An Interview with Big Bird

As I have written about many times before, I grew up in a cable free household. And not only was it cable free, but because of the poor antenna reception we received living out in the woods of New Hampshire, we only received four channels on our tv: NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS. This meant that I didn’t get Punky Brewster, the Smurfs, Gummy Bears or Duck Tails. As a result, both my sister and I spent nearly all of our television watching time with the characters of PBS. I can say without hesitation that the most influential television show, movie, music or theatrical performance in my life has been Sesame Street.

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This show and its characters exposed me to early reading and counting skills, songs and games as well as the ONLY bit of spanish I have carried with me into my adult life. It was also crucial in learning how to tell time – instead of saying that a car ride would take “an hour” which meant nothing to my 5-year-old self, my parents would say “one hour which is one Sesame Street.”

I’ve taken my love of the show into my adult life by learning as much as possible about the show, its creators, actors and supporters. I’ve read nearly ever book written on this group of incredible people, visited the Jim Henson exhibit at the Museum of the Moving Image, and seen Being Elmo – an incredible documentary about Kevin Clash’s journey to Sesame Street. Two years ago Matt surprised me by taking me to see Sesame Street Live – and while we were certainly the ONLY adults there without a child, making us look a little creepy, it was one of the most amazing things he has ever done.

As I mentioned yesterday, I have a few things on my bucket list… near the very top of that list is visit the set of Sesame Street.

Sesame Workshop, the non-profit educational foundation behind Sesame Street is one of the only blogs that I subscribe to (and I work in communications for a non-profit!) and I came across this post today. While I was sad that I didn’t realize the first day of Spring had already come and gone, I was happy to read this incredible article. I hope that all of you who also grew up watching Sesame Street enjoy it as much as I did.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BIG BIRD!

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The Power of Accountability

This year for my birthday Matt gave me a Garmin GPS running watch. I know what you are thinking, that doesn’t seem very romantic. I sort of thought the same thing.

However, when I opened the watch and realized that he purchased the version with the pink stripe and floral face, I knew I had married the most romantic guy ever.

I am a big believer that in order to feel good when you are working out, you should look good. That is why I occasionally allow myself to splurge on workout clothes from Lululemon and cute running skirts. When I was running the Disney Princess Half Marathon with my sister in celebration of her 30th Birthday, I almost leapt out with glee when I overheard another runner say “oh, that girl’s skirt is super cute.”

From that point forward, it didn’t matter if I got a person best time or even finished the race, in my mind, the race was already a success.

But back to my present – the fact Matt spent an extra second to pick out the pink watch truly warmed my heart. I think after 10 years of dating, he is finally starting to learn!

Since receiving this gift, Matt and I have gone on a few runs and I have been blown away with the results.  I now know, down to the hundredth of a mile, just how far I have run. I know my pace throughout the run, my pace per mile and my “real-time” pace during the run. I can track my heart rate and the elevation of the terrain. And with all of this data, I can adjust my pace accordingly and hopefully improve my running.

The watch holds me accountable. I no longer walk up the stairs that lead to the reservoir – I run them. I no longer get slower every mile – I aim to get faster. I no longer think I’ve run 4 miles, when in actuality I have only run 2.

I am pushing myself harder and I am getting faster. It is truly amazing what accountability does for performance.

Now, if only we could think of something like this that would help improve public education and teaching…

The Grass Is Always Greener

My good friend, Noelle, is defending her thesis today. She is in the 3rd year of a PhD program on her way to become a doctor of psychology. I can’t wait until she graduates and can officially diagnose all of my mental ailments.

This morning we were chatting online (per usual) and she was explaining her thesis statement to me. I pretended like I understood what she was talking about, but I really had no idea. Then I asked her what happens after she defends her thesis. Here is our conversation:

 Noelle:  then onto my next benchmark. which is a review paper.
 me:  your life sounds awesome.
 Noelle:  no. its horrible.
 me:  yeah, i was kind of being sarcastic.
 Noelle:  oh.

Sometimes the grass is greener on your side. Good luck today Noelle. While I am not jealous of your life, I am very proud of your ambition to pursue this degree. I can’t wait to call you Doctor.

DIY Bulletin Board

So I recently moved into a new role at work… and with a new role often comes a new office! I have switched over from the Lower School into the Middle and High School. A lot of people have asked me whether this is a positive change. I am still figuring that out. All I know is that I certainly needed a change from the work I was doing, so hopefully this proves to be a change for the better. So in addition to learning a new curriculum, meeting new students and finding my way around a new (and HUGE) building, I also moved into a new office.

While the office is very nice, it was seriously lacking in the furniture department. I spent the first week in my new role scouring the building for furniture that I could claim for my office. I ended up stealing an unused bookshelf from the library, a filing cabinet from an area intended for administrative office that is currently empty, chairs and a side table from the Admissions waiting area that is the floor above my office (don’t even get me started on  that one) and a bulletin board from who knows where. My 10 x 10 foot space is certainly starting to come together.

