think:lab

Singing the Hero Song Fandango

Time.  But Who's Keeping Track?

The only problem I'll have this coming year in massaging the 'hero journey' construct with my students to help kick up the heat on the traditional Brit Lit motif will be fitting a lifetime of content into 9 months. 

Oh, and all dem crazy projects, too.

My 1st day list of possible ideas pushes well past 753 minutes right now (if I cross out 3/4 of it), a tad bit more than what passing bells will allow. Shrug. 

The Saccharin Side of Hero Worship

Perhaps I'll just show them this little Disney snippet of a happy-go-lucky young Hercules seeking his Merlin mentor, push the kids to deconstruct the stereotypical Hollywood cartoon 'hero' that such a film clip assumes...

...and then ask them if they can guess how we're gonna collectively mess that mutha up over the next 9 months.

Drinking the Kool-Aid

And that makes me think that following Ewan McIntosh's lead in figuring out a way to add a little touch of the steampunk aesthetic in terms of asking the obvious about this SecondLife-to-video-vignette:

What's the hero evolution backstory on the guy in the balloon?  And what assumptions do the steampunk sensibility light in our imagination when we wonder about the hero's journey that will follow?

Or, Maybe This

Then again...

...I'll probably opt for the cool-enough-for-school Steam Boy's trailer, instead:

CoverItLive Goes Big in Video Land

Pssst: Video-Head Alert!

Did you hear what the CoverItLive (real time blogging) just announced?

Our users can now integrate LIVE video from Qik, Mogulus and uStream directly into their CoveritLive live blogs. 

It is an extremely simple process (much like our existing YouTube integration) that lets our users quickly add live video content without the need to send their readers to another site or blog.  Our Support Center has a short flash movie to demonstrate how to put this exciting new feature to use: Demo for IE users, Demo for Firefox users

Oh, My.

Or, at least, holy digital integration, Batman!

Get a load of this, sportsfans:

The video feeds can be turned on and off with a click of your mouse.  Imagine a breaking news story where one of your readers writes in, "Have you seen the video on Mogulus right now?".

With a few clicks, you incorporate that live feed directly into your live blog. 

Or how about sending a contributor to an event with a Qik enabled phone?  They write in to your live blog that they are about to interview someone...click...the video interview is directly inserted into your live blog coverage.

I can just see the edu-blogger wheels under the BLC tent turning now.  (wink)

To My Backchannel Homeboys:

I only have 1 month until my students begin using CoverItLive to expand our in-class discussions across all my sections (so much cooler than globally 'flat' classrooms, if you ask little ol' me) given the new wireless laptop cart that showed up in my room this summer...

...so let's get movin with some educational proof of concept on this CIL video embedding business, fellas!

I'm countin' on you.

And so are my kiddos!

Planting the Seeds of Inspired Design

Out of the Design Loop

Sure, a guy snoozes a little bit.  And apparently he loses all street cred with dem pesky school architect types.  Sheesh.

Funny how just a single year away from having a front row seat at the center of the school design world has profoundly watered down my in-the-know radar for the latest/greatest projects that have a fighting chance of changing the game of possibilities for how we define a 'school' space.

While I've been enjoying my role on the DesignShare Awards 08 jury this summer -- and debating some really striking projects from around the globe with my colleagues -- I gotta admit that I rarely cross F2F paths with innovative school architecture in my new day-to-day teaching life.

Oh, My!

This is why I'm kicking myself a bit for being so late to the game about the Green School down there in Bali.

And don't even get me started about my sudden craving to be some sort of science fiction lab monkey so that I can be split into 2 independent teachers/beings, one that stays at my current school (which I adore) and one that heads to Bali to be part of this magic as well:

Heck, even Thomas Friedman has been down there on campus a couple of times.  And what does he know about school design? (wink)

Sometimes Green Really Means Green

Hard to throw a school book these days and not hit yet another use of the word "green" or "sustainable". 

Most of it, frankly, is window-dressing both from an architectural and philosophical perspective. Or perhaps just marketing chintz.

Most.  But not all...

