The Prompt:

Write a story about an eighth grader who has to write a five-minute quickwrite about an eighth grader who has to write a five-minute quickwrite.

What happens? Does the student write about the student writing about the student writing? Does the story ever end? Be creative, make it funny, and see how ridiculous you can make it!

Write for the full five minutes until the timer goes off. Write fast. Don’t worry if you spell a word wrong or make a “mistake.” Just write.

“You should always be trying to write a poem you are unable to write, a poem you lack the technique, the language, the courage to achieve. Otherwise you’re merely imitating yourself, going nowhere, because that’s always easiest.” ― John Berryman

I have long loved this quote for it’s diverse application. It is advice for writing, for life, and especially for education.

In the school where I teach, many students are below grade level. But not that many are far below grade level. One temptation teachers face is to give students work they can already do. The problem with that, of course, is the problem relayed in the Berryman quote. You go nowhere if you only do what you already can do.

I’m trying to stretch myself as a runner. My temptation, of course, is to run the same distance and the same pace all the time. But the only way to get faster is to always (not only) be trying to run a little farther or a little faster. If I run the exact same distances at the exact same pace week after week, I may build a base, but I will inevitably plateau and never get faster. I have to push myself.

The trick as a teacher is finding the right balance between “base building” and “stretching” my students. A student who is always and only ever faced with the challenge of writing the poem they are unable to write will likely be frustrated. But the student who is only ever trying to write the poem they know they can write will go nowhere.

Every day for the “Bell-Ringer” my students do a 5-minute quick-write in their Writer’s Notebook. Here are the instructions.

**Friday 9/25/26

The Prompt: What is something you are looking forward to? It could be something happening soon, something you hope happens someday, or even something small that you are looking forward to tomorrow. Write about it and explain what makes you look forward to it.

Write for the full five minutes until the timer goes off. Write fast. Don’t worry if you spell a word wrong or make a “mistake.” Just write. ** I have decided to post my own responses. Here it is.

Today I am looking forward to going kayaking on Hamlin Lake tomorrow. The weather looks perfect—upper 60s and sunshine and very light wind. My favorite kayaking is following the canoe trail through the carp ponds and portages on the far southeast end of the park. But that typically takes several hours to do, and I’ll be kayaking with J., so we’ll tool around the other parts, stopping off at little islands and watching for deer and waterfowl. I’m looking forward, also, to sleeping in the cool cabin this weekend, where I still say one night on a Thanksgiving break trip there, I got the best night of sleep I have ever had in my life. I like a cold room and ample blankets for sleeping and the overnight temperatures are supposed to be in the 40s. This is perfect. I am looking forward to reading my book on the back patio, drinking a giant coke from the gas station, and building a campfire. I’m looking forward to taking a run, a bike ride, and a walk in the woods.

That’s what I can do in about five minutes. The series will continue next week.

Though Michigan technically got the win against WMU in their opener, the playoff committee is always going to be considering that game a loss for them, no matter what their official record says. There is a lot of season left, but I think to have any shot at the playoffs, Michigan cannot lose more than one game the rest of the season.

The boys are all together now. Morgan, Jozy, and now Ollie, too. I picture them together in the fullness and perfection of their potential as dogs, maybe with my dad, in the fullness and perfection of his potential as a man. I see them walking , or rather probably running, down a forest path and toward a crystal lake.

Micah Beckwith, Lieutenant Governor of Indiana, preached a sermon about hate that has people all upset.

I did not watch the sermon and I will not.

Let me tell you what I HATE about this. And I do hate it. And I think my hate is righteous.

It’s not the message so much, because there are abundant passages of Scripture clearly indicating that God hates evil. Anyone who’s bothered to read their Bible couldn’t miss the many, many times it is clear that God abhors sin and violence and evil.

So anyhow, I did not watch this sermon, and will not. Here is why: No politician should ever be placed in the pulpit to preach. Period. I don’t care if it’s the Black church, which itself has a long and problematic history of doing this. I don’t care if it’s the most MAGA Christian nationalist church. It should never, ever happen.

Any church that does this has lost their understanding of their mission and purpose. You do not put politicians—I mean elected officials—in the pulpit to preach sermons. Whenever you do, it is an implicit, and maybe even explicit, endorsement. And that is wrong and shameful. It inevitably leads to a diabolical idolatry. God have mercy on his church.

You don’t fix this by putting the so-called “right politicians” in the pulpit. You fix this by refusing to ever platform elected officials at pulpit to preach the word of God.

If you are a pastor and you become an elected official, you resign your pastorate. Period. Teach Sunday a school class. Lead a small group out of your home. But no more Sunday morning sermons.

Given a very scripted curriculum for my 8th graders, this is how I think of what I do.

I don’t have to rebel against the curriculum. I don’t have to slavishly reproduce it either. I** interpret it, and I contextualize it.**

And there’s a progression underneath this:

• The curriculum provides the framework.
• I interpret it.
• I contextualize it for the students in front of me.
• I use my professional judgment and my imagination and creativity to determine how best to teach it.
• I remain responsible for the learning, not merely for the delivery of the curriculum.

I take the script as a suggestion, not a mandate. I’m thankful for the suggestion, but I’m at liberty to disregard it if I have a better approach for my context.

So I adapt liberally whenever necessary, which is far more often than not. I give myself permission to do this because in spite of the way the curriculum guide is written, I remind myself often that I am not a servant of the curriculum; I am a teacher of the students.

I’m toying with a new classroom policy to minimize verbalized complaints about others. “Write it up or Shut up.” It goes something like this.

