Harts on Fire | My heart for teaching and learning laid bare.

Expectations

4 February 2015 by shartley

Boys can’t draw. Year 9 Boys are horrible. So many kids with special needs in that class, you’re going to struggle to get anything done.

These are the sort of statements that have been tossed around as I prepared to teach Year 9 Geography this week. The game was a huge hook but now I had to follow up on it. I found a lame but mildly entertaining video clip on YouTube to cover the Natural Water Cycle and then asked the students to draw an A4 sized diagram of the Natural Water Cycle in the workbooks. There were mutterings of “I can’t draw” but all but a handful just got on with it. The first step for most of them was an online image search for a diagram and then they copied it into their books. As the first few were finishing I added to the task that they had to introduce 2-3 examples of the human impact on the Natural Water Cycle and then to write a paragraph about these human impacts.

By far the majority of the diagrams were fabulous and the students were on task and even engaged. I’m not sure why. Every time I congratulated a student on a good drawing they swelled with pride. When I took photos of some of the better ones, again they were pleased. It doesn’t take much. There are only four boys out of the 29 present today that had sub-standard drawings. I’m quite pleased with that result.

At the end of the lesson I introduced the class to the Google Class I had established for them and chaos ensued as they all encountered various issues with joining the Google Class. I had a student expert in the room who helped and eventually we had just about everyone logged in. Then the silliness commenced as they chatted within the Google Class page. I said they had an hour to take the messages down or there would be consequences. One student asked how they were to take them down and I said if they could figure out how to do a comment they could figure out how to delete them. A few hours later I checked and they were all gone.

There was a similar occurrence with Year 7 last week as they were being introduced to various online tools within a ‘Getting to Know the Library’ exercise. A task asked students to add a sticky about their favourite book in Padlet. Like it was with Year 9, silliness prevailed and there were silly comments all over the Padlet page very quickly. We talked about the first impressions they were making of themselves online and in person, that Year 7 was a fresh start and a chance to establish the person they wanted to be and how they wanted to be seen and respected. The silliness subdued after that.

Category Geography | Tags: , #28daysofwriting, drawing, Education, expectations, Geography, water management | No Comments
Let’s Get Physical

4 February 2015 by shartley

I teach at a Catholic school and this morning we had our Dedication Mass, as in dedicating the academic year to God. It went for over an hour with lots of standing and sitting, singing, sitting still and listening, walking up for Communion, crossing oneself and consuming the wafer and all that’s once we enter the building. 1700 people in one large space and I am continually amazed at the awe and quiet the students display for most of the service and when we have assemblies. It’s a different story in the classrooms!

My school is on 42 hectares and my staffroom and classroom are almost as far as they can be from the Sports Centre where we conduct large school gatherings. My staffroom is on the third storey at the top of the hill whereas the Sports Centre is down the bottom next to the ovals, yes, that would be a plural of three ovals.

I was tired this morning. Actually, I’m usually tired, but this morning I was particularly tired. When I’m particularly tired I go to the coffee cart that hangs around at school most days before the first class. It was absent this morning. On the way back to class from Mass I popped into the Canteen and asked for caffeine and discovered that the canteen keeps full strength Coke, just for staff, since it is deemed too unhealthy to serve to students. I downed that Coke rather quickly and it kept me going the rest of the day.

I am not a PDHPE teacher, nor do I teach a practical subject, but sometimes teaching feels incredibly physical. I constantly roam through the desks to check on students’ progress and wellbeing, tripping over schoolbags and running into desks (my first year teaching I had permanent bruises on my thighs from collecting the corners of desks). I know when I’m writing excessively on the board when my arm becomes tired. The worst time though was the morning after my first ever boxing class at the gym, my hands were shaking so much I had to give in and change the plan for the day. There are 48 stairs between my main classroom and my staffroom; we call the stairwell The Stairmaster. Between playground duty, classes and staffroom I generally walk 6000 steps each day without trying. Last Friday it was 10,000 steps but that included about 1000 steps at the gym in the morning and another 1000 in the evening at the shops. Now this isn’t that much and I should be walking 10,000 steps each day since I am trying to lose weight but due to the accumulative effect of all this hard surface walking, some excessive walking days (in New York 6 months ago I did many days in excess of 20,000 steps) and my more recent attempts to try to become a runner again (I’ve tried before but am yet to declare myself one) I have damaged my feet so that I have plantar fasciitis and Achilles tendonitis in both feet, but much more in the left than the right. The pain in my left heel can be excruciating and it is starting to impact upon my teaching. I now often sit down during Home Room. I know that sounds rate innocuous but it means I interact less with the students. I am more likely to email someone then go find them for a face-to-face conversation. My physio taught me today how to tape up my own foot and is sending me back to the GP because I have an incredible amount of swelling around my ankles at the end of the school day.

