The Game of Education

One my favorite childhood memories that I retained from spending time with my grandparents was an early introduction to the "Game of Life". I am not speaking in some mysterious metaphor; I actually am referring to the Milton Bradley produced board game "Life". Along with numerous other board games, my grandparents possessed a version of this game, and it was the first one of its kind that I ever saw. Its contents we're appealing: a wheel to spin, convertible cars, peg people (blue and pink), cards of chance, stacks of money, and a 3-dimensional board with mountains, colors, pictures, and a twisted, winding path to follow from beginning to the end. In a pre-digital gaming era, it was a feast for the eyes and mind with all it had to offer.

I spent many hours playing this game, probably achieving every conceivable end-scenario possible. Despite the enjoyment it provided, I was always left with one nagging problem: no matter how much thinking you put into playing this game the outcome hinged heavily on a helping of luck to achieve the outcome you sought. A spin of the wheel, a draw of a card, an opponent's good fortune, each of these possibilities could dramatically alter the end result and each of them were based solely on the basis of luck.

That led my youthful, impressionable mind to a simple question: Is this what life is really all about?

I could not accept that so much of the future, the navigation of the winding road to the finish, could be tied to the concept of luck.

In my adult "life", I spend so much of my time in a school. I teach and I coach. I cannot escape the nearly daily interaction with education. And the more time that I spend in this educational environment, the more that I am convinced of the brilliance of this simple board. It really is all about the spin of the wheel or the pick of a card.

Despite a host of factors that might unduly influence a student's academic performance, regardless of the amount of effort (how great or how little) a student puts forth, it all comes down to chance. Did you need to spin a "7" to pass your math class? I'm sorry -- you spun a "3". It really is too bad you failed that last test, but we are moving on because "I" have material to cover. Your last essay wasn't quite up to passing standards? I really am sorry about that 54%, but you did pick a "no revision allowed" card on your last turn and "I" really do have to move on to the next novel...

Should the principles that guide the instruction of our future really be grounded in a parlor game first issued in 1860?

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Tis the Season

If you are in the Columbus Area, turn your radio dial to 93.3. That is right. Your ears are not deceiving you.

It is that time of year again.

Perhaps it is that one of my favorite holiday characters is green. Or that I have always wanted a dog named Max. Or that on more that one occasion I have been referred to as a Grinch. I really am sorry, but I have a hard time accepting that this tinsel-laden assault comes earlier and earlier each year.

Case in point: A few weeks ago, I took my youngest daughter with me to Home Depot in the hopes of purchasing a cordless driver/drill to begin the process of hanging cabinets in the tack of my barn. Horses need closets too. Our visit to this retail giant was cut abruptly short on account of the fact that the Mickey and Minnie Mouse Mrs. and Mr. Clause display blow up lighted holiday decoration that is larger than my SUV was no longer in Emma's sight. As we turned down the aisle to compare products prior to purchase, she was unable to gaze at this overbearing reminder of the fast-approaching holiday season.

Clearly, this lead to a meltdown. I do not handle meltdowns well, whether they are my own or one of my offspring. Thus, we quickly left the store.

I had wiped this unpleasant experience from my mind until a week ago when I was abruptly reminded of my introduction to the 2011 holiday experience with the grating notes of "Feliz Navidad" stabbing my brain driving down I-270 one evening. Suddenly, my brain was addled by images of flashing lights, chimes, bells, wrapping paper, crowds, hustle, bustle, silver bells, pretty paper, pretty ribbons and on and on and on...

Yes, Bing, I'm dreaming of a white Christmas. Sadly, it's just not like the ones you used to know.

This I Believe

I spent a large portion of my youth watching my grandmother die. Whether I knew it at the time or not, this was true. I was born in 1977. Sometime in the late 1970s, she had been diagnosed with lymphoma, a specific type of cancer that attacks the lymphatic cells of the immune system. And while certain lymphomas are treatable, others are not. Some are entirely progressive and reach beyond the lymph nodes to other portions of the body, including organs, the bones and the bloodstream. Ravaging the immune system apparently is not enough. This type was my grandmother’s cancer – the one that she fought for the seventeen years that I knew her.

