Generation Why

Have you noticed these lists of "hacks" showing up everywhere? Defined by the Urban Dictionary as "a clever solution to a tricky problem," you can find hacks for your wallet, hacks for your hair, hacks for your workout or relationship or even for your dog. Really, there are hacks for everything right now, including the classroom, but that's another blog post.

Don't get me wrong; some of these ideas are really ingenious, if not genius. Enough so, anyhow, that I take the time to click through a litany or two when they catch my fancy. Just tonight, a former teacher of mine posted a link to "Parenting Hacks for Life Traps." She is a new grandparent, and so I think that explains it. Me? I guess I'm just naturally curious, and so I scrolled through a few mediocre ones, (using lotion bottles as faucet extenders or transforming the old crib into a school desk), a couple of pretty good ones (combining eye dropper and pacifier to administer medicine, upside down crazy straw to prevent sippy cup catastrophe), some really dumb ones (dust mop onesies so your infant will clean the floor as he or she scoots), and some that could go either way (flattened cardboard cartons to transform your stairs into a giant slide?). 

As with many such things on the internet, sometimes the captions are better than the post. That, too, was the case tonight on the getting your kids to do their chores by withholding the wifi password suggestion. The editor commented, I have to say, I'm glad we had dial-up when I was a kid. 

Oh. That explains a lot.

Career Options

I left school after another ten hour day today and headed out to run a few errands. My teeth were grinding a bit on the way out the door, because I couldn't get to a working copy machine to prepare the materials I needed for my lesson tomorrow, but I resolved to go in early to make them; it was my only option.

My first stop was the office supply store to buy some supplementary things for students who do not have them, and then it was on to the grocery store where, at the check out, I saw an unfamiliar magazine. Modern Farmer, issue 06, has a wary cow on the cover and a neon-orange question, So you want to be a farmer? 

Um... Maybe.

Analogy for the Season

"How is school so far? How are the kids?" Kind friends and family ask me this question often at this time of year.

Historically, I have never been much more than lukewarm in my response. "They're okay," I say with varying degrees of enthusiasm, some genuine, some not. 

The truth is that it's hard to say at this point, and it's really not fair to draw any conclusions. If I were to compare them to past years, it wouldn't be to how those other students were in September. No, I remember the other kids as they were in May and June, after we'd worked together for months to forge a community of learning. The time before I knew them and they knew me is just a vague memory.

And so I try to be patient with the new group, and I've decided that a good frame of reference might be the online course I use with my classes. In September, it's bare bones, just a few starter assignments and a couple of basic topics to post in. Every year though, it grows into something similar to the years before, but also unique to the individual creativity, interests and opinions of the kids whose writing shapes it. When I set it up each year, I focus on its potential rather than its emptiness.

And the same should apply to those squirrely strangers filling up the seats in my room and chattering constantly over my directions. They'll come along. (The only question is, When??)

A Cool Glass of Milk

Cool evening air floods through the open window this fourth Monday of September, and darkness without is illuminated by the warm glow of the television within. So many TV options beckon! Certainly viewing habits have changed in the last 45 years-- three networks have been replaced by hundreds; binge watching is a thing, and some cord cutters don't even watch broadcast television at all.

Even so,  premiere week still has a little juice, and so this evening finds us watching the first episode of Gotham, live, not even recorded. Jim Gordon is a rooky cop who catches a big case at the tail end of his shift. Seems the most powerful man in town, Thomas Wayne, and his wife have been killed in a random robbery. Their son, Bruce, witnessed the whole thing, as did a sneaky little pick pocket who runs along the roof tops and steals milk for stray cats. Back at the station? A lab tech, name of Ed Nigma, explains the riddles of the forensic findings of the case.

Gordon's partner doesn't want anything to with either the case or the rookie, but Gordon can see right through him. "You're a cynic, right?" he asks rhetorically before continuing, "a slovenly, lackadaisical cynic."

I think he may be right, but either way? Nice vocabulary, Jim!

Blue Sunday

About a month ago I saw one of those Internet men's aimed at teachers: the month of August is just one long Sunday night, it read. I laughed ruefully, because it was kind of true. No matter what your business, if you're on the clock Monday to Friday, Sunday nights can signal a grinding shift from personal back to professional. Tonight the annual doggie dip followed by a nice family dinner with Bill and Emily stretched out the weekend just a little more and chased those Sunday blues away.

Movie Marketing

At the movies this afternoon we saw an Imax trailer for Ridley Scott's next epic, Exodus, starring Christian Bale as Moses and due out a little later this fall. "That looks pretty good," I whispered to Josh. "Do you want to see it?"

"Yeah!" he answered. "It's like a live action Prince of Egypt!"

That it is, I thought and smiled, remembering the little boy who loved that movie and was all grown up and sitting two seats down from me. That it is. 

And then I thought some more. Josh is in the highly-sought demographic of males 18-24... Batman in Prince of Egypt? 

Ca-ching!

Longest Day of the Year...

... was yesterday, according to the Teachers Almanac. 

Thank goodness today was a Friday!