Oh, to live simply a/k/a How to be happy when a bird totals your jet plane
As I sit here in the Atlanta Airport awaiting my flight after a most disastrous day, I ponder this amazing poem.
I Taught Myself To Live Simply by Anna AkhmatovaI taught myself to live simply and wisely,to look at the sky and pray to God,
and to wander long before evening
to tire my superfluous worries.
When the burdocks rustle in the ravine
and the yellow-red rowanberry cluster droops
I compose happy verses
about life’s decay, decay and beauty.
I come back. The fluffy cat
licks my palm, purrs so sweetly
and the fire flares bright
on the saw-mill turret by the lake.
Only the cry of a stork landing on the roof
occasionally breaks the silence.
If you knock on my door
I may not even hear.
Oh, to be simple in life and eloquent in speech!
Today, a bird flew into the engine of my airplane destined for Atlanta and totaled the plane. Literally. Then, with all planes grounded out of Atlanta, I took the only road that would get me to St. Louis in time for the workshop tomorrow… I drove.
As Providence would have it, I had three amazing people who rode with me, including Roni, the woman responsible for the Ed Tech Leadership program at Albany State University, of all things! She has contacts in India for Flat Classroom.
And as it would have it, if we had taken off as planned, if the little birdie hadn’t been in the wrong place at the wrong time, that plane would have been turned back to Albany because of Bad weather in Atlanta.
So, the little birdie died for a reason, I guess. And the ride was quite pleasant. We didn’t stress, we just laughed about it and rode on.
So, we can still live in simplicity even when your jet plane is totalled and your flight is cancelled and your gate changes three times.
OK, time to board.This work is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Goodbye Wow2, I love you!
Tonight will be my last show as a co-host of the , THE Wow2 founder. for reaching out to me in the fall of 2006! Wow!
A big thank you to the other to cohosts . These three ladies will always have a special place in my heart.
I leave the show with mixed feelings. It is such an exciting important part of my own life, and yet I have three children who are growing older by the moment.
With two very active middle schoolers and a busy elementary student as well, there are things only Mommy can do. Right now, my family has to be #1.
My youngest needs books read to him every night. My other two need sports uniforms washed and everyone really likes a good meal on the table each night. (Who doesn’t?)
So, this isn’t goodbye to webcasting for me. Julie and I are working ahead on a variable time Flat Classroom presents screen webcast that we’ll start up in the fall. We want to do it for students and teachers and let students present and be a part of the shows that we’ll schedule sometimes during the school day.
I’m not a webhead, so, not sure what venue we’ll be on, but as always it will be creative commons and shared.
So, tonight will be it. It has been an excruciatingly hard decision and I only expect Wow2 to grow and flourish because there will be an amazing new woman (or two) to step in and take the show to even greater heights.
Best wishes and perhaps I’ll see you online tonight!
I’ll always be a Woman of Web 2!This work is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
NECC Wiki Workshop
I love the about the Wiki workshop last week at NECC.
Laurie says:
“This workshop really opened my eyes to the collaboration that the web 2.0 tools can encourage. And it reminded me, too, that it is about the content and the collaboration, NOT about the tools. The relationships we encourage students to make with one another and students around the globe are much more important than which tools they choose to communicate that message”
We had fourteen in the workshop in person and about 7 participants from around the world. Our goal was for the participants to experience a flat classroom and, it worked!
Julie and I will be offering an extended version of this course this upcoming week in St. Louis and are talking about doing another extended workshop next year in Australia if we can find a venue and enough participants to make it happen.
We will have a very small number of openings this upcoming Tuesday and perhaps Wednesday. First tweet, first to go on the list. (just direct message or e-mail me.) Just remember that top priority goes to those who are there in person, although, I think it is a meaningful experience for everyone.
I think what I love most was this comment:
“And at the end when NECC folks were coming up and giving their reflection on video, I saw Kim Vance from Cincinnati come up and talk and I realized that she is in my Influencer Online Book group that we are doing with Scott McLeod from CASTLE in Iowa. What a small world!”
Here are the ustream reflections from participants:
Live .TV show provided by Ustream
We still have some room in the workshop next Tuesday and Wednesday, July 8, 9 in St. Louis. Join us!
NECC Wiki Workshop
Here are the snippets of the ustream of the Wiki Workshop. (It is a long workshop, but you can forward it and get some out of it if you wish.)
Technorati Tags: wiki necc Julie Lindsay professional development pd education flatclassroom The World is Flat This work is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
BUSH LIES For Big Oil Again and Again!!!
George Bush said that when the Iraqi’s asked us to leave he would then bring the troops home. Is anyone surprised that George Bush lied? The Iraqi’s want the US occupation troops to leave asap….at the very least they want a withdrawal timetable they can count on.
The majority of Americans and the majority of Iraqi’s have said again and again that US troops should stop the occupation and return home.
Is anyone surprised that George Bush has used our State Dept to negotiate oil deals with Iraq?
George Bush LIES again and again…he said this war had nothing to do with Oil…PSYCH!
Once again, WE end up footing the bill an BIG OIL rakes in the profits. That’s what we get for putting two oil men in our White House. Now they are asking for McCain to be elected to continue the Big Oil legacy. The end of this horrible Big Oil reign will soon be over.
Buxx…Buzz
John McCain LIES to Vet in his Town Hall Meeting
before — and it is just a false today as it was then. As ThinkProgress documented, McCain’s so-called “perfect” record has been roundly criticized by prominent veterans groups: He received from the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America and a ” in 15 “key votes.”
As for the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars — with whom McCain claims to have a “perfect voting record” — both groups Sen. Jim Webb’s (D-VA) GI Bill that McCain tirelessly opposed.
So McCain is following Bush’s example to Lie instead of tell the truth. Appears that McCain will continue to “flip flop” and lie and do whatever he thinks he has to to become President and continue the Bush and neocon legacy.
He already thinks he is a “king.” It seems that McCain thinks only he an mention military matters and no one should question him on this. This “status quo” mindset has got to go!!
Thank heavens most of the folks in the army and air force (that I’ve spoken to) think McCain is a liar and has failed to support military people and their families.
Children and Electronic Media Panel Discussion:
After inhaling NECC 2008, I’m going to spend the next few days giving you as much pd as I can find for you to share. I’m going to save my own reflections of NECC for later. I’ve found much of the NECC jousting between bloggers to be so far off focus that it is quite bothersome.
It is about the students and improving teaching. So, that means I need to get past the edublogosphere introspection and share some things with you that you can USE!
This is an older video from the Princeton conference back in May, but it has been released on youtube and I’d like to share it with you.
I’ll see if I can find the others to share with you. I must say that all of the other speakers on this panel had me totally enthralled.
I LOVED the way that the oceans of know teaches fractions and I also am planning to integrate virtual worlds into my curriculum next year. This was a great conference!
Presenters:
INNOVATIVE USES OF TECHNOLOGY IN THE CLASSROOM
Moderator: Lisa Markman, Associate Director, Education Research Section, Outreach Director, Future of Children Journal, Princeton University
Speakers:
The Flat Classroom
, Teacher/ IT Director, Westwood Schools , Google Certified Teacher
Second Life
Kevin Jarrett, Google Certified Teacher, Technology Facilitator/District Webmaster, Northfield Community School
Oceans of Know
Daniel P McVeigh, Director, Ocean of Know
Technorati Tags: necc2008, education, teaching, princeton This work is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
