You know, somewhere inside each of us, buried deep beneath every day concerns, is a dream. Every now and then it surfaces to energize our spirit like nothing else can and then sinks back down beneath the surface. Our dream has a promise that we all too often wave off as crazy and impractical. And yet, the more our real lives, our real work, connect with our dreams, with our vision, with our sense of meaning and purpose, the more our passion, energy, and excitement about your lives and work is released. The key to this emission is to seek out, acquire, listen to, and move toward a deeply reflected and clearly articulated dream, a vision with purpose and meaning. Self-inspiration, then, is fired by the conjoining of who we presently are with who we would like to be, a union with our real selves and ideal selves, a gut-wrenching and honest reaching deep into our gut and a willingness to overcome the seemingly never-ending difficulties of pulling ourselves to the surface. Therein lies the power of a “can-do” faith, of a “there is more” hope. That–is–not–easy–to–do! Trust me, I know.

Let me take you back to October, 1991, when I had my epiphany. For fifteen years before that, I was in a self-consuming and self-devouring ‘publish or perish’ rut, although at the time I didn’t admit I was a rut. But, I was, and it was getting deeper and deeper. I was running from book to book, article to article, grant to grant, conference to conference. There was that rush to be important and that rush from being important. I had become the country’s noted authority in my field. I had a longer scholarly resume than the rest of the faculty on my campus combined. And yet, as I look back, there seemed to be less and less importance to being and looking important. The rush was diminishing to a trickle. There was less and less contagious excitement. There was less infectious passion. There was less fulfilling meaning. There was certainly no inspiring vision. I had sacrificed the students in the classroom by saying that I couldn’t serve two masters. Yet, as I look back with 20-20 spiritual hindsight, I see that, without confronting the reality of my rut, without being attentive to the habits I had accumulated over the years, I was always finding the explanations, rationales, excuses to defend and confirm my self-image and routine. I had adjusted to a life without meaning and purpose in what I was doing. I was unaware of the truth of how elusive my real self had always been because I had inflated my outer self at the expense of my inner self. I was inattentive to the powerful mind trap I had caught myself in. It was a stand that was not in reality serving my self.

Then, by chance, and with both great intrepidation and effort, I started peeling away the mask of my apparent self and slowly discovered my real self. I slowly and painfully started acquiring a vision of my ideal life; as I wrestled with my values, philosophy, aspirations, weaknesses and strengths, talents and capabilities, as I looked deep inside, I discovered the teacher within. It was like cleaning the foggy mirror I was looking in and getting a clear view of myself. It was like unlocking and opening a door, and stepping into a new world. It was like breathing fresh air and living a new life. I realized how much I truly relished being a teacher. I connected with a purpose I had never known. I was waking up on more and more mornings realizing that teaching could be exciting, meaningful, and fun rather than a routinous drag on my scholarship.

To do such on-going soul-searching requires an intense self-awareness. It demands a challenging reflection on your own life within and on your work without. It means looking at what was, what is, and what might or can be. It means thinking about the people who crossed your path and influenced the paths you walked. It means considering the nature and extent of your personal vision. It means reflecting on your commitment, dedication, and strength of perseverance to “get in” and “stay in.” It means articulating a clear and honest picture of the reality of the situation on your campus. Over the years, comparing the real and the ideal has been a discomforting and at times an fearful challenge of Himalayan proportions, but I found that there’s no sense in blaming the mountain for being too high. Instead, I had to find a way to climb it. And, as I scaled up the slopes, I discovered so much clarity about what I needed to change and what I need to be to get me and what I do right.

Over the past decade, I’ve been able to craft a vision of my life and of my role on campus. It has meant engaging in the extremely hard work of unlearning years of learned and practiced habits revolving around and focusing on research, publishing, lecturing, testing, and grading. I had to learn and repeatedly practice new thoughts and actions, surrender the weakening and debilitating fixation on obstacles in front and around me, focus on the powerful and strengthening image of who I want to be. I had to make a lasting commitment beyond a year-end resoluting to a future vision of myself, not only in my work, but in my entire life. My philosophy of both education and of my life is the way I determine my values, what forms my character, what determines my actions, what guides my relationships with others, and what forms the teaching style towards which I gravitate.

As I am about to become the senior faculty member on campus, people increasing ask me when am I going to retire. I ask myself, “Is there enough on campus and in education, in the classroom, in each student to keep me going through the changes and challenges?” More importantly, I ask myself, “Am I still having fun and am I still happy?”

