The Periodic Table is having a birthday! In March, it will be 150 years since the Russian scientist, Dmitri Mendeleev, took all of the 63 known elements and arranged them into a table. Today the Periodic Table contains over 100 elements and is found in chemistry classes and labs around the world. One of my … Continue reading
I’m not a sports fan. I almost never care who wins the Super Bowl. I’ll admit this year I rooted for the Pats, but that’s mostly because the older I get, the more I appreciate Tom Brady’s longevity. But regardless, when the Super Bowl comes, I want to see the ads. This year my favorite … Continue reading
Valentine’s Day crept up on me this year. My best excuse is that, like everyone in Michigan, my head is spinning from weather whiplash. Between the Polar Vortex and springlike temperatures, we’ve had 60 degree temperature variations in a three day period TWICE in the last few weeks. So no wonder I don’t know what … Continue reading
You can tell my friends know me well when I receive children’s books and puppets for Christmas. This year I received both. One of the books, Bread Bread Bread, reminded me of an experience I had visiting Paris last year. At the time I visited, an International Festival of Bread was being held just across … Continue reading
Here’s a special post for those of you who, as I do, live in places facing record-breaking windchill temperatures this week. All of us wait anxiously to learn which activities are moving forward and which are cancelled due to snow. And, of course, everyone listens for school snow days. This week some clever administrators from … Continue reading
What makes a safe space feel safe? What could you do to make your students feel safer to be creative? The question of how safe spaces become safe is one asked by an international team of researchers* who wanted to know how relationships in a work environment might influence employees’ creativity. If a supervisor listened … Continue reading
How do your students think about you? How would they describe you? In the case of younger students, the ways they think about their teachers can be a bit of a mystery, and often amusement. I remember young students being dumbfounded at seeing me in the grocery store (“What are you doing here?” “Uh, buying … Continue reading
A few years ago, the blog world seemed entranced by a 1995 article by Westby and Dawson* suggesting that teachers “don’t like” creative students. To me, such claims seemed wildly overstated based on data from 13 elementary school teachers, particularly because the descriptors for creative children were more negative in tone than those deemed “less … Continue reading
Whew! Is anyone else feeling as if the new year is progressing at warp speed? After several weeks of madly finishing fall semester, celebrating the holidays, and building courses for the winter semester, classes have started and I can take a breath again. Fortunately, along came Google Doodle to make me smile–and perhaps provide just … Continue reading
I’ll admit that one of my guilty pleasures is watching TV food shows. At this time of year (between the mountain of papers to grade), it is fun to watch the holiday bakers creating all manner of tasty and beautiful creations. It is like a peek into the creative process behind the glossy cookbook photos … Continue reading
