Joyful Jubilant Learning

Time to rhyme and learn

While we are celebrating our digital learning here at JJL, April is also being celebrated as National Poetry Month in the United States.

• Did you have a Poem in Your Pocket on April 17th?
• Have you explored your calendar for any poetry events taking place locally?
• Have you read any good poems recently?

Yes, I recognize that there are those who would respond: "by definition, there is no such thing as a good poem". Alas, you do not fully understand what you are missing.

The opportunity to write with some restrictions and focus comes in many forms. One is via a theme. One is via the format.

Hence, a sherku which is my variation, really an extension of haiku.

sherku: defined

focus your writing, say it
all concentrated in just
nineteen syllables

This month I am working on a series of sherku on the stops along the Franklin Line. I ride the rails twice most days, I know the stops by heart but do I know much about what is at each stop? No, hence a little speculation and a little learning ensue on this series, along with a healthy dose of fun.

For the stops I knew very little of, I used Google and Wikipedia for some research. For example, I learned that the land next to Ruggles Station was the site of the South End Grounds where the old Boston Braves baseball team played. These are the Braves that now play in Atlanta.

Franklin Line: Ruggles Station

The old Braves outfield at the
South End Grounds is a
Parking garage at Ruggles

My posting on Steve's 2 Cents about this series got picked up by UniversalHub, a collection of Boston blogs. It inspired commuter-rail limericks. Wow!

I have long admire the work of Limerick Savant so I went back to my trusty companions (Google and Wikipedia) to learn more more about limericks. I read about the story of the limerick challenge that took place amongst some newspapers back in 1924.

This series of limericks first appeared in a June 14, 1924 edition of a Nantucket newspaper. It all began when the Princeton Tiger revived the then well-known limerick printed first below and the Chicago Tribune answered with the second limerick. The New York Exchange went one step further with the third rhyme, and the Pawtucket Times took over from there.

Click through to read the limericks here

As I grew up in Pawtucket (yes, really), I needed no further inspiration:

There once was a lad from Pawtucket
who now had to rhyme with suck it
but he did not dare
as he did not swear
so he found a way to duck it

Teaching with the heart of aloha in a digital age

Throughout this school year, I have been diligently researching 21st Century students and how to effectively teach them. Route 21 has been a rewarding resource for me. 21st Century Themes focus on Global Awareness, Financial, Economic, Business and Entrepreneurial Literacy and Civic Literacy. Surrounding these focuses, there is an integration of core subjects with skills such as Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, Creativity and Innovation and Communication and Collaboration.

From this report:

We all know that learning doesn’t stop when school does, but now more than
ever, learning must be a lifelong pursuit. The rapidity of change, the
relentless advance of technology, the diminishing half-life of knowledge, the
far-reaching effects of globalization – all these factors contribute to a growing
conviction that the best thing we can teach our children is how to teach
themselves.

Certainly the challenge before us in education is how 20th Century trained teachers, with 20th Century developed materials and tools are to reach their 21st Century students. Even though the pieces and structures are generationally different, there is at least one facet that hasn't changed - reaching the heart of the student. In a time when students can learn more independently, communicate more frequently and access information more readily, it is even more important that the teacher personally encourage the hearts of students.

People are more digitally connected than ever before. 29 billion text messages are sent each month according to CTIA! This is up from 7 billion in 2005. However, with increasing distant relationships, students find themselves more alone than ever before. One researcher quoted students to say they felt abandoned.

Enter the teacher who desires to reach the hearts of her students. What a profound impact she can make as she adjusts teaching methods to her students' learning and finds a way to reach their loneliness. As our digital age offers a myriad of opportunities, life change still occurs personally. More than ever, this generation needs teachers who are on the cutting edge with their skills; but, even more than cutting edge approaches is the need to teach with the heart of Aloha.

If you would like to know more about 21st Century teaching, I recommend you begin with these resources.

Essential reading: the why, what, and how of effective technology integration:

· Adopt and Adapt: Shaping Tech for the Classroom

Twenty-first-century schools need twenty-first-century technology.

· Synching Up with the iKid: Connecting to the Twenty-First-Century Student

Educators must work to understand and motivate a kind of digital learner.

· Technology Integration Instructional Modules

Free modules are available for use by workshop presenters, college professors, or individuals interested in getting started with integrating technology into the curriculum.

(Photo courtesies: Partnership for 21st Century Learning)

~ Dean Boyer, Teaching with Aloha

What do you pack for those times you are waiting?

This morning I had to go somewhere I just knew held the inevitable in store for me: A long line and time spent waiting. Sure enough, I arrived at the DMV (Dept. of Motor Vehicles) at a Satellite City Hall a half hour before they opened, and likely due to yesterday's Martin Luther King Day holiday found that I was about number 40 in line already. By the time they opened the door for business, I was roughly in the middle of the line.

When we got inside the doorway, we found ourselves sucked into one of those maze-like line configurations like you have at amusement parks and other places queues are commonplace. No velvet ropes here - this one was constructed of wood and counter-tops for filling forms as you waited. So now, I was smack dab in the center of a people-watching heaven for about another 45 minutes.

You know what I noticed most? The majority of us are not very good at keeping ourselves amused when we are waiting in line, even when we know there will be one (not sure how it is where you live, but in Hawai'i the DMV is infamous for their lines). This morning, folks mostly got themselves all worked up over having to wait so long, visibly getting more and more perturbed that there were only four counter stations opened of the eight the place was set up for.