Discovery is a Good Thing

Well, meet the Green School -- scheduled to open this September -- and their profound approach to educational/community sustainabilty:

Green School was planned and constructed within the concept that education consists of more than ‘school’. In addition to the classrooms, athletic facilities, student and faculty housing, and numerous other buildings, an integral feature of our school is the Learning Village. In this specialized setting, our students have the chance to apply lessons to specific disciplines and real business situations, making abstract ideas come to practical life with results they can witness on a daily basis. Students are involved in everything from manufacturing their own chocolate to helping to manage the organic fields, bamboo plantations, and rice paddies that are integral to the campus. By working with dedicated teachers and experienced professionals, students solve problems while developing entrepreneurial skills that will inform and empower them to become the leaders of their generation.

I agree with what you're thinking.  It kinda grabbed my attention, too. 

A few other of the Green School links worth keeping an eye on:

• Introduction and what appears to be a truly world class team of professionals guiding the program
• Guiding Frames, Philosophy, and Curriculum
• Ways to get involved (including internships, volunteering, careers)
• Facilities and the overall land/campus
• Press coverage of the school and Testimonials
• And my favorite of all:  class/grade level blogs. Yes.  Really!

The following video highlights the school's mission and hints at a rather brave design premise in terms of the spaces that will support the students' learning process and the larger community's sustainable practices.  Definitely only hinting at what they're building.  Keep an ear open for the way they describe the physical spaces and its relationship to the programmatic issues. 

Bamboo never felt so innovative:

And definitely grab a few minutes to watch this piece, too:

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Oh-My's

Man, oh man, oh man. If these photos don't rev up your curiosity factor, something is strangely amiss.

And I can't help but wonder why all new school design projects don't find the visual/life 'joy' within their projects rather than concentrating on architecture for the sake of architecture.  This photo set might be a model that could teach a few architectural firms a thing or two about visual storytelling in a way that truly inspires.

Constructing 3-bedroom faculty housing:

The "bridge":

An air-conditioned learning space:

A hint of what CR 'furniture' means; even better, what 'student' means:

If It All Disappears, We'll Just Be Traffic Signs

Dear Web 2.0:

There used to be a time when video and real words on digital highwires weren't  battling for the universe in pseudo-deity fist-to-cuffs fashion.

There was a time when these two 1's-n-0's ninjas weren't fighting for our collective souls like a couple of Dante's adolescent angels left tossing insults on the spiritual cutting room floor, a technological battle cry barely etched in charcoal bison stick figures on the weathered Lascoux cave walls of our collective educational memory.

What Bards and Yoda Can Teach Us About the Story

We're talking way, way back (before the Wayback Machine, in fact).

Back when stories were stories, and storytellers were butt-kickin' warriors who only wore the traveling singer-poet garb to keep the kings from becoming sword-lashing antsy.

You know, sort of like a middle ages Yoda wandering the highlands.

Just with a lot more under the robe than even Beowulf might have promised Technorati's Herot.

Graphics of Universal Understanding

But if I had to give up the epic rite of storytelling our very lives across the flame-licking camp fire deep insider our ancient selves...

...but wanted to stop shy of this digital bruh-ha-ha gaining faculty lounge storm clouds over the last few years...

I'd pull up a comfy seat with a copy of Otto's classic tome on aligning a universal visual language (the Mister Miagi of "information graphics") under my arm, and try the yoemen's work of wondering how we put the cultural fissures of the classroom Humpty Dumpty back together again.

What Will Our Legacy Be?

But then again, if writing (and video) disappears, we'll be nothing more than traffic signs on the larger educational & life learning curves.

Which might not be a bad thing.

Nobody Puts Twitter in the Corner - P. Swayze

Part 1:  Nobody Puts Twitter in the Corner! 

With 77 inspired comments (and counting) over there at Will's blogging joint, this Twitter-esque debate seems to be sparking something primal  that resides deep within the veins of our collective human experience. 

What precisely is it about this Twitter that causes folks to line up like frenzied tech-politicos on 2 sides of a life-or-death chasm?  Is it really that vital?

Certainly -- one can safely say -- it has to be something deeper than simply micro-blogging 140 character idea chatter, technology platform arguments, or even emerging calls for "netiquette" codification in order to support the unintended 'business' of fostering legit edu-development for the seemingly obvious what are you doing hamster wheel. 

Part 2:  How Deep is that Itch?

