The Teacher Who Learns is the Teacher Who Can Teach: Reconciliation and Inspiration in New Orleans

posted by Carol Hillman ‘67, early childhood educator, author, and Long Trip co-leader

Eighteen intrepid travelers, some rising as early as 3:15 a.m., gathered in Newark to begin our tenth Long Trip, this time to New 
Orleans.  How fortunate we were to begin our adventure at Cafe
Reconcile, a New Orleans non-profit organization that works with 16-22 year-old African Americans to prepare them to enter the workforce.  Reconcile’s youth workforce program provides at-risk young people, who have 
experienced socio-economic challenges, an opportunity to learn basic
life and interpersonal work skills that will allow for successful employment experiences.  Perspective participants may formerly have been
challenged by poverty, homelessness, arrested educational achievement, substance abuse, or recommended by the juvenile justice system. In accepting trainees into the program, Greg Fostenberry told us it is not their existing skills which is the deciding factor in choosing ten trainees for a nine week program, but rather their answer to the 
question, “Do you want to be here, and will you keep the job?”. 


Greg, their trainer and mentor, spoke to us about some of the challenges of his work.  These young adults participate in role playing, and, through this, learn about how to handle a racist 
situation, deal with conflict management, or address whatever else could occur at the restaurant.

After hurricane Katrina the staff at the restaurant began a home ownership program as part of a Youth Construction Project. They use the
same hands-on mentoring model that had been developed at the cafe.  The first home completed was purchased by a Reconcile
employee.



Cafe Reconcile’s enticing food included fried or baked chicken, rice and red 
beans, jalapeno corn bread, and to-die-for chocolate bread pudding!



What a soul-satisfying way to launch ourselves into the unfolding story, both tragic and uplifting, of all that befell and continues to challenge the city of New Orleans.

Carol spent more than twenty years in the classroom and has been an educational consultant, an adjunct professor of early childhood education, and a member of Bank Street’s Board of Trustees. She lives part time in western Massachusetts, where she cares for hundred-year-old McIntosh trees and produces sun-cooked strawberry, raspberry, and blueberry preserves. She is the author of Mentoring Early Childhood Educators, Teaching Four Year Olds, and Before the School Bell Rings.

About The Long Trip

The annual Long Trip is a Bank Street tradition initiated by Lucy Sprague Mitchell, Bank Street’s founder, and personally led by her from 1935-1951. These visits to regions of interest, such as the Cumberland Mountains and the Tennessee Valley, were a distinctive part of the Bank Street program. Under Mrs. Mitchell’s leadership, the trips became a valued enactment of a fundamental belief: The teacher who learns is the teacher who can teach.

Since reviving the Long Trip in 1996, faculty, staff, trustees, and friends of Bank Street have traveled to Asheville, N.C., Costa Rica, Iceland, Santa Fe, N.M., the Penn Center in St. Helena’s Island, S.C., Falmouth, Jamaica, Finland, Tennessee, West Virginia and Iceland. This travel experience to cultural and geographical places of interest is educational in every way…Bank Streeters learn about culture, people, and places by actually meeting and talking with a broad range of individuals and groups and by visiting important cultural and historical sites together.

Bank Street’s Occasional Paper Series Invites Contributions for a New Issue…

“HIGH NEEDS SCHOOLS: PREPARING TEACHERS FOR TODAY’S WORLD”

Bank Street’s Occasional Paper Series is seeking essays that explore what new teachers must know to effectively engage students in a time when changing patterns of immigration, linguistic diversity, widening economic disparities, and resegration of communities are radically changing the educational landscape. Many schools are struggling to meet these challenges while also responding to a continued emphasis on high stakes testing and a growing awareness of individual learning styles. High needs schools, schools lacking in material and/or human resources, paralyzed by inflexible bureaucracies and/or a failure of innovative leadership, exist everywhere. They are especially visible when clustered in urban communities. It is often the newest, sometimes least well prepared teachers, who find themselves assigned to these difficult settings….

For more information, including possible questions/topics to address: http://webstaging.bankstreet.edu/gems/gs/opcallforpapersemotions.pdf

A 250 word letter of intent must be approved prior to submission of a full paper. Letter of intent due 7/1/09; final submissions due 12/1/2009.

