The day before...

Source: Southern Writers Magazine

I'm in my classroom prepping for the Ford's Theater National Oratory Fellowship competition here at TIS. I have 15 students competing for two spots to accompany me to Washington DC where they will work with Ford's Theater Teaching Artists and staff and ultimately present their speeches on the stage at Ford's Theater. I am insanely proud of the work they are doing and proud as punch to show them off to their family, friends, TIS and the community.

The last post on what makes great teaching has offered interesting insights for me. The traffic from my blog post was alright (but I am a greedy pup and would take more discussion) but, educator and trainer Glenn Wiebe from ESSDAK and educator and writer Brett Clark both had responses from their blog post and tweet, respectively, and so I adding those comments in the mix as well. As soon as I come out from the competition, I will compile and report. Thanks to Brett for asking the question and Glenn for continuing the discussion.

I talked to my classes yesterday about preparing for an event like the competition and one of the questions was about nerves. It's funny, kids assume that the adult default is "calm, cool and in control." As adults, we often perpetuate that misnomer. I told them I have presented to thousands of adults and students during my time as a trainer, advocate and teacher, but I still get nervous. The classroom is a safe place for me (and I hope for them), however I have struggled with 'stage fright' for much of my adult life. It wasn't always the case and I talked about in a blog post right after last year's Ford's Theater retreat.

As student asked if I would repost the post. I'm happy to oblige.

A great game for budding '007's' this summer

One of the things I like to do in May is go through all the emails and blogs and tweets I was too 'busy' for during the school year but didn't want to delete outright because they look interesting. The new blog for the Kansas Council for the Social Studies is titled Doing Social Studies and is gonna be cool. One of the contributors is Glenn Wiebe who works for ESSDACK which stands for, well, I don't know what it stands for but, they work in the world of edumacation.

I met Glenn last spring at the National Council for History Education conference. He and I attended the same session and got to talking. He ended up in the session I helped lead with the Smithsonian American Art Museum on using art in history. It is one of my passions and so I will post the Prezi I used in my presentation and move on. Anyway, I quickly learned that Glenn is the guy to know for tech in Kansas (really anywhere) and he and I have chatted electronically off and on during the past year about how I and the school might do it better.

Anyway, the spider web that is the internet led me to a post on Glenn's blog on a game called Pursued. The short version of Pursued is that you've been knocked unconcious and taken somewhere. You manage to get free but must tell Control where you are. Using Google Earth, you can look at your surroundings to decide where you are. It is a simple premise but intoxicatingly fun.

I will continue to ramble on about teaching and learning and all things philosophical, but for today I'm climbing out of a trunk, looking around and trying to descern the differences between the Space Needle in Seattle and the Stratosphere Casino in Las Vegas.

Enjoy the day.