It's gotta be touching something inside our bone marrow.  Beyond logic's reach.  Like a reaction to spiders or chocolate.

Almost thinking that if we can crack this socialized DNA code of customized Twitter @semi_life_truths, we may be actually end up farther along the edu-blogger growth curve than anything else we've seen since the first sighting of the ever insta-pundant-like digital (big)foot-print circus tent we all perform in.

Me, I can't help but admit that my own use of Twitter has gone Fonzi-like, finally jumping the shark on the tangible value vs. impetuous want wave.

Note: 

I offer zero comment on anyone's passionate/personal stake in the Twitterscape.  Clearly it serves a compelling list of needs, conversations, radars, and personalities. 

To each his own, and all that 140-character-updated jazz.

For me, however, the experiment is officially over. 

For all the perceived a value that others have rhetorically demonstrated (with passion and logic alike) that this wacky little digital tool brings, my decision has nothing to do with the tool itself, let alone any 140-character case studies that may be presented at the edu-conference in your corner of Google Earth. 

Part 3:  Jumping that Shark

What it does have to do with, however, is an investment in something larger, more profound, more real, more to-the-point.

Something that serves kids, schools and community.  Directly and unapologetically, rather then in the signal vs. noise camp. 

And for me, if even 10% of my Twitter-use falls into the:

• silly
• distracting, and/or
• real-time backchannel miscommunication

categories, then I need to admit its time to:

• take off the leather jacket
• put away the water skis, and
• tell Fonzi to leave that shark that time-jugglin' shark alone.

P.S.  All Good in the Micro-Blogging Hood

If I were to still be full-on in the Twitter-game, I'd propose 2 projects:

1. Someone's gotta buy/develop the www.140characters.com domain.  Great meme-spark for someone to start posting completely out-of-context "best of" Twitter screenshots in the meme tradition of LOLCats, opting of course for good-natured/quirky fun (over the chum-feeding frenzy of misrepresenting larger patterns of sincere conversation without the vital backstory/tone added for good measure)
2. Perhaps I'd try to nudge the @Twitterverse and its related @EduBlogger brethren to follow @HoldensJourney (and his mighty superliteraryherovoice posse this fall as they fictionally rock-n-roll with this microblogging concept, showcasing what classrooms/kids could do for the power of good if they gave @Piggy, @Iago, and @Winston some creative space as their respective stories unfold in 140-character idea bursts.

Mmm.  Dang near reason to stay in the game. Shrug.

As I hinted at above, I still retain the right / desire to keep tabs on my homies and devil advocates alike.  And anyone that takes time to DM certainly deserves a reply. 

Other than that, my Twitter has officially left the building.

Suggestion Box

Please DM @HoldensJourney if you

• have any questions
• also seek literary global micro-dominance
• wanna suggest nifty collaboration projects to help real kids, or
• simply wanna drop off a tasty cheese plate to feed us as we leap for that pesky brass ring.

Turning off the Backchannel

Table of Contents:

• Part 1:  I'm headed to Silicon Valley for context.
• Part 2:  I'll mention a famous blogger unexpectedly kicking the habit.
• Part 3:  I'll to a larger point about backchanneling at conferences.  This will lead to how the choices we make really do define us, regardless of what the tools may allow us to do. 

Note:  Pt. 3 is the key part if you skip the rest.

• Part 4:  Finally, I'll go off on a personal tangent leaning towards action.

Part 1:  Silicon Valley

Some of you who peruse the Silicon Valley blog chatter may have noticed that Jason Calacanis has officially retired from blogging for personal/family reasons. 

If you know Jason, that's intriguing, impressive, or perhaps -- to some -- just an example of showmanship.  If you don't know of Jason, it may help to know that Jason co-founded Weblogs (one of the true giants in the new era of digital self-publishing world), has been on the cover of Forbes because of his social media leadership/instincts, etc..

Part 2: The Epiphany

In other words, this is a guy built on blogging...

...and yet he's quitting.

Mmm.

While the center of his current career is based at Mahalo, a human-powered search engine hoping to take a small bite out of Google's info-search business model, it is the new e-newsletter he's sending out that has most caught my attention.  Most importantly, the one that just arrived with the seemingly saccharine title, "How To Host An Amazing Conference" (subscription required).

Most of what Jason talks about is pretty solid strategic thinking from the vantage point of organizing the event for maximum impact/value. 

Part 3:  "Turn off the Backchannel"

One point -- no. 13, to be specific -- seems to transcend the conference planning landscape, suggesting something that I am becoming more and more aware of with each day I see new Tweets, UStream vids, Skype chats, etc roaming the halls of conferences. 

Jason writes:

Turn off the backchannel: its so distracting for everyone and typically devolves into making fun of the person's appearance. For those of you who don't know about the backchannel at a conference, it's typically an IRC chat room where folks hang out and respond to the speakers. It can be fun and informative when it's good: folks post links, challenge statements with data they find on the web, and riff on what they are hearing. However, chat rooms quickly become inhuman, and I've seen folks make fun of people's accents, their weight, and other such things.

When the backchannel first started, folks would put it on the projector--now most folks understand that's a bad idea because typically the speaker is the only person who doesn't see the comments. So, folks laugh at something, it throws the speaker off and they turn around and say, "What's everyone laughing at?" It was a neat idea at first, but most of the time it's a distraction. I suggest skipping it, or just don't endorse it.

Mmm:

• distracting - check
• devolves into making fun - check
• quickly become inhuman - check
• throws the speaker off - check

Can't help but think that this isn't just a conference thing (even though this is the exact time last year that I experienced the backchannel in all its edu-conference glory at Alan November's BLC, loving almost every minute of it).  That being said, time offers new insight that go beyond the echo chamber of niche conference backchannels.  Perhaps it isn't about the conference after all.  Perhaps it's more about the larger choices we make, and what they say about us.

Backchanneling may be:

1. possible
2. intriguing
3. c) easy
4. the oh-so new black...

...but it may also be: 

the least noble side of our best selves.

And I say that knowing full well 2 key things:

1. I've loved being in the legitimate and cheap seats of the backchannel at various times, both at conferences I've attended and virtually as well.
2. The edu-blogosphere is alive with happy thoughts about the power of the backchannel to further our collective goals to make kids/teachers/schools' realities better.

I'm just no longer sure that our confidence in the backchannel allows that. 

In fact, it may actually do something far worse over time.

I'll leave that to anyone who wants to chew on the conversational bone a bit. 

Otherwise, its just a thought I can't escape these days.  And its the underlying reason I've decided to officially exit the backchannel stream, both in terms of the frenzy to Twitter update and the frankly unprofessional side of conference chatter that seems to be more and more trendy in edu-circles.  While my sophomoric instincts love the game (I can't deny it), I've finally admitted to myself that 99.9% of the backchannel has nothing to do with the goal of working with/for students to better their lives. 

The rest too often appears to be misplaced ego or long-hidden middle school drama thrilled to finally have a platform to shout from.  At least as far as I'm concerned, this has become the prevailing norm.

Part 4:  My Own Tangent

Since way early on in this blogging adventure of mine, I've had one favorite customized post category.  In my blog editor, it simply reads: 

"Doing Good".

Mmm.

Not the least bit sexy or provocative, right?. 

Hardly del.icio.us geeky, either. 

Oh, and certainly other categories would be more org chart friendly or have a chance of paying the bills (i.e. tied back to my previous consulting life). 

Best of all -- if you like irony -- I long ago turned off the visible category links on the public end of any blog post in a past spring cleaning effort to rid the site of any extra clutter.  After all, many of my posts offer enough of that noise on their own. 

(wink) 

And even though nobody can see actually see the category link, I still pick a category when I publish a new post.  Kind of a private organizational pact with myself, I suppose.

And when I pick "Doing Good", I'm reminding myself that this little something that just caught my eye is inherently more important than all the rest of the topics I may eventually blog about.  In other words, every time I choose to blog about something under the "Doing Good" category, I'm really nudging myself in the backside to focus only on topics that transcend short-term trends and divisive commentary.

The Choice:

So, in the spirit of what Jason has opted to do (for reals or for show), I'm taking my own step out on that gangplank.

From this point on, I either select topics that nestle in real good-n-tight in the "Doing Good" column, or I don't post.  At all.  Period.  Nada. 

Salient on a higher level.  Or Silence.  For reals.

And perhaps silence (with a heavy dose of listening) is really the best thing we can do for each other. 

And for our students.

It's Willy Wonka's World; I Just Teach There

A colleague of mine called me recently:

"Dude, did you know that all of the furniture in your classroom is out in the hallway?"

Result: a temporary gulping on my part, followed by his telling me the maintenance team had done a monster carpet cleaning for me. Ah!

As I pulled the chair/desk bad boys back into my CR, figuring out how to reinstate the right 'fan' row configuration so the kids can simultaneously face forward and make eye contact with everyone, I began to marvel at the serendipitous art displays found on the underbelly of every desk.  Gum -- one of the great no-no's of CRs with carpet -- has a funny way of making it past candy security gates no matter how hard we kabash our students' efforts:

Note:

While it most likely goes without saying, there isn't a school desk in the US (perhaps beyond) that doesn't have gum underneath it.  This is hardly a reflection re: any single school, let alone mine.

While I'm far from a prison guard about its existence, I dig why no-gum rules exist, even as another part of me adores the Willy Wonka-like artistic result.  Makes me wonder if a coffee table book of similar student artifacts would sell.

Yesterday, my school's headmaster, assistant upper school director, and middle school director swung by my classroom to say hello, ask about my summer, and inquire as to why I have a vintage WWF wrestler action figure standing inside an antique bird cage near one of my bookshelves.  I told them, "The students will be given the entire school year to solve that riddle. Extra credit will go to the kid who figures it out, so I can't tell you."

Given that I only just recently inherited a classroom of my own, much of my non-travel time this summer has been spent trying to design a better-than-average physical learning environment while simultaneously adding my own quirky stamp of personality to give my kids a quasi-intellectual scavenger hunt throughout the year as they look around. 

Everything -- no matter how odd or unexpected (as far as teacher rooms go) -- will be an intentionally positioned double entendre or offer a hidden message related to the work we'll investigate and my challenge to them as learners/human beings.

Even more important: 

I'm going to challenge my kids to seek the unexpected literary connection or metaphor in the real world.  And any artifact they bring in, I'll proudly display in my classroom funhouse of tangential design selections.

Right next to the classic "Hang in there" cat-claw in the tree branch poster.

(wink)

***

Note:

I'm serious on the wrestling action figure in bird cage riddle, the joyful opportunity for EC, and the need for me to keep the solution it hush-hush now, BTW. 

A photo of the contraption will go up in the coming days/weeks, along with snapshots of other classroom space vignettes, too.

Oh, and it appears I'm not the only teacher type exploring space from a what can I craft in a DIY fashion (as opposed to my previous school planner/architectural career examples).  A certain middle school history teacher/podcaster extraordinaire, and current Missouri Teacher of the Year,  just emailed me about his own plans to share photos/videos of his classroom space. 

Can we sense a innovative DIY classroom space Flickr meme in the not so distant future, sportsfans?  If so, I want all the glory in terms of blame if it goes viral. 

(wink, again)

Admissions Teams & Teachers: Take Notice!

Note:  DK and his lovely personal side project -- gnatgnat -- is 100% to blame for my latest love affair (aka video crafting crush) on the Hillman Curtis team.

***

Let's say you're just aching to grab the attention of creative students into your learning institution.  The typical branding messages, billboards, brochures, and false idol 'networking' sites that parrot Facebook's game aren't working.  And your running out of money/patience/vision.

Well, perhaps you oughta take a gander at the work Hillman Curtis did for one institution of higher learning...and ask yourself why with a sub-$500 digital video camera and a simple goal of crafting a simple story, you can't do something similar to grab eyes/hearts.  Watch the following 3 student stories.

"Iku"

"David"

"Peter"

Follow-up homework? 

Admire. Learn. Smile. Realize that inspired storytelling is different than point/shoot/upload.  Be humble.  Start over.  Storyboard.  Edit.  Edit some more.  Empathize with your audience.  And go, go, go...

Wonder what stories your own kids could tell even today at your school? 

Forget the uploading watered down video tech junk that so frequently populates the edu-blogger airwaves with its nonsensical promises to impress the kiddos.  Just figure out how to tell a story in simple, elegant terms.  And then, maybe then, as Dan warns, consider a narrative film of your own.

***

High on the list of figure-it-out items of mine for this coming school year is to figure out how to wrestle the narrative film bear to the ground. 

I'll admit it:

Some of it lies in wanting to figure out if video really deserves a role in a fairly traditional HS English curriculum (and I'm not talking about showing an Oscar Wilde inspired film adaptation after reading the play).  This is partially a 2.0 itch that keeps wanting to be scratched, although I'm with Dan in his reminders that video done poorly is video worth skipping (and this means most, if not the huge majority of teacher/student-built videos) which lack the time/vision/ability to do narrative video well. 

The second part of my craving is a bit more curriculum/student focused:

It lies in at least two students of mine from last year -- I'll call them "Z" & "M" -- who threaten to double-handedly pull me into the crafting video age on their own (along with a colleague of mine ("Kern") who is their digital movie/story teacher/mentor and the guy who will teach me a few bells/whistles, too.  I'm sitting on one of their rough draft screen plays right now 'cause "Z" wanted an English teacher's POV at this stage of his story's development.

I'm going to get back to him on that, but I'm also going to urge like crazy that he spend time with the rest of the Hillman Curtis short film portfolio like "Embrace" which is just aching for me to use in the classroom this fall with the obvious "tell me what happened the day before this..." prompt to my students. 

Man, is this crazy lovely, delicate, and powerful all in one short film shot!  If only we have the ability to learn from it:

Oh, and I'm going to strongly suggest that "Z" and "M" buy Curtis' books about making films for the web, too:

• Creating Short Films for the Web
• MTIV:  Process, Inspiration, and Practice for the New Media Designer

Twitter Maintenance Blues, Haiku #2

Just because I'm on a self-imposed "Twitter-sabbatical" doesn't mean the world cares.  DM's still arrive in all their 140-character glory in my email inbox, making it hard-to-impossible to really get off the micro-bloggin' bandwagon. 

To be neighborly, thought I'd hit "reply" in DM land without feeling as if I'm a liar-liar type as far as the sabbatical business goes.  Everything was cool until dem crazy Twitter critters bit me on the backside with all their lovely graphic designed lovelyness. 

Almost feel guilty being a real live poet:

Go ahead.  Admit it.  You're achin' for more 5-7-5 syllablic fun, right?

Well, maybe now's the time to check out the previous episode of the "Twitter Maintenance Blues" haikufest.

No shame in doin' so:  I won't tell anyone.  Between you and your inner poet. 

Even if you're a number-crunchin' type! (wink)

Checking for John Keating in the Mirror

Context for this post:

• Darren Draper's original and edited post.
• Arthus' follow-up post.
• All the comments (for, against, otherwise) written on both posts.
• My own on-going/internal concerns about the impact of professional educators using real students (before the age of 18) as examples in their blogging and conference presentation efforts, as well as the muddy waters of treating adults and children as "peers" within the larger edu-blogosphere (and related edu-networks).

For those who do not feel familiar with any of this, I'd recommend reading both links above first -- followed by taking some solo time to think what larger patterns you see (beyond the specific example and personalities) -- before you read what follows. 

Or, take it out of context and tell me what you think of it on its own merits.  Either way, it's all good.

***

I wrote the following as a comment on both Darren's and Arthus' posts [with the addition of a bit of re-formating for clarity here].

I'm reminded of the Robin Williams character -- the teacher, John Keating -- in "Dead Poets Society" while trying to make sense of this larger scenario and comment thread.

"Keating" was exceptional at inspiration.  In other words, his greatness lay in opening the door of curiosity for his otherwise traditional or naive students, giving them the support, confidence & nudge to step forward into potentially 'risky' decisions. I say 'risky' because the decisions required challenging a previous status quo to achieve a new outcome, one that often had social/life implications riding in the balance. They were 'risky' based on the student's previous life experiences or context as much as the soon-to-be future.

Key:  This was done regardless of whether the student's parents (etc) would be willing to support the aforementioned decision.

On the other hand, Keating was decidedly lousy at giving those very same students 'cover' when the proverbial dung hit the fan.

In other words, while giving them the spark to tear out the textbook's pages, start an underground literature society, ignore a parent's steadfast rules, etc., he failed to take co-responsibility for what would happen 'the next day' when the truth become public.  Just as important, he failed to provide his students with the emotional/strategic wherewithal to handle the real world pressure that would follow the execution of such risky decisions, whether they were inherently in the right or wrong for doing so in the first place.

