This is my first new blog posting in over three years. In those three years, I have both witnessed and experienced significant changes. In my work as an elementary school principal, I have seen the urgent need to bring innovation and formative assessment to our students. I am always reading and looking for ways to continue my learning and then share my learning with others. Twitter has become a powerful source for leading my thinking in new directions. When I last wrote a blog, Twitter had hardly registered on my radar and I was supposed to be not only the instructional leader of my building, but also a coordinator of meaningful professional development for my staff. Over the last week, I have been reading many tweets about ideas shared at Educon 2.3 at the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia.I was not there and still I felt as if I was at least tangentially learning about the things these fellow educators were reflecting on in their blogs and tweets. As I thought about what I read, it compelled me to rejoin the ranks of the blogging.
I’ve also changed as a person. In the last year, I shed 50 pounds and am now the healthiest I have ever been. Much as I am part of the change in education, so to was I the change agent in my health. I embraced the exercise strategies espoused in Body for Life, most significantly the emphasis on interval training. I incorporated more weight-based exercise and added yoga every night. I also made significant changes to my eating habits. By moving from a fairly unhealthy standard of meat almost every night to almost entirely fruit and vegetable based lunches and dinners, completely eliminating soda and reducing my consumption of complex carbohydrates, I went from 206 lbs in December of 2009 to 149 lbs by Christmas 2010. Unlike any other attempts I made to improve my health, this attempt has truly changed my thinking. I no longer have any difficulty with the foods I now eat. It is just who I have become.
I plan to use this blog as a way to share the continued learning that I experience. I hope to be able to share ideas that my fellow administrators, teachers, random people who find this blog or anyone else can use in their lives- personally or professionally. If 2010 was about my internal changes, 2011 is going to be about me sharing more with others. I look forward to the learning I continue to gain, the conversations I start or to which I contribute and the opportunities to engage with friends and colleagues across the world.
j_bednar 