;
• not be honest with themselves regarding their choice of school, their talents and strengths, their weaknesses, their passions, and their choice of academic major;
• avoid or not take advantage of the help offered by peers and school staffs;
• pursue a social rather than an educational agenda.

I have no definitive answers for these issues. Don't get me wrong, I am not complacent about them, but I have learned that there are so many factors which influence the decisions made by our students that are often beyond our control for which we either cannot or should not be held responsible. And I use myself as a prime example.

I graduated from high school and began college at 17. I was intelligent enough to do the work and succeed in college, but I didn't because I was far less interested in my academics than my social development. As a result, I lost my 2S deferment and was drafted into the service. At that point, I began making decisions that led to a challenging and successful career of some 23 years; the completion of both a Bachelor's and a Master's degree program; and the transition to a second career that I personally find challenging, enjoyable, and rewarding. Because of my earlier choices, I did not have the opportunity to finish my Bachelor's degree until I was 34 years old (17 years after beginning college) and my Master's when I was 39.

In most countries of the world, this would have been impossible. But in America, this was possible because the opportunity remained available to me until I was ready to make better personal choices and commit myself to making the effort required to take advantage of it. The opportunity is the only guarantee America offers its citizens. The rest is up to the individual and the personal choices we make which ultimately determine our successes or failures. I know this because I was a boomerang kid.

Advice for parents when your kid returns home.

Don't treat your 20-something like a 15-year-old. Adult children don't need to be nagged about what they eat or wear or how they spend their money. The obvious exception would be when their habits disrupt the household.

You have a right to set your rules -- but be careful not to cross into monitoring your son or daughter. For instance, if you don't want significant others staying the night, set that rule -- but don't try to control your child's dating life.

Don't fall back into childhood patterns and roles. For example, parents shouldn't do all the grocery shopping and wash all of the clothes. Such actions can enable lazy sons and daughters and keep them from becoming independent.

Before moving in, set ground rules and negotiate routines. Set a plan with a time frame for the living situation.

Don't preach or lecture.

Be patient. Some people take longer than others to settle into a suitable career.

Give advice when asked for it, but be sparing with glib, unrealistic or moralistic suggestions.

Partially bankrolling startup adults is helpful if you can afford it, but total support destroys incentive for work.

Demonstrate respect for and interest in your young adult's current lifestyle -- no matter how disappointed you might feel.

Advice for kids when they move back home.

Don't expect a free ride and few household responsibilities, as it was during childhood. Contribute financially in some way.

Give parents plenty of space, and develop an active life of your own outside of the home.

Respect and obey the rules of your parents' house, out of courtesy. But if the rules cross into meddling and controlling, assert your boundaries -- and work more quickly on your plan for moving out.

Show appreciation for your parents and treat them well. Living at home again can be a great opportunity to get to know your parents on a whole new level as people.

Multisensory learning works best for those being taught

and those doing the teaching.

Teaching Responsibility and Judgment?

Today's Dallas Morning News carried a story about a high school athlete who had "broken the rules" and still wanted to play football. But the student, a talented athlete who has drawn interest from major college football programs, not only broke the rules, he broke the law and is now awaiting an October 17 trial on six counts of aggravated robbery, each a first-degree felony punishable by a prison term of five to 99 years or life. According to a police report, he admitted taking part in the robberies of six people at gunpoint during two incidents in January and is now out on bail pending his trial. But the most amazing part of this whole story is the response to this young criminal’s actions from his coach, principal, and district superintendent.

The student was a star receiver for a large high school before being arrested on aggravated robbery charges and being placed under house arrest. However, now that school has started, he doesn't have to be in until 7:15 p.m. on weekdays, is not prohibited from participating in extracurricular school activities, and his coach has welcomed him back to play football…along with all the students who have not broken the law. "Kids are kids," the coach said. "Sometimes they make bad decisions. But you can't throw away a kid's life."

Amazingly, the principal and school district superintendent support the coach's stance and said the student should be allowed to play football. Their logic? "My question is, why shouldn't he play?" the superintendent said. "You're innocent until proven guilty. Our job is to educate students and give them another chance. This may be his only route to a college education. Who are we to take that away, by making him sit out? We're doing what's best for the kid, not what's best for the coaches association or best for society."

Fortunately, I have no children who attend the school or district in which this debacle of skewed judgment and illogical reasoning is occurring. A "Kids are kids" explanation for a premeditated action in which a student in senior high school robs people with a loaded pistol and physically assaults them with a weapon is so ludicrous that I cannot imagine how anyone with even an ounce of judgment can justify it. And just as ludicrous as the coach’s comments are the spineless positions of the principal and the district superintendent in supporting the coach.

In today's educational environment where such buzzwords as personal responsibility, safe learning environment, and zero tolerance (for such actions as weapon and drug possession, bullying, and racism) are constant points of concern and discussion by students, families, teachers, and administrators, it is particularly disturbing to watch this silly drama being played out in the news media. As a parent and an educator, I would have to question the soundness of the judgment of the coach, principal, and superintendent, and wonder whether or not I could reasonably trust them with my children's education and safety.

“Kids are kids” is an approach one takes when a student commits an action that does not include a weapon, willful physical harm, or the like. It is not an approach one takes when confronted with a premeditated action that includes armed robbery and pistol-whipping unarmed, honest citizens.

As an educator, I am resigning myself to being confronted with the usual round of general public and legislative backlash that follows such unjustifiable actions. Regretfully, the strange stance of this coach, principal, and district superintendent also lends support to those who will argue that America's educational sky is falling and cannot be left to the educational professionals to save.