Where the Buck Stops: Classroom Management and The Teacher Effect

posted by Pam Jones ‘05, Bank Street advisor and instructor

Michelle, a 1^st grade teacher, is a spirited and demonstrative teacher whose personal management philosophy is driven by her belief that students should monitor their own behavior with little direction from the teacher.  One day, she stood at the back of her classroom completely aghast—wondering how her class of well-behaved students had unraveled.  Michelle said, “Stop, look, and listen!”  Students had been instructed to respond, “Okay” when they heard these three words.  These were the magic words she had hoped would transform her class from boisterous and inattentive to calm and silent.  Unfortunately, only 2 students responded and the noise continued.  This pattern of behavior persisted and one day Michelle asked her colleague, “What is going on with these kids?  I tell you, they’re not like my class from last year; that class listened.  Why can’t they just listen and behave?  Don’t they know how to behave?!”

THE FIVE DIMENSIONS

The vignette above is one of countless examples of a teacher who is not fully cognizant of the dynamics of her classroom; specifically, it seems that she is unaware of why her students behave as they do and the effect that she has on her own classroom of students.  Teachers who find themselves in this situation, and teachers in general, need to acquaint themselves with the 5 dimensions.  My personal experience in the classroom and research on best practices in classroom management have lead me to believe that 5 factors (in particular) converge to determine the success or failure of any given classroom:  (1) Knowing Yourself as an Educator, (2) Knowing Your Students and Hearing their Voices, (3) Building Community in the Classroom, (4) Collaborating with Families, and (5) Collaborating with Colleagues.  Each of these 5 factors is of equal importance in the equation of classroom design and management.  This article, the 2^nd in a series of six, will focus on that first factor:  Knowing Yourself as an Educator.  You may be asking yourself why I’ve decided to address this factor first?  The answer to this question will be provided throughout the course of this discussion, but I will say this:  You must know who you are—what makes you think and behave as you do—before you can begin to delve into any other factor of this equation.

ENTER THE TEACHER EFFECT

In my opinion, the most under-emphasized and perhaps least-researched area of teacher education programs is something that I call “the teacher effect.”  “The teacher effect” can be defined as the “undeniable impact that a teacher has on his or her own classroom of students.”  The teacher effect can exert a positive or negative influence on any given classroom.  A number of key factors contribute to and influence any classroom and its students—specifically, the 5 dimensions discussed above.  In my work with pre-service teachers, I consider no lesson more important to their future success than helping them understand the impact they have on their own classrooms.  The teacher—his/her personality, temperament, communication style, learning style, and attention span—affect every aspect of classroom life.  Believe me when I say that I understand that there are situations that arise that are well beyond our control:  students with severe behavioral and emotional challenges, an unsupportive and even destructive administrative structure, and a host of other factors (as I have faced these challenges myself); however, learning to master what is in your control is the first step to building a strong classroom—and one that endures.

MISPLACED BEWILDERMENT

All too often, teachers stand back amidst the chaos of the classroom wondering why:  Why the students speak at a certain volume?  Why students aren’t listening to directions?  How is it that after reviewing and practicing the classroom routines students still don’t understand what is expected of them?  As I review the images of my own classrooms, as well as the many classrooms I have visited over the years, the level of cohesion and function are a direct reflection of the teacher’s actions.  Oftentimes, when you walk into a classroom where students are engaged in minds-on activities and systems are running smoothly, it is a direct result of the teacher’s clarity, consistency, and level of communication—at least in large part.

“Why aren’t they listening?  I’ve told them a million times how to line up for lunch.  Why don’t they just do it?!”  Sound familiar?  If so, it is probably because this is a common refrain.  Good teaching and management are not the result of happenstance but rather, the outgrowth of an approach that can be best described as planful, consistent, and clear.  While effective classroom managers certainly welcome the organic “teachable moment,” they more often rely upon thoughtful, careful planning to guide their practice.

GETTING TO KNOW YOUR “TEACHER SELF”

In my course “Designing and Managing Classroom Environments,” the semester begins with this first and most important factor.  Time does not allow for a gradual introduction into this topic; rather, students are quickly immersed in activities that compel them to come face-to-face with who they are and how they affect their classrooms.  Some activities that I have designed for sessions on “the teacher effect” include (but are not limited to) the following:

• Lifelines: Identify and Plot the Most Important Events In My Life that Led Me to Teaching
• Learning Styles Inventories: How I Learn
• Structured conversations about select articles that pertain to the topic of “Teacher Dispositions”

These experiences are aimed at acquainting students with their teacher-selves.  My students are encouraged to continue engaging in activities and thinking that will help them become fully aware of who they are as teachers and learners.

