What would @Alfiekohn say?

I have recently rediscovered Alfie Kohn. He is still my hero! I have been reading some of his articles and a thought struck me.

How much longer are we going to continue to do things to students and not with them.

Case in point: Reading! Evidence absolutely supports the practice of having students read 20 minutes a day. What happens when this becomes a club used to beat the students? Because this 20 minutes a day is so important in many of today's classroms it becomes the bulk or sometimes the entire measure of the students reading grade. Therefore a student who is struggling to report his reading because of organizational difficulties gets beaten down. Not because he or she can't or doesnt read, but because he or she is to busy reading to bother writing it down.

How much of our jobs as educators is to enforce a factory worker model of responsibility? How much of what we do in our day should be to instill in children the need to: be on time, turn in your work, be quiet, don't disrupt? I have written about this before: the fact that our traditional schools instill values that aren't the qualities necessary for leadership.

I wonder too how much of our job as educators is to be the guardians of civilization. The educational system is designed and sturctured to hold fast to the values of a world that is rapidly changing, but I wonder if we do that too often by holding to the practices of a world that has largely disapeared?

When I was in the classroom it took my 10 years to really learn that what mattered most was not instilling in students the values that I held so dear. Not to force them to comply or conform to what I thought was most important, but rather to help them learn to value what mattered most to them. I am not sure I ever quite got it. But, I do know that the longer I taught the more I strove to give kids multiple ways to demonstrate competency. Multiple modes to learn and demonstrate learning. The more I valued the uniqueness and distinctness of each student. We have to teach classes because it seems to just work that way, but it is still each student that learns. We have to value that student. To do that we have to measure more than: "Did little Susie write down that she read 20 minutes last night"

p.s. I never came back to finish this but decided to post it as is!

Forgiveness: a lesser law

I have been thinking about forgiveness lately. I am going to propose a radical concept. Something that's truly crazy. Forgiveness is actually a lower law. We talk sometimes in the LDS Church about the higher law and the lesser law. Moses when he first went on the Mount recieved a higher law. A law similar to what Christ would later reveal in the flesh. So goes LDS tradition. Christ when he came raised the stakes. He taught that it was no longer enough to obey the law "Thou shalt not kill" but raised the bar. According to Christ we are to not even get angry with our brother or call him Raca!

Don't get me wrong, forgiveness is an important and vital law. It enables us to get to the higher law I think exists. Forgiveness though, in the sense most people use it, connotes singularity. You made me made, or hurt me, or lied, or didn't do the dishes when I asked and left me with a huge mess even though I have an important Relief Society Meeting tonight. "I forgive you" It kind of feels like. You have sinned and this one time I will extend my mercy toward you.

Charity, the pure love of Christ, extends beyond a single act of mercy. It is a trait, a lifestyle and a character of compassion. It is: I know you are an idiot and forgot to do the dishes and probably will again in the future, but I see you are also good and I love and care for you. Charity to me has a much more permanent sense to it. Not an acceptance or tolerance of sin, but an acceptance and compassion for the sinner. Don't get me wrong at all. I am not saying we don't need to forgive or that forgiveness isn't divine. What I am saying is that I believe that in many of our relationships we develop something higher (or deeper) than simple, singular forgiveness a compassion that fills us with understanding and love of the people around us..warts and all as my mother always said.

From the bus: Unwritten rules of ridership!

I am going o start a new series. Blog posts about and from the bus.

I am a very happy Public Transportation Commuter. I honestly don't even know the price of gas because I can't remember the last time I had to fill up my truck. For the most part my commute is awesome! I can nap, read, work on my computer, play Bejeweled on my phone. These things are a a little be tougher when used to drive. People would honk, and scream. I didn't get it but anway on the bus it's easier. It takes a little longer, but it's also free. As a University Employee I get a bus pass (paid for by the parking permits on campus not your tax dollars)

My challenge today is this: Chubby people.

