Now this is what being part of a community is all about.

The Idea Factory. Before reading this book, I heard legendary stories about the Bell Labs and how they establishes a culture of creativity. This book delves in to how the were able to create a culture that lead to some of the greatest innovations in American history. The book focuses on a few brilliant scientists who spent their entire careers at the AT&T lab because they knew their work mattered and they were appreciated and valued.

Those are vital aspects of any culture. When I read this, it transformed how I thought about my classroom and the overall culture of LHS and our entire district.

Week #6 – October 12 – 13 P/T conferences

Teaching Thought #25 - Don’t Forget the Hugs

Since this is Parent/Teacher conferences, it doesn’t hurt to have a reminder of what really counts: Fist bumps are Fine, but I’m a Hugger.

Teaching Thought #26 - Teach your Students to make the Digital Footprint is W.O.W.

This thought comes via Angela Maiers. When teaching writing to her students, Maiers always stresses that they make it W.O.W., which stands for “Worthy of the World.”

We all know the disasters that can befall a quick, tasteless text or social media post when it goes viral. See the sad cases of Justine Sacco, Damian Goddard, Samantha Goode, or Alberto Iber.

The point is simple: when you write and publish anything on the web, it always behooves you to ask yourself - before you hit the submit or post button - is this “worthy of the world”?

This week was the first time in a long, long time where I felt like I was actually teaching again. I was introducing theme #2 (a narrative). I always have students write about three separate topics and then choose one to develop into a second, third, and then final draft. The three topics were discussed were an important words narrative, an expertise narrative (where students highlight the story of a best moment related to their expertise), and finally, a rite of passage narrative.

As I was doing this - and even though I had 2/3 of the students at home and listening in - I was able to fully engage them with the power of story as I narrated my examples for each essay topic. Then students began to chime in - several from home even - with their own examples and stories.

It felt like I was again building real culture in my classroom. Hybrid can't end soon enough.

Why not start out the year with one of the best podcasts: Entreleadership? This podcast shares so much wisdom on leadership. Willink, a former Navy Seal, has so much to say on how to lead others.

In this podcast, Willink talks about the importance of putting your ego in the backseat in order to really achieve anything. Why is ego so bad?

Oh where to begin? It clouds our vision. It makes us hesitant to take risks. It makes everything become about us and our ego. Ego makes it harder for us to step back and see what is really going on, for we are too worried about getting our feelings hurt.

Willink talks about how as a young Seal, he had a commander who was all about him. It was his way or no way. Even with such a rare unit as the Navy Seals, Willink talks about how the Seals in his unit rebelled against this commander. When they told command about him, he was immediately replaced. In his place, command put a legendary leader. What Willink found out was that this new leader was legendary because he embodied one of LHS's core values: "It's not about us."

The new leader didn't make it about him. He made it about the team or the unit. And it worked wonders. Instead of just telling the Seal team what to do, he actually asked for their input. Now, their input wasn't always good, for they didn't have the experience or tactical knowledge the legendary commander did. But the commander asked his team to explain their ideas and suggestions. In doing this, he was teaching and leading them. The commander asked enough questions that soon the Seal team saw the errors in their thinking and plans.

In the end, what did they come up with? Willink says the team ended up coming up with the same plan that the commander waned them to come up with, but the team came up with it. The new commander could have just told the team what to do and think, but they'd never have had ownership in it.

That is leadership. The new commander did it all because his ego was in the backseat. It wasn't about him. It was about the team.

How can we make everything we do about our students and our class, not about us?

Mr. Zutz shared this video with my class last week as he was sharing his insight on Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. I think you'll like it.

Twitter is the best PD I've ever had. I learn more in half an hour on Twitter than I did in my first decade of school sponsored PD.

Vala Afshar is an amazing follow on Twitter. He isn't political and celebrates the human spirit and innovation.

I can't stress how vital this is right now. Admin: your staff is watching. Everything you do (or what you fail to do) MATTERS.

