My aunt, Bonnie, just got her COVID vaccine shot. The joy on her face is priceless. Regardless of your stance on COVID and vaccines, there is a population that is vulnerable, and I'm glad my amazing aunt was one of the first to get it! Go Bonnie Go!

Bonnie was a librarian and her late husband, Jim, was an English professor at Western State in Colorado. They often came up to visit us in the summers. Their visits were always the highlights of the summer for me. May we all be blessed with such incredible mentors and role models in our lives.

Good old John Maxwell. I love this title, especially how it crosses out the tradition "lose" in the phrase "Sometimes you Win; Sometimes you lose" inserts 'learn' instead.

Isn't that the truth. Yet somehow we have stigmatized failure. I like what conductor Benjamin Zander does with his players. Whenever they make a mistake (or fail at something), he has trained them to throw their arms up into the air and exclaim, "Well, isn't that interesting?"

This, he argues, is vital because instinctively when we fail, our heads go down and are arms sulk at our sides and we think negatively, Zander has shifted that totally in his orchestra.

That is what this book by Maxwell is all about.

As with any Maxwell book, this is an easy read that you could polish off in one sitting. But it's packed full of great insight. In short, Maxwell has ten ways (or short sections in the book) to help you condition yourself - as Zander does with his players - to turn a negative situation into a learning opportunity.

Some of my favorite sections are -

Reality - in order to learn from your mistakes or losses, you have to be real with yourself and accept what has happened. You can't just deny that reality didn't occur (our wonder if our politicians have ever learned this lesson?) and blame others. Step up, accept the reality of the situation and learn from it.

Problems - View these as opportunities to learn something new and to grow. Too often people see problems as roadblocks or dead ends. Instead, tackle them from different angles. Kenzie, my sixth grader, personifies this so well. When she couldn't get one science project to work she tirelessly tried about half a dozen different ways to solve the problem. In sports, we discussed once what would happen if she didn't make the travel team for basketball. She said, "You know, I'd ask the Coach Terrell what I need to improve on and then I'd work on it every day." And that's a sixth grader!

Finally, Bad experiences. Don't necessarily seek these out, obviously, instead let them give you perspective. You can't help but run into bad experiences. If you are pushing forward and trying new things, you're going to have bad experiences. Don't let them limit you. Learn from them. I see this with student teachers. About 1/3 of student teachers have such terrible experiences either student teaching or during their initial year in the field that they leave the profession after 3 years. That is letting a bad experience win. My whole first year of teaching was one bad experience after another, yet I hung in there. I finally sat down and examined these bad experiences and saw a silver lining.

I've read so many Maxwell books that they kind of all blur together after awhile, but if you are looking to get some great take aways from a quick read, give this a read.

Week #18– January 11-15

Teaching Thought #75 - Rules vs. Norms

I was listening to Seth Godin’s podcast called Akimbo. In it, Godin looks at the concept of “Norms vs. Rules.” This is relevant to us in education because our world is filled with rules. But Godin notes that rules are often less than effective because they force people to do things that may well be against their beliefs or their customs or even their wishes. People who are true influencers and change agents realize you can’t force anyone to do anything (I wonder how that new rule for hands free driving is going now in MN? I see a dozen people on my drove home every single day still talking on their phones on their way home or peering down at their glowing screens at a stop light). But when you change a norm, that is when you see the magic happen. A norm is a complex thing, but Godin explains it like this – “People like us, do things like this.” That’s a norm. People like us, hold doors open for people behind us. People like us, arrive early and stay late. People like us, clap for the other team. People like us pick up the parking lot when it’s full of trash . . . If you want to enact real (sustainable) change in your school or classroom, don’t come up with more rules. Work to change the norms instead.

How does your school establish its norms so that it doesn’t have to rely on (mostly ineffective) rules?

Teaching Thought #76 - Incremental Improvement is the Key

Now that we are nearly half way through the year, it’s a good time to reflect back on all the worked and all that didn’t. I find that it’s at around this time of the year - especially when we have our MLK Jr. Tech Day - that I feel like a failure.

