Life is full of people urging you to do your best. Schools are full of posters, teacher voices, and dutiful students echoing the idea that you should always do your best.

Knowing we have another day of testing and knowing that these tests can show that a project-based approach can generate academic gains,i.e., it’s important for everyone to do their best. Sigh.

What I tried this morning was to ask everyone to reflect why it’s important to always do your best but also when you might need to “shut down the engines.”

I wanted to think about whether it’s possible to always do one’s best. I wanted to think about when compromises have to be made. I wanted to think about if there are moments where other forces are at work. I wanted to think about which standards students should aim for and what those standards might mean. As always, I wanted to think about how I/we want to be known.

We do the MAP tests three times a year. This is a good test. It helps measure growth and can offer proof that an interdisciplinary, project-based approach fosters the development of academic skills.

It’s still a test, though, and brings up all the rage or at least frustration students tend to feel about tests. While our advisory talked about growth targets last week, we began today by thinking about a question I hope fuels third quarter: What inside you do you need to get out to the world? What do you want to show the world? (For some reason I had a bad Cat Stevens song stuck inside my head, not a good one.)

Here are the responses:
I want the real world to take the projects I create seriously and learn from them…I want them to mean something. MH

I want to learn something new. JH

I want people to acknowledge me and what I do. JF

Third quarter I think I need to get the part of me that is caring and shows that I care about the people around me. TJC

I need to give the world the projects we do. BR

I would like my perspective to get out into the world. JW

(I want to get the…) story of what we do and what we do to help others (out into the world). TC

I want to get my commitment to projects into the world. When I start a project, I commit myself to it until it is done (or until I run out of time). ES

This quarter I want to show that I can get my work done. CB

I can’t keep this project in any longer…I know people will love what I’m trying to do and will want to be apart of it. HG

I want to be more of a leader, a positive leader, this quarter because I know I can make it happen. JJ

I want to show how we can make the community better. DL

Next to me as I work…

I have to erase these quotes from the entryway of our room,

I have to erase this collection of student quotes,

I have to hide this student-created list of what constitutes good daily actions,

So that I can collect all of their phones in a seed starting bin,

and administer an algebra one test.

I eat kale.

K. Anthony Appiah on whether someone should send their child to a bad public school.

vs.

Allison Benedikt writing in Slate.

Today we read a blurb from the alumni magazine. We began by writing our answers to the question posed at the outset — can imagination be taught — and then read the first 500 words or so of the article.

I was really happy with my response until I read what the students had to say:

“I think you can teach someone to be imaginative. You just have to expose them to different things. And make them want to think differently and dream of big goals.” TC

“Imagination can be taught because I had to learn that seeing is believing. You can imagine anything.”

“Instead of looking at things how they are look at them how you could change them.” QG

“I think people who say they “lack” imagination just have less of a skill in bringing it out. That part can be taught definitely.” IB

“Imagination is more powerful when you are inspired by something or when you want to do something different. Imagination is already in you, it’s your choice to express it…Whatever you love to do is helping your imagination because your constantly trying to think outside of the box and that’s where your imagination comes from, like when you want something you have an image in your head on how to get it.”

Best points to debate Monday:

“No one can teach you how to picture an image you have not experienced.”

“I think imagination can be taught in a way but if it’s taught it wouldn’t be as strong as someone’s who learned it on their own or someone who has it naturally.” TJC
(Note I could debate this forever — what a great insight)

“Some people’s imagination gets stronger with age and some people’s imaginations get duller with age.”

“Getting someone to think outside the box with precise imagery and unrealistic thoughts helps with imagination.”

It turned out that all stories betray you when you’re down to chasing crickets for your next meal. A story might help you get through your life, he said, but it doesn’t literally keep you alive–if anything, most people who have power turn their story into a brick wall keeping out somebody else’s truth so that they can continue the life they believe themselves to be leading, trying somehow to preserve the idea that they’re good people in their small lives, despite their involvement, however indirect, with bigger evils.

Think about it.

Hannaham, James. Delicious Foods: A Novel. (New York: Little, Brown and Co, 2015), 367.

Began the day by thinking about this question followed by setting some resolutions about this quarter’s work.

Some great thoughts:
“being around people doing the right thing makes you want to turn around and do the right thing.” –J

“people change because of people close to them.” –M

“people change because they get tired of living the way they’re living.” –C

“it takes mindfulness and active listening to see or hear when you’re doing something wrong.” –J

“people change when they see other people change.” –C

“when you mature” — T

“people change when they want to make something in their life better” –K

“when they think about how they want to be known.” –D

“wanting to do things different from the previous years.” –J

—

Leading these conversations, you feel the work that the students have done in previous years and how the community is helping kids to grow and change in positive ways. There’s a gap, sure, between what they’re saying and what they’re doing, but doesn’t that exist for all of us? Shouldn’t education be about helping students see and feel those connections for themselves?

This morning we considered two questions:

Where do the standards for good work come from?

Where should the standards for good work come from?

I asked the students to put percentages on their answers. Here are some of the best answers:

DO
JG:
15% comes from The Ancestors
25% comes from the teacher
10% comes from students
50% comes from the “Big Man” (The rich men and women who make the rules)

QG: 20%: your personal view on the work; do I think it matters?

SHOULD
ES:
10%:Hard working people: Just because somebody works hard doesn’t mean it is good work or should be used as a standard.