It's Cold Inside

I had this thought today: "I hope I don't die just before Christmas". Crazy as it sounds, my year has been a bit rough and my health concerns have made me paranoid about every racing pulse or short breath. But when I thought this to myself, I actually wasn't overly concerned about dying just about dying this close to Christmas.

It was a cruel thought, particularly as a mere 6 days ago and 11 days before Christmas, 27 people, 20 of them children, were gunned down and killed in Newtown, Connecticut. The week before, a friend's sister had committed suicide. I know with certainty and without googling it that millions of people are suffering or dying in some sort of fashion regardless of the advent of December 25th. Of course, suffering or dying does not limit itself to calendar holidays, be they religious, secular, or silly. What are held fast to that digital or paper calendar, perhaps even one magnetized to your fridge, are the cultural and familial traditions that bind us to the rituals, emotions, and expectations of  this particular "holy day".

Grief and loss can be unbearable in any context and fraught with private and painful reminders and triggers. But grief born at Christmas? A constant, excruciating sensory inundation of reminders - each song, smell, tinsel string a slap. Each year, a grief to be ushered in by early November and marched relentlessly through December in a fierce grip of public celebration, commercialism, and obligation.

When we were 24, my same-aged cousin nearly died. Just before Christmas, however, he came out of a coma, and the family rejoiced and did great goofy happy dances down the hospital halls. My cousin, however, came out of the coma a quadriplegic. He had a year of physiotherapy and suffering ahead of him. (spoiler alert: he has since recovered and is almost his old self) For years, we never understood why he would withdraw around Christmas time. He had lived! He had survived! He had proven all the "experts" wrong!

But, of course, he had lost a great deal too: his independence and mobility, for awhile; his short term memory, for a long time; his youth and innocence, forever. He grieved at Christmas, for his lost self. None of us in the family realized this until he finally stood his ground three Xmases ago and said, "I can't do this anymore". He couldn't fake the frivolity any longer. Christmas made him sadder than sad and none of us had noticed.

I don't need to tell you that Christmas oscillates, that some years it seems crass and others magical; some are twitch-inducing; others, delightful. I don't need to tell you that just as we are conscious of those in financial need at Christmas, we can be equally sensitive to those whose hearts are quietly breaking and re-breaking at every sight, smell, and sound of Christmas cheer, their grief and sadness inextricably and irrevocably linked to this cultural zenith of celebrations.

We can pray our own times come, late in life, on a bright, insignificant Spring day when frosts are slain and flowers begotten. Peace to all.






And, to banish what might be your imposed Christmas soundtrack of grief, there's nothing like a little Van Morrison, Summertime in England. It just is:

Informative and devastating: school lockdown procedure for parents

This was in my inbox this morning and while it may be deemed necessary, I couldn't stomach this line: "These sights have been selected based on their visibility to an intruder". Rest in peace, children and guardians of Sandy Hook.

Good morning SJD parents,

As a follow up to my email earlier this morning, I would like to provide you with information regarding our procedures here at the school should we need to go into a lockdown situation. I am providing this email for information only at the request of our PAC president and am not anticipating any need for an actual lockdown at our school.

You may recall that we had an unconfirmed sighting of a cougar around the school in mid-November. Our school went into an indoor only lockdown so that no child and/or staff member was out on the playground during the school day. This type of lockdown is the least intrusive to our school as the children and staff are able to move freely within the school but not permitted outside. We were able to stay in contact with the conservation officer and Victoria Police throughout the day as to the level of risk to our community, and provided that information to parents on email as well.

Should there be a need to go into a full lockdown of our school, the teachers and students are trained to lock the classroom doors (if not already locked) and move the children to the designated lockdown area of the classroom, music room, library or gym. These areas are identified by a symbol of a lock that is displayed in clear view within the classroom. These sights have been selected based on their visibility to an intruder. The children practice this drill regularly, just as they do fire and earthquake drills. The administration, office staff and custodian have additional duties during a full lockdown drill (e.g. locking our front door, accounting for missing students …). We run our emergency drills from time to time with our police liaison officer in attendance and/or the Victoria Fire Department. We are also required to log our emergency drills with our district Health and Safety Department.

Should we need to go into a lockdown while the children are outside (threat is within the school at the time), we have a protocol to move our students to the nearest available facility which is Central Middle School. Children would go into the gymnasium at Central and parents would be contacted to pick the children up from there.

I hope that this information regarding lockdown procedures reassures you that we have protocol in place to keep your children safe at SJD. Please contact me if you have any questions.

Regards,

Mrs. Teri Wickes

Principal,

Ecole Sir James Douglas School


Ford Pier's haunting and beautiful song: Why On Earth?