This is true for teachers and how they interact with and role model for their students too.

This website is an amazing tool for creating collages. I use this mostly to improve my slideshows. In the past, I'd have a slide with 10 pictures built in one after the the other. It just took so long to go through (and no one, especially our students, want to sit through a slideshow one second longer than they have to).

With BeFunky, you can upload your pictures and - even with the free account - create basic collages. That way I download the collage and put that single picture into my slideshow so I don't have to transition through all of my pictures built on top of each other.

It also works to edit photos too, but I only use it to create collages. Below are some of my examples.

I used the collage above to display some amazing things students have produced.

This is a collage of basic usage errors stolen from social media. I will upload this to Classroom and have students find the errors.

Finally, to prove a point about what we publish online matters, I creeped the social media accounts of all of my CC 2 students and shared with them what I found.

Under our new hybrid format, P/T conferences will certainly look different than ever before.

Talk to any employer or teacher, and they will tell you: softs skills (or social skills) for young people today are eroding quicker than ever. Maybe it' due to bad parenting. Maybe it's due to their lack of social interaction (at least physically) due to technology. Maybe it's due to isolation because of COVID. It's most likely a combination, but the article below highlights some of the most important social skills our kids need to know.

I am married to the most amazing person in the world, Kristie. It was love at first sight. At least for me. And it still is.

We have four wonderful children, Casey, Koko, Kenzie, and Cash. And now we have been blessed with five grandchildren!

I also happen to have the greatest job in the world: teaching English to high school students.

I am in my 23rd year of teaching at Lincoln High School. I graduated from Lafayette High School in Red Lake Falls in 1992. I decided to enter the field of education because of two amazing teachers, Mr. Mueller, my fourth and sixth grade elementary school teacher and assistant baseball coach, and Mrs. Christianson, my 9th grade English teacher.

I attended Northland Community College, and had my life changed by the amazing Dr. Diane Drake. Then I transferred to Bemidji State University in 1995. There I had amazing professors who further inspired me to teach English (Dr. Helen Bonner, Dr. Mark Christensen, Susan Hauser, and Gerry Schnabel). I graduated with my BS in English Education in 1997.

I student taught with the wonderful Lisa Semanko and then began teaching full-time at LHS in 1998.

I took a year's leave of absence in 2001-02 to return to BSU for my MA in English. There I had the privilege to teach and work closely with my greatest mentor, Dr. Mark Christensen. I earned my MA in English in 2006 and was honored with "Thesis of the Year" for my creative non-fiction, braided, multi-genre memoir, "Meeting Myrtle: A Biography."

In 2013, thanks to my dear friend and mentor, Dr. Jodi Holen, I was offered an adjunct teaching position fall semester at the University of North Dakota. Tuesday nights I teach Intro to Education: Teaching and Learning 250 from 5-8. Those three hours fly by in about ten minutes.

Then in 2016 I was blessed to win a WEM award (thanks to a nomination from a former student (and now an elementary school teacher), Ciera Mooney).

In 2017 I became part of the #pineconepd podcast club along with Brian Loe, Jeff Mumm, Kelsey Johnson, Kelly Weets, Josh Watne, Tevia Strand, Megan Vigen, Mariah Hruby, Laura Brickson, Loren Leake, Katie Hahn, Melora Burgee, and new members all the time. This has been one of the best forms of PD I've ever been a part of. They make me a better teacher every time we meet. Please think about joining us in the summer at the Pine Cone Pub from 6:30 - until we've solved all the world's problems. For that evening anyway.

Thanks to the inspiration of Shane Zutz (our former principal) I devised this as a way to distribute my Teaching Thoughts and add more content to, hopefully, help out and inspire others.

Email: kurt.reynolds@myprowler.org
Website: http://teacherscribe.blogspot.com
Location: 101 South Knight Aver Thief River Falls MN 56701
Phone: 218-686-7395
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kurt.reynolds.5?ref=bookmarks
Twitter: @teacherscribe