Category Archives: VPA

My word for the year: ABANDONMENT

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Last fall, a colleague asked me to choose a word that I would use as my focus for the year. A million words swirled around in my head, but then one just kept coming back to me…so I chose it. My word is “abandonment.”

Let me explain…

I love to be busy and I feel joyful when I’m doing my work because I’m doing what I love. However, there are those moments when I feel overwhelmed. During those times I read this quote that I have posted in my office. It’s from a stack of CSJ Maxim Meditation Cards that I received when I was first hired and attended a CSJ retreat down in San Diego. The cards take quotes from the writings of Jean Pierre Medaille, and some clever person made a 26 card stack of them and gave them to each of the new hires. When I got them, I used to shuffle them up and read/reflect on one word each day. Something different happened the day I read “abandonment.” That day I was particularly overwhelmed with work that I wanted to do, and was trying to multi-task and switch-task to get things done. I realized that I was losing focus, so I stopped and read my card of the day:

Abandonment-
“Never think of the future unless it is somehow necessarily related to your present work: abandon everything to the Providence of God your Father.” And another quote, “Recognize and tenderly love the presence of God in all the events of your life, however trying they may be.” 


I stopped shuffling the cards that day and have kept that quote posted. In this day and age where we are talking more and more about focus, the importance of boredom, multi-tasking, and switch-tasking…it is this quote that keeps me grounded.

Stepping Back and Letting Go

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We all want to move toward a student centered environment where the students take the lead and help lead and share their knowledge with one another.

I have been looking forward to Company this spring, since for the first time in 10 years, I won’t be designing the main stage production. Instead, Zoe Heilmann, will be in charge of the Costume Design and the Costumes Crew for Pygmalion.


However as Monday taught me, Zoe and I might both be ready for her to take lead, but the other students on the crew aren’t so sure about it. I spent most of the 2 hours after school telling students to “Ask Zoe”, “Show Zoe”, “Zoe come here and answer____ question.”

Since the show is a work in progress, I plan to give updates here all semester, so check back to see how we do.

Zoe Heilmann measures Dante Williams for his costume.

Boredom in the Classroom

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I just read an interesting article about the positive effects of incorporating boredom in your classroom. Last fall I wrote a post where I suggested a link between creative thought and movement (one of the reasons why you may have seen me and the Concert Choir students taking a brisk 5 minute power walk yesterday afternoon!) Others have also written posts this year that discuss these same observations about boredom. I think the author of this article says it better than I can, so read on…

http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/dec18/vol76/num04/The-Gift-of-Boredom.aspx?utm_source=ascdexpress&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Express%2014-15

So now I’m curious…what do you do to encourage creative thought?

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I have never thought of myself as a teacher. I think of myself as an artist. Perhaps, I could be a thought of as a teaching artist.  Actually, this is has always been a temporary career. I was offered my first teaching position without applying so I gave it a shot. Initially, I intended to give it a solid 5 year trial.  I have modified that trial period repeatedly.  

Now I try to fit in during PD days and the such.  This is never easy for me.  I can tell I make some contributions occasionally but in that context, I also feel like an outsider every single time.  There are times where the words I am hearing confuse me so much, I try to sit next to people that I have secretly pegged as “friendly interpreters”.  
As an artist, I suppose I bring something else. My theory is based on a connection between my practice and that of our CSJs.  When I was interviewing in 2001 for a position at CHS, I first met Sr. Kathy.  Soon after that, I also met Sr. Madeleine.  I was instantly impressed and scared.  After I was hired, my CSJ education began.  All the new hires were flown down to LA for a team sleepover, to see the schools, the residence and some of the clinics.  Walking into the breakfast the next day, I met so many of the sisters and heard many stories. My biggest takeaway is that there were radicals.  They were empowered and intelligent women who did things. These were often things that went against the direction of mainstream society and sometimes, against the patriarchy of Catholicism.  It was the best of introductions.
My education has always centered around creative experiences, invention, and a dualistic approach to tradition: Connect and Deconstruct.  An arts education can be immersive; classes all morning, open studio time all afternoon and early evening. And I benefitted from living in the Bay Area in the early 90s.  There was live music nearly every night someplace.  The musical attitude of punk was the nightly half of my education.  
Classroom 9/2018

Studio 9/2018
I recognize parallels between being an artist, a punk musician, and the CSJ. They all just pursue their goals determinately, they aren’t limited to conventions, do what it takes to get it done and know that there may be a mess in the process.  Somewhere in there is my contribution.  I try to transmit that outlook to the students.  When my 25 year trial period is up in a few of years, I will reflect back on this side gig and share some discoveries.

Music Makes a Difference!