Is school out forever? Teachers, students, and the inevitable now of education

Coming soon to an educational institution near you: the innovation revolution*

The school PAC had a presentation on Smart Boards last month. I couldn’t make the meeting but I was certainly curious – my American tweeps have been tweet tweet tweeting about them for almost two years now. I hear they are useful, *engaging*, and de rigeur in this modern age. I’ve never seen one except on Youtube.

There are times I feel the outside world might be whipping circles around our cosy lil’ Victorian town. Everyone else seems tech-light years ahead of our education system. Geez, all last year, our teachers weren’t even filling out report cards.

My #edtech twitter feed freaks me out: pinterest, iBooks, cramberry, audiopuzzler, wibbitz, edmodo, mixbooks, juno, voki, dvolver, gosoapbox, zooburst – no, it’s not a Clingon language- edtech tool choices multiply by the minute.  And you thought Facebook took up too much of your time.

BYOD, BYOT –bring your own device, bring your own tech – these are the #hashtags of the edtech revolution.  This call to arms naturally invites push back.

The push and the push back are usually summed up thus:

PUSH: Students are using technology already and using it better than us teachers; let’s learn it and implement it fast to enhance the educational experience.

The PUSH BACK: Students are already using technology too much and it’s distracting and detracting from the essential information; let’s explore it cautiously and limit it to very specific use.

And if that weren’t enough to put a knot in your pedagogical knickers, students are saying things like this:

“the concept of teaching something verbally, having students take notes, memorize material, and then pass tests on it is simply outdated…I missed nearly all the classes [one]semester. Nobody noticed my absence…there was no discussion and no real reason to stay. After all, the notes were posted on the Moodle website”  

While not exactly yearning for a “flipped classroom” – another 21^st century learning innovation – this sentiment hints at the perceived need for what Juliette LaMontagne calls “models in the margins [that have] effectively disrupted the status quo”  - models that also have educators questioning their own purpose and paradigm shifts that will almost certainly include technology.

But there is a disconnect between the perception and reality of what is actually occurring in a technology-enhanced classroom just as there is a disconnect between what is #edtech trending on Twitter and what is really happening in the majority of educational institutions around the world.  And as we reach what might be, paradoxically, a critical mass in innovation, there is time for REFLECTION:

As I pull out some hairs and grow a few grey ones over how to engage this new crop of learners, all my questions and fears rise to the surface:  How much of the old can we keep? How much of the new has value?  Why does this new paradigm of education feel like shifting sands?  If my students are not even reading but only taking pictures of my boardwork, what is retained in their own memories? Does the lack of remembering mean not learning? And if not retaining and not remembering is part of the new learning, then there remains this inescapable question: what is knowledge?

And if it comes down to “what is knowledge?”, I’m screwed.

*will not be tweeted because it has already happened

Alice Cooper - School's Out .mp3

Found at bee mp3 search engine

Road Pizza

With a certain substitution, the joke goes something like this:

Question: What's the definition of eternity?
Punchline: 4 Victorians at a 4-way stop.

(Ok, so it's supposed to be "blonds", instead of "Victorians" but that's not very nice is it? My poor, sad, blond friends who feel soooooooooo discriminated against...)

Well, if you live here in our wee city, you are probably chortling even a little, particularly if you have observed and cursed at the kajillion 4-way stops that are splattered all over Victoria B.C. and of course, if you are thinking about telling that joke later to a sad, blond friend of yours.

BUT IT'S NOT FUNNY, so STOP CHORTLING. Even if you are not sure what chortling means, stop it now. It's not funny because, every morning, I am now sitting in the passenger seat as my "L"-licensed child drives us to his high school. Did I mention that he is still technically a child and that he also technically has a license to propel our 4000-pound family Ford Focus through the law-breaking-cyclist-jammed, jaywalking-pedestrian-entangled, unsynchronized, 4-way-plagued streets of Victoria? Oh yes, I said it. You've been thinking it. Some of you have been doing it. My question to you: Why do you want to be road pizza?

Once, in Thailand, I'm certain I ate road pizza disguised as,well, something unrecognizable. My BFF and I called it pizza because calling it road kill came too close to acknowledging that yup, it's a rat. Or maybe a small, hairless dog. Whatever it is, it is flat and hanging from a hook at a roadside "eatery". That shack was roadside for a reason and not just because there was lots of foot traffic. But we were hungry.

Victorians, you are one careless step or wheel rotation from being hung from a hook in a Thai roadside shack. Lunching at or lurching off a 4-way stop is not the real problem in our fair city. If only.

No, you charming but seemingly self-entitled Victorians think drivers are paying attention to you as you swoop your cyclist ass into traffic without signalling, shuffle across the road with your ipod on and head down, spring onto (egads!) a crosswalk without even looking at the car that is currently in your path and couldn't stop even if God himself pressed his mighty thumb on the front tire. Guess what? Some of those drivers are 17-year old newbies that are still trying to figure out which pedal is the clutch and how to turn off the back wiper blade. Your Evel Knievel ass? That driver hasn't even thought of you yet, never mind prepared to save you from your solipsistic self. Just how magic do you think these new-fangled cars are?

