The daily meanderings of a teacher

Tag: Henry David Thoreau

  • Looking for the elder in each of us

    Bird Droppings January 3, 2011 Looking for the elder in each of us ‎ “Someday the earth will weep, she will beg for her life, she will cry with tears of blood. You will make a choice, if you will help her or let her die, and when she dies, you will die too.”  John…

  • So hard to type 2012

    Bird Droppings January 2, 2012 It is so hard to type 2012               Sitting here coming to school in the dark alone thinking back after skipping a day of writing. I received a small book for Christmas about five years ago from my wife, “It isn’t easy being green” by Jim Henson Jr., the…

  • Risk ahead

    Bird Droppings December 31, 2011 Risk ahead               How more appropriate to end the year than to look at the idea of risk and what lies ahead. Risk is a driving force of who we are and why we are and what we do. How we take chances and avoid risk are defining pieces…

  • Determining what to learn

    Bird Droppings December 30, 2011 Determining what to learn   “Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know — and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves? Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance. It is better to know…

  • Naughty or Nice !!!!

    Bird Droppings December 29, 2011 Naughty or Nice   “The best portion of a good man’s life: his little, nameless unremembered acts of kindness and love.” William Wordsworth   One day when you look back and try and remember what was that act or when, you may not remember but the person to whom that…

  • Where is the passion?

    Bird Droppings December 28, 2011 Where is the passion?   “How do preschool children, full of natural inquisitiveness and a passion for learning, turn into apathetic or angry teens with a profound dislike of school?” Robert L. Fried, The passionate Learner   Every day I hear the simple phrase from at least one student of,…

  • Why do we WORK?

    Bird Droppings December 27, 2011 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 are you doing this if…

  • A new day fille with questions and perhaps answers

    Bird Droppings December 26, 2011 A new day one filled with questions and perhaps answers   “No such thing as a man willing to be honest –that would be like a blind man willing to see.” F. Scott Fitzgerald   “No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself, and another to…

  • Quietly pursuing silence

    Bird Droppings November 15, 2011 Quietly pursuing Silence I was standing in my back yard listening. There was silence. As I stood how easy is it to find fear and or solace in silence. Many horror movies over the years and of course books for those of us who still read feature silence in all…

  • Looking at a cloud

    Bird Droppings November 14, 2011 Looking at a cloud It has been some time since I lay on a blanket at the Valley Forge National Park in Pennsylvania watching clouds float by over head. Earlier as I walked outside clouds were moving by in the darkness which always is inspiring to me seeing the lace…