Out of all the people in my line of sight, I was the only one who had brought a book to pass the time (ironically, the book I was reading is called A Perfect Mess, The Hidden Benefits of Disorder... it's a fun read) and two gentlemen had the morning newspaper with them. One girl managed to paint her fingernails, which truly amazed me (I would have made a real mess of it). There were three people listening to their iPods, and one woman was knitting, but everyone else just stood there and waited.

Also interesting to me was that the older people in line ("older" as in seniors) were happy to eventually talk story with each other, but most of those of the younger generations made it clear by their body language that conversation was not welcomed.

With this as my memory of the morning, I clicked in to JJL a little while ago and made the connection to our January theme of Packing Our Bags for 2008. Tell me, when you know you will be somewhere you will have to sit (or stand) and just wait, do you pack something to pass the time? What do you do? Any original ideas to share?

Photo Credits: Airport Queue by tomypelluz and Slip-n-Slide Queue by sean dreilinger.

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Post author Rosa Say takes a book, pen and paper with her wherever she goes. Waiting time can be a great excuse for some creative doodling!

Rosa is the author of Managing with Aloha, Bringing Hawaii's Universal Values to the Art of Business, and she currently writes for Managing with Aloha Coaching, Value your Month, Value your Life. Visit her there, and pick up a feed for your reader.

Seven Online Tools for Web-Based Learning - What are yours?

We're sure you have noticed: The way we learn from the web is changing every day.

Flickr Photo Credit.

At Kevin's Blog, Chief Learning Officer Kevin Eikenberry writes an article he says "is meant to help you use the Web in new ways; to help you learn more, and learn it faster; therefore moving you towards your goals more rapidly than ever" and offering some resources for each of these, he suggests that learners get on board with

1. Blogs
2. Social Networks
3. Wikis
4. The Audio/Visual Web, and
5. Google Alerts

Our choices can be overwhelming, and I like the way that Kevin has outlined 5 basic categories of tools ---if we were to rename the 5th one as "RSS aggregators and notifiers," Google Alerts being just one of the options. Kevin's distinction of an "audio/visual web" is not one I would have thought of, and he is so right!

In that vein, I would add two more:

6. Bookmarklets
Those browser tools which allow you to quickly bookmark your web-based finds for later tagging or referencing. The web is a virtual library, and you are the librarian! The one I use most is del.icio.us.

7. Lifestreaming
As my newest learning, this is something I am currently experimenting with at Tumblr. A sneak peek for you: Ho‘ohana Aloha. JJL Contributor Joanna Young was the one who got me intrigued with this, when she explained that to ‘lifestream’ is to "put all the streams from your writing, your photos, [your finds] and your networks together in one place." Joanna's Tumblr Log is called  The Short and Sweet of Confident Writing.

If you were to sit with a wide-eyed web newbie, placing a mouse in their hand as they sit in front of your computer, would you have a number 8 or 9 for this list in your orientation for them?

~ Rosa Say for Joyful Jubilant Learning
Mahalo Dean for the coffee!

Postscript: Before you answer, you might want to take a look at a short video on how our kids now learn, recently shared by JJLer April Groves at her blog My Beautiful Chaos.

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5 From the JJL Archives:

• More on Google Alerts: Thank you for teaching me (Google treasure maps).
• Facebook: Friend or Foe?
• Learning Best Practices on the Internet.
• This Web 2.0 Thing Explained (A video clip).

• BONUS! JJL Contributor Benjamin Bach had interviewed Kevin Eikenberry in our series, Jubilant Learners Speak Up! ~ A Remarkable Interview with Kevin Eikenberry. A snippet:

Teach us your Wild and Wacky Traditions!

As the winter holidays draw near, I invariably find I begin to think about tradition, both old and time-honored, and new ones not yet thought of which may lie in wait for us to celebrate them. Traditions are like family-spun yarns that get knitted together into the most fabulous multi-colored bulky cables; be they for scarves, shawls or sweaters, it’s the cable knit that matters most for the warmth.

Cable sweaters also hide a lot of mischievousness...

I saw these two tradition lists in a magazine called Family Fun as I sat in an office waiting room before an appointment; they were culled from the mag’s readership:

Your top Thanksgiving traditions:

1. Cook a beloved family recipe for the feast
2. Make a gratitude list to display and save
3. Call faraway relatives
4. Add leaf rubbings, handprints or notes to a keepsake tablecloth
5. Play a family touch football game
6. Start decorating for Christmas the day after

Your top Christmas traditions:

1. Set aside a day just for cookie baking, and for decorating a gingerbread house
2. Plan a get-in-the-spirit activity or outing for each day of Advent
3. Buy and hang an ornament for each child that commemorates a special interest or event in the year
4. Drive around and look at the holiday lights
5. Leave snacks for Santa (and often for the reindeer too)
6. Get new pajamas (or lingerie!) on Christmas eve

Now those things are nice, they really are, but am I the only one who thought these lists were pretty blah and way too normal?

Come on JJLers – weigh in and tell us about the weird and wacky traditions you have in your family! If given the choice, and a magic wand that could zap me into your house, why would I choose you and your family if I were looking for the most Joyful-Wacky! and Jubilant-Wild! holiday traditions for my 2007 photo album?

If you have a long story and want to post instead of comment, email me and I’ll publish it for you!

[Flickr photos by Leo Reynolds.]

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Post author Rosa Say writes for Managing with Aloha Coaching, Value your Month, Value your Life. Visit her there, pick up a feed for your reader, and let her know what you think.