Point-Of-View

One concept that a great many educators--especially those in urban and innercity schools--use today is to identify more precisely the environmental imprint a student brings to class before deciding exactly how to teach a specific subject. I said a great many because there are also many teachers who do not necessarily ascribe to this idea and don't use it. In educational jargon, environmental imprint refers to the experiences, ideas, opinions, and knowledge base a student already has in reference to a specific topic and will use as a point of departure when taking in, processing, and learning the material presented. In my experiences teaching throughout the world within the Department of Defense, a large urban school district, and in a private school whose mission is to provide a college preparatory education to learning different students, this concept is quite valid and an important tool every teacher needs to have in their personal toolbox of teaching techniques. Whether they use it or not is a personal choice that may be situationally or preferentially determined, but the tool must be available and ready to use when needed or desired.

A personal and--I think--humorous example of how one's environmental imprint affects learning occurred to our family while living in Europe in the early 1990's. We were living in Sembach, Germany, at the time, and my wife and I decided to take our two younger sons on a train trip to Paris. It was in November and an added bonus to our trip was for our family to experience the French celebration of Armistice Day--what we refer to as Veterans Day. Armistice Day is a national celebration for the signing of the armistice ending World War I on 11 November 1918 and the end to a horrific struggle which haunts many to this day. However, the importance of one's environmental imprint became apparent to my wife and I when we took our sons to the Louvre to see Da Vinci's Mona Lisa and the many other masterpieces housed in that former royal palace. Much to our surprise, our youngest, a very intelligent ADHD child, soon discovered a greater interest in the name plates placed beside the many works of art than in the artistic pieces themselves. Imagine our puzzlement at this unexpected turn of events...until we realized what he was doing. As it turned out, he was most fascinated in anything by the artists Michelangelo Buonarroti, Raphael Sanzio, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Donatello di Nicolo Bardi. Why? Because at six years of age, he was both surprised and delighted that so many of what were considered important works of art had been created by his favorite comic heroes at that time, the Ninja Turtles--Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo, and Donatello.

Reflectively, watching my son tour the Louvre on a journey of educational discovery tempered by an imaginary world he had come to embrace as a youngster made me realize just how potent and important the environmental imprint concept was to interest and learning. Today, my son is a junior in college who is continuing his pursuit of art on a personal journey that--I think--may have begun when he discovered the surreal blending of fantasy and reality he found in the galleries of the Louvre and the adventures of the Ninja Turtles.

Books are the carriers of civilization. Read them and learn our story.

Education As A Profession (1)

I never cease to be amazed at the effontery of people who will demurely defer to the perceived omniscience of doctors or lawyers or engineers or successful businessmen...yet will show little respect for the knowledge, dedication, and experience of a professional teacher. This is especially true when a teacher, student, family, and school are struggling to help a student who is floundering with a difficult or awkward academic or school related social issue. "Those who can, do; those who can't, teach" goes the old mot we all heard while growing up...the less than subtle message being that if one cannot make it in the real world (whatever that is), then they can always resort to teaching as a lesser but readily available profession for anyone to earn a living.

This patently erroneous concept of what is required of good teaching reminds me of the story of the blind men who were positioned around an elephant and, after each touched a portion of the animal that was nearest to them, were then asked to describe what an elephant is like. And of course, each had a different perspective: one touched the tail and described a rope; one touched a leg and described a large, sturdy pillar or tree; one touched the trunk and described a snake; and one touched an ear and described a large, flat animal of incredible flexibility. They were all basically right--and they were all a little wrong.

In my opinion and based upon my experience, that's the way it is whenever anyone attempts to describe the profession of teaching. Each of us has a different perspective on the matter, often depending on what portion of the profession we know and even when we knew it. Change is constant in vibrant institutions and professions, and it's fair to say that if you haven't seen the phenomenal changes taking place in the world of education and the science of learning over the last decade, you know much less of the profession of teaching than you think you do!

As the school year and this web log progress and grow over the next nine months or so, I will return to this topic again and again to add relevant points for discussion. I also plan to discuss current successful teaching strategies and practices, and to offer up experiences of life as an educator among today's teenagers, their often overly anxious parents (described by Hara Estroff Marano in "A Nation of Wimps" and Dr. Mel Levine in "Ready or Not, Here Life Comes"), and legislative bodies composed--for the most part--of lawyers and businessmen who are wont to pass laws to assauge parental angst and gain voter support without fully understanding their full impact on teaching, teachers, and student learning.

The Journey Begins

I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions, but none of them has done away with the need for character or the ability to think.

B. Baruch

After attending a recent educational conference where educational technology consultant Alan November gave a dynamic demonstration on the ease, use, and power of blogging in today's world and its potential as a powerful educational tool, I made a personal commitment to myself to create and maintain a web log that follows my travails as a high school principal navigating the worlds of technology and education during a typical school year. To this end, School Dais is an attempt to self-teach an old dog new tricks in an e-world of ever changing social, technological, and educational demands. I will make every attempt to offer up insights, observations, and topics for discussion that are relevant and interesting, but make no promises. I will also surely wander off topic periodically as something strikes a chord with a subject that piques my interest, and I may even offer insights into my personal life--although I am generally a rather private person and such journalistic meanderings will undoubtedly be rare. But whatever the outcome, I am looking forward to what I hope will be a grand adventure, a memorable and successful school year, and a new appreciation for the rapidly expanding concept of blogging.