THE BUCK STOPS…

Ultimately, my goal is to have the teachers in my course factor themselves into the equation and to hold a mirror up to themselves—to begin to understand how, why, and when they effect change in their own classrooms.  I consider these efforts a success if and when teachers leave my course with a lasting understanding of the undeniable existence of “the teacher effect.”  In short, the buck stops with us—and this is how it should be.

Pam Jones is an advisor and instructor in the Special Education Department at Bank Street.  Pam has also worked as a learning specialist for grades K and 1, as a 3rd grade general education teacher in an inclusive setting, and as a 5th grade teacher in a general education classroom. Her first article/posting Far More Than Meets The Eye introduced us to a comprehensive approach to classroom management.

A “Secret Garden”: Cultivating Community and Social-Emotional Learning

posted by Alisa Algava ‘08, leader of a small Hudson Valley progressive school

“Surprising things can happen to anyone who, when a disagreeable or discouraged thought comes into his mind, just has the sense to remember in time and push it out by putting in an agreeable determinedly courageous one. Two things cannot be in one place.

‘Where you tend a rose, my lad,
A thistle cannot grow.’”

~Frances Hodgson Burnett

It started with a garden.  A “secret garden” on the edge of the woods tended by a few of our younger Upstairs girls.  They cleared little paths, protected newly growing wild plants, and even planted seeds of their own.  Others joined in – boys and girls, ages 6-11 – and contributed their enthusiasm and ideas.  Irrigation systems, complete with PVC piping and hand-dug trenches, emerged.  Using hollow wooden blocks, they began to make their own bricks out of mud.  About 30 feet away, a new garden area was cleared by a group of younger boys.  The plan for watering the garden started small, with an angled pipe, a hose, and a trench that ended in a little waterfall over a dam made of mud.  It developed into an extensive system of pools and channels.  Every day the changing groupings of kids engaged with each other and with the environment around them.  Teachers noticed, asked questions, stepped back to observe, mediated disagreements when necessary.  This was Outdoors Time at its best – learning that is in-depth, creative, ongoing, child-directed, social, intellectual, and physical all at once.

I noticed all this extraordinary learning when I spent some time outside last week.  Amazed by their canals and irrigation systems, I was reminded of how human beings discovered/invented agriculture and irrigation more than 8,000 years ago in Mesopotamia.  Our gardeners have constructed this knowledge completely on their own using their hands and minds.  I thought about the curricular connections already being made by the Upstairs teachers and students – a math garden planted in back of the school, stories written by kids, Spanish lessons on seeds and spring, plants that had been studied earlier in the year.  I wondered which came first…  The play during outdoors time?  The curricular experiences during Math and Language Arts and Social Studies and Science and Spanish?  I thought about how we might support our kids to deepen and extend this learning.

I also noticed the complex social interactions between individuals and among small groups of children.  These gardens are not utopias for kids.  They are genuine experiences of “real life.”  As our elementary school learners work together on the self-created, self-defined garden projects, their collective energy leads to innovation.  At the same time, they struggle with making decisions, resolving conflicts, and understanding how to contribute.  They are challenged by the constant negotiations that happen through words and actions, the ones that involve a small changing of an idea or a big shift in how the group approaches the project.  They wonder about ownership and feel frustrated when something doesn’t fit with their idea of how it should be.  Interestingly, the initial founders of the gardens are the ones who seem to feel the most worried or disappointed about how these creations have evolved.

By the end of Outdoors Time on Thursday, it became clear that a moment of reflection was necessary.  A group of kids had abandoned the project because it had changed so much.  One child had taken apart a dam that someone else had built and retaliation happened before we had a chance to talk – “Alisa, I taught him a lesson” was how I heard about it.  There were questions of how they would make decisions – “Everyone has to agree before anything can be changed” was one approach.  So we sat down together in a circle in the Carriage House, just before their afternoon play rehearsal, and asked them to think about how they were feeling.  Using I-statements – “I feel…when…because…” – each child shared a thought or feeling about that day’s Outdoors Time while everyone else listened with attention and intention.  Some spoke about the excitement they feel from digging with their friends and others described the sadness or anger they feel when people change things or don’t ask for their opinions.  When we reached the end of the go-around, we simply asked them to think about something that one person said that might have made them think differently.  And then we asked them to consider one change they could make next time that might help that person.

