Birthday Parties are for Everybody.

It only happens once a year. All your friends get together. Moms make sure everyone's hair is parted straight and clothes are pressed, but we all know by the end of the day there will be frosting behind our ears and ice cream stains on our shirts. The gig can be at a roller rink, pool-side in someone's backyard, or at a neighborhood park - the location doesn't matter. Everyone who attends gets a little SWAG, a bit of grub, and at the end of the day, no onlooker could really tell which of the exhausted party goers was the actual guest of honor, because birthday parties are for everybody.

I remember my mom taking me to a birthday party when I was 8 years old. I wasn't a shy kid, but I didn't know a another soul at the party. It was a party for the son of a co-worker, so my mom wrapped a gift, slicked down my hair and threw me into the mix. Funny thing is, looking back, I started the day without knowing anyone and ended the day with two new best friends and a room full of people I'd cross the playground to say hello to.

Fast forward nearly four decades: this week, some of my friends and I are throwing a little shin-dig. It only happens once a year. It isn't in honor of anyone, but is really a celebration of everyone. This is the week of the annually awaited CapCue Techfest. On Saturday, we will be gathering 400 like minded EdTech Educators into one festively decorated location. Each attendee, whom I assume are all kids at heart, will grab a little SWAG at the door, play along in a few games and sessions, and belly up to a catered sandwich somewhere around noon. Just like the once a year celebration of a child's first day: this gig is much more about the time we spend together than the festivities that are planned on our behalf. The unplanned consequences of attending an event like this are often the most powerful: you may attend with the intention of learning something new, but instead connect with a person who becomes that friend who inspires you for years to come.

I hope that everyone who attends this weekend sees an old friend, but, more importantly, I hope that each attendee makes a new one. I hope that we all find ourselves in a room at some point, surrounded by like minded people, laughing at our common misunderstandings, as easily as we spontaneously applaud a presenter who wows us with a life-hack that saves us an hour each work week. The most important part of this particular gig is that it is local: organized by volunteers, promoted by passion and intended for everyone. This is going to be Epic!

It's Ok to Never Finish

I just listened to a great podcast by one of my favorite authors, Malcolm Gladwell. He talked about the genius of Elvis Costello, of the famous artist Paul Cezanne, and of the Canadian singer, songwriter and poet Leonard Cohen. Gladwell says that there are works of art and innovation that spring to the minds of some and are instantly finished. The song Bridge Over Troubled Waters, written by Paul Simon and now remade by everyone from Aretha Franklin to Josh Groban, hit its author like an anvil falling from an open window and the song wrote itself to completion in a single sitting. On the other hand, the song Hallelujah, now most famously performed by Jeff Buckley, took Lenny Cohen over 5 years to wrestle from within his mind, and yet, upon release, this first version was a flop. It wasn't until Hallelujah was re-written a second time and and performed by a second and a third artist that it eventually became woven into the backdrop of American music, film and television culture.

Gladwell gives colorful examples of innovations that sprang to life and others that drew out over decades, and to each he assigned a value: Picasso or Cezanne. Pablo Picasso often completed a work on a first attempt, he would work on a single canvas until content that his work was complete; Picasso would sign his name to a piece and then explore onto another work of art, feeling content that the signed painting was finished. Cezanne on the other hand would paint the same piece, over and over, refusing to sign his name to many seemingly completed paintings, because to him they were never completed. Cezanne never finished. Cezanne would literally ask subjects to sit for portraits up to 100 times, and go through as many canvass before he finally signed a work. All the works leading up to his eventually signed canvas were simply formative attempts at an eventual innovation.

Neither method is correct and neither is wrong, there is no single path to innovation. These different takes on creation make me look about the classroom through a different lens. Of course we want our students in the classrooms across America to produce, to bring projects to completion so that we may evaluate their eventual Final Product, but I would argue that in every room arranged with 30 desks there must be a handful of Cezannes. Imagine if Lenny Cohen or Paul Cezanne were rushed to finish a work, to turn it in on time, only to receive a final grade based on a work they hadn’t had time to fully revise. How many students never receive feedback because they are unable to sign their name to a work that is just not complete. How do we allow the Cezanne-child to receive the formative feedback that she needs while gifting her the opportunity to reflect, grow and improve?

Of course we need deadlines and final due dates so that we may evaluate student progress and offer important feedback on completed projects. Afterall, we have a lot of content to power through, and we can’t allow limitless time on every assignment. However, when we are designing opportunities for student innovation, it is important to remember that we may have a Cezanne or two among even a sea of productive Picassos.

My advice is this: allow for innovation. For some Cezanes, it may be ok to never finish. A masterful teacher can find the learning within even the unfinished work, evaluate whether the lesson has been learned, offer formative feedback and guide the group on to the next work of art while respecting that each student has a personalized pace for innovation. Above all, Cezanne was a revisionist. Iteration after iteration changed, morphed and improved his work. For Cezanne it was not the product but the process that captivated his attention. Painting was a process and an opportunity to reflect on each new attempt at innovation. Let's make our classrooms a place that allows for learning to happen through a process of reflection.