Now, don't get me wrong. I am not critical. I am myself a chubby person. I like to eat and I don't like to exercise. This is a recipe for pudge. My problem is for several months I have been riding the bus and it does fill up occasionally. What I don't understand those is the apparent rule that Chubby men must sit together. There is one gentleman on my bus whom I am sure is probably a perfectly decent guy, but he seems to have a man crush on me. I will be sitting on a partly empty (meaning there are other double seats with no one in either seat) and this guy will plunk down and cozy up to me. He has tried to chat me up and despite me using the universal sign of disinterest, wearing my iPod headphones, (sometimes I don't even plug them into the iPod, I just wear them) this gentleman still persists in sitting next to me whenever the chance permits. Now, This wouldn't really be a problem if the bus seats were slightly larger or one of the two of us were slightly (read: in my case 40 lbs) smaller.

So, new rules for the bus! All persons must sit in an unocccupied set of seats until such time as no pair of seats remains unoccupied. Rule 2: All persons will be paired according to a volume system. Skinny people aren't allowed to sit next to each other but must be paired with a higher volume neighbor.

At least that's how it would be if I ran things.

Prophets

I have had a couple of conversations with some folks. It got me to thinking. What do I have to believe?

A question came up about a former Prophet and leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The particular Prophet has been accused of some things that are pretty heinous. Stuff that by almost any morality code of the modern day be worthy of imprisonment. Some in the church simply don't believe it happened at all. Others have left the Church over it. As I had this conversation I mentioned that I thought it quite likely that he had been involved, but simply wasn't acting as the Prophet. The friend I was talking to told me "Hey, wait a minute, if he said that God told him to do this and you are saying it wasn't right then you are saying you don't believe in the Church and revelation and ...."

The conclusion was that he felt that as a Mormon I am compelled to blindly accept every word that falls from the lips of the Prophet. Do I?




Brigham Young once said,

“I am more afraid that this people have so much confidence in their leaders that they will not inquire for themselves of God whether they are led by him. I am fearful they settle down in a state of blind self-security. … Let every man and woman know, by the whispering of the Spirit of God to themselves, whether their leaders are walking in the path the Lord dictates, or not” (Discourses of Brigham Young, sel. John A. Widtsoe [1941], 135)

This was quoted by James Faust in the September Ensign 1998 This message is still being spoken and the message seems to be: Not everything a Prophet says is right.

But, this message is being drowned out by those quoting:

The Lord will never permit me or any other man who stands as President of this Church to lead you astray. It is not in the programme. It is not in the mind of God. If I were to attempt that, the Lord would remove me out of my place, and so He will any other man who attempts to lead the children of men astray from the oracles of God and from their duty. (Sixty-first Semiannual General Conference of the Church, Monday, October 6, 1890, Salt Lake City, Utah. Reported in Deseret Evening News, October 11, 1890, p. 2.)

This becomes my conondrum? What do I have to believe? Two prophets both quoted regularly one seems to be saying I am supposed to completely trust that God will never allow his leaders to lead me astray and another prophet, earlier by only a short time, telling me not to get to secure in blindly trusting my leaders in what they say, and that message being reinforced by a truly Modern Prophet reminding me of it in 1998.

It really does seem to come down to what James Faust says after quoting Brigham Young.:

Since each one of us has his free agency, the ultimate determination of what is inspired of the Lord, what is right and wrong, true or false, can be made by each of us.

Can I look back on a historical event, and state that I don't believe that a Prophet acted as a prophet when he chose a certain path, possibly. Can I say now that specific financial advice given by a General Authority during a local fireside may not be applicable in my case. I believe I can. I believe ultimately my choices are what I will be held accountable for. Will it ever be right for my to go directly contrary to the will of the Church, Gospel and God as revealed in by his Prophets, no I can't imagine that it could possibly be.

But do you see my conondrum? What is the balance between questioning, seeking, and being an independent seeker of truth and being an obedient servant in the kingdom?

p.s. and BTW- While writing this post I was looking for the Brigham Young quote above and found it here in a great post. Can't speak to any thing else, but I did like this post.

Brian Lamb: Open Education

His presentation was terrific. The whole concept that we have students do authentic work is for some reason seen as cutting edge. This is true in one sense, but most people learned this way in the past. They learned by doing work!

One of the items that I thought was really good was the analogy. We fear often that if we send students to post on the internet that legions of Sexual Predators will creep out of their basements and descend on the students. The reality is that the people who creep out of their basements are more likely to be people who really love copy editing, formatting bibliographies or formatting tables and graphs. The point: For the Most part online interactions are positive.

