On Teaching and Learning: February 2026

Saturday, February 28, 2026

Middle Season #6 - 2026

Friday, February 27, 2026

NYT agility drills for aged people

Here's the NYT article

The Workout

Sequence: Complete each drill three times before moving to the next. Start with one minute of rest after each drill and work that down to 30 seconds.

For each movement: Do as many repetitions as you can in the time allowed. The goal is to increase your speed.

Carioca drill

Repetitions: 30 seconds in each direction, repeated three times

Standing in place with your knees slightly bent, cross your right foot in front of your left, then bring your left foot out and step sideways. Bring your right foot behind your left, then move your left foot to the left and sideways.

Continue each lateral movement for 30 seconds, rest, then switch directions. Ideally you should do this in an open area, but if you have limited space, adapt to what is available.

Ladder drills

Repetitions: 30 seconds, repeated three times

Start with a 15-foot chalk line, tape or cord. Quickly step over the line with one foot at a time, bringing both feet to one side before going back across to the other. With each step, move sideways down the line until you reach the end. Turn back to go the opposite way.

As you improve, try an agility ladder to do these step-ins/outs while moving forward up and down the ladder.

Figure Eight Drill

Repetitions: 20 seconds, repeated three times

Set two dumbbells, cones or yoga blocks 10 to 15 feet apart. Picture the top, bottom and middle of a figure eight in your mind. Run the figure eight, aiming to improve your reaction time on turns and curves. Try switching directions with each set.
Agility Balls
Repetitions: 30 seconds, repeated three times

Hold a tennis ball or other small, bouncy ball in front of you near ear level. Drop it and squat down quickly with the goal of catching it in the same hand after it bounces once and starts to come down again.
To make this more challenging, toss the ball against a wall and catch it one hand.
Skaters
Repetitions: 15 repetitions, repeated three times

Beginning on your left foot, hop sideways onto the right, then quickly back to the left while gently swinging your arms. Work into a back-and-forth rhythm and focus on a soft landings. As you improve your control and speed, practice staying on one foot for a few seconds before hopping to the other.
Shuttle runs
Repetitions: 30 seconds, repeated three times
On a flat, open space, mark two points about 25 feet apart. Sprint from one to the other, stopping briefly before sprinting back. You can do this by shuffling side to side for more of a challenge, or just run up and back.
Another more challenging option is to invite a friend to help. Shuffle in one direction, and when your partner gives a signal, move in a different direction.

Thursday, February 26, 2026

It's Temporary

Special Ed teacher Jim Westphal was in the Green Room with me helping students take a geometry quiz. The room's radiator started making a terrible whining, ratcheting, pained squeal. Kids, distractable, just settling down to do the mental work of the geometry quiz, begin to take protest and unsettle. Immediately, Jim says "it's temporary."

I'm imagining this is a long distance runner technique, something to say to yourself to not give up effort and concentration.

Wednesday, February 25, 2026

Dinnerdisheshomeworkreading

Reading my old blogs recently brings me back to Sisyphus feeling in 2020 or 2021 when I wrote it, but also back to 2016 or 2013 (from where some of the blog posts originated as I re-read earlier journals.) When will I learn not just to recognize the rush, but to do something about it?

Today, I began, as Sarah Susanka has it, to perforate my day with mini-pauses. For instance, when I arrive in my car at work, I don't leap out, but I stop, and take three very slow breaths, trying to "drop in" mindfully for 3 in a row.

The first one, in the morning, makes me think of being pulled from one "to do" to the next. Image of Chaplin in Modern Times. The in between places - the walk from the car - I usually consider "wasted time" in between events.

Another one, again in the parking lot after a DCLT meeting at Hinsdale South, Was thinking this afternoon of the feeling of no one will miss me. No one knows that I’m not even here (between HC and HS) waiting in the warm car for just a couple minutes

Planning for pauses. At 7:23 this evening- thinking of how much time I have until 8 when I’ll start reading - and I'm thinking that I want to work a 3-min break before and after I start (between dishes and HW). I'm planning the pauses, rather than booking everything back to back.... dinner, dishes, HW, reading. Dinnerdisheshomeworkreading.

The pauses are not "check social media" time.

I feel like I did a blog entry a few years back -- during COVID -- on "taking a break" in a Zoom meeting, where that break time was filled with running to the bathroom and checking email (or both!). Even during COVID, the event that should have forced us to take a break.

Tuesday, February 24, 2026

Guided Meditation Collection

Body Scan

Loving Kindness

Sharon Salzberg Loving Kindness in the Body Insight Timer

Vipassana (Breath)

JKZ Guided Mindfulness Meditation Series 1 (2014)
Tara Brach Vipassana (Basic) Meditation Insight Timer

Open Mind

Labelling

Monday, February 23, 2026

3+ admirable ways of being

controlled burn at Bemis with beautiful tree against a blue sky

Recently, I've come across ideas that are admirable ways of being, a sense of how we should be going about our daily lives.