PS I’m not happy with this post, its boring topic or its whingey nature but I suppose the pain post physio this afternoon dominated my thoughts. I wouldn’t post it except that I have made a commitment to #28daysofwriting – hopefully tomorrow I’ll have something a little cheerier to write about.

Category Uncategorized | Tags: , #28daysofwriting, Education | No Comments
Game

2 February 2015 by shartley

Game on!

Last period today I finally met my Year 9 Geography class properly. We are starting with the topic of Water Management and on the weekend I found this wonderfully appropriate game called Catchment Detox. So today I introduced the course by just asking them to play the game for the whole 64 minute lesson, briefly raising the idea of showing them how to play, but they assured me they could work it out for themselves and in the most part, they did. The game involves taking 100 turns and at each turn deciding upon how to raise money through industry (eg various forms of agriculture and/or tourism), how to manage water supplies (eg investing in water research and/or building dams) and other ecological decisions (eg whether to make national parks). I dangled a prize of a packet of lollies for the highest score by the time of our next lesson on Wednesday.

Some students went slowly and carefully while others went at great speed and played nearly three times in the time period. They were allowed to play in pairs or individually with most choosing individually but openly discussing tactics with each other. As some became more adept at the game they helped others. Some were competitive, trying to find out each other’s achievements. Interesting, even though I had said score/rank was what would win the prize, most of the focus was on how much money they were earning. I heard conversations about cows versus pigs, orchards versus rice and excitement about investing in viticulture. Questions of each other were asked about salinity, where one should build a dam and the merits of logging. A handful of students listened to music with ear buds and one played music quietly on his laptop, muting it whenever I came near, as if I couldn’t hear it unless I was standing right next to him. Other than looking for music, I didn’t see any screens not on the game until the last few minutes of the lesson.

Many students were scoring in the 500,000s (I achieved 599,602 in my only game yesterday) but then 5 minutes before the end, a student who already shows signs of being disengaged, low achieving and disruptive in a ‘regular’ class environment was excited to achieve 642,000+ and was very pleased to have a fuss made about it. When I say ‘signs’ I guess I mainly mean his attitude or perhaps just my teacher’s sixth sense.

I learned about lots of the students’ behaviour (who swears, who becomes loud when excited, who is competitive and so on) and they had a lot of fun. They left class feeling good about themselves, with most of them thanking me for the class. The next lesson will be about what sort of issues Australia faces in regards to water management and I bet they’ll have heaps to contribute now. I look forward to seeing them with their thinking caps on, applying the game to real life, and hopefully engaging in authentic learning. I’m glad I was game enough to throw them into chaos from Day One.

Category Geography | Tags: , #28daysofwriting, behaviour, collaboration, Education, engagement, games, Geography, technology, water management | No Comments
Tell me a story…

29 October 2014 by shartley

Image Source: RBA
http://www.rba.gov.au/chart-pack/factors-prod-labour-mkt.html

Inspired by Cameron Paterson to use images for inspiring thinking processes, to commence the topic of Unemployment for HSC Economics I handed out a different graph from the RBA Chart Pack related to Unemployment and gave students in pairs 15 minutes to tell me a story about what the chart told them. I said I was looking for drama and climatic turning points. They then presented their stories to the rest of the class. The stories won’t win them many points in an Economics HSC Exam but it certainly engaged them in the topic and allowed them to be more creative and think deeply about Unemployment. The story below is the result of one pair based on the graph pictured above, while not 100% accurate, it demonstrated creative thinking about the graph. Please note the concluding paragraph was a deliberate ploy to include several English terms.

