Summer Break 2012

Their pets are getting old and dying.  After sneaking in and out.  My name in Hebrew means Lily.  They are poisonous to cats.  She was a cat named Lily.  Today, she was put to sleep.  Today, I am burying her beneath the Rhododendron out front, pink, that I watered every summer at their house.  Their dog, next.  A sadness all around.  I want this life to slow down, mean something.

The carpets are all cleaned but what does that mean?  Who will care about it tomorrow?  Why do I want to plant things, see them grow?  Why does my life seem over, too, soon, as well?  The young deer in the ditch.  It had been hit, its guts beginning to stink.  A rancher came over to talk about the hay, missing his wife.  Now, his now-lady friend, a lovely woman, too, but still he cries about Deb, about Jake, his Border Collie, eight puppies from Jake, but still, not Jake.

From Big A to Little K

Not quite sure that being called "Big A" is all that flattering (by the students). 
Their graduation--quite something.  The seven ti-leaf lei I made started to smell ripe
in the plastic bag from Long's.  I gave them away and yes

sad to not be seeing them day after day and observing them
more than the faces of my own family
I should know that they are as excited
and lost as I am in the world
of petroleum products everyone thinks
they know what to do with.

Student Perception Data

"Success seems feasible, press for effort, perseverence, and rigor."

about students:
encouragement, support, interesting, relevant, connected, integrated

ideas:
press, lessons, students with students, about students
are elicited and respected

culture: 
behavior

precis:
Why am I here?  The jumble.  The piece, thesis.  I wonder about the fact that the info. was easy to digest.  These things too.  The mandatory experiment to explain the same thing over and over using the same words.
Who knows these anymore? What are these for and what is supposed to happen here?

I remember the other morning as a student, liking and not knowing what to expect and where, when, and why.  This was Ed Dorn's teaching style and way.  I remember caring too much about him and his classes--trying to decide exactly what I was learning--what was it?  I did not especially know.  Another rigamorole, a challenge in that is the best and other day dream. 

Back in February it was winter and it was the same thing that the done deal inside takes on everything.

Teacher Evaluation: What It Is (Not)

The Seven Cs
(care, control, clarity, challenge, captivate, confer, consolidate)

A popularity contest established by research
as a valid and reliable set of measures
focused on issues that have nothing
to do with learning.  A low value
of student and teacher time
and an opportunity to increase
student outcomes
by using their insights
to improve teacher practice.

Focused on issues that have nothing
to do with learning--
an invitation for students to complain.

(Lines found in Tripod Student Survey:  What It Is And What It Is Not)

The Eighth "C" (Creepy)

Will the Real Administrator Please Stand Up?

Teachers are begging: just a peek at the test!  Please
so I may drill
as a dentist would
into their minds
the seven Cs
Because I'm drowning
Drowning in the Seven Cs
They are not
Caution, Creativity, Craziness, Craving,
Cramming, California or Colorado.
No, they are not.

Found Object

This is a musical instrument made on Neptune.  It is dark inside and there are sounds of gold miners making their way to the dredges inside--to the fields--they are carrying heavy packs but laugh at their burdens.  They are as rich as they'll ever be.

This depicts a wolf with white legs or white stockings.  The wolf holds a continent next to his belly.  I remembered his name some time ago.  His name was Bohemia.

This is a doorknob from off the captain's quarters on a pirate ship--this is a round version of a flat world that sinks into the galaxy's teeth like a flat pizza.

What happens next is that I remember going to the store and finding nothing like it ever again.  A draft has opened my door and I wonder if it is the apparition I felt/saw last night while sleeping.

Something creeped around me in the bed, sniffing.  It was small and harmless and then it crouched down on my chest.  It was a black and white cat.  Was it there to tell me to sleep peacefully, that all was well with everything? 

Richard Brautigan's Please Plant This Book weighing heavily on my mind.

Lead Me Deceive Me

The dregs of the day unfold in a silly way.  Too many educators and not enough education.  The students smarter than I am, solutions at their fingertips.  Impatient when I speak out loud.  Words. They are spoken too slowly, there is too much listening.  Delete the verbose.  Delete the verb.  If this essay told you a secret about itself, what would it whisper?