Teaching & Learning

Language Builds and Divides Culture

It seems the dysfunction in communicating with each another; of hearing one another; or looking to gain a sense of understanding with one another is a centuries old phenomenon  playing out with increasing intensity in today’s political environment.  I was reminded of this when I checked out a  recently published book, The Power of Our Language by Viorica Marian, at our local library.  The first few paragraphs of her Introduction used Peter Brugel’s renowned painting, The Tower of Babel, to make a point and brought me back to a visit to the Historical Art Museum (Kunsthistorisches Museum) in Vienna, Austria where the original painting graces its walls.

The short version of the story behind the painting is that God considered it blasphemous to build a tower to the heavens, so he created multiple languages dividing people into linguistic groups, rendering them unable to understand one another. The result was a palatial building that went sideways instead of up. I purchased a print of the painting at the museum, had it framed when I returned home, and it hung it in my office as a high school principal. It sometimes provided a reference point for centering discussions to build common understandings as we worked with students and each other to make teaching and learning more constructive.

Today, our democracy seems to be moving sideways, perhaps our version of Tower of Babel, due to an increasing inability to speak with one another. In a recent Atlantic Magazine article entitled, “Do You Speak Fox?”, Megan Garber describes our current state of discourse as both a national and personal crisis. She writes that Fox uses two pronouns, “you and they…that you are under attack, and they are the attackers.”  She notes that Fox language includes words like mob, socialist agenda, hoax, and invasion or open borders… and it’s continually a language of grievance.

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Writing, Reading, Technology & The Humanity of it All

“…in the meantime, we are going to concentrate on writing itself, on how to become a better writer, because, for one thing, becoming a better writer is going to help you become a better reader, and that is the real payoff.”

Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird; Some Instructions on Writing and Life

Several years ago, while co-teaching a high school humanities class, I was also doing graduate research on the relationship of writing, both formal and informal, impacted a student’s ability to read and think critically. The connection interested me in since reading William Zinsser’s book, Writing to Learn, and provided a reference for my own core teaching and writing beliefs. My thoughts on the teaching of writing continue to evolve given the reading and writing options available today including AI options like ChatGPT, Grammarly, and Rytr; but no matter what new technologies impact the writing landscape, there are two claims by Zinsser on writing for me that should always remain at the forefront for determining the value of writing.

Zinsser’s first claim was “Writing and thinking and learning were(are) the same process.” Relative to this notion, he went on to note “writing across the curriculum isn’t just a method of getting students to write who were afraid of writing. It’s also a method of getting students to learn who are afraid of learning.”  His second claim was, “ Writing is thinking on paper. Anyone who thinks clearly should be able to write clearly…”  So, how do those claims about writing translate in a 21st Century world that offers a range of technology that potentially marginalize or even eliminate paper in many cases?

In classrooms, I have observed students who write and think better through the keyboard and screen, as well as students who respond better with a pencil or pen in hand to paper for developing their thinking regarding matters important to them or make meaning of the reading being done. Then there are pencils for tablets and voice options for ‘writing’ as well that are part of the equation.  However, options available for writing and reading face a number of obstacles (standardized testing/assessment, outside demands on instructional time, etc.) that have limited the informal writing experiences across disciplines providing conditions and motivations for reading and shared thinking. It’s the informal writing experience done in journals, as drafts, or in the margins of notebooks/textbooks(paper & digital) that promote deeper thinking and greater inquiry. Writing as part of an assessment is the product of one’s thinking; but discounting  informal writing opportunities that precede any assessment places limits and ceilings on that thinking.

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Learning to Read the World Through My Radio

A tidy picture of simplicity sat in front of me.  A study lamp stood on one corner of a heavily lacquered wooden desk along with the obligatory dictionary and thesaurus. Offsetting the light in the opposite desk corner, was a radio.  The rectangular plastic box was one of my most prized possessions given to me during an earlier holiday period.  Its blackness demanded attention since the rest of the room was quite drab if honestly described; modest if the color of the lighter tan walls were added.  The radio’s presence also served as a primary companion for an only child who sometimes needed to hear voices of people other than his parents.

