Fourth Grade - Radios and Freedom

Fourth Grade Closing Exercises

May 27, 2011

I enjoy the news. On my drive to work, I like getting caught up with the latest local, national and global events and being generally aware of what’s happening in politics, the weather, and so on. I specifically like listening to NPR. It’s generally been the only station I’ve tuned into on my short commutes to school for the past decade or so. But something changed this year and my radio horizons have been broadened, despite my best efforts to resist such broadening.

Over the course of this year, as I’ve taken turns driving my 4^th grader to school, guitar lessons, baseball practice, and various other places around the city, he has slowly gained control over the tuner, and, as a result, I’ve, once again, 35 years later, become fluent in top-40 radio - specifically “KJ103-ese”.

In my life, I have had many goals, one of the most important is that I will be a life-long learner, be curious about the world and try to make a difference. What is absent from my long list of goals, however, is to learn, by heart, most of the Bruno Mars, Keisha, and Black-Eyed Peas songs, including instrumental breaks. Also absent is the desire to have those songs constantly in my head, all day long.

That probably wasn’t the case when I was in 4^th grade in 1976. Back then, I did want to know all the words to “Afternoon Delight” by the Starland Vocal Band, “Don’t Go Breakin’ my Heart” by Elton John and Kiki Dee, and “Play that Funky Music” by Wild Cherry. I’m fairly sure my parents fought the impulse to hum those tunes during quiet times in their days back then, but I’m also certain that they were just as powerless over them as I am today. As a ten-year-old, it was one of the first times I realized that I had my own music, separate from my parents - it was empowering to know that those songs were mine. Independence was just over the horizon…

Fourth Graders: Whether you know it or not, you are educating your parents not only in the language of top-40 music, Ryan Seacrest and the cultural realities of pre-adolescence in the year 2011, you’re also teaching them (and your teachers) about patience, compassion, and humility.

We adults sometimes think we have all the answers, but we don’t. Lucky for us, you’ve been teaching us for a long time. And while we may not always enjoy the lessons, believe me, we’re learning them because of the amazing and wonderful things you do and are interested in. Because of who you are, how you live your lives, and what you want to become, you remind us every day how important it is to be curious, to work hard, to be kind to one another, and to try our best.

In school, while we have a set curriculum and a well-planned sequence of what gets taught when, we also know that there are countless other problems that need solutions that are outside the walls of the school. We hope that your musical tastes evolve appropriately, but it’s inevitable that you’ll like what you like despite our best efforts to convince you otherwise. You need to become your own person with your own peculiarities – those are the things that make you who you are and will become. We need to understand that and guide you with an open and flexible heart and the belief that you will, in the end, do something to make your world a better place.

This beginning has ended. Next year you’ll take on more responsibilities and you’ll have more freedom. You’ve shown us that you’re ready for those changes and we know you’ll rise to the challenge. As your taste in music evolves I hope you’ll never waver from your work to become the best person you can become and to make a difference. We know you can do it… 

Congratulations!

My Garden

I am an enthusiastic gardener. I have high hopes for my flowers and vegetables each and every year, and yet I know that with each success I must endure disappointment. Some of my plants will flourish and others won’t. But, despite gardening’s inevitable pitfalls, it reminds me that taking time and energy to do the difficult work in the cold of winter and early spring leads to at least some success in the Spring and Summer.

In gardening, as with all things, we need to be humble. I have a chance to tend to my garden only temporarily and to try my best to guide it toward healthy development and hopefully to provide some beauty along the way. Sometimes ice storms and hail rain down and divert the plan and sometimes drought and wind make the work that much more difficult. But, despite the obstacles and diversions, life has a way of continuing on and if I’ve planned well and prepared well, enough of my labors will bring the results that make things a bit better.

