I'm tired of my blog's daily ramblings of the ups and downs of teaching today. I'm also tired of the problem solving around system's issues and potential from the vantage point of the classroom. I'm sure I'll continue to take part in these conversations on chats and elsewhere, but for now, I'm ready to take my blog on a new path. I'm going to call the path "365" and dedicate a year to a regular focus on the strategies and efforts that truly empower the classroom community.
To do this, I'll immerse myself in the study of cognition, neurology, content knowledge, and other factors that impact student learning. I'll try for posts that reflect this research and effort. I'd like my posts to take on a story structure too when possible.
In the meantime, when I have time, I'll organize the past posts by getting rid of the posts that represent "old think," ideas I've outgrown, and consolidate the posts related to same topics. As noted before, I hope to cluster those posts into a book titled, Classroom Choreography: Teaching Children Well.
The next charge will be the design of lessons and efforts that truly impact learning--lessons built on good research, and lessons that respond to student need. I want to clearly determine the lesson's objectives, and assess well so that I'm well aware of students' growth and needs. I also want to be mindful of the holistic goals of teaching children well as I teach looking for broader and deeper ways to assess that work. In a sense, I want to go deeper, not broader, as I continue down the path of teaching children well.
A year's focus on this is a right direction now, a good path for me. I look forward to the consult of my PLN in realtime and online with regard to this past as there's so much to learn and discover about teaching children well today, orchestrating optimal environments for learning.