The year always starts with a bang. Then about ⅔ of the way in, I begin to doubt myself. Am I teaching these kids anything? I should push them harder? Their writing isn’t good enough! They aren’t reading enough! I’m not getting their work back to them soon enough! Are they even reading any of the comments on their papers? I should just give up.

Seriously. Those thoughts have gone through my mind every year since I began in 1998. If you’re like me, you know what that is like. But remember this - and I have to remind myself of this all the time - incremental improvement is the key.

If something didn’t work previously, that’s okay. It doesn’t mean you have to junk it. If one class isn’t meeting your expectations, it’s okay. There is still time left to work on it. Don’t lose heart. Keep moving forward incrementally. If you keep getting just a little bit better, over the course of the remainder of the year, you’ll make significant improvement!

What I also need to remind myself whenever I go to a training session like TIES or one of our sessions from the MLK Jr. day, is that I don’t need to overhaul my entire curriculum. Just try one small new thing.

A few years ago, I read Penny Kittle and Kelly Gallagher’s excellent 180 Days. I was set to overhaul how I taught composition. Well, it fell flat after about two weeks. It was too much of a change.

Now, three years later, I try to add one new thing per semester from that book to my comp courses. That incremental improvement is the way to an overhaul of my course, but it might take a few years instead of overnight.

That’s fine.

Teaching Thought #77 - Toll Booths vs. Road Blocks

This one comes from Tim Elmore’s excellent Habitudes. Simply put - on the road of life do you offer students (or employees or athletes or your kids even) a chance to work hard and pay a price or do you just let them struggle (or worst of all, just give them a free pass . . . that would be what a lawn mower parent would do)?

We have seen this in our own lives. A great example is the training app, “Couch to 5K” exists. It trains you in smaller steps until you achieve the entire goal. When I start out on that app and have to walk for 3 minutes and then run for 1 minute (doing that several times over the course of 30 minutes), I’m paying the price at the toll booth, so to speak. If I just decided to go out and run 3.1 miles without any training, well, I’d probably have to crawl across the finish line. But after paying the tolls, I can confidently stride across the finish line thanks to the “Couch to 5K” training app.

The key in the classroom is how do we intervene and work with kids when they struggle? If we don’t offer enough timely formative feedback, the struggle becomes a road block. This is when most kids give up. At the end of my College Composition course students will have to write a 12-16 page research paper. If I assigned that on the first day, that would be a roadblock. But we start out with a short essay right away - a descriptive essay of just one paragraph. Then we write a narrative essay that is a couple of pages. Then we move on to a how to essay of 4-5 pages. Next is a literary analysis of 5-6 pages. Once they get some confidence down and learn to push through (in other words to pay the tolls) the hard places, knocking out a 12-16 page paper is difficult, but it’s no roadblock.

What are some ways you help students understand the importance of grit and determination or good ole fashion “paying the price”?

Teaching Thought #78 We Send You Our Best

This is an important read. It’s always worth remembering to be careful when labeling students. I recall receiving a message from a former student last year. He thanked me for having an impact on him, apologized for plagiarizing on his CC research paper, and said I had a big influence on him even though he overheard me say he was ‘robotic.’

My heart broke. I don’t recall saying that about him, but it must have been true. How terrible.

I thanked him for his kind words and for reaching out to me. Then I tried to apologize for labeling him as robotic. He said it was okay, but I still feel terrible. Luckily, he overcame my label.

Kids are resilient. I think far more than we give them credit for, but still. I shouldn’t have labeled him.

Teaching Thought #79 - Do the Extra

I was listening to a business podcast where a business owner was talking about the power of the “100 dollar handshake.” In short, once a week he walks around his office with a couple hundred dollars (or fifties) and will surprise an employee who is really doing something great with a handshake that has money in it.

He tells the employee, “Don’t just toss this in your wallet. Take your wife out for dinner and a movie.”

