The film Memento (2000, directed by Christopher Nolan) is the story of Leonard, a man with one abiding purpose in life — finding and bringing justice to his wife’s killers — and one serious handicap: he is unable to retain short-term memories. As a result, Leonard develops a system of reminders — including tattoos like those in Figure 1 — and […]
Archives for January 2016
Teaching Success in a Noisy World
I’ve written before on information overload, but a recent read gave me a much better word for what I’m getting at: noise. You and I and every one of our students live in a world so unprecedentedly full of noise that we, as a species, are literally figuring out how to deal with it for […]
The #1 Problem with New Years Life-Changey Stuff: Clarity of Purpose
Maybe you’re a “one word” person, or a classic resolution-setter, or a jaded New Years apathist. Regardless, here’s all I have to say: without clarity of purpose, resolutions, goals and words are destined to disappoint. Importantly, this principle extends way beyond efforts at personal improvement; clarity of purpose is critical with things like school improvement initiatives and literacy frameworks. In Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit […]
A Simple “Back from Winter Break” Classroom Activity
If our aim is long-term flourishing for our students, then we all care about helping kids discover their aspirations, build goals backward from those aspirations, and remain committed to those goals on a regular basis. And yet, the further you get down the list of those skills, the greater the challenge becomes for our kids: Defining the big […]