If you have a complaint about the behavior of another student in class who has done something to disrupt your learning—they threw a paperwad or pencil at you; they called you a name; they closed your chromebook; etc.—you are not allowed to verbalize it or “tattle” on them. You will be required to write a 200 word minimum “Student Incident Report” and submit it to me. In your report you must describe what happened in detail, explain how this disrupted your learning, and explain what you think should happen.

Incident Reports like this are only necessary when I have not observed the behavior. If I see it, I will take care of it. But if I don’t see it, I don’t want to hear you complaining about it or tattling. Instead, I will supply you with the “Student Incident Report” form to fill out. Your job is to “write it up or shut up.”

One exception: If something is serious, threatening, dangerous, or involves an immediate safety concern, tell me immediately. That is not tattling. That is reporting a problem that requires immediate attention.

Otherwise: WRITE IT UP OR SHUT UP. Don’t interrupt class. Don’t announce your complaint to the class. Don’t argue with the other student. Don’t turn a classroom problem into another classroom problem.

Put it in writing. This is an English class. If you have something important to say, learn to say it well in writing.

Steve Kerr wants to eliminate the three-point line entirely. Phil Jackson wants to widen the court. Both ideas have merit, but honestly? They’re either too drastic or too expensive. I’ve got a simpler proposal that nobody seems to be floating, and I think it actually solves the problem.

Keep the three-point line exactly where it is — except in the corners.

Right now, the corner three sits at 22 feet, about 18 inches closer to the basket than the rest of the arc. That shorter distance is the whole reason analytics-driven offenses have made it the most valuable shot in basketball. Defenses have to honor it, which spaces the floor, which opens driving lanes, which creates kick-outs, which leads to more corner threes. It’s a loop that’s made the modern NBA increasingly predictable.

Here’s my fix: extend the corner portion of the arc to the same 23 feet 9 inches as the rest of the line, without widening the court.

Do the math. An NBA court is 50 feet wide, meaning there’s 25 feet from the basket to each sideline. At 23 feet 9 inches, you’ve only got 15 inches between the arc and the out-of-bounds line. A men’s size 12 shoe is roughly 12 inches long. You need both feet behind the line to hit a legal three. The geometry simply doesn’t work. You haven’t banned the corner three — you’ve just made it physically impossible to shoot legally from there.

No new rule language. No arena renovations. The line does the work.

But here’s what I think is the real payoff: it doesn’t just eliminate a shot, it changes how defenses think. The corner three’s value was never just the shot itself — it was the threat of the shot. Right now a defender has to honor four or five perimeter spots at once. Take the corner off the board and suddenly a defender can cheat off that spot, clog driving lanes more aggressively, and rotate more freely. The entire defensive calculus shifts.

And offenses? They’d have to actually get creative again. No more parking a big man in the corner to stretch the floor while everyone watches. You’d need movement, cuts, and — dare I say it — mid-range jumpers. You know, basketball.

Kerr and Jackson are both right that the corner three is the problem. They’re just thinking too big about the solution. You don’t need to blow up the game or rebuild every arena in the league.

You just need 15 inches.

One of the saddest things I’ve ever read…

“Your property near Baugo Creek in Wakarusa was once part of northern Indiana’s pre-settlement landscape, dominated by mature mixed hardwood forests before European settlers cleared it for farmland around 175-200 years ago.

Forest Composition Picture a dense canopy of towering oak-hickory trees—white oak, black oak, shagbark hickory—mixed with beech, sugar maple, and scattered ash or elm, reaching 100-150 feet tall with girths wider than a person’s arm span. The understory would feature younger saplings, ferns, wild ginger, and spring wildflowers like trout lily, with sunlight filtering through in dappled patterns on an uneven, leaf-littered floor.

Creek Influence Along Baugo Creek, envision a wetter “lowland-depressional” zone: sycamore, silver maple, and cottonwood lining the banks, with buttonbush thickets and skunk cabbage in low spots, fed by the creek’s gentle flow over rocks. Beavers might have dammed sections, creating small ponds alive with frogs, herons, and pileated woodpeckers drumming on snags.

Ground and Wildlife The forest floor would feel spongy underfoot, rich with decaying logs hosting fungi, salamanders, and insects; deer trails weaving through, and the air thick with bird calls amid occasional prairie openings nearby. This mosaic reflects 87% of presettlement Indiana’s forest cover, now mostly gone.”

I asked perplexity.ai what my property would have looked like before settlers wiped out the native old growth forest.

I ask God if a “new Earth” can feature my home place restored to such grandeur.

I hope so.

It’s a small thing undertaken by a puny man like myself to plant trees and watch them grow on this 3 acres of abused ground. Every year it gets better, but I will be long gone before I see it in its glory.

How could they not have seen the impact on surface temperatures row-cropping would have? Somewhere back there in time, I wonder if one of my own ancestors cleared the forest to make a life.

A High School English experience that doesn’t require you to read at least 20 full length books over the course of four years is a complete failure. Students should be reading 4-8 full length works of literature per year. Reading endless excerpts, many of them A.I. generated, on screens as “test prep” is no solution to the massive literacy problem we face. There is good evidence that it is the main cause of it.

After a lifetime of Windows PCs, since September I’ve been using a MacBook Air. Being somewhat familiar with the ecosystem from being an iPhone and iPad user for years made the transition smoother, I suspect.

The MacBook Air is incredible.

Once you go Mac, you’ll never go back.

You might get advice to teach by starting with a stated “outcome” in view and then look for content to serve that end.

My teaching got so much better when I did the opposite: I started with great books and let them work their magic, enchanting the souls of students and leading us in surprising directions.