Thinking about this in terms of the Episcopal tradition, it’s much like the season of Lent in preparation for Easter. We send time preparing ourselves for the coming hopefulness that is characterized with the Easter season. And now, with the passing of Easter and the appearance of the first blooms of Spring, we look with optimism toward the conclusion of the current year and the opportunity to put things in place for the coming year. We’ve reflected comprehensively throughout our ISAS accreditation process and having been evaluated, we’ve now begun to put in place those things that our reflective work has identified as important and necessary.

Putting a plan in place involves making choices – we choose to do some things and we choose to ignore others. We make thousands of choices each and every day, some minor, some major. Thankfully, we tend to try to make choices that improve things. This year, once again, the School has made choices that are designed to make our school better. This has been the case at Casady for nearly 65 years and it will be the case as long as our School continues to exist. To be specific: we’ve chosen to improve our schedule for next year, we’ve begun to transition to a new way of approaching our lunch program, while keeping the family style dining firmly in place and offering additional healthy options, and we’ve analyzed and evaluated the way we assess student work and the kind of work we ask our students to produce.  

The kind of analysis and implementation necessary to make those kinds of initiatives work doesn’t happen in a vacuum; it involves many minds and being disposed to listen to many, and sometimes, competing perspectives. Understanding that each person who has helped to prepare the foundations for next year and the years to come has done so knowing that the benefits of the many hours in committee meetings and in finding compromises won’t be immediately apparent. We prepare the ground, cultivate seedlings, and make sure each plant has the opportunity to benefit to the fullest of its potential, but we have to be patient, thoughtful and diligent to ensure we’ve done all we can to ensure success.

Preparing the ground is tough and the rewards are usually not apparent until much later, but it’s the day-to-day attention to the plan, and everything that’s necessary to provide the proper conditions for future growth that makes the difference. This important work isn’t nearly as rewarding as watering a newly effulgent flowerbed and picking the first ripe tomato, but without it, our plants wither and struggle to survive.

Excellent gardens have a thoughtful mix of perennials and annuals; anchors and pillars that frame and provide stability, and those that are temporary and provide needed color and texture that change depending on current conditions or necessities. We rely on the perennials to keep our framework strong and our ability to plant annuals is linked directly to our understanding about whether they are appropriately placed and actually fit appropriately within the structure established over many years of cultivation.

Perennials in our school are things like our commitment to daily chapel and the importance of a strong academic program. Our Episcopal identity is anchored in the promotion of faith and reason. Here, in this chapel, we pause to reflect and think about those things that bind us together; in here, we are inspired to do things that make our world better and make our community stronger; in class, we strive to understand complexity, learn to become responsible for our own work, and we think creatively in order to understand our world and to make a difference. Annuals, on the other hand, are the kinds of courses we offer and our daily schedules. We make changes to these, year in and year out to meet the needs of our ever-changing society. We adjust our program and the way we divide our day to make sure the skills and knowledge we promote are those that colleges, universities, and our communities demand from our graduates.

Our perennial mission is to educate, each of our students, in mind, body, and spirit so that they are prepared to and have the desire to make a difference in their world. As we tend to our mission, we’ll evaluate what kinds of annuals will highlight and promote that mission to the best of our ability. Not all of the annuals we’ll plant will survive – we’ll remember not to choose those again as we make plans for the next year. But some will, and we’ll remember those as well. Obviously, the choices we’ll make won’t please everyone, but we’ll make these choices with the very best intentions: to ensure that our mission remains strong and dedicated to the most important work there is.

The Pursuit of Excellence

Change. It’s a concept the Casady community has become all too familiar with over the past decade or so. But as I near the end of my third year as Head of School, I feel that we are finally beginning to enter a new era of stability and growth. Many aspects of our institution needed thoughtful analysis and as I’ve begun to look strategically at our School with valuable input from many of our stakeholders, we have indeed made many changes. Changes that put our School on a stronger financial footing; changes that provide a better classroom experience for our students; and changes that ensure we have the very best cadre of faculty to guide and shape young minds.

