Adventures in Administration

I have been thinking a lot lately about teaching and learning.  We have had lots of Professional Learning over the last several years designed to bring our teachers "up to speed" on the current ideas being talked about and implemented in classrooms around the country (and around the world).  Topics like Project Based Learning ,   Design Thinking , Flex Furniture, the purpose of homework, how to maximize Google, and many others have been tackled by our staff.  however, it is Design Thinking that is most on my mind these days.  I am enamored with the approach and find that it is a logical sequence to follow for problem solving.  Our location, being only 13 miles from Stanford University, means that Design Thinking is becoming more and more main stream in schools and businesses,  Yet for some reason, I can't get our faculty to embrace this approach whole-heartedly.  Why?  Is it a case of initiative burn-out? Do we need more training?  Shou...

Photo Credit People reflect and write a lot about how much they love their #PLN.   You can set up an IFTTT  recipe to thank new followers on Twitter, the hashtag #FF is a popular tag on Fridays to recognize people you respect and want to acknowledge publicly for great contributions to your learning, and Twitter provides analytics that allow you to review and track reach and followers.  All of this is great.  And I know many people who are as data-driven in their personal lives as they are professionally.  In this day of social media, if you want to grow in any field, you have to put yourself "out there".  I understand that, and honestly, I work at it in spurts.  There are many a night when you can find me marveling at the Google analytics for my blog.  Hey, who doesn't like to see a new country pop up on your map of readership? But reach and data are not what I want to write about.  For me, my #PLN has become something much more persona...

Well,  @teachthought is at it again.  Another blogging challenge, and keeping with the "theme" of November, it is all about gratitude.  This month has been pretty crazy for me so here I am on the evening of November 12, almost half-way through the month, and I am finally getting to enter a post.  Our prompt for Day 12 is: Share a photo--or photos--of things/people you are grateful for.  Well, how lucky am I to enter the challenge on picture day?!  I have to say, I have much to be grateful for (as we all do). The family... At the top of my list is my family: without their constant love and support there is no way that I could do the job that I do.  Not that I am "great", I have much to learn.  However, my husband makes sure that I have the time I need to spend at work and willingly steps in to care for our son--even when our son wants NOTHING to do with dad.  It is tough to be an Administrator.  Not having to worry about my family ...