Time and again, this has worked wonders for his employees and culture.

As he was talking about the power of this at a conference, another business owner asked, “What column does that come out of in your expenses?”

The owner just shook his head. “It comes out of my pocket.”

The other business owner was shocked.

Then the main speaker added, “But the profits come back to me multiplied when I have happy and motivated workers.”

Now, obviously, we aren’t going to do this in education. But what are some ways you keep your students happy and motivated beyond learning targets and lesson plans?

Now, it's not what you think. I don't mean that I'm happy that it's over. What I mean is something far more personal.

Each year for as long as I can remember, I start each semester out strong. I have confidence and feel like I know what I'm really doing. Then, tough, doubt creeps in. After about three months, I have lost my confidence and feel like I'm not teaching the students anything. I'm a charlatan. I'm setting these students back!

That lingers for a few months. But then something happens with about three weeks left in the semester. Hope returns. I'll have a conversation with a student that reveals their growth. I'll have a breakthrough with one writer who finally gets it and hits the paper out of the park. I'll have another student text me about how much they loved reading a book. So by the end of the semester, my hope and faith in my ability to teach kids has returned.

Well, it's back until midway through the semester when I feel like a fraud again. But I'm enjoying this while it lasts!

I've mentioned Jennifer Gonzalez's excellent podcast numerous times. This one, "Fire Up Your Students With A Campaign Unit," is timely for me personally as I'm in the midst of brainstorming ideas for a new class I may be teaching next year: Social Media/blogging.

Gonzalez interviews Jane Currell a teacher in the UK who came up with this writing assignment on a whim, which I'm convinced is how the best assignments come into being.

In short, Currell has her students work on a project that focused on a fictitious place called "Alchemy Island." Students had to develop and present a campaign to protect the environment from a deforestation project. Currell was impressed with how engaged the students became as they worked in small groups.

As I listened (and you can listen to the link above or read a full transcript here), I began thinking of my Social Media/Blogging class. Not only do I want students to have a positive digital footprint via social media, to learn what sources are real and what are less than reliable (such as posting an interview from an 'expert' that they posted on Youtube or Soundcloud or, heaven forbid, posting a photoshopped image as proof of something), but I also want them to learn to make a ruckus for topics and causes they are passionate about.

And getting them to learn how to start and carry out a campaign is a great way to structure part of the class.

After the events of last week, I think we all need a little reminder about the good things in the world. The sheer joy Kent has in meeting his little brother, Noah, is a perfect reminder of that.

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.

Here is an interesting twist on the end-of-the-semester evaluations. I have to do these via NCTC, and they are okay. Sometimes students just go through the motions or they aren't really sure how to respond and the feedback isn't always the most useful.

This article from Faculty Focus, they offer a unique idea to gain some very specific feedback from students.

Here is an example format tool for having students give feedback -

Your insights into your learning in this course can help me see our course from your side of the desk. Please respond to any three of the statements below (more if you’d like). Submit these anonymously; I will use them as I plan for my courses next semester.

In this course …

• it most helped my learning of the content when…because…
• it would have helped my learning of the content if…because…
• the assignment that contributed the most to my learning was… because…
• the reading that contributed the most to my learning was… because…
• the kinds of homework problems that contributed most to my learning were…because…
• the approach I took to my own learning that contributed the most for me was…because…
• the biggest obstacle for me in my learning the material was… because…
• a resource I know about that you might consider using is…because…
• I was most willing to take risks with learning new material when… because…
• during the first day, I remember thinking…because…
• what I think I will remember five years from now is…because…

Seth Godin's blog is gold. He explores the power of the seeds we choose to plant and the impact they have.

If you're like me, you struggle to open or begin classes. I open my classes better than I end them (but I'm terrible at wrapping up my classes, hence the kids lining up at my door before the bell), but this article from Edutopia offers a great way to open your classes that isn't busy/bell work and offers some actual formative assessment. If you think the 'rose' metaphor is too cheesy, you could easily tweak it to fit your needs.

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