Top 10 reasons to be thankful for no big family gatherings

With the pandemic raging, nearly everyone I talk to has greatly modified their Thanksgiving Day plans. Instead of the traditional great extended family gathering, couples and individuals are spending the day by themselves.

While this sounds very sad and very lonely, there are definitely some upsides to skipping the hoards coming to the house. For many years I hosted family holiday dinners for up to 25 people, so I know where of I speak. This year, let's decide to be thankful for the positive things about going small. 

1. Poisoning worries. No worries about being convicted of mass murder after the entire family died of undercooked turkey. 
2. Leftovers are all for you. No watching the rest of the bird, pie, sweet potatoes, etc. escaping in Saran Wrap out the door with departing relatives. More wine left over too.
3. Napping in privacy. No audience for your snoring and drooling after you nod off on the couch after the big meal.
4. No cleaning house. No need to deep clean the entire house so people get the idea you always have a clean house. Oh, and then cleaning it again after everyone leaves.
5. No weird vegetable casseroles. There's always a vegan cousin who brings a strange dish which everyone must sample. 
6. No pinched fingers from having to put in the leaves of the dining room table. Or from hauling chairs up from the basement or setting up card tables.
7. Crazy brother-in-law is absent. You know, the guy with strong (and usually ugly) political views who can't keep them to himself.
8. No need to cheat at cribbage. Nice not to have lessons in humility given by 10-year-olds who are far more skilled at cards and board games than you.
9. No arguments over best way to cook sweet potatoes. Or cranberry sauce or apple pie or stuffing.
10. TV dinners. You can microwave your feast in five minutes and throw away the dish.

OK, I really do miss these big gatherings. (The lump in my throat kept getting bigger the longer I was writing this list.) Someday when my grandchildren have children I may experience such feasts again.

But I don't want to have to be in charge. 

BFTP: When to be creative

Our district office building was often full of teachers learning how to teach in a prescribed fashion that suits a particular reading series - something that happens in thousands of districts around the world.

Yet at the same time, these same teachers hear the message from educational reformers that both they and their students need to exercise creativity - that it will be the creative people who, in an economy beset by automation and outsourcing, will thrive.

Teach exactly like this - and be creative.

The question is not whether to go by the book or to try new things, but when to go by the book and when to try new things. In my experience, even the best teaching method, best resources, and best intentions never work with every student. It is for the kid you've told a thousand times and still doesn't get it, as the quote above describes, that you need to get creative, ignoring the best practices and school-supplied texts.

When I am in the dentist's chair, I am reassured knowing the professional who has the power to cause great pain or great pain relief is following recommended procedures. But I also would like to think that the dentist, when it is called for, can find a creative solution to a unique toothy problem. It's not if creativity should be used - but when - when needed.

Don't value creativity for creativity's sake. Value it because it can solve problems and create opportunities that standard practices cannot.

Original post 8/17/17

BFTP: Personal, professional, political: the social media quagmire

I have always been, and remain, a reluctant Twitter user.* And lately Twitter is conspiring to make me even less of a fan. Along with other social media forums.

To the extent possible, I have attempted to keep my political, personal, and professional lives somewhat separate on social media. Reading blogs and Twitter satisfied my FOMO by linking me to the best thinkers and newest publications in education and technology. Facebook let me keep up with friends and relatives, providing as well an endless supply of wit, humor. and mindless trivia. And well, those old fashioned things called newspaper and magazines, both online and in print, were my source of reasoned political opinion from both the left and the right.

While there has always been some overlap in social media, I felt I had been able to keep communication spheres somewhat distinct. But the lines over the past few years have blurred.

Politics has wedged its way into both my personal and professional communication arenas. While education has always had a political element (I was the state school library organization's legislative chair for many years), tweets and posts have become more about national politics in general. Friends and relatives now share more political diatribes, satire, and outrage than they do photos of entrees and grandchildren. Just how sad is that? And our mainstream media has become more overtly polarized as well.

It is the satire and outrage that I find most distressing. Both sides of the political spectrum have been sinking to ever lower levels of communication. Do I really need to see one more Photoshopped version of President Trump as a pumpkin? Do I need to see any more posters that question the intelligence of mask wearing (pro or con)? I really wish the level of our political discourse would rise to the level of polite debate rather than hurled insults with all the depth of a bumper sticker.

Perhaps the spaces between personal, political, and professional spheres of communication have always been an illusion. And maybe I am the only person who needs the occasional respite from the loudly banging drums and blaring trumpets of political screed. Or maybe I am too far into geezerdom to "get" social media.

But thank you my friends and colleagues for keeping politics from your tweets and posts to the extent your conscience allows. 

* Discussion via bumper sticker, The 140 character discussion, Poster Power on Twitter, 10 useful Twitter alerts, I killed my Twitter account, etc.

Original post 8/21/17