#reflective practitioner

My team leader decided we should have a surprise party on the last day of school for a guy who has been here this school year for college purposes and as such will be gone after this year. I'm kind of hoping they're secretly planning something to acknowledge me as well as I, too, will be gone after this school year.

When I started here (in October) I thought I was only going to be here for a month. Looking back, I would have done things so much differently during that month if I knew I was going to be here all the way to the end of the school year.

Mostly, I didn't spend nearly enough time building rapport as I needed to at the beginning. I tried to be as much like the regular teacher as possible and keep them from losing too much of the curriculum. If I had known, I would have been myself and worked on my own curriculum much sooner. Both rapport and respect came much more easily when I was able to be myself and take charge of my own unit planning.

Thank you. That makes me feel good. Because I could just delete and block and ignore those antis, but I guess I have not ENTIRELY given up on fandom. I’m still trying to make the fandom that I want to be in and because of that, I am handling my antis and trolls transparently, so you, the other people who are struggling with negativity, will see what I do and how I do it, and that you DO have a choice.

You do not HAVE accept shipwars or fanwars or constant negative criticism on your favorite show and characters as WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A FAN.

I have been a weirdo my whole life. I was born this way. There was no way I could be like everyone around me because I just WASN’T like everyone else. I was the wrong color, no matter what people I was with, I was the wrong religion, my family were hippies and artists, and that was just weird everywhere, i was too country for the city and too city for the country. I was too intellectual for where I was born and too low class for where I went to school. 

Because there was no way for me to fit in and be like everyone else, I decided, oh well, I guess I just gotta be me, because there’s nothing wrong with being me. When something seems wrong to me, I work to change it or remove myself from the situation. I don’t accept the community’s dictates as the only way to be, because I often just am by nature not like that. And I did nothing wrong being born different, so they must be wrong about it being the only way to be.

I’m relatively new to fandom, but I have been in MULTIPLE communities based around shared interests, AND IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY. Fandom seems to be modeled after Mean Girls. On the VILLAINS of Mean Girls. 

We even had a burn book in this fandom. Seriously. Bitch made a burn book. And people defended her and supported her and hid her while spreading hate. Okay. Let it go. Clearly I’m still pissed about gossip*grounder.

Anyway. My point is that the way fandom is now is NOT the only way to be a fan. And I don’t like it. So I’m going to be a fan in a DIFFERENT way.

I know I talk about the wank too much and it bugs me, but I need to SHOW you that we don’t have to be this way. And I need to break it down so you guys can see that fandom culture is not the nature of being a fan, but just how it has developed recently. You know I analyze stories, that it’s a function of being a geek and teacher, but you should know that I also analyze culture and I analyze communities, because as a teacher I was what they call a “reflective practitioner” which means that as I was teaching, I evaluated my effectiveness as a teacher and how my students responded and I would adjust my behavior according to the needs of the class. Now I’m not a teacher here, but I am evaluating my community to see how it’s working and if I can change to make my community work better. So that’s what I’m doing. 

Some of my prints I feel are standalone good things, image printed on just one side, I don't want them to be bound or folded, I don't think. Note to self: A print doesn't have to become a traditional book to make it valid for this project! Today I spent a while rummaging through all the prints I have made and thinking how nice it would be to facilitate a rummage for other people. Reminded of this which I made a while ago:

-Like the meditative experience of folding and unfolding. Like playing with the paper.

-Like the idea of decisive-seeming yet arbitrary folds- I'm just making it up.

-Like the sculptural form the paper takes when it's been folded and when it is then unfolded - it has been manipulated and can't return to its former flat state.

The complexity and difficulty of reflection, notably the reflection on self, in addition to reflection on others, of the reflective practitioner in corporate life is illuminated by Loot in his work, Picturesque.

Picturesque Neutrally coloured, average sized and painfully demure. Face etched with lines drawn with a hard edged scale rule. So awkward in others company, so unhappy on your own. Contain…

http://themoth.org/posts/stories/lego-crimes

This hilarious story "Lego Crimes" (from "The Moth", go check it out) is an example of 3 powerful powerful lessons:

       1. Micro-worlds:  

In his classic book "The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization", Peter Senge described the value of "micro-worlds" as arena's for corporate executives to experiment with big, scary decisions.  He was mostly referring to computer models and programs which simulate the real world.  The best part of micro-worlds, though is that participants could observe the consequences without feeling the consequences.

Classrooms are micro-worlds in themselves (and this will be a theme on this blog): places where we can experiment with new world orders, economies, roles, rules and more.  In this story, students feel the consequences for their actions in a way that is creative and new and customized to their situation and "world" (classroom).  Imagine if our justice system was more like this!  Which brings me to ... 

(Q for the reader: what would you like to test in a micro-world? Many urban schools practice inter-ethnic and inter-cultural peace without realizing it ... perhaps a icro model for world peace?)

       2. Improvisation

The universal practice of improvising is commonly defined: "making something out of nothing".  The Brave New Workshop believes improvisation can "increase learning, innovation, leadership, creativity and productivity".  In fact, they travel and teach this to CEOs and business professionals worldwide. 

Why do these executives demand "improv" training?  Because  of something many teachers know: it works.  Working with people means you are forced to be either a good improviser or mediocre (bad) at what you do.  The most meaningful learning in my school-age came from teachers who adapted their curriculum or teaching to meet my learning needs.  

(Q for the reader: When was a time you had to improvise in your personal or professional life?)

       3. Story-telling

I rarely meet a teacher who can resist telling a great story when I ask "tell me about your students ... any interesting things happening in the classroom?"  Teachers are natural story-tellers.  In fact, story-telling is probably one of our most instinctual forms of teaching. 

Literacy is a relatively new thing in human history - especially at today's rates.  It used to be that lessons and achievement happend from stories.  The modern trend of being a reflective practitioner rests on this notion that reliving our own stories and experiences, and those of others, can make us stronger.  And the quicker we do it successfully, the quicker we can move forward in new ways to greater levels of success no matter the subject or setting.