Losing Geography

Sitting in my high school library on the first day of school, I was faced with a question. I was a brand-new transfer student and my new school had not received my records yet - including the records of my high school course selections, which I had completed the previous spring. I sat in the library and was faced with a decision I was told would have a tremendous impact on the rest of my life. What classes should I take? My parents had made a huge deal about the courses I should take. We sat down with the course selection guide and discussed, in length, every course I should take while in high school. Courses they felt would benefit me the most throughout my life included typing and accounting , as well as religion. The only courses we did not discuss were the courses now considered "core" classes. Social studies, math, science, English were all assumed to be of such vital necessity no discussion was necessary. I was going to college, after all. I needed them all. But my parents were unable to accompany me on that first day. And as I sat there, I realized that for the first time in my life, I had some amount of real control over my life. True, that control was minor and mostly a product of my own imagination, but at 14 it seemed real and important. Everything my parents had told me fell straight out of my head (well, not everything - I kept typing, and I'm extremely glad I did. I'm a wicked fast typist.) , and I was left with my own beliefs about what was important for my future. I was alone, with only a high school guidance counselor and the State of Texas' graduation plan for guidance. Neither were very helpful… At the time, Texas did not have what I would now consider rigorous graduation requirements. Even then, I thought they were terribly basic. I told the counselor that I wanted to take geography. Her immediate response was to ask me if I planned to go to college. When I told her that was indeed my plan, she informed me that I would be better off waiting until my sophomore year - that world history would be a better class to take. But I wanted to take both. She tried to fight me - I didn't need both. But I held my ground. I did. I knew I did. And, as it turns out, I was right. I came to be a geography teacher early in my career, but not in the most direct or typical way. As much as I had insisted upon the importance of geography when I was 14, I neglected to take it in college. But once I started teaching it - I fell in love. Geography encompasses everything I love - science, culture, travel, adventure, food, literature - all into one field. A field which, as I tell my students often, makes everything else you've ever studied make sense. Geography is the lynch pin that connects all the disparate subjects we study - it helps us understand it all. When I reflect upon my teaching career - not just as a geography teacher, but history and English, as well - I realize how much I was influenced by both of my geography teachers. They had vastly different approaches, and I credit them both with helping me develop as a teacher and as a geographer. Ms. Tingley helped instill in me a love of adventure and international travel. She introduced me to the places I wanted to go and made them tremendously alluring. She also is entirely responsible for my belief that literature has just as much of a place in a geography class as it does in English. Mr. Doerr, on the other hand, taught me that you can teach without ever having the students even look at a textbook. He relied instead upon his vast collection of road maps and back issues of Time magazine. I may have switched to National Geographic, but my students can attest to the importance I place upon outside reading - both fiction and non-fiction. And, I am a beast at reading maps. When Texas adopted the 4 x 4 graduation plan in, I was extremely proud. It seemed to me like the state was saying - all kids needs a strong foundation in all of the core subjects. Geography was deemed just as important as history. It had a high-stakes test. It was taken seriously. I felt that Texas was finally becoming a leader in education. Last month, all of that vanished. The new graduation requirements are even less strenuous than when I was a freshmen 30 years ago. We have not just taken a step back; we have plunged ourselves back into the dark ages. Math and science were bludgeoned, as well. Whatever spin the SBOE and the legislator put upon it, all I can hear in my mind is "we don't think Texas kids can succeed with rigorous graduation requirements". I had agreed all along with testing . While I did not like the amount of tests the kids had to take and the generic approach to teaching that resulted from emphasizing standardized assessments, I understand the importance of collecting data, analyzing the data, and acting upon it. I am a geographer, after all. But after implementing the tests and analyzing the data - their interpretation was utter failure. They read the data as an indictment of our students' abilities, rather than a reflection of how much work we needed to do to improve curriculum and instruction. Their interpretations of the data are fatally flawed, and their actions will have devastating results. I wonder if I am the only person who sees the irony - the courses they slashed are the very courses which teach those skills. Perhaps their inability to see the value in those skills is a reflection of their inability to perform them. Maybe it's because they never took geography.

