Happy New Year!

ZZZZZZzzzz….zzz z…zzzzz….zzzz…z

West Texas Christmas day snow.

Yosemite

Yosemite

Grand Canyon

Learning should not be difficult, it should grow increasingly more complex and challenging.

Education does not need rigor, it needs vigor! Check out the definitions of the two words. Rigor is not educational. Vigor is.

In education we start with the end in mind. Our curriculum is built with the end in mind. Our state and national assessments are built with the end in mind. Our system of evaluating teachers and administrators is built with the end in mind. Our system of evaluating schools is built with the end in mind. Most of our classrooms and teaching styles, however, are not built that way. Most classrooms are built on the same rationale and methodology that my track coach used when trying to teach me to run the quarter mile… “go as far as you can as fast as you can, then finish, preferably with everyone following you”.

That rationale and methodology probably needs to change if we are going the be successful in education.