Are you brave (or wild, wacky and weird)? Take her up on this challenge!

Learn 5 New Things About Walking

       

Preface: Start here if this is the first you are seeing these tell-tale Lx5 letters: A Mahalo November: Learned with 5. In our November study of appreciation, gratitude and thankfulness, my contributions to JJL this month have to do with the past learning I am most grateful for.

I learned how to walk in 1996.

No, not walk again. There was no accident, nothing like that. I learned how to walk for my best health.

I walk three and a half to five miles every day unless bad weather or my travel schedule interferes, and gratefully, that doesn’t happen too much. I give thanks every day for living in Hawai‘i because I get to walk outdoors and not on a treadmill; I can drink in the beauty, breathe in the ocean or mountain air, and meet my neighbors.

1996 was the year I finally broke free from the hotel business and went to work for HDC, the land developer who designed and built the Hualalai Resort. The difference wasn’t really the business, but the lifestyle of the people I soon found myself surrounded with — they were all fit and trim work-out junkies. The resort was not yet open for business, and so at 4:00pm sharp everyone turned off their cell phones and computers, locked up their construction trailers, switched from hard hats and construction boots to baseball caps and running shoes, and did 90 minutes of speed-walking before heading for home. We had the luxury of an almost-open 5-star resort at our disposal, and the fanatics among us would run and did sprints barefoot on the golf course fairways. Eventually, I did too.

Eleven years later, the habit has stuck.

It’s not always at 4:00pm, and if I head for a golf course these days some marshal will surely kick me off. But I keep walking for my best health because it makes me feel so good; I like knowing I am taking care of myself in a smart, fulfilling way.

Here is my LearnED in 5 about walking for best health:

.....Walking is serious exercise and you should treat it that way.

Walking is not an easy way out of other exercise, and you can’t cruise through it. It doesn’t count unless it’s speed-walking, at least enough to elevate your heart rate, and make you feel like you’re workin’ it. When I started with the Hualalai fitness junkies, the rule we adopted was that we’d walk at a pace that made it difficult to keep a conversation going; if you talked too much, you were a slacker. The agreement was that we were working out, and helping each other keep healthy, not making a social call.

There are rights and wrongs. Never skimp on good shoes or wear them down, or you’re asking for trouble (such as aches in your shins, calves, or lower back), especially if you are walking outdoors and on asphalt instead of grass. (Impact stress makes speed walking far better for me than running.) During the summer in Hawai‘i, sunglasses and sunscreen are musts, as is lip balm to prevent windburn.

Learn 5 Ways to Stop Complaining

       

We have begun our study of appreciation, gratitude and thankfulness on MWA Coaching through the 3-way Promise of Mahalo (living in thankfulness) in this framework:

• Knowing Mahalo through Appreciation
• Becoming Mahalo through Gratitude
• Sharing Mahalo through Thankfulness

Currently we are concentrating on appreciation, and it brought something to mind for me that I could share with you as another Lx5 (LearnED in 5 keepers), though this one always qualifies for me as continual LearnING too! Here are,

5 ways to Stop Complaining

Have you noticed that those who are appreciative rarely complain?

Appreciation is terrific medicine for curing the complainer’s bug, for it helps us to recognize what is right with us instead of our focusing on what might be wrong or missing. To borrow Starbucker’s favorite adjective, appreciation fuels the “half-full” view shared by those positive people who are optimists.

1. Instead of thinking “I have to,” say to yourself, “I get to.”

2. Instead of hurting with pain, recognize the signal.

3. Instead of saying “you did this,” examine how “I created this.”

4. Instead of lodging a complaint, make a request.

5. Instead of demanding something, shine a light on what you would appreciate.

Can you imagine how wonderful a world we could create if we all just stopped complaining?
~ Rosa Say

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Just clicking in? Catch up with my other Lx5s this month:

• A Mahalo November: Learned with 5
• GTD Learned with 5 Take-Aways

Post Author:
Rosa Say is the founder of Say Leadership Coaching, and author of Managing with Aloha, Bringing Hawaii’s Universal Values to the Art of Business.

Read more about Mahalo, the Hawaiian value of appreciation, gratitude and thankfulness on Rosa’s coaching blog this month, Managing with Aloha Coaching. Start here ~ Mahalo: 3-way Promise, 5-fold Learning.

3 Environmental Habits to Learn and Feel Good About

Thanks to the learning challenge which was set forth for us by Blog Action Day, I have learned much in October about the different ways we leave our footprints on the earth. Some things I’d call re-learning, others un-learning, and as always gets us charged up here at JJL, new learning. Here are three examples we’ve talked about ‘round our dinner table in this environmentally-flavored discussion.

1. We are re-learning Recycling

We realized that our family had gotten a bit lazy about recycling, and that some of the good habits we’d started years ago have been neglected in the name of ease and convenience. For instance, it’s a 30 mile drive from where we live to the nearest recycling center for our bottles, cans, and paper, and packing those deliveries into the car when we’re headed in that direction hasn’t been happening for quite some time now. We all recommitted to getting it done.

Further, it’s clear that because we don’t enjoy this chore, we’ll naturally cut back on producing much of it in the first place! It’s connected to the next thing on my list:

2. We are un-learning our Consumerism

Second, at the urging of Steve, Tim, and others, we’ve joined the mantra that “water from a bottle is passé. Importing bottled water consumes gasoline and wastes plastic, and helping reduce consumption of these fossil fuels speaks to a forward-thinking consumer.” This is a pretty easy one for us in Hawai‘i, where we have wonderful tasting water straight from the tap and needn’t even filter it. Bottled water is hereby banned from the Say house.

And that is but one example. Less materialism, less clutter, less cleaning around the stuff, less maintaining it all. Minimalist living looks more and more attractive to me every day.

3. New learning: E-Waste

It’s long made perfect sense that we’ll have less paper to shred and haul to the recycler if we don’t use it in the first place, and we have all groomed increasingly digital habits, reading the local paper and favorite magazines online etc. However my new learning has been in the call to action many Blog Action Day writers made in regard to keeping hazardous wastes our of our landfills. It had not occurred to me that we were swapping one problem (forest consumption in paper goods) for another (highly toxic e-waste) — yikes!

For example, cell phones are becoming an ever-larger factor in this ecological challenge, and “One in three Americans will replace their cell phones this year, adding to the 500 million unused phones currently waiting to be discarded or recycled.” This is what I’ve learned to do the next time I get another phone (these three tips are from USAA, my insurance carrier):

• Erase personal data. WirelessRecycling.com tells how to remove names and numbers before you sell or donate your phone.
• Sell your cell. Your wireless company may give credit on a trade-in; other companies do offer to buy old phones.
• Donate it. Some charities sell phones at good prices, others use them to provide 911 access to battered spouses or the elderly. I learned that Cell Phones for Soldiers collects and recycles them for cash, which goes to buy prepaid calling cards for soldiers.

And not just cell phones; think PDA’s, pagers, computers, and your digital cameras too.

As my title suggests, this is the kind of learning you can feel great about, don’t you think?
~ Rosa Say

More from the JJL Community:

• Did you see Joanna’s wrap-up for Blog Action Day? Click to: Learning from the Blog Action Day story
• Here is the official Blog Action Day Wrap-Up presentation: Blog Action Day 2007.

Learn a 5-Step Weekly Review: You’ll love it.

What says your Weekly Review today?

I don’t know about you, but without my calendar there is very little I would remember. Surely calendars are the single best organizational tool EVER conceived of. If there were no such thing I would have had to invent some semblance of one myself by now, or I would appear to be a complete mess. I would be a mess.

Perhaps Robyn McMaster of Brain-Based Biz can explain this to us: With all due respect to my brain, it is a great servant but poor master; like some turbo-charged vacuum-servant it obediently and dutifully collects all I place before it to handle for me, whether logical or completely random, but it doesn’t necessarily retrieve my stored up tidbits and gems at that precise moment I may need to recall them again.

Productivity guru David Allen of GTD fame talks about this with some great examples, and I’m sure you have your own; think of the last time you got back from the grocery store and had done the shopping cart stroll without a list, only to remember what you needed at the exact moment you’d returned home and had just parked your car. Been there?

Thus, I worship my calendar, and with the easy-to-program recurring feature, digital and electronic is the way to go. My 5-Step Weekly Review is part of my Strong Week Plan, and it goes like this:

A Promise to the JJL Community: We will Make A Difference

How has your learning already made a difference, or how do you know it will? What is the difference you are learning to make, and what are you doing to make it happen?

I received a blog tag from Terry Starbucker this past Monday. I’m going out on a limb here, and taking the liberty of responding to him on behalf of the entire hui (group) of contributing authors we have here at Joyful Jubilant Learning.

My feeling is that this is not a conventional blog tag meme, but one that speaks into a commitment you decide to make to uphold the honor of what blogging can, and should be. Like any medium, dignity and honor is created for the whole by the actions of the individuals within it. This does Make A Difference; a big difference.

Thus, I wanted to squeeze my response into our current forum, for it seemed to fit so perfectly. Therefore, I ran short of time to run my draft by my fellow authors here, but knowing them and their intentions as I do, I didn’t feeling forging forward with this was that big a risk: I know that each and every one of them wants to write for a blog that strives higher; one that is committed to making a difference. They are Alaka‘i ka ‘ike, Guides in Learning who lead by their great example [alaka‘i.]

In fact, a few of them have already committed to this Blogger’s Promise (initiated by Joe Hauckes, author of Working at Home on the Internet). You can read what was said by our authors individually:

1. Terry Starbucker: I'm Making Joe's Promise
2. April Groves: Remembering Who I Am with a Promise
3. Joanna Young: Respect for the authentic conversation: comments, links and all that jazz

All of you who read Joyful Jubilant Learning are very important to us. You inspire us in the penning of every word here. We always write in the hope you will decide to join our conversation one day, for then you become teacher and we your willing, eager student. However an online presence can be scary for some, and joining an online community can seem to be too consuming a commitment. We understand, and even if you never choose to add your voice to these conversations, we want you to be proud of us, and proud to learn from us, and with us, silently in your own way.

So I, and I am sure my fellow authors here, do not hesitate to make this commitment to you. In sharing this blogging promise, and joining the ranks of many people we admire, we start with our values:

  [Badge designed by Rick Cockrum at Shards of Consciousness.]

Because we are committed to Aloha and Ho‘ohana,
[i.e. We write with the Intention of unconditional Aloha]
Because we are committed to Collaborative, Lifelong Learning,
Because we are committed to the Inclusiveness of Community,
Because we are committed to the Possibilities We Create within our Humanity,

We, the Authors of Joyful Jubilant Learning do Ho‘ohiki
[We make this Promise]

We will add value and conduct ourselves with distinction in the blogging community.

