Comments on: An Agent of the System http://borderland.northernattitude.org/2006/05/23/an-agent-of-the-system/ (bôr'dər-lănd') n. Located on or near a frontier. An indeterminate area or condition. Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:22:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.5 By: Sarah Puglisi http://borderland.northernattitude.org/2006/05/23/an-agent-of-the-system/#comment-8159 Sarah Puglisi Tue, 17 Oct 2006 04:35:08 +0000 http://borderland.northernattitude.org/2006/05/23/an-agent-of-the-system/#comment-8159 In the end I'm just re-runs of I Love Lucy...and strumming Here Comes the Sun (or rather Nothing new under the sun). (It's been a long cold lonely winter, little darling it seems like years since you've been here....here comes the sun and I say it's alright....) I suppose...certain lines of thought in my educational past and in the past seem worthy of a bit of nostalgic revival.They were times there breeding creative possibilities. I can't wait till they revive Whole Language. I'm for calling it The New Wholer Language or my new one is Wholier Language ...again. I was so amazed at Maslow in his last (I think unfinished work) which I foolishly lent out and a Speech teacher did not return yet- for talking of the kind of teacher necessary in an age of information, where people might well hold five or so different job roles in a lifetime. Certainly a certain group will be educated around those changing needs in society, educated in flexibility, adaptability, creative construction concepts... it just isn't likely for my kids in poverty. The troubling thread in this piece is the obvious disconnect for those in poverty who are slipping further from educational access, opportunity. There we truely do seem to replicate failure models so consistently, and innovation is whatever buzz political stakeholders are spinning (oh how I recall Herdon's The Way It's Spoze to be ending with ....it doesn't seem like there's any change coming)........my world in school is about as innovative as good old 1980 Archer and M. Hunter, and a long DI chant....the one thing I saw in a year or more that I thought had potential for real innovation, and thus making me uncomfortable, aware of my lack of abilities, need for real training, was at a summer tech conference in San Diego where cheap laptop systems (oh what was it called, sorry) made me dream again of checking them out to kids for home and seeing if that might not begin to help in opening doors. It seemed so possible in that conference. I came back to work in a District now locking out just about every site on site and realized the end of a dream...deferred, locked, dessicated....ugh. In the end I’m just re-runs of I Love Lucy…and strumming Here Comes the Sun (or rather Nothing new under the sun). (It’s been a long cold lonely winter, little darling it seems like years since you’ve been here….here comes the sun and I say it’s alright….) I suppose…certain lines of thought in my educational past and in the past seem worthy of a bit of nostalgic revival.They were times there breeding creative possibilities.

I can’t wait till they revive Whole Language. I’m for calling it The New Wholer Language or my new one is Wholier Language …again. I was so amazed at Maslow in his last (I think unfinished work) which I foolishly lent out and a Speech teacher did not return yet- for talking of the kind of teacher necessary in an age of information, where people might well hold five or so different job roles in a lifetime.

Certainly a certain group will be educated around those changing needs in society, educated in flexibility, adaptability, creative construction concepts… it just isn’t likely for my kids in poverty. The troubling thread in this piece is the obvious disconnect for those in poverty who are slipping further from educational access, opportunity. There we truely do seem to replicate failure models so consistently, and innovation is whatever buzz political stakeholders are spinning (oh how I recall Herdon’s The Way It’s Spoze to be ending with ….it doesn’t seem like there’s any change coming)……..my world in school is about as innovative as good old 1980 Archer and M. Hunter, and a long DI chant….the one thing I saw in a year or more that I thought had potential for real innovation, and thus making me uncomfortable, aware of my lack of abilities, need for real training, was at a summer tech conference in San Diego where cheap laptop systems (oh what was it called, sorry) made me dream again of checking them out to kids for home and seeing if that might not begin to help in opening doors. It seemed so possible in that conference. I came back to work in a District now locking out just about every site on site and realized the end of a dream…deferred, locked, dessicated….ugh.

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