This document, although published in 2007, just became available online. Collective and distributive intelligence and insights of many minds exemplify the benefits of participation, connectivity and divergent thinking.

collapsing-geography

Well, It’s finally done. The 21st Century Teacher Blog has served it’s purpose. But now, changing demands and shrinking free services and features have required me to relocate the blog to a commercial host, give it a much needed face-lift to match my own learning and thinking styles, and to reemerge from the ashes like a Phoenix with a new energy, purpose and name: the Divergent Learner blog.

I, like many of us in the edublogosphere using Apple Macbooks, am a Divergent Learner that really shines and feels in his own when brainstorming, expanding, imagining, fantasizing, and seeing the big picture before the details. I work best in groups and collaborating. My personal learning network is one of my most cherished resources, both socially and professionally. I am visual and learn best with imagery and colors and shapes dancing around. So everything about this new blog space will reflect me and celebrate right-brain thinking, shaping and honoring.

Divergent Learner is in harmony with Dan Pink’s prediction that we need a whole new mind and that right-brainers will rule the future. The Conceptual Age calls to us. And, we must answer in creative, inspirational, participatory ways — distributed and democratic collective intelligence. But it’s not that easy: the left-brain dominance of society, business, education, politics, religion, family and beyond are still a powerful and somewhat counterproductive force that doesn’t serve us well as people, nations, students, educators, business teams, friends or family members. Shifting to the right requires patience, persistence and strength.

For now, I have only migrated by Edublog archives over to the new digs at Divergent Learner. Please update your RSS feeds and social bookmarks to redirect links from the old to the new. The Divergent Learner is back!

Thanks
Frank Stonehouse Lupo
Divergent Learner
http://divergentlearner.com/blog

This morning while excitedly participating in the live CNN-Facebook coverage of Obama’s Inauguration Day activities, I happened upon my Facebook friend Brandy Agerbeck, who is a talented graphic facilitator. I asked her if she was going to draw the speech to commemorate it. She said that she hadn’t thought of it at all! She grabbed her paper and pens and went to work. Great Job, Brandy! The result: Obama’s Inauguration Speech. Click link to read Brandy’s accounting of the drawing and conceptual process; and visit her online portfolio. Her incredible talent puts me at awe!

Also, if you are reading this post, I would be thrilled if you would participate in my PLN Inauguration Day Voicethread. Thanks!

I made this Wordle graphic of President Obama’s Inaugural Address on January 20, 2009 .. minutes after his speech was completed. Click image to visit Flickr for larger version. Speech was crafted by 27-year-old Jon Favreau in a Starbucks. And, while I was participating in the live CNN-Facebook coverage, I prompted graphic facilitator Brandy Agerbeck to draw the speech, and she DID.

I have a second Wordle desgin that is more formal looking. Wordles hit magazine covers, too!

Also, if you are reading this post, I would be thrilled if you would participate in my PLN Inauguration Day Voicethread. Thanks!

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land – a nagging fear that America’s decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many.

They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America – they will be met. On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted – for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things – some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn. Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions – that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act – not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions – who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them – that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works – whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account – to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day – because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control – and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart – not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort – even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus – and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect.

To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages.

We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment – a moment that will define a generation – it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends – hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism – these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility – a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence – the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed – why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

“Let it be told to the future world…that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive…that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it].”

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Please share your thoughts, hopes and dreams for the new Presidency and Administration before, during and after the Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama. –Frank

Original Voicethread (large version)

I was looking at all some really complex charts on personal learning networks (PLNs); and was thinking how intimidating they must be for those just starting to grow a network. Sometimes simple can be more powerful. After all … All PLNs start with a single connection.

First of all, if you missed my Happy New Year 2009 video, well you can peek at it now.

I was tagged by Nergiz Kern (aka Daffodil) my Second Life neighbor on Virtlantis Island, home of SLEnglish with Kip Yellowjacket. The task: to reveal 7 things about me that others in my PLN may not know. Most of you already know that I am Salty Saenz in Second Life and that I am creator of the Ning, Mexico English Teachers’ Alliance: META. I also blog about education and experiences in Mexico. But the following 7 things should help you to know me beyond these academic pursuits. My newest blog, Avatar Times, will be debuting soon.

Here are the rules:

• Link your original tagger(s), and list these rules on your blog.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post – some random, some weird.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter.

So, here I go:

1. Career in Nuclear and Defense Programs
I am retired from the nuclear materials production programs for national defense (USA).
Most people that know me do know about my pre-retirement career. I have worked almost all of my professional life for the United States Department of Energy and the University of California … both are integral parts of the production of nuclear materials (uranium, plutonium and tritium) for the Defense Department. Having worked in these programs, I have been to all the defense production sites from the Naval Reactors sites to weapons production and surveillance to nuclear materials production … from Aiken, South Carolina, to Fernald, Ohio to Richland, Washington to Oak Ridge, Tennessee to Los Alamos, New Mexico to Livermore, California and more. Yes, I had a “Q” security clearance. For my last 10 years in the DOE family, I moved away from defense activities and worked on programs dealing with Earth and environmental sciences. So, perhaps I left a little more “green” and peaceful than I entered. I am now retired from the University of California.

2. Diversity Educator
I was born and grew up in Detroit in the 60s. The area is still somewhat racially segregated today, but not like it was then. Then, of course, there were the horrible race riots at the end of the 60s. I was 8 years old. My father was a taxi driver in Detroit during those days; and he took us through the city so that we could see history in the making. I saw with my own eyes what hatred and oppression can do. All the white people literally fled (called “white flight”) out of Detroit while it was burning and falling. Detroit has never really recovered. It is a city that burns down a little more each year on Devil’s Night. The burning and destruction and misery continue even today. I went to Fitzgerald High School exactly 1 mile from the Detroit city limit and I lived on the now famous 8 Mile (thanks to rapper Eninem), which is the city limit. One little mile from the Detroit city line and there were 0 black students in my school, although Detroit was 90% black. How was that possible? The answer is easy: discrimination and prejudice. Today when I looked up my old high school in Facebook, I was pleased to see that recent graduating classes are now racially mixed. But even so, the last time I was in the area, segregation on societal , economic and educational levels are still heavily ingrained there in 2009. