The daily meanderings of a teacher

Tag: Education

  • What is the freedom we desire?

    Bird Droppings January 25, 2025What is the freedom we desire? “Brute force, no matter how strongly applied, can never subdue the basic human desire for freedom and dignity. It is not enough, as communist systems have assumed, merely to provide people with food, shelter, and clothing. Human nature needs to breathe the precious air of…

  • For some, creating and writing in a digital world is difficult.

    Bird Droppings January 22, 2025For some, creating and writing in a digital world is difficult. “Experience is not what happens to a man; it is what a man does with what happens to him.” Aldus Huxley In 1965, I was introduced to this author in a tenth-grade English Class. The book Brave New World was…

  • Learning is a journey strewn with boulders

    Bird Droppings January 21, 2025 Learning is a journey strewn with boulders “In a word, learning is decontextualized. We break ideas down into tiny pieces that bear no relation to the whole. We give students a brick of information, followed by another brick, followed by another brick, until they have graduated, at which point we…

  • It would be great if we could script great teachers or develop a package that truly provided teachers with student learning.

    Bird Droppings January 14, 2025 It would be great if we could script great teachers or develop a package that truly provided teachers with student learning. I have watched several movies about teachers over the years. It hit me as I thought it would be great if we could provide a package for new teachers…

  • Bird Droppings January 10, 2025 Caregiving and or being cared for, we need both? “To care and be cared for are fundamental human needs. We all need to be cared for by other human beings. In infancy, illness, or old age, the need is urgent and pervasive; we need caregiving, and we need the special…

  • I am sitting by my computer, thinking of a circle.

    Bird Droppings January 2, 2024I am sitting by my computer, thinking of a circle. I missed the last rerun of a favorite miniseries, Into the West, and one of these days, I will find it streaming somewhere. The movie starts and ends with a circle of stones with a line going east to west and…

  • Finding a pathway even when one does not appear

    Bird Droppings December 30, 2024Finding a pathway even when one does not appear The past week has sort of run together, although each was an interesting day in its own right. It may have been sitting and watching movies with the family after sharing gifts, eating all day long, and then getting ready to head…

  • Can you give it one more try?

    Bird Droppings December 29, 2024Can you give it one more try? “You win some, you lose some, and some get rained out, but you gotta suit up for them all.” Satchel Paige is often attributed to J. Askenberg In my high school teaching days, teachers at my school judged seasons by testing season, not weather.…

  • Why do we WORK?

    Bird Droppings December 28, 2024 Why do we WORK? “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” Aristotle How many times do we all hear how difficult the job is or how “I hate my job?” I am always confused when I hear this. I want to ask why you are doing this if…

  • Reading your view sometimes offers a clue

    Bird Droppings December 26, 2024Reading your view sometimes offers a clue After forty-six years of marriage, it seems almost like day one. Every day and each day keeps getting better. Periodically, over the past years, I received at some odd hour of the night and or morning a paper to review for my youngest son…