So, here are are again. February is National Heart Health Month. It’s a cute tie-in to Valentines Day, I suppose, but that’s about it. There a barrage of talk about living a healthy lifestyle, much of which centers around daily exercise.

Really? Have they looked out my window? I can barely walk down my driveway to get the paper much less take off on a briskly paced jaunt around the block. The ice and snow of this cute little month produce copious amounts of exercise guilt and stress. Then guess what happens? Up shoots that darned old blood pressure again!

Here is a brief brochure that contains warning signs of heart disease in women and issues to consider in our never-enidng attempt to live a long and healthy life.

Friday, February 4 is Wear Red Day, designated as such to draw attention to the heart healthy ways to which we should all adhere. I’ll wear red (if I remember–but that’s another story!), and I’ll be the one in the corner eating ice cream and texting someone about moving this celebration to the month of May.

From the Spring, 2010 edition of  The American Scholar, this essay has consumed my thinking since I read it last weekend.

Teachers, by nature of their jobs, are allotted almost no solitude during the school year. Professional development time normally consists of a topic selected by administrators and delivered via direct instruction, either in large groups or small, with little time built in for reflection. It may also consist of completing a task–a curriculum document, a textbook evaluation or a common assessment, something that can be shared with the school board as proof that the time granted was “worthy” from a budgetary standpoint.

One exception to this model is the Boothbay Literacy Retreat, sponsored by Heinemann. Time alone to reflect and think about new learning is an implicit part of the daily schedule. It is an extremely effective professional development model. The time to concentrate and construct one’s own learning based on new information is invaluable. Time is also set aside for sharing and discussion which aids in the processing of finding new ideas and creative solutions to difficult situations. In addition, because I drove to Maine from my home, I was afforded an additional 1,350 miles to ponder and concentrate and create ways to apply what I learned.

Deresiewicz delineates the need for time and solitude and reflection in order to develop new and original thinking. For leaders to be creative in their problem solving, they need time to sort through options and strategies. What a marvelous school reform strategy it would be to give teachers Solitude Days. This is a lengthy piece, but a very worthy one. The magazine cover contains the link to the article.

It’s cold and dark and gloomy these days. Another storm is on the way. Pretty soon, people will begin whining about the woes of February. More on that later. Want to lift that gloom? Want to hear your heart sing with goodness and joy? Want to see a feel-good movie that will make you laugh and cry? Then hurry on out to see The King’s Speech. You know the story–there’s no surprise there, but Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush bring the characters alive in such a tender-hearted way that you’ll want to stay for the next showing and relive the story all over again. It took me a while, but once you get over thinking of Helena Bonham Carter as Bellatrix Lestrange, you will enjoy her performance immensely, too. I’m rooting for this little movie all the way.

Will the glorious sound of those two words ever cease being a thrill to hear? Though this upsets the apple cart known as my class syllabus, it’s a beautiful snowy morning and a glorious blank slate of a day. Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal contained a very useful graphic regarding efficient ways to remove snow from the driveway. For your shoveling pleasure:

The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid haunts me still, though I finished it over a week ago. It’s a short tale with a compelling and easy to read narrative. The protagonist, a Pakistani, shares his life story over the course of a meal lasting for several hours to an American stranger he meets in a cafe. The author does a superior job of maintaining an underlying tone of tension beneath all of the dialogue. Though perhaps not indicative of a universal experience, the story sheds light on the assimilation of a young man into a culture very foreign from his own.

My students listened raptly to this RSA Animate of Sir Ken Robinson. With his lovely, lilting language, complimented by the engaging RSA Animate technology, Sir Ken explains the need to change educational paradigms. Sounds pretty dry, right? Not for students of today.  They have lived the situation he outlines. They relate to the disenchantment and frustration described by Sir Ken as they have been subjected for most of their lives  to the the following out-dated educational model: information is delivered to large groups of people in a linear fashion, most of whom are sorted solely by their “date of manufacture.” How many years will it take until we see systemic and meaningful change?

The cornerstone to keeping my weight under control is exercise. Love it when I’m done, hate it when it looms before me. It’s hard to be accountable for appropriate levels of exercise, though. The scale tells one part of the story, but it goes way beyond that. Arthritis and heart disease run in my family, so cardiovascular exercise is a must for a long, healthy life. The only person who knows how much I really use my treadmill is the technician who comes out every few years to clean and service it. When he gets inside the guts of the thing, he can see how many hours and miles have been used since the last tune-up. In four years, I have only walked 320 miles. Pathetic. I vow to do better in 2011 and made a date with Erik to make sure I follow through. Now, if the kids would just come to town to pad the numbers, I’d be much obliged.

The iPad has turned into my sole platform for reading. I haven’t held a book in my hands since last April. The only problem with this scenario, aside from the horror expressed by my physical book loving friends, is the beating my budget takes from having to buy all of my own books. Last spring I tried to download an eBook from a local library, but due to the lack of Flash on iPad, it was not possible. Assuming the change would happen sooner or later, I waited. This past weekend, sure enough, I was able to download an ePub book.

At this point in time, an App called Overdrive Media (currently only native for iPhone and iTouch, but compatible with iPad) allows for reading ePub text on the iPad. There is an update coming out soon which is supposed to allow for the reading ePDF books, as well. There are only a few drawbacks at this point. The libraries don’t have very many digital copies of each title to loan. Once a book is checked out, it’s out. Just like a physical book, you must put the title on hold and wait for it to return to the library. Availability will be better when the new App comes out and ePDFs can be checked out, as well. The other problem an upgrade will solve is the slightly pixelated look of the text that comes from using an iPhone App on iPad.

As one who take great joy in all things digital, this turn of events is exciting. Digital media will surely become easier to access as the demand for eBooks increase.

Why is it sometimes so hard to take a first step in the right direction? Every morning, I walk downstairs and have a choice–open the frig, grab a Diet Coke, and sit at the table reading newspapers and working crosswords, or walk one step further, head down to the basement, strap on the walking shoes and hit the treadmill. Once I take that extra step, it’s all good. The iPad occupies the next forty minutes, and time on the treadmill passes quickly. The impact that one step has on my day is fairly significant. Here’s hoping this new year begins with a series of first steps in the right direction for you.

Today’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch contains this front page article: “Colleges find college freshmen unready.” Some of the schools listed on the “best schools” chart are very solid institutions, but find up to 26% of their former students in remedial classes during their first two years of college. Are high schools trying to do so much that they aren’t able to do enough?

While serving as a Department Chair at a school considered to be rigorous, I was approached several times a year about the high number of Fs in our department. The teachers in our department are not hard-nosed, stick to the bell curve kind of people. Their greatest desire is to see all students succeed. They move heaven and earth to help students who struggle. Systemically, we have multiple supports in place for kids who need more personal or intensive assistance. Yet, some kids do not pass, often times because they have not chosen to do the hard work necessary to demonstrate even low levels of achievement. However, the pressure exists to make sure all kids are “on target” to graduate in four years.

Does this push to pass every student through high school in four years do a disservice to some students? Would it be possible to allow some kids to slow down, take fewer classes each year and allow for more depth in learning? Could we ever get over the stigma that the five year plan would impose on students? Would another year really help?