Picture this: Australia in 2002-5, a bustling economy struggling to establish itself with the giants of the world against insurmountable odds. The economy had job vacancies higher than the advertisements for these jobs, showing the lack of awareness of these jobs. Never fear though because after 2005 there was a sharp increase in the advertisements for jobs, with only a marginal increase in the job vacancies. At this point in time the advertisements were actually higher than the vacancies, showing the desperate need for awareness regarding job vacancies. PEOPLE WERE CRYING OUT FOR HELP, AND THERE WAS NO WHITE KNIGHT RIDING TO SAVE THEM. This travesty is due to the Global Financial Crisis, which hit Australia at the peak of advertisements shown in the graph, when vacancies were 1% lower than advertisements. In 2008 the vacancy trend was removed completely from the graph. This could be due to the vast amount of vacancies as the GFC hit, causing a substantial outlier in the graph that would affect the average too much.

A DARK DAY IN 2009 WHEN the Advertisements nosedived in, after everyone was made redundant as a result of the GFC, and the vacancy of those jobs were no longer available.

The vacancy trend picked up again in 2010, staying just above the advertisements, and mirroring its trend from 1.5% of the labour force to just above one percent in present day. A TREMENDOUS VICTORY FOR THE GOVERNMENT, BUSINESS AND THE INDIVIDUALS THAT MAKE UP THE ECONOMY AS A WHOLE. THE WORKING CLASS. THE COUNCIL WORKERS AND THE JOE BLOW FROM FRIENDLY GROCER.

This is a tremendous story, cohesively highlighting the economical and unemployment trends experienced by Australia, and allegorically represents a microcosm of an economy experiencing the fluctuation in job vacancies whilst fighting to keep unemployment at a controlled level.

Category Economics, Uncategorized | Tags: , chart, Economics, Education, graphs, RBA, story, unemployment | No Comments
Everything old is new again

21 September 2014 by shartley
Image source: Shani Hartley

Remixes, mash-ups, whatever the young people are calling it these days, leadership literature has nothing new under the sun. Macbeath (2006) takes us back to morals, Kellerman (2007) returns to using the language of ‘leaders and followers’ after some of the literature had a stint at promoting everyone as a leader, Eacott (2011) has returned to Bourdieu for inspiration and Blackmore (2013) is looking at leadership through a feminist lens. Albeit there are slightly new nuanced meanings of leadership hashed out in the process, the search for a holy grail of leadership continues.

This holy grail represents the easiest and most reliable path to greatness through leadership and change management. However, this holy grail is a myth because there are so many factors at play in leading an organisation, particularly an educational organisation, that all variables cannot be accounted in a simple instruction manual or recipe. They make some good guides to follow but they cannot be strictly adhered to because they do not represent the real world. It’s like click-bait for blog posts – the ones most clicked are those that have an identified number of items in a list and use marketing techniques to suck you in.

The worst article I have read so far as part of my ‘Leadership for Learning’ course is Zimmerman’s (2004) climbing a mountain analogy. I wanted to puke. So I thought I’d give it a go myself. We recently installed a new kitchen in our house so in 20 easy steps I’ll guide you through how replacing a kitchen is like leading a school through change.
1. Make a decision that the old kitchen/paradigm/building/etc is not good enough anymore
2. Convince others that this is the right/best thing to do
3. Dream big – plan what the new kitchen/paradigm/building/etc will include
4. Measure and cost – what is achievable?
5. Adjust, compromise
6. Have a plan drawn up
7. If possible, hire additional workers to do what you can’t do yourself
8. Rip out the old kitchen/paradigm/building/etc
9. Suffer during the transition process
10. Put in some hard yakka yourself (last school holidays I did 65 hours of painting in one week)
11. Discover the unexpected hurdles and expenses, and changing parameters along the way (doors needed to be removed to fit the new large fridge, the oven doesn’t have a clock/timer!)
12. Adjust, compromise
13. Everything takes longer than expected
14. Adjust, compromise
15. Enjoy the shiny new things (the fridge really is lovely)
16. Discover that not everything has improved from before (there’s less storage space!)
17. It seems there are a few bits and pieces which never seem to be finished off
18. Settle into the new kitchen/paradigm/building/etc
19. Turn your attention to the next area in need of a revamp
20. Return to Step 1
Blackmore, J. (2013) A feminist critical perspective on educational leadership. International Journal of Leadership in Education. 16(2), 139-154.

Eacott, S. (2011). Leadership strategies: re-conceptualising strategy for educational leadership. School Leadership and Management, 31(1) 35-46.

Kellerman, B. (2007). What every leader needs to know about followers. Harvard Business Review, 85 (12), 84-91.