Anyone who has experienced cancer, either directly or indirectly, understands that there are ebbs and flows. Some days are good. Life continues as close to normal as can be expected. Then, there are the others that become stunning reminders, just in case one forgets, that cancer can be crippling and capable of draining the life right out of the living. I distinctly remember one of those more difficult times near the end of my grandmother’s life. It was in the fall of 1994.

Relegated to extended hospital stays, visiting my grandmother became one of life’s weekly routines. Frequent trips to the hospital to lift her spirits and monitor any progress were common. I remember standing in the hallway with my father, just outside his mother’s room, watching the final seconds of the Colorado-Michigan game in late September. When Kordell Sterwart flung a football nearly 70 yards in the air to find it land in the open arms of a Colorado receiver in the end zone, the “Miracle at Michigan” was made. Uproarious shouting in the halls of the ICU hardly seemed appropriate, and it was quite difficult for two Ohio State fans to suppress our joy at the misfortune of the Wolverines. But we tempered our glee. There was to be no “Miracle at Mount Carmel”.

It was less than a month later that I remember standing in the very same hall ready to walk into her room for another visit. You see, in addition to many other similarities, we both shared October as a birthday month and the time had come to “celebrate” our days. There were the customary hugs and the trivial small talk about how everyone was doing. That moved quickly to an exchange of cards and birthday wishes. You can imagine my surprise when I opened up my birthday card and a check made out to me in the amount of $10,000 fell gently into my hand. I had never held that much money in my life. I remember standing at the foot of the hospital bed and gazing down at her vanishing frame in astonished wonder. As I looked back down at the check, she replied, “I always have known that you wanted to go school there. Maybe this will help.” It was hard to hide the tears in my eyes looking back at her from underneath a worn, navy blue baseball cap stitched with a gold, interlocking “ND”.

My grandmother watched over me from my birth until her final days. She doted on my successes, praised my progress, and kept an eye on my academic exploits with the keenness of a hawk in flight. As a child of the depression who married young, there was little opportunity for her to explore her intellectual potential beyond graduating from high school. As farmer’s wife, she fulfilled her duties and obligations set forth by the life she chose. Yet, she read voraciously, studied medical journals as if she were a practicing physician and never missed the chance to teach me something in the hours I spent under her care. I often thought that she longed to be a teacher. There was always a certain wistfulness in her words when she commented on a few of her contemporaries who fashioned careers as educators. Looking back, I wonder now if in some way she was able to live vicariously through me.

My grandmother died in December of 1994, just before the holidays. It had been a long battle and one that she no longer had the energy to sustain. She knew that it was my dream to attend the University of Notre Dame. There is a selfish part of me that is relieved to know that she was not here to discover I hadn’t been accepted – I wouldn’t be fulfilling that life-long dream. Nevertheless, I believe in the power of dreams.

Dreams are curious things. They sometimes come to us when we are unaware and plant seeds of thought in our fertile minds. Occasionally, these seeds grow and blossom into beautiful visions that we spend days, months, years, even lifetimes chasing. Had I not chased mine, I would never have wound up walking into a classroom each day with the chance to plant some seeds all the while thinking about my grandmother. This I believe.

Nothing

I think that my title says it all.

I really have nothing to say.

I tried. But I keep coming up with the same thing -- nothing.

Instead, I think I will just listen...

When would be a good time for you?

One of the things that I am beginning to notice about my family, my friends, my peers, and my colleagues is that they are becoming quite needy. It seems to me (and my perspective could be somewhat skewed) that the people in my life feel compelled to ask for my input, assistance, thoughts, feedback, or any other want/need at an ever increasing rate. I don't mind lending a helping hand. If I am able to assist you in some way, then I feel compelled by some weird sort of cosmic force (that I don't really completely understand and never will) to provide that help.

Here is the problem: they need that assistance -- right now.

