Genius Freak

When I first started this blog post, it was about making mistakes. Or maybe failing. It was about thinking I had put together a good research assignment, and realizing I hadn't. That I didn't really make someting that embodies my principles and my ideas about learning and teaching - something that would encourage students to follow their curiosity and explore an idea deeply over time. I made a research project that would make them rush superficially through too much ground to cover in the time I allotted. This post was originally going to be about how it feels, as a teacher, to recognize you have made a mistake and then have to decide whether to live with now and fix it for next time, or to own it now and make some changes  now.  The answer of course, is to own it and change it now. I hardly ever do the same exact assignment twice, so in a practical way, for me, waiting didn't make sense. Waiting to make things better if you can also doesn't make sense. Most import...

I played volleyball the other day, for the first time in ages.  In the library. It had been a long morning of testing - or watching testing.  I don’t think there is a school thing that I find more excruciating than proctoring a standardized test.  I am always tempted to take a personal day, but I usually don’t, hoping instead that I may be able to offer some small amount of calm amid the joyless and stressfully quiet cacophony of number 2 pencils filling in circles and calculator buttons clicking out answers and “you have 5 minutes remaining.”   Three and a half hours is a long time of sitting, especially when you are not engaging with anything but inane questions indifferent to your existence. Or the direction manual for those inane, indifferent questions. I was in my office afterward, and I spotted the giant tennis ball I have been meaning to bring up to my classroom (because you never know when one of those might come in handy). I picked it up and walked...