This is community.  One person, or a few, start something.  Others join in and that something inevitably changes.  How we talk together, resolve our differences, learn from new ideas or different approaches, treat our friends when something upsetting happens, change our own minds – these experiences transform us.  This is the learning that teachers cultivate.  This is how our children grow into thinking, contributing, courageous individuals.  I can’t wait to see what happens next.

Alisa Algava graduated from Bank Street’s Leadership for Educational Change program in December. For the past 14 years, she has taught and learned in public, private, and charter schools in NY, NJ, and RI. She has written a handful of postings in the past four months about her experiences leading and learning in a small progressive school. Alisa loves learning. She loves moderating The Alumni Blog. And she really loves her nephew.

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Post your own opinions about teaching, learning, children, politics, special education, school reform, play, the standards movement, student teaching, museum education, leadership, block building, morning meeting, curriculum mapping, collaboration, isolation, benchmarks, bilingual classrooms, social-emotional development, the arts…right here on The Bank Street Blog!

Join the conversation! To send us a blog posting, visit Your Voice. To leave a comment on a posting, please click on the “comment” link beside the posting date. (Comments will be reviewed before they appear.)

Counting Up, Counting on Each Other: Constructivism in Early Childhood Math

posted by Alisa Algava ‘08, leader of a small Hudson Valley progressive school

To know the world, one must construct it.  ~Cesare Pavese

Walking into a math group last week at my school, I saw a group of first, second, and third graders deeply engaged in trying to figure out how many days there are until the annual Spring Show.  The challenge was to determine the number of days between two dates in different months using the evidence in front of them.  Without a calendar, they were using all they had learned the week before about months in the year and the number of days in each month to solve “story problems” that related to their real life experiences.  Some of these mathematicians counted up from April 17 (that day) until they reached May 7 (the night of the big performance).  Others wrote tally marks for the entire month of April and then crossed out 17 days and counted how many were left.  Ben, a second grader, realized that he could subtract 17 from 30 and then add the 7 days in May.  Once he shared that realization, everyone decided it was now “easy” to solve these problems.  And, thankfully, there were so many more problems to be solved!

This is what we do in real life.  We are rarely given every bit of information we need – we infer, draw on prior knowledge, and, when necessary, do additional “research” to solve the problems we encounter, whether we are paying bills, scheduling a vacation, or figuring out how many bags of flour we need to triple a batch of cookies. While subtraction and addition were important tools these learners used, the real thinking happened when they were deciding how to solve the problems with the limited information they had.

But even more important (and interesting to me as someone who loves learning and loves seeing other people learn) is the fact that these six, seven, and eight year olds constructed their own understanding of how to solve these calendar problems. Anita, their teacher, purposefully didn’t tell them what to do or how to do it, even though she knew the steps that would get them to the right answer.  Instead, they tried many different strategies, each of which worked for each learner.  They shared their various approaches and listened to each other’s explanations.  Ultimately, these learners discovered on their own that using subtraction and addition would make the process quicker and easier.

Constructivism is a theory of learning that explains how human beings generate knowledge and meaning from direct experience.  We learn by doing, not by being told what to do.  The teacher is a facilitator, and learning happens through an active, social process in which children are challenged to reach just beyond their immediate comfort levels or abilities.  Through this process, they acquire new skills and a deeper conceptual understanding of all they encounter.  (Dewey and Piaget and Vygotsky are some of the great thinkers who provided inspiration for the founding of this school in 1963.)

And by the way, I’m so looking forward to seeing all of our mathematicians-turned-actors in the amphitheater when the “curtain goes up” and the Spring Show begins, exactly 13 days from today!  (That’s 30-24+7.)

Alisa Algava graduated from Bank Street’s Leadership for Educational Change program in December.  For the past 14 years, she has taught and learned in public, private, and charter schools in NY, NJ, and RI.  She has written a handful of postings in the past three months about her experiences leading and learning in a small progressive school.  Alisa loves learning.  She loves moderating The Alumni Blog. And she really loves her nephew.

Six Earth Day Activities for Your Classroom

posted by Ted Wells ‘07, 4th grade teacher at The Park School, Brookline, MA

Sprinkle a few of the Earth Day seeds below into the fertile garden that is your classroom. With the help of your students, tend to these ideas, and watch them grow! Here are six activities that my fourth grade classroom at The Park School in Brookline, MA has been working on leading up to Earth Day. There are thousands of ideas out there, but I like these six. Perhaps one or two of them will fit into your 2nd to 8th grade classroom?