1. Basho's quotation - Every day is a journey, and the journey is home. Being settled and comfortable in the unsettledness of a life of newness.

2. Thoreau's quotation - I am that rock on the pondside. (suggesting that he is MADE for bird song, like a key is made for a lock). We are MADE for this world, and made to take pleasure and be effected by it.

3. Effortless confidence - The aura of Alysa Liu's Olympic figure skating gold. Nerveless and exuberant. Threatless.

These three bring to mind also Zen Habit's idea of "this day is an opportunity to..."

All of these are contrasted with self-protection, whinging, worry, the sentry, worry, anxiety.

Sunday, February 22, 2026

A game called Raconteur

From Paul Ford's How to Be Polite

A friend and I came up with a game called Raconteur. You pair up with another Raconteur at a party and talk to everyone you can. You score points by getting people to disclose something about their lives. If you dominate the conversation, you lose a point. The two raconteurs communicate using hand signals and keep a tally on a sheet of paper or in their minds. You’d think people would notice but they are so amused by the attention that the fact you’re playing Raconteur escapes their attention.

Saturday, February 21, 2026

Notes on the Reality of the Self by Jorie Graham

Notes on the Reality of the Self

By Jorie Graham
New Yorker

Watching the river, each handful of it closing over the next,
brown and swollen. Oaklimbs,
gnawed at by waterfilm, lifted, relifted, lapped-at all day in
this dance of non-discovery. All things are
possible. Last year’s leaves, coming unstuck from shore,
rippling suddenly again with the illusion,
and carried, twirling, suddenly shiny again and fat,
toward the quick throes of another tentative
conclusion, bobbing, circling in little suctions their stiff
presence
on the surface compels. Nothing is virtual.
The long brown throat of it sucking up from some faraway melt.
Expression pouring forth, all content no meaning.
The force of it and the thingness of it identical.
Spit forth, licked up, snapped where the force
exceeds the weight, clickings, pockets.
A long sigh through the land, an exhalation.
I let the dog loose in this stretch. Crocus
appear in the gassy dank leaves. Many
earth gases, rot gases.
I take them in, a breath at a time. I put my
breath back out
onto the scented immaterial. How the invisible
roils. I see it from here and then
I see it from here. Is there a new way of looking—
valences and little hooks—inevitabilities, proba-
bilities? It flaps and slaps. Is this body the one
I know as me? How private these words? And these? Can you
smell it, brown with little froths at the rot’s lips,
meanwhiles and meanwhiles thawing then growing soggy then
the filaments where leaf-matter accrued round a
pattern, a law, slipping off, precariously, bit by bit,
sudden flicks, swiftnesses suddenly more water than not.
The nature of goodness the mind exhales.
I see myself. I am a widening angle of
and nevertheless and this performance has rapidly—
nailing each point and then each next right point, inter-
locking, correct, correct again, each rightness snapping loose,
floating, hook in the air, swirling, seed-down,
quick—the evidence of the visual henceforth—and henceforth, loosening—

On This Day (02/21):

Friday, February 20, 2026

Middle Season #5 - 2026

So much change in this middle season. Ice fishing in Madison after we just emerge from the deep freeze (it was 50 on this day), controlled burning of grasses at Bemis Woods Forest Preserve, the first tulips/daffodils after 3-4 days of 50s and 60s, the first sandhill cranes of the year on the 19th.

On This Day (02/20):

Thursday, February 19, 2026

Report from 3x10 #5 - 2026

On This Day (02/19):

Wednesday, February 18, 2026

Tara Brach's Vipassana Meditation - awake regardless of the weather

Bemis Woods; they're doing a controlled burn in February

From Insight Timer, Tara Brach's Vipassana (Basic) Meditation. It's introduced with: This meditation cultivates a non-judgmental, lucid present-centered attention and gives rise to our natural wisdom and compassion.

The Buddha's practice for developing mindfulness is called Vipassana,

Which means clear insight are seen clearly in Pali,

The language of the Buddha.

What follows is a simple introduction to this practice.

Find a sitting position that allows you to be alert,

Spine erect but not rigid,

And also relaxed.

Close your eyes and rest your hands in an easy,

Effortless way.

Allow your awareness to scan through your body and wherever possible soften and release obvious areas of physical tension.

You might very consciously relax and let go in the shoulders.

Soften the hands.

Relax the belly.

As we so easily get lost in thoughts,

Vipassana often begins with attention to the breath.