One thing I wonder about with this whole idea though. Brian Lamb encourage adoption of open architecture. Things like blogs, youtube, iTunes University, and others. The challenge becomes for me is on the users end. As a participant it is a frustration to have to learn new sets of tools for every course. My wife is taking a course right now that is a mashup of three different online curriculum tools. It becomes extremely frustrating to have this course with due dates listed inconsistently, with multiple logins and with a f2f component that each sends a different message.

Course management software has it's downsides but there are advantages to it because it provides a consistent interaction for a student in a specific institution. The challenge will be watching students bringing courses from multiple institutions together to create their own learning.

A weekend with the Family

Memorial day weekend was an important milestone in my family. Dad turned 80. This is a particularly big milestone because all during my growing up years, my Dad swore, he would never reach this age. In fact he often expressed sincere and heartfelt desire to be dead before 75. Views on death are a little complicated in our family.

Well, with his birthday coming up my eldest sister decided we should get together in Idaho where Dad and Mom had lived most of their adult lives. That didn't work out. Most of my other siblings couldn't make it at that time and my Dad simply set in his heels and refused to go up there. So, my Sister decided to get herself and her now grown children together and come visit us in Utah. She told my mom to expect her at 10:00 am. Now as far as I know my sister has never arrived anywhere by 10:00 am. I can speak with some certainty that she has rarely ever arrived at a family function on time. She surprised me to no end by arriving right on time with two of her four children. We actually had a really great time. My sister has been much more attentive and respectful of me as an adult in the last couple of years. It really means a lot to me. It has been difficult for me to be the youngest in the family by 8 years. All of my siblings were out of the house by the time I was 11 and frankly, I don't feel like they know me all that well especially as an adult. I bear the blame in that because I haven't done enough to stay in contact with them.

Two important things that came out of this visit. First, my nephew who is only a few months younger than I am was a Marine, and not just any Marine, but a frontline, special forces grunt. He has some crazy stories to tell. He told us about one. He was on road block duty and following all the protocols. They were instructed that if a vehicle approaches to follow these steps:

1. Flag the vehicle and try to get their attention
2. Assertively flag the vehicle and warn the drivers
3. If the vehicle continues to approach fire a warning shot
4. If the vehicle continues to approach fire a second warning shot into the ground in front of the vehicle
5. If the vehicle refuses to slow down or stop fire on the vehicle.

Well, during this particular event a vehicle was approaching at high speed. My nephew didn't have much time and the first 3 steps happened in rapid succession with the result that my nephew fired a shot in front of the vehicle that ricocheted off the ground and bounced through the bottom of the fast moving vehicle and clipped the passenger in the @$$. The passenger was an older gentleman and once he had been shot the driver stopped the car and this older (mid seventies) man jumped out of the car and was dancing around from the pain in his derriere. It was a lot more humorous to see my Marine Nephew acting out both sides of this exchange, but I thought I ought to share. By the way, my older son thought it was the funniest thing in the world to pester and annoy the guy we kept reminding him probably knew at least 5 ways to leave him maimed or dead. Kids are stubborn.

The second and probably more important bit of information I gained from this exchange was the knowledge that I live in the heart of the Jello Belt, which extends along 1-15 from Rexburg, Idaho in the north to St. George, Utah in the south. Never heard that term but I suppose it is accurate.



View The Jello Belt in a larger map

Tithing a principle with Promise

Yesterday in Sunday School we were discussing the importance of Tithing and Fasting. I heard the greatest story about tithing I have heard in a long tme.

One of the men in our Ward told us of a time when he just didn't have enough money to pay his tithing. He knew that if he paid his tithing then there wouldn't be enough for the bills and food. He decided to show his faith anyway, and he prepared his Tithing envelope, filled out the tithing donation slip, sealed up the envelope and handed it to the Bishop. Later in the week he decided to attend the Temple and as he was coming out of the temple he reached into to pocket of his slacks and found $100.00 the exact amount of his tithing. He was immediately grateful for the blessings of Tithing and of attending the temple. He used the money to take care of his bills. On Sunday at church his Bishop came up to him and said,"Thank you so much for your tithing, everything was fine except you forgot to put the money in the envelope!"

My wife pointed out during Sunday School that we all have miracles in our lives but that we forget them and forget the Lord. It's imotant to remember the lord and that all we have comes from him. He just asks that to show our devotion we give back 10% to build up his kingdom here on earth.