MacBeath, J. (2006). Leadership for learning: quest for meaning. Leading and Managing, 12(2), 1-9.

Zimmerman, J. (2004). Leading organizational change is like climbing a mountain. The Educational Forum, 68(Spring), 234-242.
Category Masters of Education, My learning | Tags: , Education | No Comments
Leadership and Learning

21 September 2014 by shartley

Image source: Wesley Fryer (Flickr)

This post (aka rant) is a result of being part of a team driving change at my school; studying not one, but two university subjects focusing on leadership; and having numerous conversations about leadership in recent times beyond these circumstances.

There’s a fine balance between the autocratic/transactional style of one-way communicating telling staff how things are to be done and a constant consultative style that becomes caught in trying to please everyone so that nothing ends up being done. It isn’t a dichotomy but a spectrum of leadership style. As a leader I like to work alongside people but realise there are times strong decision making and even discipline may be required (although I know to treat the action not the person, just like with students).

Character traits apply to leadership style but a lot of the traits demonstrated by leaders are an act, not necessarily something they are given at birth. I’m naturally an introvert but assume a stronger persona because I’m someone who strives to be a high achiever (if a job needs to be done I want to do it well). This is why most people view me as an extrovert. For instance, I hate conflict as a passive observer but being in it or trying to reconcile conflict between others is worse. Yet, I am good at it. I once went to a psychologist who helped in career matters and he told me that my sense of pride in doing things well over-rode being out of my comfort zone but it wasn’t sustainable as a constant practice. At uni we were once asked what we thought was the most important aspect of leading change, and everyone else said communication while I said, all-in. Communication is just a method for driving an all-in attitude. I therefore work on solidarity, cohesion and an all-in attitude within teams.

I believe there should be a clear vision in schools and that a vision should have at its core a focus on learning, but too often I see schools avoiding the word learning and making the vision more about character. I wonder how much this is to absolve parents from that role? I think developing character is important but learning across all aspects of life is important and surely, the main purpose of secondary education.

I think it is important for my current school to move from a transactional leadership paradigm to a transformational paradigm (Bass 1997) but beyond this, it needs to bring in more open leadership style, with a focus on people more than administration (Kotter 1990). I want to be part of that paradigm shift. I like what Robinson, Lloyd and Rowe (2008) and Davies and Davies (2005) have to say about leadership because although they simplify leadership, they don’t oversimplify it into unrealistic expectations of a mere series of steps to follow. For instance, I like Robinson et al emphasise building trust and it appears genuine, not just a means for meeting goals. Davies & Davies are excellent at moving leadership theory for product based organisations to the school environment and taking context of environment into account.

I love Eacott’s (2011) analysis of Bourdieu (who I studied extensively as part of a writing and literature course) partly because “A central aim of Bourdieu’s sociology is the attempt to remove the dichotomy between the individual and society” and partly because Eacott demonstrates how the accountability of schools have become the end-goals in themselves (p.42). The HSC should be a measurement, not the goal in itself. The learning involved in undertaking the HSC should be the goal.

We need a focus on learning in an environment of trust and strong relationships. Otherwise, schools become a competitive arena about point scoring, amongst staff and amongst students. Even between teachers and students. Some of the top academic achieving schools seem to want to foster an individual selfish competitive environment, taking away the focus on learning to a focus on marks, and even though I’m competitive by nature and take pride in high marks (mine and my students’), a system that thrives on that is my idea of hell.

Bass, B.M. (1997). Does the transactional-transformational leadership paradigm transcend organizational and national boundaries? American Psychologist, 52(2), 130-139. DOI: 10.1037/0003-066X.52.2.130

Davies, B.J. & Davies B. (2005). The strategic dimensions of leadership. In Davies, B., Ellison, L. & Bowring-Carr, C. (eds) School Leadership in the 21st Century (pp.8-16). London: RoutledgeFalmer.

Eacott, S. (2011). Leadership strategies: re-conceptualising strategy for educational leadership. School Leadership and Management, 31(1), 35-46. DOI: 10.1080/13632434.2010.540559

Kotter, J. (1990). Management and Leadership. In Kotter (ed.), A Force for Change: How Leadership Differs from Management (pp.2-18). New York, NY: The Free Press.

Robinson, V. M. J., Lloyd, C. A., & Rowe, K. J. (2008). The Impact of Leadership on Student Outcomes: An Analysis of the Differential Effects of Leadership Types. Educational Administration Quarterly, 44(5), 635–674.

