Salutations friends, my sincerest apologies for not posting yesterday, and for posting two days together at once. Yesterday was our CCSU 2010 Literacy Essentials conference.
March 20, 2010
My whispered prayers today are for a little girl from Connecticut who has Leukemia, and whose pathetic principal went to the hospital to give her the Connecticut Mastery Test. Could you imagine this sicko doing something like this? The ugliness that that NCLB brings out in administrators never ceases to amaze me. Let me say not all administrators are like this. There are decent principals out there, but ones like this give them all bad names.
today Dr. Don Leu from the University of Connecticut was our keynote speaker. Dr. Leu is a gifted scholar who I have known for about 10 years now. His speech focused on his field New Literacies, or as some people like to say Digital Literacies. Dr. Leu and his students took us on a ride into the future, and it was exciting. He warns us that the current focus on paper and pencil testing is leaving our children behind.
If you ever have the chance to hear him please do he is a genuine visionary, and his work on digital comprehension is fascinating.
I also got to spend time with Barry Lane who is such a gift to teachers and children. Barry Lane puts the fun back into learning and teaching, and I was blessed to have spent three sessions with Barry. We danced, sang, and walked away with tones of practical ways to blend higher thinking order processes and fun into our teaching.
Almost forgot to say I did 5.5 miles again. Hey did you think I would miss preparing for my walk to DC? No way I am is on a mission to walk to DC, and give Secretary Duncan a piece of his mind. My music was all Motown today. Needed to walk fast, and Motown makes my feet fly.
Another thing I did at the conference was set up a table to inform people about my walk to DC, and to promote the facebook group “children are more than test scores”.
It was fun, and everyone who stopped by was positive, and I am certain I picked up a few new members, and maybe even a walker or two.
March 21, 2010, today was bright, sunny, and warm. So I drove up to Eastern Connecticut to walk. I walked up, down, and around the hill up around UNCONN. Wow, it was just shear bliss, and I walked 6 miles, and loved every second of my walk. My whispered prayers were thank you to the Lord. Two weeks ago I thought is anybody listening? Does anybody care about this insanity called NCLB/RTTT?
Tonight some 2,626 members later I know I am not alone. I am humbled, and completely taken by surprise, I am in total awe of how many people have joined our facebook group “Children are more than test scores”. This is a dream come true, and they post and share their ideas, concerns, and hopes openly. They inspire me, and I am walking to DC.
Today my meditations were thankful thoughts, and the hope that when I make it to DC that a few people will be there to greet me.
My music for my walk today was a DC or Bust playlist on my iPod of Dylan. Marley, Joan Boaz, Peter Gabriel, Sinead O’Connor, and Andrew Lloyd Webber, with a little Gospel music.
I am struggling with how to post my Google walking map the thing is 15 pages long. Let me know if anyone has any ideas? I want to do it right, because it will allow people to walk a mile or two with me, and share their NCLB/RTTT stories as well.
I am walking to DC,
Jesse
March 20, 2010
My whispered prayers today are for a little girl from Connecticut who has Leukemia, and whose pathetic principal went to the hospital to give her the Connecticut Mastery Test. Could you imagine this sicko doing something like this? The ugliness that that NCLB brings out in administrators never ceases to amaze me. Let me say not all administrators are like this. There are decent principals out there, but ones like this give them all bad names.
today Dr. Don Leu from the University of Connecticut was our keynote speaker. Dr. Leu is a gifted scholar who I have known for about 10 years now. His speech focused on his field New Literacies, or as some people like to say Digital Literacies. Dr. Leu and his students took us on a ride into the future, and it was exciting. He warns us that the current focus on paper and pencil testing is leaving our children behind.
If you ever have the chance to hear him please do he is a genuine visionary, and his work on digital comprehension is fascinating.
I also got to spend time with Barry Lane who is such a gift to teachers and children. Barry Lane puts the fun back into learning and teaching, and I was blessed to have spent three sessions with Barry. We danced, sang, and walked away with tones of practical ways to blend higher thinking order processes and fun into our teaching.
Almost forgot to say I did 5.5 miles again. Hey did you think I would miss preparing for my walk to DC? No way I am is on a mission to walk to DC, and give Secretary Duncan a piece of his mind. My music was all Motown today. Needed to walk fast, and Motown makes my feet fly.
Another thing I did at the conference was set up a table to inform people about my walk to DC, and to promote the facebook group “children are more than test scores”.
It was fun, and everyone who stopped by was positive, and I am certain I picked up a few new members, and maybe even a walker or two.
March 21, 2010, today was bright, sunny, and warm. So I drove up to Eastern Connecticut to walk. I walked up, down, and around the hill up around UNCONN. Wow, it was just shear bliss, and I walked 6 miles, and loved every second of my walk. My whispered prayers were thank you to the Lord. Two weeks ago I thought is anybody listening? Does anybody care about this insanity called NCLB/RTTT?
Tonight some 2,626 members later I know I am not alone. I am humbled, and completely taken by surprise, I am in total awe of how many people have joined our facebook group “Children are more than test scores”. This is a dream come true, and they post and share their ideas, concerns, and hopes openly. They inspire me, and I am walking to DC.
Today my meditations were thankful thoughts, and the hope that when I make it to DC that a few people will be there to greet me.
My music for my walk today was a DC or Bust playlist on my iPod of Dylan. Marley, Joan Boaz, Peter Gabriel, Sinead O’Connor, and Andrew Lloyd Webber, with a little Gospel music.
I am struggling with how to post my Google walking map the thing is 15 pages long. Let me know if anyone has any ideas? I want to do it right, because it will allow people to walk a mile or two with me, and share their NCLB/RTTT stories as well.
I am walking to DC,
Jesse
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