• We will be sure to comment on other Blogs if we can add to the conversation in our spirit of collaborative learning.
• We will respond to comments on our own Blog.
• We will acknowledge any links to our Blog with a comment on or trackback to the linker’s Blog.
• We will continue to link to other Blogs that are pertinent to our posts’ content.
• We will commit to being a Vital part of the Blogging Community, in full acceptance of our responsibility in Learning Leadership.

And you know what? We do collaborate here: No post is ever set in stone forever … Consider this a first run, and jump in with your feelings my fellow authors, for I am happy to keep editing this until we have a manifesto we proudly shout from the blog-tops in one clear voice, Lōkahi.
~ Rosa Say

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Footnotes to references above:

• on Ho‘ohana: By Blaine Collins: The Body Ho‘ohana

• on Ho‘ohiki: On Ho‘ohiki: Keeping your promises

• on Lōkahi: Lōkahi Teams: The ties that bind are your shared values, and Lōkahi Teams: When they are Virtual and Voluntary.
  
  By Joanna Young: Lōkahi: the language of collaboration.

• on Making A Difference: Our Compilation Page.
  

Barnstable does it right

My official turn here comes up later this month but an article in today's Boston Globe caught my eye. The Barnstable High School Girl's Volleyball Team is a powerhouse in MA. How it got there and stays on top of its game is the confirmation of lessons for us.

The girls on Barnstable High School's legendary volleyball team decide over a sub-shop lunch to warm up to Kanye West's "Stronger" at the season home opener that could bring their winning streak to 100 matches. Then they dash through a downpour to Kristi Everson's Ford Escort and Kara Cullen's Jeep for the short ride to afternoon practice.

After slogging through axle-deep puddles, Cullen's brakes fail at a red light, and she hits Everson's car. Nobody is hurt, but Everson erupts into tears when she pulls into the school parking lot and inspects the crumpled back of her 8-year-old compact. Cullen moans, "I just rear-ended my best friend's car." Casey Eagan breaks the tension. "This is a 'thunderbolt,' she announces. "We'll get through it.

Once again, the team reaches for the counsel of professional basketball coach Pat Riley, dispensed in his book The Winner Within: A Life Plan for Team Players, which their coach, Tom Turco, has them read every year.

and this:

Turco has begun his 20th year as head coach. He's an adaptive physical education teacher specializing in special needs students. When he wanted, in 1986, to try working with more typical youngsters as well, girls' volleyball needed a head coach. Never mind that Turco's experience consisted of one season of club volleyball at Bridgewater State College. He landed the junior varsity job, not varsity. "Thank God," he says. In 1988 alone, his first year as head coach, he attended a dozen coaching clinics. The team's 5-11 record that season comprises one-quarter of Turco's 43 career losses.

"As frustrated as I was, I sought the advice of some very, very good people," Turco recalls. "I was either going to not coach or be a successful coach."

Did you miss this post?

I work on Lifting my Lid by doing one not so simple act - I am making the decision to stop holding it shut! The only ceilings I have are the ones I have created myself. I have banished the phrases that are self defeating
*Well, I am not really sure about this (when I am)
*This is all new to me (when I know what I know works)
*Not sure that was really helpful(when I know that it was!)
~ April Groves

How about this one?

Writing is such a focusing exercise - I think some of my unfinished "works" are ideas that didn't pass strong scrutiny, or that I didn't have the passion to complete. That, in itself, is rewarding.

I love those moments when the words and thoughts flow without having to think about things; without having to try hard. That is when writing is joy.
~ Dwayne Melancon

This one was great, wasn’t it?

You know what? You are rich beyond comprehension. It's not money bulging the vault door outwards, it's experience. Each picture that you've taken and each page that you've written have been deposits in your bank account of experience.

Anyone out there who is familiar with Julia Cameron see where I am going with this?
~ Dave Rothacker

Oh, and this one.

I'm smiling because I also at first thought "unlearning" was a kind of semantics game. That's why it took me so long to figure out how to write about it. I kept going in circles...and then I realized I had to write about my deepest beliefs, not just facts I had learned.

I remembered that "unlearning" is actually part of the cognitive and emotional dissonance we go through whenever we change habits or beliefs that are so much a part of us, we thought they were unchangeable.
~ Ariane Benefit

Actually, you may not have missed the post, but if you missed the quotations above it’s because you aren’t clicking through the comments! GET PUBLISHED – join in and let us know what you have to say!

JJL Author Joanna Young has a terrific article on her own site, Confident Writing, called Writing Comments with Intention, and she coaches us that we can comment

• To say hello: as simple as that, it's a way of letting the author and other readers know that you're there.
• To have a chat and a bit of fun: there are some places where it's fun just to go and chew the fat for a while...
• To learn: if you're reading something that's really got you thinking, try taking it a step further and ask the writer a question as part of your comment.
• To connect: have a look around you and you'll find some of the most powerful conversations - connections, alliances, new business partnerships...
• To encourage: don't underestimate the power of this.

“Writing comments is time consuming - but on balance I'd say it's well worth the worth the effort given the benefits that flow from it.  What are the main motivators behind your own comment writing - and do they make it worth your while?” – Joanna Young

Tomorrow, another way you can GET PUBLISHED!
~ Rosa Say

PodCamp Boston 2

What is a PodCamp?

