"On this site in 1897 nothing happened." and other CCWTF thoughts.

I'm am preparing for a webinar with the new Civil War Washington Teaching Fellows today and it has me waxing nostalgic. I thought I would offer a top ten five six list to them for their edification.

5. Wear comfortable shoes...

All the coordinators from the different sites are all apparently seasoned Olympic calibre marathon runners and are unaware that some of us are less agile. ;)Walking tours and house tours and the Bataan march that is the steps up to Douglass' house. These tour are going to  give you boat loads of pictures and notes and you will use so much of it in your classrooms, but really...where is the Segway flatland tour/pubcrawl?

 

 

 

 

 

4. Take notes...

 

I know, you are officially on summer vacation ... but as you walk the city of Georgetown or listen to the tour guide at the US Capitol (the best tour I've ever had of the site, BTW), or listen to a speech at the Douglass house, or are in a class session...something is going to be said that you'll want to remember back home. I use my notes from CWWTF quite a bit this year. The depth and insights you're going to walk away are invaluable. Make sure you have a place to capture them.

 



 

3. Give yourself time to process...

I referred to my time in DC as the equivalent of drinking from a fire hose. I'm blessed that I can say that of a number of the seminars, classes, fellowships I've attended. The CWWTF fire truck was on full blast all week and I needed time to process. I have found keeping a blog is a great way for me to process and often find myself going back to old posts and finding new ideas that just needed fleshing out. If not a blog, get a journal or something that you can use.

 

 

2. Pray to the roommate gods....

 

You are going to meet some of the coolest teachers and you'll become fast friends. CWWTF is in some ways a master class. Listen to them and learn from them. Perhaps the most important person is going to be your room mate. Now Jake at Ford's is a nice guy but, from my experience, is terrible at matching roommates. Depending on your faith tradition, light candles, fire up a smudgepot, paint a red circle in the middle of the room, whatever you need to do. The only negative part of my experience was my room mate--how did that guys even get selected! He came to classes unprepared, never once asked a question or offered an insight and I would talk about his hygiene but he was from Oklahoma so I really didn't have high hopes for that anyway. (After all this, James, I suppose that when we meet up this summer I'm buying lunch?!)

 



 

1. Think about how you take the experience back to your kids...

 

If you are like me, you spend a lot of your summer reworking your curriculum for the next school year. I wish I could explain to non-teachers how much prep really goes into good teaching. As you are processing and collaborating with the other fellows, keep a running list of things you want to bring back. I found that, a week or two after I'm back, when the 'tyranny of the urgent' returns, I forget. That may be just me. A great trick suggested a few years ago was to create a running list while you're there of ideas to play with or content to add. If I'm not intentional, then I remember it a day before I need it and, well, that means it ain't gonna happen.

 

And finally... Bring a friend...

 

There is absolutely no reason for this thought other than these Flat Stanley pictures were burning a hole in my pocket. (shhh, some of them aren't even from CWWTF)