The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier

It is cold out there this morning! Mid-twenties!! The air had a slight chill that was akin to liquid nitrogen. I thought for a time or two that I was going to be quick frozen. By the time I came in from my walk my skin was the same color as my Carolina Blue grubbies. [...]

It’s an early crystal clear Sunday morning. Sun is still asleep. There’s a heavy chill in the air. Just did my five miles. Coffee’s not yet out. So, while I’m waiting, I’ve leaned against a cold iron handrail while sitting on the chilly concrete entrance steps to the Marcum conference center jotting down whatever is [...]

No walking this weekend. I’ve got a low level cold that suddenly came on a few days ago that I’ve got to catch before headig off to the Lilly conference on collegiate teaching next week. So, Susan and I had to cancel our weekend plans. I’m hunkering down with large doses of echinecea, cups tea [...]

I’ve been talking with a lot, and I mean a lot, of professors off-list from around the country as a result of their responses to my latest “On Teaching” Random Thought series. Most feel trapped in a limbo, stuck between two worlds. At times they have what W.E.B.Dubois called “a two-ness”: living in the two [...]

This stuff is pouring out fast and furious. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m going into a preparatory, meditative mode as I ready myself to present a series of workshops on creating a classroom learning community at the Lilly conference on collegiate teaching at Miami University in a few weeks. Well, no maybe about it. [...]

(17) Content, content, content. Information. Information. Information. Critical thinking skills. Nothing wrong with them. They’re critical to be sure, but they are not the alpha and omega of education. The great teachers are not content with merely transmitting content and honing thinking skills. Do you know why some educational visions are more powerful than others? [...]