Category Masters of Education, My learning | Tags: , Bourdieu, Education, leadership, learning, traits, trust | No Comments
NY8: The Last Day

20 July 2014 by shartley
I awoke to my last morning in New York frazzled about what little time was left and what to do with it. It then felt like I moved in slow motion as I began the packing process and readied myself for the day. At breakfast I had my map and guide book out, my brain flicking through ideas of what to do out of the great list of options and time kept ticking away. In the end I decided to go with my original plan from days earlier, to visit the art galleries in Chelsea and walk a bit of the High Line. I went by subway (Grand Central to Union Square and then across to 8th Avenue on the 14th Street L Line).

The High Line used to be a railway for trains transporting freight to and from Manhattan’s industrial centre but due to the increasing use of trucks for such matters, the High Line ceased being used in 1980. After much campaigning, it became a public open space, including gardens and scenic viewpoints (further history). What they have done here is superb. My photos do not do it justice. As my guide book recommended, I bought gelato at the market stalls but then had trouble juggling money and ice cream to buy a T-shirt.

Once I had walked from 14th Street to 23rd of the High Line I descended to the Chelsea art gallery district. Some of my favourites were:
- Yell-o exhibition at C24 Gallery, in particular Ekaterina Panikanova’s work (I wanted to buy this one) and Nick Gentry‘s use of small floppy-disks as a canvas and part of the portraits themselves.
- Banksy and Mr. Brainwash at the Taglialatella Gallery
- Beth Carter at Axelle Gallerie – I would buy Minotaur Reading if money wasn’t an issue
I became rather melancholic as I wandered through the galleries. I think it started with viewing Napalm by Banksy and then every piece of art that depicted sadness resonated with me. The sadness became more intense as I ran out of time, even after deciding a cab back to the hotel instead of the subway would buy me more time. I didn’t want to leave New York quite yet.

I checked out of the hotel with 5 minutes to spare and met Melissa for lunch at Pera, another gourmet delight, and soon after I headed to JFK as President Obama was arriving. The trip home was uneventful with QANTAS failing to live up to the standard it set on the trip over. I mean, someone occupied the seat next to me the whole way, the trip was mostly in darkness (but flying across Sydney early in the morning was good) and even the food wasn’t as palatable. I’m glad to be home but I hope to return to New York one day to finish what I started.
Category My learning | Tags: , Education | No Comments
NY7: The Reason

18 July 2014 by shartley

The day finally arrived. I woke at 2.30am local time and worked another couple of hours on the presentation. I was nervous until I sat in the session before ours. The presenters were quite interesting and distracted me from what was coming up. In the end, we were both cool, calm and collected, even with our Principal in the audience. Apparently he took photos. I haven’t seen them yet. There were four presentations in our session and after we had all spoken there was a Q&A time which we dominated because people were really interested in what we were doing. I was approached at the end by someone for James Cook University who would be happy to act as a guide for our future research.

Our Principal had told us we should visit St Patrick’s Cathedral and see St John Baptist De La Salle. So when we finished at the conference of the day, we did. And we lit a couple of candles for him.

Thanks to Yelp, we located a Japanese Restaurant for our celebrations. We were on 43rd Street, looking across the road to where the restaurant should be but could only see a Japanese restaurant with a different name. We crossed the road and at the front of a stark white corporate foyer there was a small sign with Sakagura written on it but the decor and the sign didn’t seem to match-up. There was a man at a concierge desk in the foyer so we entered, surprised the doors were unlocked, and asked the concierge. Oh yes, he said, just go in further, turn left and take the stairs to the basement. I asked him if he would recommend the restaurant. You’ll love it, he replied. As we descended the stairs and passed piles of rubbish, like descending to some drama out of Law & Order, we came upon the restaurant. We had to wait 20 minutes for a table but it was worth it. Wonderful food, plum flavoured sake and great service. For the first time, on the last of eight nights in New York, I slept through the night.

Category My learning | Tags: , Education | No Comments
NY4-6: Work and Play

16 July 2014 by shartley

Central Park

Sunday, Monday and Tuesday were a big mixture of work and play. Melissa joined me on the Sunday and we worked for several hours on the paper and presentation.

