Thoughts, links & ideas from the 2008 National Teacher of the Year

Each time I've taken off in a plane since May (which is a lot), I've been writing in my journal, then adding these journal entries on this blog.

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(Note: the blue posted dates are actually the dates I wrote the journal entries, not when I posted them online.)

Saturday, June 7, 2008

Clifford's house

Salt Lake City, UT

Yesterday was my first time on a "National Advisory Council".  It was at Clifford the Big Red Dog's house.  (Scholastic headquarters in NYC.)  It went well, and people were pretty darn enthusiastic and grateful for my presentation.  They said that oftentimes Teachers-of-the-Year talk about the importance of teachers and tell some cute stories about kids.

But my presentation was a bit different, they said, and they were pretty stoked about it.  Francoise even told me that it gave her a stomach ache from laughing.  That's a nice compliment.  Ernie Fleishman (VP) said I didn't need to say a word about the value of great teachers, I just demonstrated it.  I had a number of people ask if they could be in my classroom for science, which is also a nice compliment.  But I think they'd have a hard time getting dates in middle school.

Anyways, I think I'll keep pushing a bit and hope to affect some change.  Or at least get people thinking about the bigger issues.  I guess that's kind of a teacher's job, eh?

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