My answer is always–so far–an “I’m still in.” I’m in because I now have only holy encounters with a student, because now I see and hear an angel walking in front of each student proclaiming, “Make way! Make way! Make way for someone created in the image of God!” And, I can’t help but to love each student. The more you love each student, the more you respect each, the more value you will see in each, the more value you will give to teaching, and the deeper you will be in. The more you leave the dismay and discouragement behind, the more the negatives dissolve into nothing. The more you make room for love, joy, happiness, and accomplishment, the more you will get rid of the mental junk. The more genuine enthusiasm you put into each student, the more real fulfillment you’ll get out of teaching and the greater will be your accomplishments.

So, the real challenge in teaching and learning is to love each student as much as, if not more than, yourself. The challenge in teaching and learning is to build relationships, including our relationship with ourselves; the challenge in teaching and learning is to approach each student as if he or she is there, not just for our purposes, our pleasure, or our accomplishment, but for his or her purposes, his or her needs, and his or her achievements. The challenge is to see beauty in each person no less than you would in a rose or a panoramic scene. But, let me tell you, after a student came up to me this morning, there is nothing like the glowing, enveloping beauty of that moment. It’s a beauty that’s not limited in time or confined to a place. It’s an inner beauty that I will be with me wherever I go. In some ways, that moment is enough beauty to last a lifetime. In some ways, it is not, for as the beauty of that moment opened up like a blossoming flower, I knew there would be more blossoms to come, that I could see and feel more. He was, for me, a reminder that for every single thing that may cause me dismay, there are far more reasons for hope; that it’s not enough merely to count my blessings. I have to live them with vigor, dedication, commitment, perseverance. And, as I do, there’d be no end to the joy of teaching and reaching out, touching, and transforming. The more moments of beauty I look for, the more moments of beauty I see, the more beautiful is each student, and the more beautiful is teaching.

I have discovered, then, that if I advance confidently in the direction of my dreams, and endeavor to live the life which I have imagined, I will meet with an uncommon success, satisfaction, and fulfillment unexpectedly in the common hours.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

I was walking in the cool autumn air this morning, and I couldn’t get an image out of my mind. Thursday morning I was walking down the hall heading for class. Approaching me was a female student, books in hand, heading for class, dressed in black from head to toe, her black boots reached to her knees, her baggy shorts were held together by polished metal brads, chains draped from her waist connecting to her boots. Her jet black hair was spiked. She wore heavy, black makeup that would make the rock band KISS jealous. She sported a pair of huge, sweeping, black, mesh butterfly wings that made everyone in her path duck!

I chuckled an “ah, youth.” It was an interesting sight that fed had an interesting question. I’ve always described students as “adults in training.” Recent, however, I’ve been asking in a more serious tone, “Are students really adults?” Now, I am not talking about those who fall into the vague, jargonized category of “non-traditional student.” I’m talking about the “traditional” 17-22 student fresh out of high school. And, the answer may not be as plain and simple as a lot of us academics love to assume and have assumed for a long, long time. I know. If you’re old enough to blow out the candles on your 18th birthday, old enough to vote, old enough to shoot a gun, old enough to have personal privacy, old enough to be tried as an adult, you’re an adult. Period! End of discussion!

But! In the last few years, I have chosen to teach only in those challenging but excitingly potential and critically important first year classes. Let me tell you that so many of them more often “kid” around and don’t act “adult-ish.” At times, a lot of times, I wonder alone over a glass of wine: “Where were they?” “Did they listen?” “How could they not understand?” “Don’t they care?” “Don’t they respect themselves?” “Where are their priorities?” Now, maybe I have an insight to those question.

Most academics perceive students through some ideal, normal socio-bio-brain model. “They are adults,” is the normal proclamation. This pronouncement assumes that the brain finishes its growth during puberty and then settles into its adult impulsive constraining form by the time the student comes into collegiate classes. This assertion declares that students ought to be completely self-disciplined, totally responsible, excellent time managers, outstanding priority organizers, unqualified committers to excellence, pure pursuers of learning for the sake of learning. Heck, a lot of us academics don’t reach the summits of those heights, but that doesn’t stop us from moaning about students when they are not. After all, students are adults.