Actually, if you could have done this five minutes ago, well that would be even better. The growing impatience that seems to be affecting our society as a whole has not missed my social circles. In fact, I believe that it has poisoned them to the point of no return. My great fear is that I will no longer be able to meet everyone's needs because I am drowning in these requests that demand immediate attention. I have already forgotten about what I need -- there is no time for that.

To be a jack-of-all-trades suggests that you would be a master of none. Although you would never master one trade, you could at least be able to help many in some way. Being something to everyone is a nice concept in theory, but painfully exhausting in execution.

This is why I have resolved from this moment forward to adopt a new mantra. I will faithfully try to live my life guided by this wise maxim:

"I cannot be something to everyone, but I certainly can be nothing to everybody."

Sure seems a lot less involved. And I can start on that right now...


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Caveat emptor

A funny thing happened to me this morning -- I became involved in a customer service dispute without even knowing it.

You see, I, in fact, was the product. My wife the purchaser. What she failed to realize is that what she purchased over 9 years ago was not actually what she intended to purchase. Instead, she fell victim, as many of us do, to clever marketing ploys and fancy packaging. And like all products tend to do, they become somewhat less effective with age.

Unknowingly, our four year old daughter, Sarah, triggered a mechanism in the door frame of my wife's Honda CRV that amazingly rendered the door completely inoperable. The darn thing just wouldn't shut. Being outside of running distance to my garage, I listened, with great impatience, to her explain the situation as I digested the details. My mind quickly developed a number of suitable solutions:

1. Attach your sub-plans to an email explaining why you won't be coming into teach today, put your pajamas back on, and enjoy some morning cartoons while eating cereal with the girls.
2. Take some twine off one of the thousand of hay bales located in our barn and tie the door shut.
3. Accept the fact that it was not the driver side door or either of the two rear doors and proceed to your destination knowing that both you and the children are strapped safely in the vehicle. (It's not like we are in England and driving on the other side of the street. If the door flew open, just avoid the nearest mailboxes)
4. Saddle up the 1986 Ford F-250 in the barn. Strap the children in and hope there is enough brake fluid left to make it to school and back.
5. Worst case scenario: Fire up the 1967 John Deere 2020, affix the haywagon, and give the kids a ride to the sitter's house they won't soon forget. (that bad boy really hauls ass in 8th gear)

While all these options seemed plausible to me, my better judgement forced me to forgo offering any of these pearls of wisdom. I continued to listen and occasionally respond to her inquires with edgy, short, and perturbed remarks that heightened my wife's disdain, both for the situation and me, with each passing moment.

Facing such calamity, she called my cell phone in the hope that I would be able to provide a sense of serenity. A calm surrounding the vortex of crisis that she was momentarily stuck in. What she found instead was actually an accelerant, something to fan the flames rather than put out the fire.

People should come with personality disclosure forms, much like one finds for property when purchasing a house.

Let the buyer beware.

Happy Birthday to Me

I sincerely want to extend my gratitude to all of my friends and family for providing me with such warm birthday wishes and acknowledging me on my birthday. I really appreciate it.

Now that is over with, I would like to take a moment to say how I feel about birthdays...

As you get older, birthdays become increasingly more depressing. They serve as yearly reminder, an anniversary signifying that you are twelve months closer to death. The fanfare is gone. The colors, the excitement, the balloons, the cake, the wrapping paper, the candles. Done. Over. Once you hit your mid-teens, it is all for naught. Of course, this is with a few glaring exceptions.

• Your 18th birthday: A general sense of excitement and anticipation is readily felt on this momentous day. You are finally legally an adult. You can finally be tried, convicted, and place in a smallish, gray box with someone named "Spike" for the crimes you have committed.
• Your 21st birthday: You are now legally able to imbibe the fruits of the vine. Too bad you probably won't remember it.
• Your 30th birthday: A celebration that you are no longer in your twenties. The self-absorption that you once wore like your favorite pair of jeans must be finally tossed aside. Time to pull on those chinos and don those loafers.
• Your 50th birthday: A birthday with colors shrouded in habiliments the of the grave. The apex of the hill has been reached and there is nowhere to go but down

Perhaps my feelings stem from the fact that I share a birthday month with my oldest daughter. Sarah, who just recently turned four, spent a wonderful day in the autumnal sun with family, friends, and a two-story bounce house that took up the better part of my backyard. To say that she was excited, would be putting it mildly.

