When Personal Life Crosses Over with Professional

This past week, Camp Tri-Mount announced their 2016 Program Director. Why is that important? Well Tri-Mount was the first Boy Scout Camp I ran as a program director back in 2005. As a program director, it is my responsibility to ensure that every aspect of a scout’s week is fun, educational, and safe. As I had seen with many summers working at scout camps, one way to tie everything together is through a theme. At that point in time, Tri-Mount never operated with a theme. I came in and put together my dream theme: Super Heroes.

Super Heroes comes to camp

“I’m Batman!”

What does this have to do with my professional life? Well, the concept of theming, as a means to tie everything together.

Recently the PD offerings at the two Middle Schools in my district have focused on reviewing and reflecting. Since the offerings happen during lunch periods, typically they are called Lunch N’ Learns. To signify a different type of session, we have called these ‘Catchup & Relish’.  This way we stick with the theme of lunch. We want teachers to have a chance to “catch up” on anything they might have missed at a previous session and “relish” on what has worked well in their classrooms, ah-ha moments they have had and obstacles they have overcome.

I created, with input from my colleague, Kim Lowden, two Google Drawings for the teachers to be able to fill out and reflect on their integration journey. The first is a hot dog which they get to dress with various condiments (Ketchup = Tech Tools, Relish = Strategies, Cheese [though, I wanted onions] = connectors). The second (offered later in the year), is a cheeseburger that they will deconstruct to reflect on the past school year. Both are below for your viewing, as well as, you will be prompted to ‘make a copy’ if you click it.

Dress Your Hotdog

Deconstruct Your Cheeseburger

I’m also kicking around the idea of having Picnic time at an upcoming Faculty Meeting where the teachers will “Pick” a technology tool to learn ‘in the “nick” of time’.

Have you created any theming for your learners?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *