RJ Stangherlin

Keystone Technology Integrator and STAR Discovery Educator

This site is for Mrs. Stangherlin's classes at Salisbury High School.

Time Out: Making Time Matter

NOTE: I cross-posted this on the PA DEN Blog.

One of my PA Discovery Educator Network friends, Jennifer Dorman, a.k.a. cliotech, is an avid blogger with a widgetized digital footprint.  We are a part of each other’s social networks, and that is a very good thing for me because I always learn from her footprints.  Usually my learning takes the form of acquiring a new Web 2.0 tool or tutorial, but often I learn things that were eluding me, like how to show I had a digital footprint (that’s next on my to do list when I have some time out).  But her recent cross-post about connecting the right-brain creative accidents of Evan Williams (creator of Blogger, Twitter, Odeo and his Obvious Corporation) to Discovery’s Webinar with Dan Pink and A Whole New Mind was an insightful connection.  Interestingly, however, what lingered from her post was her first sentence admission that she had “unplugged” for several days. 

I, too, unplugged for several wonderful days with my family, who traveled many miles to share the holidays.  But unlike Jennifer--who returns with a wonderful technology post from her reading The Economist--cover to cover, I read Real Simple and Body + Soul January-February 2008, selectively concentrating on whole living.  ‘Tis the season for resolutions, and while RS focused on organizing the new year, B+S targeted living healthier in the new year.  Similarities: undoubtedly, since both are Martha Stewart Omnimedia Inc. publications.  In that way that sometimes I purchase something because “it speaks to me,” I subscribed to Body + Soul‘s “10 Healthiest Resolutions,” embracing #4 about breathing deeply (hard copy p. 101) because it resonated for me the need to unplug to recharge (not really an oxymoron) to live richly, the goal of this month’s magazine, and what I suspect we all do when we unplug.  The problem is that we just don’t unplug enough.  It’s not about being off line, although sometimes that’s where I start.  It’s really a lifestyle change.  I think of how Viana LaPlace‘s unplugged kitchen returned me to the simple authentic joys of cooking.  And how Jennifer’s simple unplugging--and that from a high-end, high tech achiever, allowed me to unplug without guilt and make time matter with those who really count: family and friends. 

So, how will I achieve balance and simplify my life in the new year.  It will, I suspect, connect to what I have come to think about abundance, one of Pink’s 3A’s.  While Pink’s definition of abundance links to his theories of automation and Asia as reasons why people in the U.S. cannot compete at their current level of abstraction and logical thinking in the marketplace, Terri Trespicio offers a different reading of abundance. In “More Than Enough” (pp. 107-112 B+S), she asks how we achieve a better life without letting the quest consume you.  Her answer: striking a balance between not enough and way too much.  That’s my new year’s resolution: finding balance.  Making room for the new and creating spaces for the old. Rediscovering center somewhere between too little and too much.  And like everything else wonderful that happens through social networking, I have so many friends in the Discovery Educator Network who will keep me on course, educated, and timely. 

The Gift of Giving

Students rushed to class.  You should have seen the calculations--figuring short and long-term percentages.  Discussions about negative numbers and positive points.  Strategy sessions on what to put in and when and how to hold back on investing.  Conflict resolution skills abounded in the debate of how to maximize coin and dollar values. Who to sabotage--who to support?  Getting into a solid competition without playing sports.  It was fun, it made sense, and it was for a good cause.  It was Penny Wars, and all the English classes competed to see which section in each teacher’s class would win. 
All fundraisers work for a common goal, but none of them created more positive and sustained energy day after day than Penny Wars.  Students made some incredible sacrifices, too.  One girl dragged in her penny collection that she had accumulated since she was 3.  A sixth period student got permission to go to his car, dipping into his pay check to the tune of $14 to offset Period 8.  After school on the last day of the contest, classes came back to add more money, and all day today the only question on students’ minds was who won.

And that answer is so fundamental (and millennial).  Everyone won.  Those who gave felt so good about doing good.  Everyone understood the cause and everyone gave something.  At this time of year, when wish lists and wanting are in the air, it was refreshing and rewarding to watch students give so others less fortunate could receive. 

Think Pink: A Whole New Mind

If you have not read Dan Pink‘s A Whole New Mind, you really should.  Teachers, parents, students, everyone really should read this book.  But if time is the issue (and who ever has enough), why not join us [NOTE: DATE CHANGED] THURDSAY, DECEMBER 13 at 7:00 PM to listen to Dan Pink via a Discovery Educator Network webinar.  It just might be the smartest best hour you’ve spent in a long time.  Why?  Because Dan Pink will change your mind forever about your future.  Will empathetic right-brain thinkers create a new economy with a whole new brain?  What will drive the change?  Quick clue-->

For a good summary of his major points, click this link.  If you would like to join us [over 300 participants already registered, and some of them are my students], click here.  If you cannot attend, you can view the archived event here Just in case you ever wondered if you are left or right-brain dominant, here’s a whole new way to know.