PodCamp Boston 2 is a FREE 2 day Unconference exploring new media community tools like blogging, videoblogging, podcasting, second life, twitter, and more. The event is created by the participants, and everyone had a voice in the experience. Newcomers are welcome and you don't have to be a techie to get a lot out of coming and participating in a PodCamp.

Check out some of the outtakes from the recent PodCamp Pittsburgh (thanks to Chris Brogan for the link) Then consider registering for PodCamp Boston 2!

Why 2?

Duh, 1 was last last year. 2 is coming up this October!

What does it cost?

PodCamp is an unconference and free to all participants. For more information visit the PodCamp Boston web site or register at this link.

Listen to this promo:

See you at PodCamp Boston!

PS - if you can't make it to Boston for this PodCamp check out the schedule to see if there is one in your area.

Learning about blog fighting

Tim Ferriss recently shared some great tips for dealing with "haters" in the blog world, but I notice that a lot of his concepts apply in the real world, as well. Consider Tim's list:

1. The only way to win a fight is to avoid it. 2. Focus on getting your desired outcome, not on being right. 3. If a fight is inevitable, strike first. 4. To diffuse a fight, admit mistakes and validate others' feelings. 5. If a group fight is unavoidable, take out the leader. 6. Remove anonymity. 7. There is strength in numbers. Never fight alone unless you have to.

He also hits the nail right on the head with the reason these blog fights happen in the first place:

Why do people attack others trying to do good things? I can only come up with two theories:

1. There are two ways to increase perceived self-worth: elevate yourself or cut down others. The latter takes less time. It's a case of "the worse you look, the better I feel about myself" and a short-lived high.

2. Empowering others involves removing external excuses for inaction. This is threatening to those who would rather complain than take action to improve their circumstances. Their alternative solution is thus 1 above: attack the messenger instead of the message (referred to in logic as an ad hominem attack).

Awesome advice, and Joyful Learning about a not-so-Joyful topic. Go read the full post on Tim's site - it's worth it just for the picture of the apology note he wrote in first grade.

 

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About the author: Dwayne Melancon is the author of Genuine Curiosity, where he is always on the lookout for new things to learn.

UnLearning Hesitancy and Reticence

I am one of those people who must learn to come right out and ask for what she wants.

There it is; it reads like a confession at Shrinking Violets Anonymous.

My extreme hesitancy with asking has plagued me most of my life, and perhaps the ticking clock of my inevitable aging has something to do with this, but I am sick of being such a wimp.

I remember buying The Aladdin Factor by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen back in 1995 to help me with this. In the book’s introduction, Jack Canfield had written something that was all too familiar to me:

“Until I knew I could ask for what I wanted, I had lived my life in an unacknowledged state of resignation. I had silently agreed not to be a nuisance or a bother, to never intrude on anyone, to never take up anyone’s time and certainly not to be a pest! … I made less money than I was worth, laughed a jokes I didn’t understand and never raised my hand in class. I accepted too many things without questioning authority and I bit my tongue when I wanted to ask somebody out for a date. I stared longingly at all the things I wanted, but I rarely got them. That was my life—a life of settling for less than what I wanted, less than I deserved, less than the best, and less than what was possible.” —Jack Canfield

Oh yuck! When you first read that, you think “how sad!” and “how can we do that to ourselves?” however so many of us do! Take a look at the footer of this posting, and as I was, you’ll probably be amazed at how many categories learning to ask for what will improve your life actually falls into!

In The Aladdin Factor, Canfield and Hansen tried their best to coach me out of what they felt to be the “five barriers to asking; the main reasons we don’t ask for what we want:”

1. Ignorance— “most of us don’t know what to ask for”

2. Limiting and inaccurate beliefs— “limiting and negative beliefs get programmed into us by our parents, teachers, churches, peers and the media”

3. Fear— “only your mind can produce fear. When we become afraid of rejection, looking foolish, losing face, being vulnerable or hurt by others, we become passive”

4. Low self-esteem— “as a result, we don’t believe our needs are important and worthy of pursuing”

5. Pride— “we get stuck in our pride, becoming too arrogant to admit we need anyone or anything”

I did make some progress with my hesitancy with the Canfield and Hansen coaching, but not enough, and it didn’t last. Another book has helped me understand I keep regressing at times because I have never made asking for what I want my habit.

These days, Lisa Haneberg is my mentor-in-a-book and blog with my unlearning my habits of hesitancy and reticence (which can make it seem to others that you are uncommunicative— yikes! Don’t want that!) for Lisa includes “making unreasonable requests” as a breakthrough catalyst in her book, Two Weeks To a Breakthrough (Dwayne Melancon had reviewed Lisa’s book for us in ALAWB).

“Ask and ye shall receive, right? Making unreasonable requests is not as unreasonable as it may seem. I use the tern unreasonable here to mean big. Unreasonable requests are big requests that most of us are generally too chicken to make.” —Lisa Haneberg

Well, I’ve been too chicken with my requests of others whether they are small, medium, or large. Lisa coaches us that “outrageous requests make great things happen” and when I think back to those few times when I swallowed my hesitancy or outright fear about making them and took the plunge, I know Lisa to be right; I did get results. They may not always have added up to my wildest dreams for them, but they were always better results than I would’ve gotten without making the request to enroll someone else in my goals.

So JJL community, I am declaring my intentions with this unlearning of my inclination toward hesitancy and reticence in the most public way I can with all of you. I truly have very little fear in your warm readership, and I do think I have pretty well conquered those other barriers in The Aladdin Factor. I suspect that my learning will have to do with my focus on it, and with making room for new and unreasonable requests in my Strong Week Plan we learned about in Learning Project #2 here at JJL.