Anyway, this pronouncement says that at some magical point during the summer between June high school graduation and that first August day on a collegiate campus something in the vacationing water triggers a selective but endemic mutation. The impulsive, spontaneous, immature, undisciplined, naive adolescent genetically transforms into a mini, experienced, thoughtful, responsible, self-disciplined, measured, “knows better,” scholarly adult dressed in teen clothing. No matter about the belly button rings or pierced tongues or eyebrows or lips or nipples or wherever, no matter the tattoos or gothic dress and “interesting hair styles,” no matter coming to class in pajamas and other “interesting” styles of dress, no matter the binge drinking, no matter the wild parties, no matter the impulsiveness, no matter the casual sex, no no matter the musical chair dating, no matter the drunken driving, no matter whatever. Students are adults.

I was reading a written code of student conduct from one institution. It said, “…..assumes students are adults and responsible for their own conduct.” It goes on to say that the institution expects students “to behave in ways which demonstrate care and respect for the personal dignity, rights and freedoms of all members of the community, and to demonstrate care and respect for College property and the property of others. As members of the …… Community, we all share responsibility for safeguarding the rights and freedoms of other members and for maintaining community standards.” Sounds great. Like heaven on Earth. It was written by academic adults that a lot of academic adults with all our experience, years, learning, resumes, and reputations find hard live up to that ideal. And, then, we expect our 17-21 years old to do that? Why not. One college goes so far to differentiates itself from high school by the simple statement that “most college students are adults and all high school students are adolescents.” There’s that mutation causing water.

Well, what’s sharpened by thoughts on this matter is some material I’ve been reading lately about the work by neurobiologists and psychologists that seems to rattle the conventional view of these academics who see these young people as competed adults. The studies seem to indicate that it isn’t that simple, that “students are adults” may not be as undeniable an undeniable fact as many conveniently suppose, that it simply may not be that simple, that to think of students and treat them as miniaturizations of ourselves doesn’t make it so. But the use of that word, “adult,” is used by many academics to shirk their responsibility in the learning process that often creates a chasm between them and the student. How many times have you heard, read, or said, “I teach; they learn” or “Students are responsible for their own education” or “It’s your, not my, responsibility for you to learn” or “I don’t spoon feed” or “It’s not my job to hold their hand.” What if it wasn’t that one-dimensional, that one directional, that cut and dry?

Deborah Yurgelun Todd of Harvard Medical School and Boston’s McLean Hospital and others show it may be a tad more complicated than most people think. She shows how the brain changes during adolescence and into adulthood. The latest brain research has found strong evidence that when it comes to maturity and organization and control, key parts of the brain related to judgment and “thinking ahead” haven’t kicked in. Some scientists would place the threshold over which a person enters adult maturity at about 22 or 23! Her recent work suggests that teens’ brains actually work differently than adults’ when processing emotional information from external stimuli. A teenager is not going to take the information that is in the outside world, and organize it and understand and respond to it the same way we adults do or the same way we educated adults do. t just may be that road to maturity and insight for our young students may be far slower and more arduous than we academics have suspected. Don’t I know that!

This research may–I repeat, may–go part of the way to explain the miscues between adult teachers and young students. It may indicate why it so often seems that the two don’t seen to be talking and listening to each other. Now, I don’t think Deborah Yurgelun Todd would argue that her work provides THE answers. Nor would I. But, it sure does raise some tantalizing questions. And, it equally may cause us to examine our educational methods and attitudes. It sure may strengthen the need for empathy in the teacher’s arsenal. It may call for the “I” and “you” in teaching and learning to be forged into a “we.” Food for thought.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Well, I guess the segments of the interview by student which I shared with you weren’t all the parts he used. I received some more of the transcript yesterday. And, I would like to share wit you what I just received:

“I wish I could be like you someday.”

“Wish for someone you can be.”

“Who’s that?”

“You!”

“Me?”

“Sure. I teach who I am. So, you will teach who you will become. Teaching is an inside-out job.”

“What are you talking about?”

“In the days when I wore ties and jackets and suits and all that academic costuming, my salesman at a men’s store where I got all my clothes, once told me that if you wanted to know the real quality of a jacket or any piece of clothing, turn it inside-out and look at how the material is cut and sewn together. You can use the finest material, he once told me, but if its cut and sewn shoddy, it’s schlock. It’s no different with teaching. Why don’t we understand that, for better or worse, whatever we wish for we must work hard at being, work just as hard or harder than at doing. Wishfully clicking the heels of ruby slippers isn’t going to make anything come true, nor will wishful singing to the evening sky from a starlit window sill. Whatever we do and wherever we go on the outside, our inside, we, are there guiding, directing, influencing, determining. If you want to take risks, be fearless; if you want to be respected, be respectful; if you want to be feared, be controlling; if you don’t want to be engaged, be distant; if you want to be frustrated, be impatient; if you want to be hopeful, offer hope; if you want to be believed, be believable; if you want to be trusted, be trustworthy; if you want to beautify, be beautiful; if you want to be appreciated, be appreciative; if you want to be honest, be authentic; if you want to be heard, hear; if you want to be understood, be understanding; if you want to care, be caring; if you want to be loved, be loving; if you want to be a mover, be on the move; if you want to be adventurous, be different; if you want to make a difference, reach out and touch; if you want life in the classroom, live it.”

