January 17th: Kids 4 Haiti

It may seem rather ironic, but today's positive thought stems from tragedy. Specifically, the recent tragic earthquake in Haiti. I was listening to Conversations this morning, expecting to hear a conversation about why one would become a teacher. Instead, the topic never strayed from Haiti. At first, the talk was all about how horrific the situation is in Haiti, and how the people there must be suffering.

And then the topic turned. At Christmas, I told my uncle "You know you're meant to be an educator when you realize you're always looking for ways to turn everything into a lesson." And so it went this morning. The topic went from tragedy to hope in a matter of minutes as we started planning ways that our students could make a difference for those most affected by the earthquake. By the end of the hour, we had the start of a plan, a wiki was created for the project:

Kids4Haiti

We even had our very own motto:

Connecting the world, one wiki at a time.

No, I don't expect that we'll save the world...or even Haiti...with our project. But it's exciting to at least feel a part of something great. Something that has the potential to change lives...maybe even our own.

January 14th: If We Build It...

My seventh graders and I had a nice long chat this morning about the earthquake in Haiti. It isn't where we started the conversation, but it's where we wound up. I often like to ask my students for input on what we're doing in class. They usually have some great ideas, and my hope is that it makes them feel like they have some say in where their education takes them. It is their education, after all.

This morning I asked them for some ideas on a project for social studies. One of the first ideas that came out of the conversation..."we should do something about Haiti!" Well, what do you mean by "something"? "We should raise money to send them supplies and stuff!" Stuff. Any other teachers out there who've banned the word "stuff" in their classrooms?

In the span of about ten minutes, we went from a bake sale to raise money for "stuff" to holding a triathlon to raise money to build a community center in Haiti! The kids would even like to design the community center!

Hmmm.

Part of me kept wanting to stop them and say, "You know, you're talking about a lot of work, a huge commitment, and who knows if we can even pull any of this off." It was really hard to be supportive of their big ideas, but I managed to fight off my inner pessimist. My kids can change the world. They just need me to step out of the way!

My favorite moment this morning was when one of my students raised her hand and said, "Um, we should probably do some research first."

Really??? What a fabulous idea!