Questions about identity and values inevitably arise during transitional times with any institution, but schools are unique in that much of what creates our core identity are the thousands of interrelationships among teachers and their students over time.

Casady has had its fair share of transitions over its 65-year history, and while we’ve continued to challenge our students and to prepare them for success, we’ve also worked to ensure that the ways we prepare them are the most effective and long-lasting, given conditions in our local, national and global communities. Research shows clearly that our students are experiencing their worlds in very different ways than their parents and grandparents, and the School has been able to respond and grow accordingly, while maintaining its commitment to the pursuit of excellence.

One key area we’ve spent a lot of time and energy reviewing is our grading structure. Any time schools begin to look at how students are assessed and evaluated, there is a fear that those changes will damage the central value of the school. Having looked back over the years and having carefully analyzed our current system, I have found that we are not unique in our desire to provide and communicate an appropriate context for the challenging curriculum at Casady School.

Back in the 1970’s, legendary Headmaster Dr. Robert Woolsey determined with the faculty that the grading scale used at the time wasn’t accurately reflecting the work students were producing. Their solution was to move the scale for an “A” from a 90-100 to an 85-100. Fast-forward 40 years, and we have found ourselves in a remarkably similar situation and have now taken additional steps to ensure that our students are properly rewarded for the work they do as they prepare for life in college and beyond.

We believe that taking on challenging work should not be an impediment for our students. Here’s a description of the plan we will implement next fall, including a full Upper Division course list for the 2011-12 school year.

We, in no way, have tried to make the work easier. In fact, we’ve created additional levels in mathematics and other courses to make certain that each student is appropriately challenged to be their best. We believe that upholding high standards helps our students learn to be self-reliant, confident, organized, ethical and competent young men and women.

We celebrate our teachers who challenge students to think, to defend and to provide reasons for their arguments while learning how to write critically with a strong voice. Additionally, given what we know about learning styles and learning differences, we also strive to find teachers who understand those realities and work to teach to the top of each child. We attract and retain teachers who promote these values because it is they who create the experiences that become part of our graduates’ identity and the identity of the School.

Finally, as we work to build on the solid foundations laid over many years, we look critically and thoughtfully at each decision we make and how we make it. As with every era in our history, difficult choices have to be made, but we have a strategic and thorough process in place to guide us to the right answers. We endeavor to make those choices in the way we ask our students to make them: with respect, with understanding and with an eye to what serves the greater good.

Going forward, we’ve planned conservatively for sound financial and programmatic development, we’re hiring the finest and most dedicated teachers we can find and we’re making great progress on our capital projects – all of which will ensure an environment for our students to pursue excellence in academics, the arts and athletics. Our Episcopal identity and history provides essential spiritual guidance for each of us in all of these areas as we continue to grow and learn together. 

Revolutions and the Impending Snowpocalypse

It’s the end of January and there’s a definite chill in the air.

The news the past few days has been filled with revolution and upheaval. Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen are in the throws of major democratic shifts, shouts of protest and calls for change. It’s hard to imagine the feelings and emotions that those who are standing up are experiencing, but it’s a process that has happened again and again over the centuries and millennia. It happened here more than 240 years ago.

Sudden, dramatic change tends to be the exception to the rule. Normally, change occurs slowly, incrementally over time, often occurring outside of our view. I, like many of you, like to pretend that, basically, things stay the same – we create schedules and divide our time into chunks to mark out the passage of days, weeks, and months, knowing that Mondays are nothing like Fridays and that afternoons aren’t anything like mornings, and so on.

And then:

Every once in awhile the sky opens up and sends us a reprieve from the normal day-to-day routine.

As a kid, I rarely had snow days here in OKC, but when they came, there wasn’t a better feeling in the world.