I think she finds it strange that when my birthday approaches, just over a week after hers, that I don't meet it head-on with the same zest and enthusiasm.

Ah, the innocence of youth. I should let enjoy her birthday for a few more years. I'll wait until next year to tell her about Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy...

Leeches

I will be honest. I am becoming somewhat disenchanted with people taking advantage of me. In fact, it's seems to be increasing at a relatively alarming rate.

For example, I typically buy coffee to take with me into the workplace. Likewise, my collaborative partner also will purchase coffee to bring with her on a weekly basis. We will typically consume about two cups of coffee each for a total of four daily. The pot that holds our freshly made dark roast java usually contains about six cups of coffee. Two pots a day would yield twelve cups. 12 - 4 = 8.

I wonder where the other eight cups go...

I have a few ideas.

My father once told me the story of a itinerant farm hand who frequented their home each summer in the hope of finding gainful employment. While he was a hard worker, this farmhand had a troubling habit -- he would perpetually bum tobacco of the other workers and never repay his debt. One day, he asked a co-worker if he could "bum a chew" from him as they were riding out the field on a wagon. The man replied sure, stood up, opened his pouch of tobacco, urinated into it, and handed it to the beggar. He noted "that's how I keep it moist..."

The wanderer never bummed a chew again.

I sure would hate to have to start peeing in the coffee can...

What about me?

It could be the fact that I was an only child that contributes to this overwhelming sense of self-importance that I tend to place on myself.

Or it could be that each day I am constantly reminded, in a number of different ways, that I just really am not significant.

Of course I'm really not talking about myself as an individual. Rather, what I am referring to is this suffocating sense that I have developed in my working life that everyone's stuff is way more important than my stuff. I have a hard time accepting this. I don't think my demands are that unrealistic. I want to believe that there is as much importance in what I do for my students in class as what others do for theirs. Yet, it is that constant, stinging reminder that I might not be just as important as I think...

This experience tends to demonstrate a microcosm of a much greater societal issue -- we all live in our own bubble and that bubble is becoming increasingly smaller at a rapid rate. For most of us, we are caught in a tangled web of technology that has provided us with an invisible digital barrier bound by the fibers of Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and other forms of social interaction. What a tangled web we weave. How I long for the 20th century. The email inbox that once confounded us by demanding our attention with a little "ding" is now just readily accepted as something that must be done frequently, daily. Like bathing.

We have lost ourselves in the digital personas that we have carefully constructed by adding our friends, commenting to others, sharing our accomplishments and the like. These high intensity technological demands we have placed on ourselves, both as a society and as individuals, has led the decay of empathy. We are no longer able to relate to each other, in spite of being closer than ever.

So I will try not to take it personally. I will continue to consider the needs and demands of others doing what I can to make sure that we can both co-exist peacefully. I will work, learn, and live each day hoping that someday we will all seem to be aware of what each of us is doing, place value on it, and respect it for what it is.

Positively Annoying

I am not the most ebullient person you will ever meet.  In fact, some might go as far as to say that I am a bit "glass half-empty".

I like to think that the glass simply had a hole in it.

Yet it remains to be seen (by me) why so many people strive so hard to remain positive on a daily basis.  War. Escalating fuel prices.  Escalating food prices.  The dismal state of our economy.  Political division and unrest.  The list goes on and on.  With so many reasons to be negative, think of the energy that one would have to expend to stay afloat in this sea of positivity.  Our culture is lazy.  No one is going to argue with that.  We have spent the better part of the 20th century developing technologies that will ensure the completeness of our laziness, resulting in the demise of our culture, our way of life, and ultimately our country.

Why then would we exhaust so much energy in "keeping on the sunny side of life"?  

Because we have always held on to the hope that what is through the looking glass is better than what we see in the mirror.

Excuse me, I have to go fill up my glass again.