photo credit: Speed-Light via photopin cc

Take me out to the ball game

Take me out with the crew

Buy me some peanuts and local brew…

Would be the way I’d write the NCCAT version.  The Kenan Fellows week at NCCAT – following a week in Raleigh training on the OER rubric, the NCLOR tagging system, and Home Base- could have gone foul of the information-overload line.  But insert Patio PD at night and one glorious day on the river and for me the week stayed fair of that line.

The lineup Lisa and Craig put together for the week at NCCAT was impressive.  I am ecstatic that I have several notes in an Evernote notebook of innovative ideas to try in the fall (more flipping, augmenting, inquiry, and blogging here we come).  But the setting of my strongest memories from the week at NCCAT is outside.  Summers for me are a time to recharge my batteries for the next year, and nature is my recharging station.

So while I appreciated the opportunity to be awed and inspired by and learn from such innovative educators, sitting in a room without windows for hours at a time was a challenge.  (Something I must constantly remind myself and others of when designing lessons for our students.)  Cue the nights sitting on the patio – meeting and getting to know other Fellows and getting to know my fellow “Home-Basers” better.  As the fireflies came out and another bottle of a regional brew was opened, topics of discussion ranged from life-changing surgeries to pedagogy to the acting chops of Leo.  The patio provided the perfect place to unwind from the day’s activities and congregate with others who have chosen this exhilarating and exasperating profession.

The cleanup hitter for the week, however, was the rafting trip down the Nantahala.  I love that river.  I’ve been down it several times, but had no idea that one of the most diverse plots of land on the continent resides on its banks.  Listening to Peter talk about the culture and the environment of the river made me think of Richard Louv’s work about the importance of finding the balance between technology and nature.  The beautiful, natural setting of NCCAT at Cullowhee was an idyllic place for the week.  I hope and pray it will survive.

“The future will belong to the nature-smart—those individuals, families, businesses, and political leaders who develop a deeper understanding of the transformative power of the natural world and who balance the virtual with the real. The more high-tech we become, the more nature we need.”
—Richard Louv