 The bulletin board is a very nice size, but I have a problem. I wanted to snaz it up a bit (either by covering it with fabric or ribbons) but it was drilled into my wall before I had a change to get my hands on it. So now, I have a large bulletin board that is hung on my wall and I am not sure how to “martha-ize” it.

         

Anyone have any good suggestions as to how I can achieve something similar to these without taking the whole bulletin board down? The best idea I could come up with was to paint the entire thing and then mod-podge some fabric onto it (e.g. cut out flowers or a design from the fabric). Anyone have anything else???

The Lottery

When I was younger, I never really thought about where I was going to enroll in school. In the earlier years, I went to the nursery school that Abby had attended in our neighborhood. It was run out of someone’s basement, which seems a little weird, but we didn’t think anything of it at the time. Kindergarten at that point in time wasn’t something that our public school system offered so I attended a program (that I later taught at) that was run out of an old barn that had been converted into a small 4 room school. From 1st grade to 12th grade, I attended our local public schools. My education was something that I took for granted.

While it was certainly something that was important to my parents and eventually to me, it wasn’t something that we worried about. I knew that I was going to get a solid education at school, have amazing teachers and extremely supportive parents. To be frank, going to college was always in the cards for me. That was how I was brought up and what I wanted in life.

When I got home from work today, I watched the movie, The Lottery. I had heard about this movie a while ago, and even received the DVD at a charity event I attended last Spring, but I am embarrassed to say that I never got around to watching it. The movie follows four families from Harlem as they go through the lottery process to get their children into one of the Success Academy Charter Schools.

I first learned about these schools when I moved to New York. I didn’t have a job, so my friend graciously hired me to help teach some of her cooking classes for her newly formed company, Cupcake Kids (now named Taste Buds). She had organized 10-15 field trips for the Kindergarten classes from the Success Academy schools. Every morning for a couple of weeks, we would teach 25-27 5 and 6-year-olds, all dressed in navy and orange uniforms, how to make pizza. We talked about the different ingredients, explained how yeast gives off gases (like a bump) that expands the dough, sang a song about making pizza and eventually ate delicious and healthy food that we made together.

During the time that I spent with these kids, I learned that their grade was not referred to as Kindergarten; they were called the class of 2025; the year that they would graduate from college. Their individual classes weren’t named after their rooms or their teachers’ last names; they were named after the colleges that their teachers attended. So every day, in would walk the classes of Brown, University of Virginia and Princeton. These kids know, like I did, that they are going to graduate from college.

Harlem Success Academy 3rd graders took their first standardized state test in 2009. The results are staggering:

• 100% of Harlem Success 3rd graders passed the math exam, with 71% achieving the top score of “4,” ranking the school #1 out of all public charters in the state.
• 95% of Harlem Success 3rd graders passed the English Language Arts exam, with nearly a quarter achieving the top score of “4,” ranking the school #2 out of all public charters in the state. Harlem Success Academy ranks #32 out of 3500 public schools in New York.
• No public school in the state scored higher than Harlem Success on the math exam. Harlem Success outperformed its school district by nearly 25 percentage points in English Language Arts.
• The percentage of students “advanced proficient” in math surpasses even the affluent Upper East Side of Manhattan by nearly 35%.

In short, this school’s approach is working. While charter schools do raise a lot of concerns, often over teacher unions and conflicts with failing public schools, it is hard to overlook their achievements. I would strongly encourage people to watch this movie. While Waiting for Superman is receiving a lot of support and media attention, this movie delivers a message that is just as strong. We need to rethink our educational systems; we can not accept failure because we are afraid to change.

 

An Educational Vacation

My parents number one priority for Abby and me was our education. We were exposed to limited tv, an abundance of books and we played games like brain quest, trivia pursuit and scrabble. Things were no different when we were on vacation. They would try to incorporate as many “educational opportunities” as possible as we traveled across the country. We visited museums, studied nature and learned about the local areas we visited. One of the most memorable was during our road trip from San Francisco to Seattle.

In between camping and hiking, my parents thought that we should stop in and learn about the local economy. When we drove through Tillamook, Oregon Abby and I were treated to the educational experience of the Tillamook cheese factory. Because honestly, what vacation wouldn’t be complete with a tour of that?

While the tour was certainly educational, both Abby and I swore off eating cheese for months afterwards. To this day, when I think back to that trip, my stomach gets a little queasy. No one should ever be exposed to that much cheese product.

It is nice to know that not much has changed with my parents. Even though Abby is 30 and I am 27, my parents are still concerned with our education. Yesterday after a morning stroll on the beach, we drove over the Hyannis to learn about the local economy through a tour of the Cape Cod Potato Chip Factory.

While it didn’t last long, the tour was filled with loads of information and we all left feeling just a little bit smarter. The free samples didn’t hurt either!

Thank you Mom and Dad for continuing to educate me and find free food to keep my belly happy!