What an incredible first day of school! I'm so excited that I will get to teach many of my students again in a different capacity and I'm eager to get to know all of the students that I did not meet last year. While I love my summer vacation, I have to admit that I could not wait to get started and learn with you all! Please become familiar with this site because you are the very-soon-to-be-coauthors of it! I am attaching this video because Clint Smith has a much more powerful way of explaining the value and importance of your voice which I look forward to hearing (or reading) regularly this year. I look forward to working with you all and have a wonderful weekend! "Ain't no envelopes to open, I just do it cuz I'm s'posed ta!" TROPHIES -Drake These are the words of Howard Zinn on the homepage of The Zinn Education Project website: "I can UNDERSTAND pessimism, but I don't BELIEVE in it. It's not simply a matter of faith, but of historical EVIDENCE. Not overwhelming evidence, just enough to give HOPE, because for hope we don't need certainty, only POSSIBILITY."
It is indeed the possibilities that drive me. The possibility that my students might become more confident learners; that they might consider the perspectives of others; that they will critique...respectfully; that they will challenge injustice; that they will smile at a classmate they don't know; that they will advocate for someone who cannot advocate for themself; that they will empathize with people who are different from themselves; that they will welcome mistakes; that they see failure as an opportunity; that they will challenge themselves to be better than they were the day before; that they will find balance when so much is expected. And so in these very last hours of summer before PD starts early tomorrow morning, I raise my plastic tumbler of ice water and salute my fellow educators who love to teach and learn: "here's to the possibilities!" Not to the flag. I choose not to recite that pledge (that is a topic for another post), but I do pledge allegiance to my students and to learning. Allegiance. A noun that means, according to the New Oxford American Dictionary application on my Mac, loyalty or commitment of a subordinate to a superior or of an individual to a group or cause. I am an individual. My loyalty is to a group: my students. I am committed to a cause: providing the absolute best educational experience that I can to every single student that I am entrusted to teach and mentor, and I LOVE what I do!
I have never blogged before, my friends, and so this is kind of scary for me....very scary in fact. I am blogging because I wish to share my challenge with you and I solicit your critical feedback. I want to model risk-taking for my students and I want them to see that I am part of this learning process with them. John Dewey said that "if we teach today's students as we taught yesterday's, we rob them of tomorrow." I am not a robber. And so I pledge allegiance to my students, and to teaching them how to be learners and thoughtful contributors today and tomorrow. This school year, I am challenging myself to allow that my students own their learning, inspired by the ideas and processes put forth in Alan November's book Who Owns the Learning? Preparing Students for Success in the Digital Age. He was the keynote speaker yesterday at the Regional Achievement Center's 2014 Summer Conference and as he spoke, my colleagues and I resolutely scribbled notes determined not to miss a single strategy nor resource that could transform learning for our young scholars. Strategies and resources that give ownership back to our students and that may even have them proclaim (perhaps secretly at first) that they like school. There is the possibility that I may fail (never a good-enough reason not to challenge myself because my students are too important) but I will not give it up. This is my challenge, this is my blog, and this will be my way of modeling perseverance, grit, and my allegiance to learning. |
AuthorI am Kiina Dordoni and I love teaching and learning! This year I am transitioning to the Social Studies after teaching Spanish for six years. This is my first time blogging and I am hoping to (1) make this a useful resource and communication tool for my students and their families; and (2) have my students actively participate in and contribute to the global learning community. Archives
November 2014
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