Yes, that would be a very good habit-creator for all of us, don’t you think?

Have you got a big request for us here at Joyful Jubilant Learning?
Make it!
~ Rosa Say

This wonderful quote and photo was sent to me by the extraordinarily talented Hawai‘i photographer Elan Sun Star. Mahalo Sun!

Postscript: This posting is one of taking up Dean's unlearning challenge for August: Have you read this yet, and made your unlearning list?

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Post author Rosa Say writes for Managing with Aloha Coaching, Value your Month, Value your Life. Visit her there, pick up a feed for your reader, and let her know what you think. Are you brave? Coach her to follow-up with this unlearning, and volunteer to be on the receiving end of her big requests to come!

Learn from the Master: Blog for 1 Person

The "Master" you learn from is you.
The "1 Person" you blog for is you.

If you are a blogger, a writer, (or want to be) or keep a journal (or have been wanting to), this post is for you.

The Blog as Journal

I've been keeping a personal journal using TypePad, and it's become a terrific multi-purpose tool for me. It's been working out so well, I felt I had to share it with you as a suggestion to try. In fact, I have had this draft sitting here since this past May because my results were almost immediate, but then I kept doing it instead of blogging about it, and the draft scrolled down my posting page until it totally disappeared from view --- I had forgotten it was here until I told Joanna Young about it today within a comment at Confident Writing.

Joanna had started the conversation while reflecting on her recent "blogging holiday;"

"One of the things that you can do while taking a blogging holiday is take stock of the way that you read, and write, and comment and engage in this activity we call 'blogging.'"

She talks about routine, addiction, time, writing, focus, and purpose; great thoughts you can reflect on with her too. To save you from re-reading my comment there...

Back in mid-May, I created a brand new blog and simply called it "bJournal." It is password protected and not public, and I initially started it because after a lifetime of paper and then Word doc journals, I wanted to tag my morning pages and other private journaling with categories and keywords so I could better find those flashes of inspiration that can come from stream of consciousness writing.

Well it has turned out to be one of the best writing ideas I have ever had. I now use it for all my blog writing: The "noise" and private stuff stays there, and what is worth sharing and I think worth the value of my readers' attention moves to one of my "real" blog draft fields to be slept on and then edited in a more online-worthy voice of the Mea Ho'okipa. Blogging is very addictive, and what bJournal has done is satisfy the fix, while serving its digital archiving purposes for me, with the cleaning up of my act a true bonus.

I have had a goal to be a better commenter within the blog community and not an "airy fairy" one, and I now find I am putting comment drafts in bJournal too if I want to curb my first impulse in its writing and return to the blog later.

Now I will be the first to admit that there are times I cannot resist sharing the noise. This is a work in progress!

There is another thought that comes to mind with this.

Who is the "Master" and just how many blogging tools do you need?

Web-based Writing as Top-Shelf Toolbox

My dad used to say that the best tool in his beloved Craftsman toolbox was the box itself. (He meant the portable one you carry around with you - not the mega he-man garage models.)

He felt that there must have been some divine intervention in the mind of the guy who took it from prototype to its red stainless steel goodness, for the space between the top shelf and the cover when it latched shut most effortlessly, perfectly defined which tools any respectable common sense handyman would use most often, readily accessible to him. Far as Dad could see,

To use more than that; irrelevant and uncertain tinkering.

To skip using what was there in nearly every job; you're rushing and may have missed something.

When it came time to allow my brothers the learning privilege of using his precious tools, he'd simply open the cover, wait for them to make their choice for the job at hand, and then teach them based on the tool they chose, grilling them on why they did so.

I have now been blogging for three years, and TypePad is my Craftsman. There are twelve blogs on my TypePad dashboard, some public, some private, some mine, some hosted for clients, some at the invitation of others to guest author. I don't really think of them as for blogging; they are for writing as my craft.

The lesson I've been thinking most about these days, is another one from my Dad, about how there were times he just knew that an older once-cherished tool had to slip a drawer down to make room for a newer one, or just maybe, it had to be left in the garage.

Related posts: From the JJL Archives

• We all have magical powers. We call those magical powers ‘writing.’ The magic is within the written word.
• A Guide to Writing Well; this is a must for your del.icio.us tagging with writing how-to.
• Write to Learn; Slow, Steady, Sure. We need to keep learning connections intact, no matter what wizardry technology cooks up next, if we are to continually mentor new generations of lifelong learners. 9 very thoughtful comments in this conversation.

Advice from Starbucker: I offer this advice to someone reading this who's thinking about blogging - go to one of those services like Blogger, register, sit in front of your computer, and start pouring some of your life experiences onto the screen.  At worst, it's therapy. At best, it's a whole new wonderful world.
Read the rest here: How Do I Blog Thee? Let Me Start at the Beginning

Thank you for teaching me (Google treasure maps)

“Thank you for teaching me.”

“Thank you for listening.”

Contributing JJL Author Tim Milburn gave us some coaching recently on studentl.inc in connection with using Google Alerts, and I’m adding my “I second the motion!” here with an example of how those wonderful email alerts can be like getting a treasure map delivered to your inbox.

I’ve been using Google Alerts for a while now; I’m pretty sure that Leah Maclean, Queen Techie of Working Solo was the one who first taught me about them. The first one I set up was for ‘Rosa Say’ and ‘Managing with Aloha’ to help me be more responsive if/when mentioned somewhere in cyberland.

