Category: Uncategorized
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new year’s resolution to finish what I star
I constantly look for new beginnings. Every culture has rituals and traditions for ending and beginning chapters, and I celebrate them all. But we don’t really need a calendar reminder to be our better selves. Today* (*whatever day you’re reading this) is the perfect opportunity to reinvent yourself. Do that thing or practice that quality…
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writing is dead long live writting
Over the last few days I received notes from friends and colleagues expressing concern that ChatGPT will be the end of writing. These are intelligent, caring people. I can’t imagine any of them ever outsourcing their expressions of thoughts and feelings to an AI Chat Bot. Each considered the issues and wrote to start a…
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do or do not do. there is no essay.
Before the pandemic I asked 150 high school juniors in four separate classes to think of a word they associate with writing essays. After giving them a couple minutes to think, I stood at the board and wrote down the words they called out. Here are the lists: As you can see, the students’ feelings about writing…
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The OSL Making of an Ironman
The meaning of life is to give life meaning. Viktor Frankl Everything I do means something to me. At 3:45 on Sunday morning I pulled into the parking lot of the Indian Wells Tennis Gardens and did something I’d never done before. I wrote a prayer. I wasn’t asking for anything, I just had a…
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“I never learned to read!”
About 15 years ago one of my brightest, most articulate students told me that she hated to read. I was shocked. She went on to describe reading as a painful chore she associated with school, something she was forced to do on threat of punishment. I looked at the assignments and assessments through her eyes…
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thank you
The Thanksgiving holiday has a troubled history that remains our troubled present. Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 proclamation was a patriarchal, overtly religious, plagiarized lie intended to distract Americans from genocide, slavery, and race rioting. Here we are, 159 years later, still dealing with some of the very same issues. Today I am putting all that aside…
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the right tool for the job
I originally wrote this 10+ years ago on a course blog for high school students – it applies now more than ever. -dp ______________________________ In the words of Thomas Carlyle, a Scottish philosopher whose work influenced prominent writers and thinkers from Charles Dickens to Ralph Waldo Emerson: Man is a tool-using animal. Without tools he…
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ferocious joy
Fun is underrated. Joy is the truest measure of success in learning. You know that feeling when you finally solve the mystery, remember the idea, see the solution, hear the music? Oh, that is so good! What if we made that feeling our priority in helping each other understand concepts and master skills? Take a…
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ain’t no mountain high enough
Listen, baby… Chapter 1: Ain’t No Mountain High Enough The Cactus to Clouds hike up San Jacinto Peak is the 5th hardest day hike in America. A couple weekends ago I hiked the South Lykken and Skyline sections, which ascend 8400 feet from the Coachella Valley Floor trailhead at the end of Ramon Road to…
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technology that brings learning back to the living
Every reference I can find for the etymology of the word technology has to do with, “art, skill, or craft.” Technique comes from the same root. Any system of making or doing requires qualities such as dedication, skill, and patience. Technique/technology is all about purpose and cleverness. Tools and computers are sometimes included, but not…