When I began my experience with the Kenan Fellows Program last year, I had no idea the opportunities it would bring.

Among other things, I can count the following as resulting (directly or indirectly) from my fellowship:

• Broader professional network

I can count my mentor (Dr. Stephanie Schuttler) at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and many of the people she works with as friends and professional resources. I have connected with over three-fourths of the people in my cohort on social media. Many of us get together every couple of months to check in with each other.

I look forward to our Kenan gatherings with great anticipation. The teachers in the program are positive, motivated solution-seekers and enjoy discussing various aspects of education. You will be pushed to think in new ways and entertain new perspectives. There were a few exercises that we did at the Professional Advancement Institutes that felt like getting a peek behind the curtain that is public education.

• Practice writing legitimate science curriculum

Just today, I finished my final draft of my curriculum. My students are loving their experience combining science and literacy in the eMammal program. Each time we check the memory cards to see what animals passed through our schoolyard, the students wait with bated breath. Coyotes, deer, foxes, raccoons, possums, and squirrels surprise the students each time. We do close readings on various mammal-related scientific texts and students are practicing standards-based reading and writing skills while learning about the nature that exists around them.

• NCCAT visit

Have you been to the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching? It is INCREDIBLE. If you are an educator in North Carolina, you must sign up for one of their professional development offerings. In the first week of the Kenan Fellows Program, you will travel to Cullowhee, NC and spend a week diving into your fellowship. You’ll develop relationships, feel inspired, build confidence in terms of approaching your fellowship, and participate in TOP-NOTCH professional development.

• More money in my savings account

I can’t look past it–one benefit of the fellowship is that it is paid. As a teacher, if I can spend part of my summer improving my craft and putting money in the bank, that is a great opportunity.

I am undoubtedly a better teacher for having participated in the Kenan Fellows Program, and I am immensely grateful.

I am now a little over halfway into my year as a Kenan Fellow. 2015 brought with it many incredible experiences and unique opportunities. Every year at Christmas, we sit around the tree, read Luke, Chapter 2, and exchange gifts. But, somewhere in there, usually right before the gift exchange, we reflect on the past year. Each member of the family gives a brief overview of the last twelve months, highlighting a few of the best memories and naming the challenges.

This year, sitting around the tree with the rest of my family, I was able to count my Kenan Fellowship as one the things I am most grateful for in 2015. I have gained new perspectives, grown my professional network, been inspired, collaborated with my team and mentor to write and revise curriculum, planned activities to get students get fired up about authentic science in a Social Studies/Language Arts class, learned how to stay aware and participate in education policy, and participated in well-planned, helpful, and interesting Professional Advancement. I am a better teacher and my students are better off because of my Kenan Fellowship. I am thankful to have this experience.

Too many kids enter my class in August with the misconception that the president can do whatever s/he wants and they are the be-all, end-all of decision making and change in the United States. It blows their mind when they discover how much influence citizens hold. Thus, it should be pretty powerful that the teachers on my team and I are structuring everything around the theme of citizenship this year.

• World War II on the homefront: What can you do to conserve resources to play your part to beat Hitler?
• The Constitution: Why is it important for you to understand and discuss the Bill of Rights?
• Civil Rights Movement: How can an individual create change within a larger context?

Perfectly fitting with this theme of citizenship, we will now ask the following:

• What can you do to create a conservation area in your backyard?
• Why is it important for you to understand what animals are around your school? Why should you advocate for them?
• Why should you participate in a study about shark’s teeth?
• Did you know that you can play a part in a scientist’s research?

Viewing life through themes (rather than content areas) illuminates understanding that you would otherwise miss. How powerful is it for students to realize that everything in life is made up of every content area you can identify?  Take an idea and explore it from every angle possible: art, math, music, science, physical activity, reading, writing, history, foreign language, psychology….

I’m hoping that through participating in my eMammal project and Mr. Bourne’s Shark Teeth project, our students come away with a deep, meaningful understanding of what it means to be a citizen–and pursue it in their lives beyond 8th grade.

Teachers just don’t get to experience things like the Kenan Fellows Program very often.

Teachers, imagine…

…throwing yourself into the role of the learner again.
In everyday life, we are learning constantly, from students and colleagues, from authors and artists. And yet, we are rarely formally in the role of Learner. As a Fellow, you’ll sit in a raft and learn about the insane biodiversity of an island in the Nantahala River in North Carolina. You’ll learn ways of identifying various dragonflies, then take a trek to a pond to catch and identify dragonflies–applying your newfound knowledge. You’ll learn an insane amount about whatever project (mammals? soil? shark teeth? ants? cotton? nanotechnology?) you are on. You’ll develop a meaningful relationship your mentor, who is a professional working in the field. You’ll learn new ways of instructing and guiding learning of kids.

As a teacher, you give and give and give and give. All day long, all year long. So, this is a chance to receive. This learning is refreshing and invigorating.

…being treating professionally.
At every turn in the Kenan Fellows Program, you and your ideas are valued. You are taken seriously as someone with a degree and experience. You’re put up in a hotel or conference center during Professional Advancement. You’re fed (almost too often) really quality food.

…networking with educators outside of your school.
You, like me, probably have some fantastic teachers in your building that you can learn from and with. But, with more people in your network, you are exposed to more ideas and you will become a better teacher just through spending time in the company of great teachers. You won’t be limited to the teachers on your hall or in your building; and, yes, you can get some of the benefits from an extended professional learning network from Twitter or other social media, but nothing can beat sharing stories, laughing, and discussing teaching together around a dinner table.

…helping to change how science is taught in North Carolina (and getting paid for it!).
You’ll work to bring your mentor’s work to classrooms around North Carolina. You’ll develop approachable, hands-on curriculum that allows students to become scientists and participate in actual science. We should be pushing to create experiences for students all the time in all of our classes, and this fellowship offers the tools and time to do that. The supplemental income for the summer is pretty nice, too!

These are my biggest takeaways. The more I reflect on the experience, the more I am grateful for the opportunity to participate in the program.

I am currently sitting in a glass-walled work room in Hunt Library on NC State’s campus. This building is one of my favorite spaces–its design could serve as a model for an amazing middle school someday.

In this room, I can control the temperature and lighting. I can wirelessly connect my laptop to the television for collaboration if needed. I can set a “noise-masking” function for the room if I were a middle-schooler in a group trying to plan a top-secret presentation that would blow my classmates’ minds. From the windows, I see thousands of books in rows on shelves set against a background of healthy, green trees. I can gain perspective here.

Location is important. For the past three weeks, the Students Discover group of Kenan Fellows has been located in the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, and many of us stayed in the Holiday Inn downtown. This common location has provided ample opportunity for working together, challenging each other, discussing crazy ideas, dreaming, supporting, celebrating.

We’ve had success with some pretty lofty goals. I can’t explain how impressed I am with Team Dirt for making science accessible for students and teachers will little funds and support. Those of us who believe in public education because of the opportunity that it provides for everyone are grateful for Team Dirt giving priority to making their project accessible. Team Ants made videos of ants’ behaviors so that even a class with limited equipment can participate in their project. Team Jaws is utilizing 3-D printing of sharks’ teeth to open their project to teachers and students who do not have access to actual shark teeth. Those of us on Team eMammal are connecting interested teachers with the museum to gain access to high quality camera traps. We’ve all spent considerable time making our lesson plans approachable for teachers who have not participated in the fellowship.

And, at times, it has been frustrating:
What in the world are these numbers I’m looking at?  I’m not sure I’m cut out for this.
Why are there so many meetings?
I can’t concentrate with a thousand people talking.
WHY DOESN’T THE WIFI WORK?

But the amount of support from each other, Kenan, Your Wild Life, the museum, Students Discover, our post-docs (Thanks again, @FancyScientist!), etc. etc. was overwhelming and allowed us to overcome our challenges.

For the past three weeks, I’ve only been in one location with eleven other Kenan Fellows. There are Kenan Fellows all over the state accomplishing similar things. And on Monday, all 42 of us will be reunited in this library for three days to round out our summer experience. We will undoubtedly recount our successes and failures and challenges and accomplishments and be presented with a time and space to reflect, discuss, dream, support, commiserate, celebrate. And we’ll all gain perspective. Location is important. Looking forward to being together on Monday!

Team eMammal!

The great part of Citizen Science is that my students will be helping gather data for the eMammal project. My kids’ collection and identification of the photos they get will allow Dr. Schuttler to answer certain questions about animal activity around schools.

One of the questions being explored is super interesting:

Do animals change their behavior based on the school schedule? Are animals more active after everyone goes home for the day? For the weekend? For an extended break?

I am excited to play a part in real science through collecting this data for the eMammal team.

Tomorrow begins Week 2 at the Nature Research Center, which is part of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. Many of us have already expressed disappointment that Week 1 is over… this experience has been amazing.

I believe that we learn best through experiencing things. We learn our best lessons about interpersonal relationships through making and maintaining friendships, but also through losing touch with people or sometimes actively choosing to end friendships. We learn our best lessons about how to be good employees through gaining promotions, being written up, and setting and maintaining personal goals.

It only logically follows that we learn our best lessons about how to be an attentive scientist, an inspired historian, a talented linguist, a brilliant artist or a curious mathematician through experience.

The good folks at the Kenan Fellows Program completely immerse you in your fellowship. You have no choice but to learn through experience. As an educator, I strive to do the same for my students–and at times, I succeed. I try to design lessons to hit the senses and get kids active, but there is always room to grow. And this is one area in which my fellowship has already inspired me to be a better educator.

We have a long list of goals that we are tackling in the next couple of weeks. We’re delegating some, sharing some, and peer-editing all of them.

I can’t wait to inspire the same sense of awe and curiosity about mammals that Dr. Schuttler and Dr. Kays have inspired in me.

Week 2 holds a lot–small mammal trapping, curriculum development, data analysis, field guide creation, and more…

Also, Week 2 holds my third anniversary with this lovely lady:

Life’s good.

Hard to believe I woke up in the beautiful Smoky Mountains this morning. Joanne, Nate, and I drove to Burlington, where Nate and I promptly got in his car and drove to Raleigh-Durham airport, because I am about to fly to Ohio to go to the wedding of a great friend of mine with whom I teach and coach. I’m sitting near Gate D17 at RDU, waiting for my flight. Looong day.

While I was super excited about the raft trip and it was (along with the edcamp) my favorite activity of the week, the highlight of my experience at NCCAT would be the relationships formed. Our cohort is AWESOME.

Project: The 1NFuns

Project: Wearable Devices

Project: Students Discover

The teachers here have been selected (from a pool of around 300 applications) to do this project and I feel honored to be among them.

We were presented with some fantastic resources in addition to having the time to network and form relationships. The project management tool Trello is going to revolutionize the way I do group work.  I do some formal debates in my class that require a lot of purposeful collaboration and teamwork.  Trello is going to be a perfect tool for that (and my teammates and I are going to use it to plan our year AND my E-Mammal projectmates and I are going to use it to plan our Kenan product). Trello was introduced to me by @mcscienceteach, who put on a great workshop about project management. @mshicksenglish shared some great resources for the discussion based classroom as well. Hoo-boy, I am ready to start cracking on next year.

Even with something as high quality as Kenan PD, there is always room for improvement.  I attended a session with a teacher that (because I follow her on Twitter) I know is awesome. But, I was expecting some very practical advice on implementing successful project-based learning in my classroom and I didn’t get it.  I think edcamp’s philosophy of “The Law of Two Feet” needs to be implemented at ALL PD for teachers, and this problem would be solved.

Regardless of this session, my week at NCCAT has been better than any other PD I’ve attended save my two day visit to Ron Clark Academy. The programming that was put together was helpful and useful and practical and didn’t waste our time.  Additionally, they take good care of teachers at NCCAT and I’m currently brainstorming a way that a few teachers at Broadview can go.  Believe it or not, this resource is not widely mentioned where I teach in ABSS.

I have a feeling that will change soon.

It is DAY 2 of our retreat at NCCAT in Cullowhee, NC.  I am thrilled to be surrounded with teachers of this caliber.  I’ve had refreshing conversation after refreshing conversation.

I believe that Kenan will elevate my teaching career by providing resources, connections, relationships, and experiences that would otherwise not be available to me.  I am excited to fall more into a role as a teacher-leader within my school and my district. I am excited to do a better job of empowering teachers around me to do things they want to do for their students.

Working with my mentor Stephanie will provide a level of expertise that my students and I (and hopefully other teachers in the building) will benefit from.  I’ll be able to tap into her knowledge base to bring that to my students.  Having more perspectives is ALWAYS better than having fewer. I think that is why this time at NCCAT has been so great. I’ve been surrounded by great perspectives–and many of them.  I will carry these ideas back to my school.

Here is to two more days here at NCCAT!