Blogush

Here is your task. Walk by five kids at your school–not when classes are passing, but when you are by yourself in the hall and there is only one or two kids passing you. You may look at them, but you can’t say anything. Do they say hello? Please try to do this five times and let me know the results. If you happen to be a student reading this, do it with the teachers in your building, or even other students. I would like to get responses from at least five people. I have a theory I would like to blog about but need some data first to make sure my school is not the exception to the rule. I’ll even take the results from one pass, past passes, and even guesses. Also mention what grades and how many kids are in your school!

Thank you,

Paul

Yesterday I overheard this statement from a student about one of their teachers:

“It’s not like he was teaching us how cure cancer.”

When we teach our subject with no connection to others, when we teach our subject with no connection to the world outside our four walls, when we teach our subject with no connection to the students lives, when we teach our subject with no pizazz or vigor, when we teach our subject with facts instead of problems, when we teach our subject with no connection to people across the street, state, country, world, when we teach our subject with no imagination, no place for dreams or passion, when we teach our subject with no interest in modeling love and empathy…our kids will never see the connection between our classes and curing cancer. I don’t teach social studies. I teach life. I do use certain social studies tools, topics and lenses to teach about life. I hope that someday, when a student is asked about me, they will say,”He taught me how to cure cancer.”