Forecasts and predictions aren’t always right, as we know, but with a reasonable eye toward logic and fact, we prepare for what is likely to happen. Based on our prior experience, we know that an upcoming weather event will share some of the characteristics of prior events and if we’re thoughtful, we’ll be reasonably ready to cope. In the case of the upcoming snow-pocalypse the impending and certainly incessant Doppler 9000 alerts will interrupt coverage of events happening in the Middle East and northern Africa, whether we actually get snow or not.

In my role as Head of School, I get to do some interesting things and I have certain powers that come with a great deal of responsibility. My favorite of these powers is the power to close school. For instance, I could, right now, go ahead and cancel school for tomorrow and take all the excitement of waking up bleary-eyed to a news ticker scrolling across the top of the screen, intensely and alphabetically focused on the arrival of the first of the “C”-named schools to declare that elusive and tantalizing “Snow Day”.

I could, but I won’t. Despite the incredible power of the Doppler systems and the wisdom of Gary England, too often the weather guys get it wrong, I call off school, and my favorite superpower becomes my biggest headache.

Despite all assurances that the snow will indeed come and we will be sleeping in just a bit longer, I don’t want to deprive you of the anticipation and excitement of the possibility. Life has far too few pleasant surprises as it is to deny you of that simple gift.

At my house, I’m ready. I’ve prepared a large vat of chilli, I’ve bought a bag of Fritos, made sure we have ample supplies of sour cream and grated cheddar cheese. We all have our favorites, but in my opinion, there is nothing better than Frito Chilli Pie when it’s too cold and snowy to go outside.

If we don’t have school, and because tomorrow our local channels will likely be filled with news about the snow, or lack thereof, I urge you to take some of your day and devote it to finding out what’s happening elsewhere in the world – why is it that the people of Tunisia, Egypt, and potentially Yemen have decided to take their future in a new direction? What could it mean for their ability to pursue their lives the way they want to pursue them?  What might it mean for you? 

Making Learning Whole - Gaming Education

I'm reading a very interesting book called Making Learning Whole by David Perkins, Senior Professor of Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education. It centers on the idea that effective learning is done by approaching complexity as if we're playing the 'whole game'.

Too often, we ask our students to focus on the elements of a problem without helping them understand how those elements fit together. Also too often, we teach about things like revolutions, chemistry, and so on without trying to understand how to do those things. Perkins calls these two realities elementitis and aboutitis.

As an English teacher for many years, I struggled constantly with the grammar question. I certainly knew how important it was to arm my students with the tools they would need to ensure their writing could become technically correct, but I also knew that unless they had a sense of purpose as to what they were putting on paper, they'd be learning the elements of writing without really understanding the whole process. I really tried hard to create a studio environment in my classes where each of my students were treated like real live authors. I wanted them to be engaged with their writing so deeply that their lives depended on it. Isolated lessons on grammar were important, but only as part of a much more holistic process. Knowing what a gerund phrase is will not likely improve student writing.

(For all of you who enjoyed my little grammar joke just now, thank you).

Of course, we learned about good writing by reading it and talking about it, and we spent the requisite time improving discrete skills like finding the gerund phrase within the sentence. (Thanks again - ;) ). But, the lights only really came on when I asked them to write. Often, I wouldn't assign topics, I wouldn't provide due dates (other than: 'it's due when you've finished it'), and the grades assigned would correspond to growth in areas in need of attention. The importance of understanding that each of my students came to my class with their own particular history, their own particular way of seeing things, and their own particular strengths cannot be overemphasized.

There is no 'one size fits all' approach to teaching that makes sense and more important, the idea that there might be is damaging and, at its core, unethical.

We need to take the time to let our students own the process of their education. School should be a place where we all have 'skin in the game'; where we get to try things out, not because we are going to become professional physicists or NBA All Stars, but because by doing them we become better and we make a difference for those around us.