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Last week we inducted 18 students into the National Honor Society for Music (aka Tri-M.) At our induction ceremony, I asked student Katherine Blobner to share a reflection on a musical topic of her choice. Here’s an excerpt of what she shared:



“What about music is able to unify people? I got to thinking about all of the subjects we study in school (math, science, language, art, history) and how frequently we assume these subjects to be independent of each other, but I realized that in reality all these subjects are just different ways of looking at and interpreting the same world. As individuals we tend to understand the world better through certain lenses—I, for example, don’t understand physics or math all that well, so when I hear the number “262.2 Hz” I have no idea what that means. Anyone know what that number means? Ok, what about this (plays middle C on piano)? They’re the same thing! 262.2 Hz is the frequency of middle C—look we’ve just made a connection between physics and music! I could go on and on with examples of how music connects to different areas of study, but my point is, music is something we can all understand because it is the culmination of all these different subjects we often assume to be different. Music provides an opportunity to bridge the gap between math and art or history and language, and by extension an opportunity to connect with people. That’s why we’re here: to take our understanding and help other people to make those connections. To show people the value of music, not just as a form of art or entertainment, but as a means to better understand each other.”

Our students are so cool.

Carving out time for yourself + movement = creative thought?

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I’ve been inspired by the recent blog posts of my colleagues (Ashley, Jen, and Steph) which have focused on finding and establishing a healthy balance in our busy lives. I too have found myself a bit over committed recently, and often struggle to carve out time for myself on a daily basis. A once avid daydreamer, I crave having time to myself…time to think…time for creative thought.



But where is that time now? When I think about where/when my best ideas happen it is either in the car, the shower, or while rocking my kids to sleep. In other words: times when I don’t have a screen to distract me and I’m by myself. Hmmm…



A few times a week, I hop on the treadmill super early in the morning before the day gets going. This typically involves me dragging myself out of bed, sneaking downstairs without waking anyone up, grabbing my iPad to turn on Netflix, and starting my routine. When I started my workout yesterday, I thought “what would this be like if I didn’t watch something while I did it?” So, I gave it a try.



What did I find? First- as any new mom will tell you- time to be with yourself is a huge gift. It was rejuvenating to let my thoughts and ideas bounce around with no real agenda. As I walked, I started daydreaming. Some of my daydreams were work related, others not, but I found a sense of freedom in this experience. Gradually I felt that some of my daydreams became ideas so good that I didn’t want to “lose them” so I grabbed my phone, did some “speech to text” emails to myself, and kept on daydreaming. When the workout ended I felt centered, creative, and excited to start the day.



This experiment got me thinking more deeply about the correlation between physical movement and creative thought, something I’m now more curious about. Does carving out time for yourself + movement = creative thought? For me, I think so!

Film Clips on Schoology

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When I was a student, I saw a lot of great films, once.  My professors exposed me to marvelous images and sequences but I really needed to pay attention.  Each viewing was unique and not to be repeated.  Like my current seventh period film student, I fell asleep in class often.  Sometimes I could find the same film at a video rental but I rarely tried. 

Daily, I show the students many clips and stills from all type of movies.  I want to flood their mental image banks with possibilities.  I also want them to have access to everything I show in class.  Some of it may be on youtube but they will rarely try to find it there. 


Using an open-source program, VLC player, I am capturing stills and sequences from dvds (for my educational purposes).  It is a simple task and it takes a few minutes but it is much faster than trying to cue up that scene from a dvd player during class! Whatever I show them in class, I also put on a Schoology for the students’ reference.  At then end of the years, I will save my clip library as a resource and expand it with new clips next year.

You can talk to our IT department about downloading it on your device.  I have learned that it works much easier on a PC than the MacBooks. I am mostly using a faculty room pc for this operation.

If you merely want to use it once in a while or for a single project, I will help you do it!

A great resource for hi-res film stills

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Looking at film stills is a significant portion of our film studies class.  I usually clip my own shots from our dvd collection but often want images from other movies.  It seemed like there should be a library of these images out there so I looked around a bit.  I found Film Grab and think it is worth sharing. On this site you can search by a few criteria to find the right collection.  The quality of the images is fantastic well curated.  It was such a delight that I start to imagine if other disciplines might be able to see possibilities.

image from Atonement, Joe Wright 2007





partial page view 


Singing Is Risky Business!

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I am nervous to write this blog. Nervous because I fear that what I am about to share will not be well received or (worse yet) that what I say won’t affect any change…


So here it is: from my perspective at mass today, I noticed that many faculty and staff members were choosing NOT to sing. 


I don’t understand why. Now, I know I’m biased because I’m a vocal music teacher and this is “my thing”, but if we are trying to embrace a culture of risk taking (and learning by failing) then shouldn’t we be prepared to model for our students some risk taking of our own? 


I know it can be scary, but let’s take a risk…let’s sing in mass! In the words of Sara Bareilles, “I wanna see you be brave.”