Well, it's here again. This marks the fourth year that I have taken on the task of writing a blogpost a day from today until Christmas Eve (to put this in perspective, I have written 13 posts so far this year). Appropriately, I am nested in a Starbucks chair before work (with my red cup), trying to use a mixture of caffeine and white noise to get me started.
First to updates. I have come to acknowledge openly this year something that I have long known but have been unwilling to state (no, it is not that I am a woman trapped in a man's body). I enjoy traveling and giving speeches and workshops more than anything else I have done in my professional career, and while I continue to find satisfaction in my job, I don't think that would continue long without these other opportunities. This realization has caused a shift in my approach from watching opportunities happen to working to make them happen. I spoke in more places last year than ever before, and I will work to make next year continue this trend. It makes me uncomfortable to offer myself, rather than waiting to be asked (and asking for appropriate fees is hell, “I'll do it for free, just want me!'), but I believe I have something valuable to offer, and this is the best outlet to do it.
Tying to this, I have also acknowledged that I MUST write a book. I have had a couple of articles published this year, and it is a great feeling, but I need to get some core ideas down on which I can scaffold my future talks. I also frankly need the legitimacy that a publication brings for my speaking gigs. I have no idea how I'm going to do this, as the long suffering readers of this blog have endured, but it has to be done. If anyone has suggestions, please let me know.
But enough of that, I wanted this first post to focus on the reader of this blog and these twenty-four doors of the Advent calendar. When talking about this blog recently, and bemoaning a bit that there are not more readers, I was asked, “Who is your audience?” My first reaction, of course was to say, “Well, me,” but it did get me thinking about who is, and who I want to be on the other end of this line.
Obviously this blog is for educators. There has never been a more challenging time in education, when so many assumptions are challenged and so many bad ideas are circulated. The term I use is “messy.” We won't have clear direction, and we will make many well-intentioned mistakes as we build the new city of learning. However, this messiness should not dissuade us from trying, for the alternative is fossilizing. I know what we have been doing will not work (and is not working), but I also know that we can't yet clearly see where we are going (that's why this blog is subtitled “Courageous Education for Frightening Times). I put forward innovations, challenges, and opportunities not as a guru on top of a mountain, but as a sometimes inept climber who looks ahead and asks, “Hmmm, what are we going to do about that?” I hope that educators who read these posts can find seed for their own ideas to grow and that these ideas would spur challenging (but respectful) conversation on the blog and elsewhere. If you like what you read here, please invite others to “join the conversation” (ugh).
Broader than this, however, I am speaking to everyone who is intrigued and confused, excited and troubled by the quickly changing world. I don't think that education is a separate world, rather a microcosm of the changes, challenges, and opportunities we are finding everywhere. How one leads, how one learns, and how one copes as the landscape shifts is what this blog tries to be about.
Finally, these twenty-four posts are about the coming of Christmas and a season that brings an intensity and complexity of emotions unlike any other. The songs and stories, the images and decorations, the nostalgia and hope, these all tumble in a life and death struggle of mistletoe and holly. As I share my experiences and memories, I invite you to do the same.
So off we go…laughing all the way!
As always, I welcome your comments
Image: https://www.flickr.com/photos/aliedwards/1922495869
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