David Perkins puts it rather well:

"Much of the rhetoric around education emphasizes excellence, and indeed excellence is a fine grail to seek. However, imagine a world where almost any adult had a kind of energetic if simple sense of civic engagement or ecological responsibility or avoidance of prejudice. Starting from the baseline of today's indifference and neglect, these 'games' do not have to be played in very sophisticated ways to do substantial good! The world would be a better place if in areas like these most people achieved active mediocrity rather than passive erudition." (Perkins, Pg. 23)

Non-Commissioned Work

Casady School sent 35 or so teachers and administrators to the World Creativity Forum here in Oklahoma City over the past two days. The opportunity to be involved in conversation about innovation, creativity, ethics, and technology is deeply appreciated and I'm looking forward to bringing the group together over the next few weeks at school to reflect and expand our ideas about what we can and should do as a school moving forward.

One idea struck me as I was planning for an upcoming Core Curriculum Committee meeting: Dan Pink's thoughts on the importance of 'non-commissioned work'.

Check it out.

Dust Storms and Education

A few years ago, I spent some time with my grandparents when I was home visiting for the summer. Among other places, they had lived in Morse, Texas, Dalhart, Texas and later, Beaver, Ok. Growing up, one of the things we often talked about was the Dust Bowl. As a child, I remember hearing about how thick the dust was, how it piled high on the side of their house, how their cabinets and floors were completely covered with dirt, how little there was to eat and how difficult it was to raise a crop. 

I knew the basic history of the 30's, but I hadn't heard anything specific about the static electricity problems... As I understand it now, dust particles in the air created a powerful electric charge so that metal objects like cars became dangerous to touch. One day, during a particularly awful dust storm, my great grandfather tried to make his way back to his house from the barn a few hundred yards away, but he couldn’t see a thing in front of his face - the house was completely obscured. Lucky for him, he looked to his side and found his way because the barbed wire fence that led to the house was sparkling blue with electricity.  

The image of that fence, illuminated – a beacon - highlights important ways I think about family, education, and this school in particular. It helps me remember what’s important, how to keep things in perspective, and it also reminds me of the kinds of things that are important to our students as they begin their own journeys through life and into independence. 

For my grandparents, it served as a reminder about how bad they had it then and how important it is to remember what matters most. For me, it’s a way to ‘see’ what they saw, to strengthen our connection and to benefit from their experience. For you, I hope it is an image you keep handy, not only because it’s really interesting, but also because it’s an example of how resourceful people can be in the face of challenging circumstances.  My great grandfather acted bravely that day and he had faith that the foundations he had laid in the form of a barbed wire fence would lead him back home to safety and to family.

We’re here to help kids understand where the boundaries are by asking questions that make them think; we want them to know how to use those boundaries in ways that enable them to navigate the confusing and disorienting times that inevitably occur along the way. At times, the challenges our students experience are best met by looking at the world out of the corner of their eyes. Looking straight ahead and focusing only on the ends instead of taking time to find the foundations and focusing on the means to get where you want to go can lead to disorientation, disconnectedness, and disillusionment.

In order to avoid losing our way and establishing a clear direction forward, we must deepen our understanding of and commitment to sustainability. Our commitment to environmental, programmatic, global, and financially sustainable practices will ensure that our school will shore up the foundational frameworks already so strongly in place here at Casady. Committing to these practices will ensure our ability meet the needs of our students now and far into the future. Specifically speaking, we must adopt and commit to practices that are good for our planet and model responsible life choices for our students; we must develop our program and curriculum in such a way as to be reflective of the values of the school beyond the particular needs and desires of individuals; we must understand global realities that shape developments in politics, education, and economics and educate our students to understand these realities as well; and, we must keep our school on solid, predictable financial footing to ensure the long-term health of the school and our ability to plan thoughtfully for our future.

Leaders point the way, but we all decide, each and every day what Casady is and will become; interweaving stories and experiences among faculty and parents, students and alumni, past and future faculty, shape this place and create a highly complex biological organism with a mission to replicate, protect, evolve, change and thrive.