But it's not just the 17-year olds; driving is HARD and not getting killed or making road pizza generally hinges on everyone else doing what they're supposed to be doing too, plus some luck. And visibility. And dry roads. And. So, you two-legged and two-wheeled citizens; if you're near or on a road, you are just as responsible for your own safety as the 4000-pound Ford Focus hurtling towards you is. If you don't start paying attention - in a contest with a 4000-pound gorilla, my money is on the gorilla.

p.s. This awesome song has very little to do with road pizza and 17-year old drivers. Or does it?



p.p.s. For those of you younger than my old self, this is: Evel Knievel

The Month I almost Died - a texting memoir

#whyareyoufollowingme?

My husband will tell you that I have an unhealthy obsession, which, I suppose, is a bit redundant given the innate nature of obsession but still, this is what he believes.


(aside: do you ever feel that you are the only person on the planet who spots the obvious logic of a situation and yet cannot persuade others to see it your way?)


I call it a pet peeve, not an obsession - I have broached the subject less than 6 times, so it hardly qualifies but I won't quibble (again). It's Twitter.


I love Twitter. I tweet often. I re-tweet. I mention. I follow. I follow back. My pet peeve, and I'm only slightly embarrassed to announce this publicly, is when other tweeps unfollow me. I just don't understand and frankly, you unfollowers, my feelings are a bit hurt.


People use Twitter for a myriad of reasons but for me, Twitter is primarily a professional platform. I am building my "personal learning network" - a.k.a. #PLN - and connecting and sharing with like-minded educators around the world. It's fantastic. I'm not trying to sell tea cosies or porn or get a kajillion followers. I am methodically and conscientiously building my network.


Following someone new on Twitter can be a bit like a blind date, except that you have ALL THEIR PREVIOUS TWEETS TO READ and kind of assess a) what kind of person they are b) what they are interested in and, obviously, c) what they tweet about. If the abc's don't gel with what you're up to on Twitter, don't follow them. It only takes a few minutes to see if you're a match or not. Seems simple to me.


My twitter heart is on my sleeve. So, why, for the love of Pete, do people start following me and then quite unceremoniously unfollow me a few days later?


My photo is front and center. My profile is there for you to read. I have over 2000 tweets you can scan to see what I'm up to. Is the "what you see is what you get" just a little too obvious for you? Did I not surprise you enough? Did you think I would follow you back even though your entire Twitter feed is in Japanese or worse, incredibly boring and irrelevant?


I feel like you're driving me home because I didn't make out with you in the back of the car even though you knew I had a boyfriend. You just wanted another notch in your Twitter belt.


Honestly, I think you're kind of sluttish and well, I have my pride. Go tweet with @suzy745 and think before you follow. I did. 

Oh, Luke Skywalker, where have you been?!

Christmas at the Bramble house brings a brooding cloud of parent shame that is on par with the should-be shame of toddlers-and-tiaras-special-juice parent pushers. There exists in our humble home enough lego to build a second summer home in the Hamptons or, at least, Lake Cowichan - enough for a wrap-around deck and extendo-dock. The collection hit the ground running with #1 and then over the last decade and with child #2 gathered enough momentum to be the natural disaster plot in a Will Smith doomsday flick.

So, it was with some happiness coupled with deep embarrassment that I announce two new babies in the Bramble-lego-brick household: the adorable "Alien Conquest" and its collectible twin "Indiana Jones". Merry Christmas 2011.


And so begins the great clean-up of 2012, for, in order to make room for these enormous new sets, one must reorganize and as I like to say - redistribute (to the neighbours, to charity, to the recycle bin). This past Saturday, as I shuffled and lugged and carted, I rediscovered the joy of rediscovering.


Every baby and child-rearing book touts the power and simplicity of the "put away for a rainy day" toy strategy. But not having read such books since, well, I was pregnant, I guess it had slipped my mind.


You see, my children are spoiled rotten. Like budding hoarders, they are mostly unaware of all the cool stuff they already have. But with a little bait-and-switch, suddenly they are looking at Luke Skywalker as if they had never held his little plastic body in their sweaty, greasy hands or as if they had never snapped his blond hair off and replaced it with Harry Potter's...or Hermione's. They'll be mesmerized anew. For at least 20 minutes.


So, my fellow long-suffering-long-guilty parents, I recommend doing the ol' switcheroo every few months - shuffle a few books, move the playmobil upstairs, and bring the puzzles out of the closet. It'll be like Christmas without well, the Christmas. 


p.s. My 16-year old is going to kill me for lumping him in with his little brother but replace "Luke" with "Winston" and it's all the same.