But of course we had to play too. We walked through Central Park when it was so muggy I was red-faced, dripping in sweat and my clothes sticking to me when we arrived at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, or ‘The Met’. We started in the Greek and Roman section and I immediately felt sorry that my daughter wasn’t with me. I enjoyed The Met much more than MoMA. The amount of art and artefacts on display became overwhelming, particularly in comparison to Australian museums and galleries, and we left after four hours (including lunch).

Bruno Mars

On Monday night we saw Pharrell Williams and Bruno Mars at Madison Square Garden. It was a lot of fun. A lady from Connecticut sat next to me. She and her 18yo daughter had come in by train. The daughter was going to college in California but was on Summer break auditioning for all sorts of shows in New York. They’re encouraged by a cousin who wrote a production that is about to appear off-Broadway, Mighty Real: A Fabulous Sylvester Musical. I was asked what I’d seen of New York already and included the 9/11 Memorial in my list. Another cousin had died in the 9/11 attack but they hadn’t been to the memorial yet to find his name. Sitting in Madison Square Garden waiting for a concert wasn’t the time or place to delve for a deeper story.

As for the whole purpose for being in New York, that has started. There is a wide range of international academics at this conference, like ICERI2013, but it is not as professionally organised. For instance, the WiFi is awfully slow.

I’m a big nerdy fan of Bill Cope and Mary Kalantzis who come from Australia but now work in Chicago at the University of Illinois. They have fabulous ideas for modern pedagogy (see their website, New Learning) and I believe they are the people behind The Learner conference and its publications. They opened proceedings with some really good information that supports what we are doing at my school.

Other sessions we have been to have been less than dynamic and contain lots of, ‘well duh’ moments. For example, it has been discovered that university students who are late to class or often absent, don’t do so well when they are out on practical placement in schools. Hopefully when it’s our turn we don’t have the same effect on our audience.

Category My learning | Tags: , Education | No Comments
NY3: The Aussies

14 July 2014 by shartley

I started Saturday with a quick stroll around the local shops, mainly shoe shops, along Madison and 5th Avenue but didn’t buy anything. I then grabbed my laptop and set up office in the Rooftop Lounge, choosing the leather couch in the middle picture above. I was alone on the 14th floor, which sounds like a movie title, particularly when you realise it is actually the 13th floor (the emergency evacuation plan told me). After a couple of hours of successful work I returned to my room for my now daily nap but scoffed some mini-bar snacks as a lunch substitute.

It has been an unusual Winter holiday in that it seemed everyone I knew on Instagram and beyond were travelling in foreign lands and it turns out some were in New York the same time as me. I had a day’s overlap with @townesy77 but we were in different areas of Manhattan and failed to connect. On this occasion, however, I met with @biancaH80, @waginski and @johnqgoh for pizza. Bianca and Lee have been travelling across the USA with their two boys for a few weeks now, with another week to go. As they told their stories it was a strange experience because I knew most of their stories already, since I’ve been following their trip on Twitter, Instagram and in Bianca’s blog. The travelling they’re doing is an amazing learning experience for them but also their children. Early on when we had children we weighed up travelling versus private schooling and went with the private schooling. Generally I have no regrets but sometimes when I see and hear what the Hewes family are doing, I wonder.

I’ve also been following John’s journey. He has been on a week long course at Harvard and a blog is never going to cover the depth of what he has learned and is still processing. I enjoyed listening as he continued to explore his thoughts and reflections of his experience. Much of the conversation was about how what we do in our schools reflects our values, particularly for principals. So if a Principal is participating in classes, professional development of staff and generally being involved in the learning processes of a school you can see how much he or she values learning. I know John does all these things.

Pizza at Luigi’s on 8th Avenue

Walking down Broadway – (1) Empire State Building (2) Our Point of Departure

We had met at the SE corner of Central Park, walked the Southern edge, stopped for pizza, made for Times Square and then followed Broadway until we reached the street of Bianca and Lee’s hotel. Similarly, John and I walked (and talked) until we reached the street of his accommodation and then I completed the loop back to mine. It was a very pleasant evening for it too. I have done a lot of walking since I’ve been here and enjoyed it immensely, except for the blisters!

Saturday may not have been as jammed pack as the previous two days but connecting with other passionate educators is of deep value and the life experiences we are all experiencing here will add to who we are as people in general but particularly as teachers.

Category My learning | Tags: , Education | 1 Comment

Older Entries

Newer Entries