Preparing for my walk to DC this morning on my treadmill I covered 5.5 miles at a level 4 incline. I burned a little over 800 calories. My routine on the treadmill is to read on my kindle, and listen to inspirational music on my iPod. I let my imagination go wild. I imagine meeting people on the walk to DC, and listening to their NCLB/RTTT stories. Sometimes I see myself alone, sometimes someone joins me, and sometimes my imagination even sees hundreds walking with me.
My reading for this week is Suzanne Collins “The Hunger Games” and Diane Ravitch’s new book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education”. I find both books compelling reading. However music this rule the day today on my treadmill.
Today my inspiration came from the number of new facebook voices on “Children are more than a test score, ”and music from Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. This morning it was Starlight express that took over at 5 miles, and brought me home.
You have to love this musical’s plot. It revolves around a group of toy railway trains, portrayed by actors on roller-skates, who come to life inside the mind of a small boy. The trains race to become the 'fastest engine in the world', and in the end, Rusty the underdog triumphs, and wins the race and the heart of the beautiful observation car. Musicals and my imagination running wild won the day as we all were marching into DC together.
I am walking to DC,
Jesse
I just love this....
ReplyDeleteThank you Sarah, I needed to do something positive. I just could not sit by as the children and teachers I work with were being harmed by this failing NCLB policy. Race to the top certainly did not sound like a change in policy to me. So I wrote letters, I emailed, I faxed, and I called Washington over and over again. Not one person reacted, no one responded, and so I started planning my walk to DC. I know it is crazy, but it lifted the spirits of the teachers I work with. They would say are you really walking. People started to believe when I lost 30 pounds preparing for the walk. And once I started the facebook group they all knew Jesse is really going to walk to DC. Now I am on a mission to walk to DC.
ReplyDeleteThank you Sarah for your kind remarks.
Jesse