The Google emails can contain a lot to wade through, but they are easy to skim. The alerts they offer are divided under two main headings: Google News Alerts, and Google Blogs Alerts, and over time I’ve found that I skip the News Alerts and go straight for the learning I can discover via other bloggers.

I now have alerts set up for the keywords I normally live/ work/ write about, like ‘coaching,’ ‘leadership’ and ‘aloha’—and ‘learning’ for Joyful Jubilant Learning. Every new month I’ll add or switch-off between the value of the month which is my theme. For instance, I now have an alert set up for ‘hospitality’ to help with our July Ho‘okipa forum on Talking Story.

This entire posting got written, because I just had to share a treasure map I found today. It came up with the ‘Rosa Say’ alert because the author’s daughter and I share the same name. However it wraps up in a gift package much of what has come up for us here with learning, and with practicing hospitality and the social graces which can have such an effect on our lives in unexpected, but always good ways.

Do read “Thank You For Teaching Me” at Grounded and Rooted in Love by Heather Kirk-Davidoff.

Yesterday, I accompanied my daughter Rosa to her violin lesson. Rosa has been studying the violin for about two years now, but we only found this particularly wonderful teacher about 4-5 months ago. She uses the New Approach, a modified Suzuki method, with great results.

Anyways, at the end of every lesson, she has taught Rosa to tuck her violin under her arm and face her teacher, bow and say, "Thank you for teaching me." Then, her teacher bows to Rosa and says "Thank you for listening." Sometimes the teacher goes first and Rosa responds. I've seen them do this before, but last night this simple exchange really caught my attention, and struck me as very beautiful.

So, today I spent some time with someone in our community who is learning to use the blog...

Heather, thank you for being the treasure of my day.
~ Rosa Say

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A bit more clarity on the links above:

Tim Milburn's posting: Create Your Own Online Leadership Class

A charge for the Ho‘okipa Brigade: Social Graces

On Talking Story this month: We are Talking Story about … Ho'okipa, Hospitality; an index with 14 articles on hospitality --- and counting!

Why the Alert for Managing with Aloha

Be Fiercely Selfish With Your Time to Learn

When I attend conferences I feel like I am on a seesaw:

Up: They inspire me. I key into presentations and conversations with people I am newly meeting. New ideas float to the top of my consciousness so I will pay attention and honor them with action.

Down: I watch the rest of the audience, and go crazy at the tragic waste of human intellectual capital. It is easy to pick out people who are there because they have to be, or feel they are expected to be, and now they've caved in.

Caving in~

Caving in is something I very passionately rant against in all my Managing with Aloha presentations, especially when we are talking about Ho'ohana, the Hawaiian value of worthwhile work, for when you ho'€˜ohana, you are fully present. The polar opposite of ho'ohana is caving in.

Definition: "Caving in" is giving up and then giving away more than you need to, continuing to give up throughout the entire ordeal. It is the half-empty viewpoint that it will be an ordeal, versus the half-full vantage point that it can manifest as opportunity.

Caving in happens something like this:

--- your boss says you must attend an annual conference to represent the company. You really don'™t want to go, but you know this is not a request you have the option of saying no to, and you go.

--- other than packing and tying up loose ends on what you leave behind, you don't prepare much more for the conference. You Google the weather so you'll know what to pack, and you might even visit a bookstore to grab some best-selling paperback for the travel time, but you ignore the conference agenda, figuring you'll deal with it when you arrive. You don't look up any of the speakers or the exhibitors, and you don'™t brainstorm a list of goals to achieve while you're there.

--- at the conference you sit in the back of the room, or wherever the nearest exits and/or refreshment tables are. A planter you can hide behind when you whip out your blackberry during boring presentations is considered a true find.

--- when a speaker does manage to get your attention, you sit back and listen expecting to be magically spoon-fed. You don't take any notes, and during the breaks you escape instead of engaging the person next to you in curiosity about their take-aways as compared to yours.

After the conference, you will probably be thinking to yourself, "I knew that would be a waste of time."

Well of course it was! You had caved in, and that "waste of time"€ became your self-fulfilling prophecy. Why not be fiercely selfish instead?

Own your time, and harness it for learning~

Know this: You are always in control, even when you are doing something for someone else. To think otherwise is a lazy, uninspired excuse, a fooling-yourself justification, and a cop out.

Every moment in time you find you are in, will be defined by the choices you make and the actions you take within that moment.

Even if you have to be somewhere, or attend something for someone else€™s agenda for you, why not milk it for all it can potentially be for you? You can reread my example of caving it above, and quickly pick out what I feel you can do instead.

What other ideas and suggestions do you have for each other JJLers? I know that the lifelong learners who read JJL do NOT cave in.

When you attend a conference, how do you milk it, and own it for you?

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Related articles:

• Take Responsibility For Your Learning by Sterling Frandsen
• Send that Blackberry to Solitary Confinement at Talking Story
• Own the time you DO have at Talking Story

Google Docs and Microsoft Word

The Office Watch curent issue has more details about using Google Docs for collaboration around a document and then finishing the document with formating and other things that Microsoft does well.

Several of the regular newsletters I subscribe to come from the folks behind the Office Watch. They keep current with what is happening in the land of Redmond, WA with a particular eye to the users of the Office products. They cut through the hype and vaporware to deliver the straight skinny as much as it is possible. In the years that I have subscribed, they are generally right on the money.

You can view the online version of the newsletter here.

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