Jerusalem and Ottolenghi - ATWI80 Cookbooks, Post 2

I had originally been joking about my Around the World in 80 Cookbooks project, but sometimes life really does have other plans. Two events occurred which made this project seem much more worth while - almost like I was being told by the universe that this MUST happen. That being said, perhaps I should start a blog just for that project, but I have such a hard time keeping up with this one; I can't even imagine trying to keep up with two. In any case, the first event was the opening of our Christmas presents. For the second year in a row, my husband gave me cookbooks - an extremely unusual thing for him to do, especially twice. This year's books were related to each other - both written by the same authors. Jerusalem and Ottolenghi are both written by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi. These two cookbooks both really illustrate a lot of my food philosophy - that food defines cultures, unites people, and can open up the world to everyone. The two authors grew up in Jerusalem - one is Muslim and the other is Jewish. This divided city, which has been fought over for decades, is at the heart of a conflict which began 10,000 years ago (or more). And yet, the people who live there share share one of the most fundamental culture traits - a cuisine. I have always loved foods from the Middle East, and I was fascinated by the stories behind these books. I had already read through most of the recipes, which seemed very do-able except for one major issue - the availability of some of the ingredients. This is still a new concept for me. Having lived my entire life in extremely large urban areas, I have never had to deal with being unable to find even the weirdest ingredients. Living in small town America is still a shock to my culinary system. Every time I go to the grocery store, I have at least one item the clerk can't identify, but I still have difficulty finding all but the most basic ingredients. And then, I found myself standing in a Middle Eastern market in Kissimmee, Floriday on Christmas Day. Yes, Christmas Day! We had decided to spend Christmas Day relaxing - no visiting the theme parks on the busiest day of the year for us. We had lunch at Wolfgang Puck's in Downtown Disney - which was quite lovely and nice, but not as over-the-top fabulous as I would have hoped from such a famous chef. For dinner, we decided to eat at Jerusalem - a Middle Eastern restaurant my husband and Mother-in-law had found while driving around outside of Disney. They had both raved about how great it was, and it seemed appropriate to us to have Christmas Dinner there. We were right, of course. The food was great - and there was a tiny market attached to the restaurant. Within 5 minutes, I had found most of the unique ingredients I needed to make the recipes from these cookbooks. I also found a can of harissa - my precious stash from Morocco having been depleted already. I still need to find a few of the unique spices used in the recipes, but next weekend's trip to the Metroplex should afford me the chance to find them. So, hopefully, my next post will be after I've tried several of the dishes. I'll post some pics, too. Till then!

Around the World in 80 Cookbooks?

I have recently become a "professional reader". I get advanced copies of books so I can read and review them, and post my reviews to my sites. The first book I've started reviewing is called "Snackistan", and it got me thinking about my Around the World in 80 Books project. I often use cookbooks as a way to introduce my students to other cultures - should I include them in my project? Or, should I have an entirely separate project just devoted to cookbooks? The last option sounds like a much more fun - and tasty - idea. So, my plan is to pick one cookbook a month (wow - 80 months is like 6 and half years...) to review AND cook out of. YUM! No, I won't cook EVERYTHING; nor will I cook out of it every night. I'll just try a selection of the most promising recipes. Since I'm already reviewing "Snackistan", it'll be my first choice. Just to give you a preview...the idea behind "Snackistan" is the snack and street foods common to the Middle East and parts of the Mediterranean where meze is popular. Meze is the Mediterranean version of a heavy hors d'oeuvres buffet. While street food is still not common in my part of America, it is catching on in many urban areas in the US. But, the rest of the world has eaten off the street for centuries. In China, we were strongly discouraged from eating at street vendor stalls, but they were ALL over the place. In France, the food sold on the street was better than most of the food we eat here in restaurants. In Japan, there weren't many street vendors, but there were scores of vending machines dispensing everything from hot green tea to octopus balls...(yeah, don't ask). The entire first chapter is on pickles - which is something I've been wanting to work on in my kitchen, anyway... so stay tuned!

Around the World in 80 Books - First Dispatch

Wow! I can't believe it has been so long since I posted. I will try to do better - I promise. In fact, I actually have some serious blogging goals now that I am unhindered by actual work. My first goal is to actually review some geo topics through my various sources and report back here - like I used to do for my kiddos. Once I start working on that more regularly, I'll send out the word to my ninjas to take a look at my page. My second goal, the reason I am posting today, is to write about my new project. So, I have this list I found - of 80 books (83, actually, I added a few). 80 books of literature and stories from around the world, my new project is Around the World in 80 Books. I love to read, I love to travel, and I love to read about places I want to travel to. So, I thought I'd work my way through the list. Maybe I'll learn more about the places I've been, find some new places to go, keep my wanderlust satisfied until my bank account allows me to travel again, and most importantly, find some books to add to my Recommended Reading List for Geography Ninjas. After reviewing the list, I realized that I've already read 6 of them - including the one I added. But it's been a while since I've read them, so I'll probably read them again, anyway. In any event, I have since gone through the list and reorganized it by continent and have noted some severe shortages. So, I've decided to use the original list (which I found online somewhere) as a guideline, but I'll add my own books along the way. I'll start with one of the books I added - Around the World in 80 Days by Michael Palin - it seemed like the best book to start with... "...air travel shrink wraps the world leaving it small, odourless, tidy and usually out of sight." Air travel may shrink wrap the world, but it also makes it accessible. While I laud the ideal that traveling closer to the ground makes you more a part of the scene, I wonder which scene he was actually attempting to see. On land, Palin rushes as quickly as possible through every major city, minor village, and everything in between. He comments on how this is part of the plan - in the original book our valiant explorer skips all the sites, too, and necessary due to the time constraints. But, he spends most of the trip at sea. True, he gets to spend more time with people - gets to know them much better than the average traveler, but he accomplishes little in the way of seeing the world. Unless you are trying to convey the sense that the world is mostly ocean. His travel methods did leave him a lot of time for introspection, but little time to inspect what he could or should be introspective about. In the end, we learn a little about people - mostly people who are away from home themselves, so what we learn - what we see - is an incomplete picture. But, maybe that's the point. The world is mostly ocean. It is a relatively small vessel upon which we are all travelers throughout the solar system. Seen from a global, rather than local scale, the book does tend to tie us all together, and the stories are as interesting and amusing as you'd expect from a former Python. Worth a read, for sure.