“But what about methods and techniques and strategies?”

“I’m not dismissing them, but there’s a more important ‘how.’ They’re the skeleton, but it’s the ‘feel’ that gives them direction, purpose, meaning, and is critical to their effectiveness–or ineffectiveness.”

“Feel? That spirituality again?”

“Mark Twain was wrong. You can do something about the weather. The teacher controls the climate in the classroom so that the student inhales clean, fresh, and invigorating air or toxic fumes. I’m saying your effectiveness as a teacher is rooted in the mood you create in and out of the classroom. We can criticize with harsh words and offensive gestures that belittle, humiliate and wound. Or, we make sure that the words which come out from our mouths are positive and beautiful. Good moods, good work; bad moods, bad work. Good moods are lubricants; bad moods are grinding sand. Good moods enhance flexibility, imagination, creativity, and satisfaction; bad moods stir up second guessing, anxiety, rigidity, and dissatisfaction.”

“Wait a minute. Don’t you evaluate students when they’ve done something wrong?”

“Ah, it’s how I act and the words I use that are critical. I don’t use negatives and I don’t sneer. I never angrily proclaim a blanket “Wrong!” I’ll display a kind disappointment. Ill always find a positive on which a student can build and ask him or her to do again whatever he or she was suppose to do; I’ll always ask if he or she gave it everything he or she had; I’ll always say that he or she is disrespecting him-/herself; I always say he or she is better than that, and so on.”

“Why do you do it that way?”

“Intentions are important. They impact on the words you use and the gestures you make, and they, in turn, have a powerful impact on a students attitude and performance. I’m not there to blindly take off points, diminish, be inconsiderate, be unreasonable, be unsympathetic, discourage, frighten, tear down, or weed out. I’m there to nurture, support, encourage, respect, empathize, understand, listen, direct, enhance. I once said that any teacher who can’t go 24 hours without saying or thinking a negative about students has lost control of his or her heart and tongue no less than someone addicted to nicotine or alcohol or a narcotic has surrendered control.”

“Are just words that important?

“They’re symbols of your attitude and beliefs. They’re powerful, and most people’s armor to protect themselves against them are as thick and strong as aluminum foil. They are verbal sticks and stones; they do break bones; they do do harm; they do wound; and, they are soothing salves; they do heal. Let me put it this way. Each student is like a hitchhiker. You can stop and give him or her an emotional lift or you can stop and emotionally hijack him or her. How you, I, and each student feels affects our performance and what they, we, will achieve. Hey, go to prepare for class.”

“I’ve got to run, too. Can I call you again.”

“Sure, but before you leave, I’ve a reading assignment for you. Read two books. The first is Daniel Goleman’s PRIMAL LEADERSHIP. The second is Joseph Telushkin’s WORDS THAT HURT, WORDS THAT HEAD. They both nail it with the first page!”

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Three students once came to the famous rabbi, Bal Shem Tov, and he asked them, “What would you do if you knew you would die in six months”

The first student said, “I would go to Jerusalem to the Wailing Wall and pray continuously.” The second one said, “No. The journey would waste valuable time. I would go to my room and begin to pray continuously.”

The third remained silent and the first two assumed he had nothing to say. But, when questioned by the Rabbi, the third said, “Why I would continue with my job and my normal daily schedule.

So the Rabbi said, “This third answer is best, for if we cannot find holiness and meaning in our moment to moment daily existence we shall not find it in Jerusalem or anywhere.”

That’s how I feel about teaching.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

A couple of weeks ago, I receive a telephone call from a student attending a western university whom I didn’t know. He introduced himself and told me that he had an assignment to write a paper for his teaching in higher education class based on an interview with a college professor. He didn’t want to talk with anyone at his institution. So, he found me by surfing the web. He asked if he could ask me a bunch of questions and tape our conversation. I agree. He asked and I answered. Today, I received a transcript of those portions of our conversation that he used as the basis of his paper. I’d like to share it with you.