Using the breath as a primary anchor of mindfulness helps quiet the mind so that you can be awake to the changing stream of life that moves through you.

As you practice,

You might find that a different anchor,

One other than the breath,

Might be most useful for you.

Perhaps sounds or maybe the whole field of bodily sensations or perhaps both listening to and feeling your moment-to-moment experience.

What's important is that your senses are awake and attention with the breath as a home base,

Our sounds,

Our sensations,

Can help you to know that you're here.

Take a few very full breaths,

Aware of the inhale,

Filling the lungs,

Slowly and gently exhaling.

And then allow your breath to be natural.

This is where you most easily detect the breath.

You might feel it as it flows in and out of your nose.

You might feel the touch of the breath around your nostrils or on your upper lip.

Or perhaps you feel the movement of your chest or the rising and falling of your abdomen.

Bring your attention to the sensations of breathing in one of these areas,

Perhaps wherever you feel them most distinctly or you might feel a sense of the whole body breathing.

There's no need to control the breath,

To grasp or fixate on it.

There's no right way of breathing.

With a relaxed,

Interested attention,

Discover what the breath is really like as a changing experience of sensations.

You'll find that the mind naturally drifts off into thoughts.

Thoughts are not the enemy and you don't need to clear your mind of thoughts.

Rather,

You're developing the capacity to recognize when thoughts are happening without getting lost in the story line.

When you become aware of thinking,

You might use a soft and friendly mental note,

Thinking,

Thinking.

Or simply recognize this is a thought.

Then without any judgment,

Pause and reawaken to the moment,

This moment,

Listening to sounds,

Feeling the sensations that are here,

Gently returning to the immediacy of the breath.

Let the breath be a home base,

A place full with presence.

While you might notice other experiences,

The sounds of passing cars,

Feelings of being warm or cool,

An image of a future event,

Sensations of hunger,

They can be in the background without drawing you away from here-ness,

From this moment.

Be aware of the difference between being inside a thought and being awake,

Senses open,

Present.

If any particular sensations become strong and call your attention,

Allow those sensations,

Instead of the breath,

To become the primary subject of mindfulness.

You might feel heat or chills,

Tingling,

Aching,

Twisting,

Stabbing,

Vibrating.

With a soft,

Open awareness,

Just feel the sensations as they are.

Are they pleasant or unpleasant?

As you fully attend to them,

Do they become more intense or dissipate?

Notice how they change.

When the sensations are no longer a strong experience,

Return to mindfulness of breathing or perhaps to listening to and feeling your moment-to-moment experience.

If you find it difficult to stay with persistent,

Strong sensations,

Unpleasant sensations,

You might breathe with them.

Let the breath help you find some balance and openness in the midst.

Or if the sensations are so unpleasant that you can't be present with any balance or equanimity,

Feel free to return to your home base,

To your primary place of resting attention,

The breath,

Perhaps listening to sounds.

In a similar way,

When strong emotions arise,

Fear,

Sadness,

Happiness,

Excitement,

Grief,

You can practice meeting each experience with a kind and clear presence,

Not pushing anything away,

Not judging,

Not resisting what's happening.

Rather,

Simply notice and allow the experience just as it is.

Notice how this fear or hurt or difficult emotion feels like as sensations in your body.

Where do you feel it most strongly?

Is it static or moving?

How big is it?

Is there judgment in your mind about what's happening,

About the fear,

Our restlessness,

Our irritation?

Does your mind feel contracted or open?

As you pay attention,

Just notice what's happening and let it be as it is.

In this present allowing awareness,

Notice how the emotion changes.

Does it become more intense or weaken?

Does it change into a different state?

Perhaps anger to grief or happiness to peace?

If the emotion is strong,

Is difficult to be with,

You might breathe with it.

And if it feels overwhelming,

Come back to your breath,

To the home base that allows you to relax with the present moment.

If you're confused about where to pay attention or if the emotion is no longer compelling,

Again,

Relax wakefully with the breath.

Are perhaps listening to and feeling the naturally arising moment to moment experience?

The particular sensations,

Emotions or thoughts that arise when we practice mindfulness are not so important.

Like the outer weather,

There is no inherent goodness or badness to these inner states.

What matters is our willingness to be awake regardless of the weather.

It's this unconditional presence that reveals the nature of reality.

Continue to be here.

And especially if the mind is not so distracted,

You might let go of any anchors for attention and explore not controlling anything,

Not directing the mind,

Not managing or manipulating your attention in any way.

Let your senses be wide open,

Listening to and feeling the entire moment.

When any experience calls your attention,

Perhaps strong sensations or emotions,

Simply notice and allow this expression of aliveness to be just as it is.

Allow whatever is happening to unfold in an awake,

Open awareness.

On This Day (02/18):