Life on the Edge

Now that we are settled in to our new home, and school/life has settled into a good routine, I finally have time to get back to writing my blogs.  They kind of depress me, since I have no members, yet.  But, I can't blame anyone for not reading them since I've only written 4 posts in two years.  Here's to a better future!

Our new home is very interesting from a geographical standpoint.  Texarkana sits on the state line between Arkansas and Texas, and this location creates some interesting features in the city.  First, we have two mayors, city councils, sets of city services, school districts, etc.  So the laws in each part of the city are quite different.  Take alcohol.  Bowie County (on the Texas side) is dry.  So is Miller County (in Arkansas) EXCEPT for within the city limits of Texarkana, Arkansas.  The result is that anyone living in Texarkana, TX has to drive to another state to buy alcohol.  Second, there are the taxes.  Arkansas' sales tax is lower, so it is cheaper to shop in Arkansas - except for food.  Since Arkansas taxes food, many people buy their groceries in Texas. 

And then, there's the TV.  Texarkana - even with both sides combined, doesn't seem to be big enough to support its own TV stations.  All of our TV comes out of Shreveport.  So, all of us Texans and Arkansians (IDK - I can't remember what they call themselves, I'll have to look it up later) have to watch Louisiana TV.  Actually, so do a few people in Oklahoma - it is only an hour away.

Finally, there is the sudden mind shift of living at the edge of the state.  For my entire life, I could drive for hours in any direction, and still be in Texas.  Now, I can be in another state in 10 minutes.  Two more within an hour, and a half day's drive brings me to about 6 more - less time than it would take to get back to Austin.  Ironically, this has resulted in everything here being more Texas-oriented than in the other places I've lived.  Almost as if they are afraid that if they don't constantly remind themselves they are in Texas, they'll forget.  That being said, if they want to Texan up this place, they need to add a few more Mexican restaurants and some barbecue places with more beef than pork. 

Still, life here on the edge seems to free people here from being locked within state boundaries too much.  I knew people back home who would leave Tarrant County to do anything - even if the county line was only a few miles away.  And in Austin, no one ever crossed the river, unless they had to for work.  Here, people go back and forth all the time.  We've already had field trips to Arkansas and Louisiana, although that may be because there really isn't anything interesting in this part of Texas.  I know - I've looked. 

That is, of course, part of the reason we moved here.  We've pretty much been everywhere in Texas.  I mean it, we have.  Even places that people say NO ONE has ever heard of - we've been there.  Being here opens us up to travel to more parts of the country - we don't have to add an extra travel day just to get out of Texas.  Hopefully, this will spark some more blogs, and I can start posting more regularly.  Until then...

--
MC
Don't Panic!

Really?!?!?!

So, our school got some money from the federal government - we're Title I, now. There are some really good things about getting federal money, but there are some drawbacks, too. One of them being that you have an auditor overseeing how you spend your money. Now, I haven't met him personally, and I am certain he is a perfectly nice government auditor. I am sure he takes his job very seriously, works hard, and does the best he can. Just like all government employees. And I know funds are limited. Still....

My teachers asked for atlases. We each had sets from 10 years ago when the school opened. 6 class sets over 1E0 years had disintegrated into 20 something barely held together with hope and prayer. We've been begging for new ones for years. The book has maps, of course, but not as many, not as much detail, etc. The district decided they'd rather invest in online or atlas software. Ok, this is the 21st century. I'll get on board with that. But, oh yeah, we rarely have access to computers. The lab has been appropriated by the Math department. We were going to have our own. Our amazing tech teacher even found 30 computers for us. Alas, no tables. It's ok, the kids can work on the floor.

With this federal money, we decided to try again. First veto - can't the kids just use Google Earth. Well, sure but see above about the computer issue. Plus, Google Earth doesn't do thematic maps. Those are kind of important.

So, ok, buy us more technology so we can do that. Sounds reasonable???? Oh - well, we should spend the money on Math and English since that's where we're tested.

That's what testing has done to us. We are relegated to the status of annoying step children who only get hand-me-downs.

Well, next year, we'll be tested, too. Shouldn't we invest now? Plus, doesn't analyzing maps support mathematical thinking? Aren't thematic maps just complex visual data sets which require analysis and allow students to apply all that math they've been learning? I submitted a rather long argument to that effect. The jury is still out. But, I have to say that when schools are forced to sacrifice learning in one discipline to "support" learning in another - I think the kids suffer, greatly.

I also just asked for a set of novels for my kids to read. Wonder what that answer will be...

Places I Have Been

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