I was atypical of a mid 60’s teenager with a radio in their room.  There was never a moment where a parent needed to bellow, “Turn your radio down!”, while the Moody Blues, The Rascals or Jim Morrison were playing…most enjoyed though with the volume up. My radio strayed from the music scene of the FM band to the to the baseball and basketball games being broadcast on the AM side of the airwave universe.  The secretive affair that didn’t necessitate increased volume.  The only requirement was other contents in my desk that allowed my imagination to connect to a larger world.

Four drawers were available to keep needed materials and ‘stuff’ that perhaps made me an early minimalist.  The top thin, center drawer contained pencils, pens, rulers, and geometry tools; along with baseball cards, available for trade or flipping.  The top drawer to my right contained all the paper I’d need for schoolwork as well as stationery for writing thank you notes to relatives or the pro athletes of my choice.  Autographs in the 1960’s were obtained for the price of a postage stamp and the willingness to write to a star letting him know he was your favorite.  The second drawer contained an eclectic connection of important things that I didn’t want to misplace.  Items such as class pictures, award certificates and a Mad Magazine or two could usually be found in there.  The bottom drawer contained my spiral notebooks, which were turned into homemade scorebooks.  That bin held the real fruits of my labors and the parts of my study time that helped make real world connections to portions of my schoolwork…a sort of gateway for my imagination to overtake the mundaneness off reading and summarizing a period of history or doing the assigned even or odd numbered math problems.

Opening that drawer, along with powering up the radio, opened my mind and helped me discover new possibilities beyond the humdrum learning transpiring each day between yellow school bus trips to and from a large, bricked building with over a thousand minds at various stages of receptivity.  The drawer held a year’s worth of notebooks keeping running scores of most Boston Celtics and Red Sox games.  I could have been classified as a real ‘get a lifer’, but for me it was a labor of love.  And for a time, my schoolwork became secondary to scoring games.

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Trauma Can Travel Across Time and Place

A recent Boston Globe article clarified an anxiety, a despair I feel as an educator each time the news covers a traumatizing incident at a school. The article entitled, Mass Shootings Are Taking a Toll on our Mental Health, was in response to another horrific school shooting massacre in Uvalde, Texas killing 19 elementary students and 2 teachers. It’s the most recent example of the mounting carnage wrought by the political inaction of this century; a crass, immoral gun lobby; the ambiguous wording of the Second Amendment; and a continued indifference of the American voter when it comes to reforming gun laws.

My anxiety and despair is visceral when it comes to schools, teachers and students. As the Globe article pointed out, “No matter how far removed we might personally be from the events, experts say, they still take a toll on our mental health… It can be very personal even if it’s a distant experience.” I felt this way 23 years ago as a first year principal when news broke of the Columbine, Colorado shooting on April 20, 1999 taking 15 lives and injuring 24 others. We had a scheduled school board meeting that evening and the published agenda seemed trite. The discussion quickly turned to school safety concerns we seemingly never had to think about previously.  However, from that day to the present, schools have had to continually ramp up safety awareness and active shooter drills. Schools have been hardened and police officers added, yet school shootings proliferate as weapons of war easily fall into the hands of teenagers who can legally purchase and carry guns in too many states across the country. Each school shooting is a subliminal reminder that no matter the distance, your school or community could be next.

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Rooney, Rooney, Rooney… The Craziness Spectrum

“Great teachers are usually a little crazy.” Andy Rooney

From my experiences, Andy Rooney’s quote was right on target. But like most things with our writing or experience, we can’t oversimplify the significance of a word that can parsed into a multiplicity of meanings.  My work in schools has run the gambit from a ‘good crazy’ that translated to an act of courage for the sake of students; to a ‘crazy crazy’ as I approached my newly appointed dean of students position  at a middle high school in New Hampshire. Based on those experiences, I’d add administrators along with teachers to the spectrum of crazy.  Ironically, it was two additional Rooneys (Gerry and Ed) who directly and indirectly helped me understand that we can’t take the word ‘crazy’ too lightly.

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