1. Warm-Up Worksheet: Get students thinking about the importance of a healthy Earth by reading two or three picture books about environmental sustainability, then having them fill out this sheet. It puts the ball in their court by asking them what they love about nature, what they know about environmental problems, and what they’d like to do to help. This can be done as a two-night homework assignment or in class. Download the worksheet here.

2. Recycling: Progressive teaching takes on the problems of the day by asking children to think creatively to solve them. Do this by discussing students’ responses from the worksheet above and by trying to implement one or two of their ideas at your school.

Students will bring up recycling. Student-run recycling initiatives are popular in schools for a reason — they’re a perfect, age-appropriate topic to study that kids can do themselves and have real impact at school and at home. The fourth graders at my school collect over 800 pounds of paper waste each week. The third graders collect hundreds of bottles and cans. Marketing this work to the community can be especially creative. See this video for an example.

3. Build: After starting a recycling program, you will end up with large quantities of bottles, cans, paper, and cardboard. Before you have it collected by a recycling company, let your kids build with it! Challenge your students to build something that fits into your curriculum.

Could they build Egyptian pyramids? A scene from a text being studied in English class? How about a model of the Hudson River? A mosaic map of Colonial America made from bottle caps? As part of a social studies-centered curriculum, my fourth graders study Ancient Greece most of the year. We are currently building an 8′x4′x4′ Parthenon out of bottles and cardboard recyclables while we study this famous temple and time period.2009-04-16-parthenonA.jpg

When ideas and learning become physical through hands-on building, kids have fun and concepts are more deeply understood and connected with. As teacher and author Tarry Lindquist says, “Making learning meaningful is the core of teaching. If children don’t connect what’s going on in the classroom with their minds, their hands, and their hearts, then it seems to me that not much learning is going to occur.” Getting our kids’ hands doing more than just wiggling pencils may be exactly what it takes to better engage their minds — and if we’re lucky, their hearts.

4. Cancel Sales Catalogs: My school started “The Catalog Canceling Challenge” in 2007, and since then other schools and scouts have joined the fun. So far 3,600 kids in eight states have canceled over 22,000 unwanted sales catalogs! It saves trees, water, energy, and our climate. In fact, these kids have saved over 290 trees so far! It’s a pretty straightforward idea that kids really enjoy. If your school would like more information, go to www.CatalogCancelingChallenge.com. Or read our story here.

5. Take a Walk: Take your class outside. Visit some nearby woods to get inspiration for poetry or to sit and read books that are set in the woods. Kids spend so much more time indoors; many are never given the opportunities to connect with nature. Help facilitate this. It’s easy if your school campus is rural, if not, visit a park. Many are surprised by how much ecology they can find in cities. When outdoors, kids can adopt trees, study insects or birds, help with landscaping, pick up litter, and other such activities. When the weather’s warm, I try to move our “Read Aloud” time to a grassy patch not too far outside of the building. The kids love it — unless the ground is wet.

6. Be a R.R.R.ole Model: It’s important for us green-talkin’ teachers is to be sure we’re also doing the green walkin’. Model the 3 Rs: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. Great power lies in a teacher or an entire faculty that consistently uses reusable mugs and water bottles. Great power lies in a school that doesn’t waste paper, has scrap bins by copy machines for reuse in classrooms, and doesn’t allow cars to idle. The list goes on. Bike to work, start Green Committees, insulate walls and windows, turn off the lights, notice beauty in nature, read Robert Frost poetry, get outside. To teach green, we must live green and value our natural world, especially when our students are looking up to us. If we truly care about kids, we will take better care of Earth and teach them how to do the same.

Ted Wells teaches 4^th grade at The Park School in Brookline, MA and makes green videos that can be seen at www.TedWells.tv. He wrote his first Alumni Blog post in November – 145 Students, 50 Trees, One Catalog at a Time – about the catalog canceling project he and his students run at his school. Ted’s Earth Day posting can also be found on The Huffington Post’s website.

Tutoring the “Behavior Problem”

posted by Allison Warren ‘08, new mom, recent grad, and early childhood teacher

After graduation last May, I moved to my hometown, Memphis, Tennessee and took this school year off to have my first child. Because the school district has cut funding for tutors, I decided to volunteer once a week at a local public school.  I was assigned to help two first grade students with their reading skills.  The teacher asked if I would consider tutoring a “problem child.” My overwhelming reaction was, “Absolutely!”  The child, who I’ll call David, was born in Sudan but has lived in the United States since he was two.  His family speaks very little English. According to the teacher, his home life is a difficult one.

