Is Your Program The REcipe For Great French Toast?
In April, I went to Mobile Alabama for the first time. It had never been a destination for me (not a fan of heat or humidity). Honestly, it still isn’t a destination for me with the exception of educational events and a little experiment that I set forth in April.
(For those not accustomed to the Alabama dialect and pronunciation, Mobile is pronounced Mo-BEEL. In a world where everything is mobile (as in capable of movement), the things of Mobile are funny… like the Mobile Pet Store…Sorry… I may be showing more of my inner voice than you need.)
I found Mobile a pleasant place. It's a beautiful city with a ton of history. It’s especially great from inside my air conditioned, humidity limited car in July. The humidity is such that no matter where I am, a trip outside means I have to remove my glasses in order to see… It’s a beautiful town once the fog of my lenses clear.
My first trip in April was to support the Alabama SkillsUSA State Leadership and Skills Conference. The event is held in the Mobile Convention Center (another funny application of the traditional use of mobile). The venue is right on the waters that lead to the Mobile bay and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. The skyline is lorded over by the cranes that lift shipping containers out of cargo ships. There are literal battle ships built on the opposite side of the water way from the convention center. It’s a pretty cool area. That’s not why I get excited to come to Mobile.
The excitement I have comes from the parking deck across the road from the convention center. Using a “sky bridge,” you can cross Water St. to get between the parking deck and the convention center. In that parking deck are three cars that caught my eye. Two are mid-70s model Lincoln Continentals and the third is a mid-60s Studebaker Daytona. These cars would stand out in any parking deck. They are classics and in shockingly good shape.
The reason that caught my eye in April is that they have been parked in that deck for a VERY long time. How long? I don’t know. What I do know is that they have been there long enough that I noticed the layer of dust and dirt on them. I noticed this in April and they are still untouched - other than someone using their finger on the rear window of one of the Continental to scribble 7-8-2024 in the dust on the car.
I immediately thought “at some point, those cars were something that someone was very proud of.” They drove it home that first day with the windows down just beaming with excitement for their new car. I imagine they washed and waxed them regularly. I best those cars were treated like they were worth a million dollars.
Now they sit… in the salt air off the Mobile bay and falling deeper and deeper into a field of dust from the parking deck.
As I drove home from Mobile, I thought about teachers and their programs. I wondered “how many programs are just like those cars?” How many programs are still serving their purpose? Still putting out a daily announcement show? Still interviewing principals? Still doing the daily slog that is teaching… blink and 9 months have passed.
I know that I didn’t have a really long teaching career, I did fall into that habit. Just pushing out content. No passion. No drive… just push. Like stale bread. It serves it’s purpose but it wasn’t worth looking for.
As always, my train of thought got off a “Food Depot.” My next thought was French Toast. I love french toast (my wife and kids hate it so I don’t cook it that often) but I love it.
** Secret time** After my drive home,I hid a package of bread that had about 4 pieces left in the back of the breadbox - behind the fresh loaf. I’m not ashamed.**
That weekend as I prepped my special meal, the idea of a stale programs came to mind again. My parallel hit me. Stale is ok. Stake is something that we all go through. It’s just a fact of life. Stale can be good - especially if you add a little egg, some milk, a pinch or two of cinnamon, and a splash of vanilla. Stale bread makes the best french toast. I know the science - dry + moist = not as dry. The bread soaks up the wet mixture.
Follow me as I break down the recipe for your stale program….
The Bread
You know if your program is stale or quickly headed there. You don’t remember the last time you got excited about something a student did or your program accomplished. You are just using the same lesson plans in the same order as last year - minus the date change. You know… everyone knows.
Now it’s time to turn that stale bread into something great!
The Eggs
Stop. Take an afternoon (not a weekend) and stop. Leave as soon as you are no longer obligated to be at school. Do this for a couple of days… will it be tough? Yes. Will it cause you more stress later? Possibly. Will you feel guilty? Probably. Is it essential? Yes.
Take this time and drive home. See things. Go home and watch tv. Stop thinking about your program. Just go for a drive!
This will lead to new ideas. Exciting ideas. Ideas that will probably scare you when they first hit your brain. When you are trying not to drown, you aren’t thinking of anything other than not drawing. Stop drowning and just float. .
The Milk
Now that you have these new ideas. You need support to help make them become something. Find your support. Often that support lies in a student or two who are passionate and need something to help them quell their desires. It may also come in the student that is just getting by and needs something to fire them up. The support “does a program good.”
Share your ideas. Ask for help structuring a way to make them happen. Is it a new segment? Share that with a kid and ask if they will lead the team. Is it a new piece of technology or a new technique? Give it a whirl.
As teachers we too often are afraid to fail because we have to be the best, smartest, brightest, and wisest… that’s not the case. Use your students to support you as you try new things.
The Cinnamon
The spice in your program has been washed out by the flood of expectations and just trying to get by. It’s time to add a little more spice. Just like in my french toast - a pinch goes a long way.
That pinch could be new music for your show. It could be a new font for your graphics. It could be simply bringing a lamp into the classroom and turning off the fluorescent white wash. A dash of simple spice can go a long way.
The Vanilla
Vanilla gets a bad wrap. “That’s so vanilla.” Of all of the ingredients in my recipe, vanilla scares me the most. It’s great when you add just enough to get a taste of vanilla but it doesn’t overpower the cinnamon. The problem is that there is a fine line between not enough and too much. The vanilla in your stale program recipe is your new found passion.
Fake passion just like fake vanilla is terrible so we won’t even go there. We are talking about that true “I’m glad I made those changes” passion. The “I like my job again” kind of passion. If you do the things above - take a break, find some support, spice up your program - the passion will return. It will come back because you will see new things - kids smiling, kid succeeding, new elements in your program. This is great. This is the whole goal of this article. The problem is when that new found passion to see those new things and experience growth takes over and you have added too much vanilla.
Finding your balance is key to the success of your program, your happiness, and ultimately your life. I too often see a teacher who has reignited their passion for teaching quickly flame out because the flame grew too hot… and no matter how great your recipe is - if you burn the toast, it’s a bad thing.
Meet the Author, Tom White
Tom White is the Education and House of Worship Specialist at Amitrace. Tom's role is to help educators build better programs through better training, planning, and equipment. Before joining Amitrace, Tom was the Broadcast Engineer at Grady College of Journalism and Communication at the University of Georgia. Prior to that role, Tom taught at Morgan County High School and Rockdale Career Academy where he and his student produced thousands of live streams for sports, news, and community events. Tom’s program at the Rockdale Career Academy received the NFHS Network Program Of The Year in 2016 and his program at Morgan County High School received the New Program of the Year title in 2018. Tom has been a long time contributor to many publications and is the host of Teaching to The Test Pattern Podcast.
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