“Okay, Dr. Schmier, let’s begin. What does it take to be a teacher at the college level?”

“Well, you don’t have to have any education courses as long as you have the credentials in your discipline. For me, I have found during the past eleven years that’s not enough. It’s not enough to be ‘subject smart’ and ‘technology smart’ however important they are. And, important they are.”

“But, don’t you have to know your subject?”

“Sure, but just because you know it doesn’t mean you can teach it. That’s a myth. A second myth that’s going around as gospel is that to be a good teacher you have to be a good scholar. If that’s the case, I guess very, very few k through 12 teachers are good at what they do. No, scholarship, that is, research and publication, require one set of skills that are divorced from the skills required of teaching.”

“That’s what I want to know. What are those skills you need for teaching?”

“You’ve got to be a ‘people-holic,’ that is, you’ve got to be a compassionate people person with lots of ‘people smarts.’ But, above all, you’ve got to be a sprite spirit and have a joyous love of living life. A decade ago, I wrote a Random Thought I called ‘To Be A Teacher.’ You can read it on the website where all the RTs are archived. After all these years, if I have a favorite Random Thought among the over 500 out there in cyberspace, it’s that one. Towards the end of it, I wrote my strategy, ‘If you want to be a teacher, make all those marvelous feelings and images an intimate part of you and bring them into the classroom with you and share them.’ That’s why not everyone can be a teacher and why just because you know your discipline you can teach it.”

“I’ve read that you weren’t always this way.”

“Gosh, no. I was once an accomplished scholarly ‘researchoholic’ and ‘publishoholic,’ a lecturing ‘talkoholic, and a ‘testoholic!'”

“When did you change and why?”

“It happened in October, 1991, but is this pertinent to your paper?”

“No, not really. I’m just curious.”

……You know, I’m so lucky and I do humbly appreciate it. I’m so happy. I am so lucky that I found a way of making a living that’s a way of living, a way of authentically doing and being at the same time in the same place. I am doggone lucky.”

“Well, if you’ve already changed, where do you go now?”

“Not ‘already changed,’ but ‘changing,’ that is, evolving to reach my own unique potential as I help each student help himself to reach his or her own. It never stops. My change was not a big-bang event. It’s a process of growth. It’s a journey. Where do I go? I go back into the classroom tomorrow and continue my journey of growing and learning.”

“A teacher learning in the classroom? I thought it was the teacher who teaches.”

“And learns. I invite the energies and talents of each student into my thinking and learn from them. I don’t know it all. Nothing works all the time. Nothing is accepted and applauded by everyone. Nothing always runs smoothly. I’m always trying things out. There are always jolting bumps and potholes in the road. There’s always the unexpected.”

“Doesn’t that pose a problem if you’re not prepared for those problems?”

“Well, I’m prepared for problems to appear, although I don’t know what they might be. But, none of that is the problem.”

“What is?”

“Our attitude. It’s our attitude towards those potholes and bumps, towards the challenging, towards the unexpected, towards the imperfect; it’s our tightly held but largely unexamined beliefs. Do you know what a belief is?”

“I think you’re about to tell me.”

“A belief is an attitude we’ve had for years; it’s an unexamined habit of thinking without thinking about it that we’ve developed over years and which governs our perceptions and actions. So, if I’m going to break my habits and make sure I don’t replace them with others, I’m always examining my attitude and efforts, always learning to unlearn in order to maintain my spiritual focus in the face of resistance and challenge, always seeking to improve a wholesome partnership between life and work, between living and working, between me, the teacher, and me, the person. To do that, I’ve got to keep myself fresh and alert while avoiding the seduction of success and the arrogance of authority. I’ve got to learn to give everything and everyone my full attention. That is emotionally demanding and energy draining. Nevertheless, only then can I do what needs to be done. It’s one thing for me to say I want to help each person help him- or herself become the person he or she is capable of becoming. It’s quite another thing for me to develop the attitude and skills, as well as maintain both the energy and emotional level, necessary to make that happen.”

“So, what does it take to be a teacher?”

“You want a step by step 1,2,3?”

“If you can.”

“I’m not going to make it easy for you because it’s not that easy. Really, I’m not sure I can or want to. I know it is not automatically the result of x number of classes, x gpa, and x degrees, or even x number of years of experience in the classroom. I’m not a five easy steps ‘how to’ guy. I’m not a walking teaching infomercial touting a sure-fire gadget that will make anyone’s teaching perfect with only a mere five minute a day workout. I’m a “I want you to think about” guy. I’m more of a guy who offers a choice, a challenging choice, a constantly and daily work hard at it choice, by showing ‘this is what I do and why I do it.’ Now, this is going to drive the ‘spreadsheeters,’ jargonizers, labelers, categorizers, lovers of ‘ists’ and ‘isms,’ the scholarship of teaching people, the assessors, and those who take comfort in numbers up a wall. Some teachers ‘have it.’ You know ‘it’ when you see it, but you can’t put a handle on it; you can’t put it into words; you can’t identify it or slap a tag on it. It’s both concrete and ethereal, both physical and spiritual, both idealistic and practical as instinct, a ‘touch,’ a ‘gift,’ an intuition, a ‘knack.’ It defies calling it something. I’m not sure that ‘it’ has to have a name and that it’s not a waste of time and misleading to conjure one up. It’s so personal that it doesn’t have a prescribed step by step plan. It may not work in another place with another person. And, I’m not sure that is bad as long as you can see it and experience it for yourself. It has something to do with passion, commitment, faith, awareness, belief, empathy, connection, and, yes, love.”

“Why did you say you offer a challenging choice. Why can’t you tell me what it takes to be a teacher?”

“Okay, I’ll tell you what it takes. Teaching is a matter of paying intense attention. Let me go back to ‘To Be A Teacher.’ It ends with these words: ‘If you want to be a teacher, as Carl Jung advised, you have to put aside your formal theories and intellectual constructs and axioms and statistics and charts when you reach out to touch that miracle called the individual human being.”

“Pay attention to what?”

“More to ‘whom’ and your ‘why’ than to ‘what’ and ‘how.’ To the individual human being! To your purpose and meaning. Paying attention to the every-changing and transforming kaleidoscope of the individuals in the classroom, as well as of ourselves. We have to listen to the voices heard and unheard. They’re so different from each other. You know, no two snow flakes are the same; no two sets of finger prints are the same; no two human faces, as Richard Avedon always said, are the same; so, too, no two people are the same. Yet, we so often strip people of their uniqueness and treat them as if they are the same. So, ‘pay attention’ means be keenly aware. Be an intense observer. Remember, that the small details are important. Everything a student feels and does is an integral part of and has an impact on his or her learning and teaching. Everything you do is an integral part of and has an impact on your learning and teaching.”

“How do you do that? There has to be a formula to accomplish that. I mean we have classes to teach us all about that.”

“You still want a string of sure-fire steps. Here are my ways by which I’ve found my way. They may not be sure-fire, but they sure fire me up each day. Each day! Don’t forget that. It’s in the everyday. Listen to the Tao le Ching: You ‘accomplish the great task by a series of small acts.’ The angels are, therefore, in the details. Love and live with the mystery of the unexpected and inexplicable, be flexible, let go of control, lie low, don’t use force or threat, have a clear open mind and heart, let go of limiting labels, let go of preconceptions and expectations, be a resource not the source, be spontaneous, take risks, be prepared to make mistakes, learn from your mistakes, create a supporting and encouraging community, make the most of both your and each student’s imagination and creativity, keep a clear and open mind, practice humility. If you can learn that, it can make a huge difference in how things work out. And, you will make a great difference.”

“I don’t get it. You haven’t said a thing about using technology or testing or evaluations or anything like that.”

“They’re tools, nothing more. We focus on them too much. They’re not miraculous cure-alls. Never were. That’s not to say they’re unimportant. But, you know, just because someone invented the fountain pen doesn’t mean we’re better writers. And, the computer doesn’t mean we’re better connected and communication is faster and clearer, or that standardized testing means we’re more knowledgeable, or evaluations make us better at what we do. All teaching and learning is people teaching and people learning. Teaching is all about people. The ‘people factor’ is critically important. It’s people who decide how to put the tools to use. I’ve seen people use the finest tools to do a lousy job, and even an unethical job. Let me put it another way. We use all sorts of tools to work with all sorts of materials to build a house, but those tools don’t decide whether the work is shoddy or exceptional, and it’s not the tools that makes the house a livable home. No, we have to be ‘people smart,’ not just ‘technological smart.’ Everything you feel, think, and do as a teacher, including whether and how you use those tools at your disposal, derives from the extent to which you respect, appreciate, and love yourself, what you do, and each student.”

“I’m not sure I get it.”

“Think about it for a while and we call me with some follow-up questions if you wish. I’d like to read a copy of the paper you hand in.”

Make it a good day.

–Louis–