I began meeting with David and realized that his self-confidence was low and his distractibility high.  During the first few meetings, we strictly worked on forming a relationship, discussing common likes/dislikes and sharing books together.  I noticed David peering around the hall, getting out of his seat often, and saying under his breath, “I’m bored. I can’t do this.”  Instead of demanding he focus or negating his feelings, I did what Bank Street taught me.  I gave him breaks and agreed that reading can feel difficult.

One example brings a smile every time I think of it.  A few weeks ago, David and I were discussing ‘-ing’ endings when it seemed that a switch turned off in David.  He began popping his finger in his mouth.  You know…when you put the tip of your finger in the side of your mouth and pop it out, making a hilarious cartoon-like sound. David’s demeanor was one that read, “Watch this woman. What are you gonna do now?”  I smiled at him, put my finger in my mouth and popped right back.  His eyes were huge and he laughed. I said, “How loud can you make yours? Let’s both try five times and then we’ll get back to these endings.”  And…we did.

Allison Warren graduated in 2008 with a MS in Early Childhood and Elementary Education.  She is currently taking the school year off to raise her first child.

From 3 to 91: Intergenerational and Interdependent

posted by Alisa Algava ‘08, leader of a small Hudson Valley progressive school

Everything, including all people, exists only through relationships with other people or things.  Nothing exists in isolation or absolute independence.  No person, or thing can arise of, for, or by its own accord.  Everything is interdependent.  ~Taro Gold

What a wonderful day we had on Friday.  It was our annual Grandparents and Grandfriends Day, which we combined with our annual Pancake Lunch for the very first time.  Thanks go out to the weather, to the kids and teachers, and to the hard work everyone did with the syrup, the setup, the pancakes, the activities, the singing and sign language, and the cleanup.  Each group in the school did its piece to contribute to the overall success of the day.  The “Downstairs” (pre-K and kindergarten) made the applesauce, the “Upstairs” (1st through 5th grades) made enough batter for 220 pancakes and decorated the Amphitheater, and the “Carriage House” (middle school and high school) set up the tables and cooked the pancakes.  Throughout the past two months, everyone in the school helped tap the maple trees, collect the sap, boil the sap, and make our very own SCHOOLMADE MAPLE SYRUP.

When we work together, we are able to accomplish so much more than any one of us could ever do alone.  This is the inherent value of living and learning in community with each other.  I learn from you, you learn from me.  We help each other to make things happen, and ultimately, to grow individually and collectively.

The other beautiful part of Friday’s event was seeing so many proud and loving grandfriends and grandchildren interacting and enjoying the day together.  One of my favorite memories of our small progressive school is an “intergenerational” one from a few years ago.  From a distance, I noticed two kids on the swings in the playground, which, in and of itself, is not an unusual sight.  But one of the kids was a big 8th grade boy and the other was a small 3-year-old girl.  And they were deep in conversation.  Connecting with each other, young and not-quite-as-young, is part of what makes this school so special.

Alisa Algava graduated from Bank Street’s Leadership for Educational Change program in December.  For the past 14 years, she has taught and learned in public, private, and charter schools in NY, NJ, and RI.  She has written a few postings in the past two months about her experiences leading and learning in a small progressive school.  Alisa loves learning.  She loves moderating The Alumni Blog. And she really loves her nephew.

“Earth Hour” is Tonight (Saturday) at 8:30pm.

posted by Ted Wells ‘07, 4th grade teacher at The Park School, Brookline, MA

“To my mind conservation is fundamental. A law of survival. It involves the interdependence of all life – of plant, animal and human kind. Because man can think and plan ahead, his is the responsibility for maintaining the balance of nature. In fact, his very existence depends upon it.” ~Helen Kitchel, 1966

Join 100s of millions pushing for stronger international efforts in the fight against global warming. Show your support by turning off your lights for one hour at 8:30PM. It’s pretty simple, yet on a mass scale – they’re hoping for one billion participants – it’s a strong symbolic message asking world leaders to cut global warming pollution more quickly.

For more information:
www.earthhour.org/about/
news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090328/ap_on_re_au_an/earth_hour

Pass it on,
Ted

Ted wrote a blog posting in November – 145 Students, 50 Trees, One Catalog at a Time – about the catalog canceling project he and his students run at his school. You can also check out catalogcancelingchallenge.com for more information about their ongoing work.