Slight tangent (with key punchline) coming:

I doubt many would argue that Keating was a bit of an underground revolutionary who conveniently used the 'guise of a classroom teacher to validate his own philosophical journey, perhaps even acting out (vicariously through his students) his own latent needs to rebel in a way that he was not able to do when he was their age in a similar setting. 

To that end, his character becomes morally suspect as a model for teachers everywhere, no matter how inspired his individual classroom/teaching lessons may have been (or how Hollywood set him up to be in the closing minutes).

This comes to mind because the collective WE (as formal/paid educators) run the risk of being "Keatings" far more than we may choose to recognize or admit.

I, for one, can't help but hold my hand up in recognition that I've been culpable in the past.  Where/how?  Well, any time I've chosen to write about, support, challenge, publicize, highlight, showcase at conferences, blog-link to, collaborate with, and/or criticize younger students (very much like Arthus or very different than Arthus) in the public forum of the edu-blogosphere (and beyond) -- students who are not technically/legally adults (i.e. 18 years of age) -- I've run the risk of being a "Keating" by subconsciously validating my own philosophical journey...and potentially at my students' (or 'kid' bloggers') expense.

Yes, me included.  Intentions notwithstanding.  I'll let others determine if the mirrored reflection(s) feel familiar to them as well.

Back to the original 'situation:

Every response to the aforementioned situation (as hinted at by Darren after it was edited, and further written about by Arthus on his own blog) is exceedingly human in nature.  'Reactions' and 'territory' of privilege or identity/age took over where intellectual content once was the center of things. 

In my opinion, the now-exaggerated issues of age and responsibility -- heck, for that matter, the value of the original situation that sparked it all -- have far less long-term currency than the underlying issues of:

a) Are WE as professional educators beginning to sincerely evaluate our unspoken intentions when we showcase individual pre-18 y.o. students in the blogosphere (etc) -- regardless of intention or project value -- as well as what unintentional outcomes are waiting for us as this pattern continues? 

b)  Are we so convinced that our instincts about making the educational world for our students transparent/collaborative based on 1)  legitimate and thought-out professional truths for the welfare of the students' academic success or 2) some sort of latent need to prove a philosophical element in our own hearts to the larger world?

c) How are WE as professional educators facing the often conflictive desires 1) to give students in our buildings/classrooms a second chance when it comes to behaviors or reactions we would not necessarily accept from our own adult peers on campus or in the community vs. 2) calling out these same students out (who we frame as supposed 'peers' in the decidedly less F2F, less personal realm of the virtual network/world) for public and link-based criticism at the first (or second) sign of poor behavior?

These are the most vital questions that linger -- for me, at least -- after having read through everything written about and commented on (at this time) re: this specific "conduct of communication/reaction" situation.

I doubt that anyone involved will be the last to 'behave' in a similar manner as the edu-blogosphere continues to mature, regardless of age or topic.  Fortunately, decent damage-control and admission have occurred in the last day or so.  Arthus has done decent work accepting his own responsibility in his follow-up post.  Likewise, Darren has done decent work accepting his own responsibility by editing his original post and through this evolving comment thread.  This is, I can't help but think, simply a human situation with lots of 'wishing' that the clock could be turned back a bit on both sides.

My only concern now is that the moral of the story may remain focused on the individual personalities and specific expressions that were at the center of the original "communication" and "backlash"...

...rather than being focused on the larger issue I wrote about above via the Keating example. 

After all, the last time I checked, if something goes wrong in my classroom -- or anywhere I am directly involved as the 'lead' teacher/adult -- where my students  make poor choices, I am the 1st to be held accountable.  Period.  End of story.  This is true when it comes to displaying evidence of maturity/experience, as well as restraint.  And it is further true in terms of being able to see the larger implications when the dust settles and the majority of us have to return to our careers/classrooms to 'lead' those that show up to 'learn'.

For what it's worth, I'm putting myself on "Keating watch" in my very own mirror, good intentions or not.  I'm hoping that the collective WE -- as trained, professional, paid educators -- do the same over time as frequently as we are capable of doing so.

Your thoughts?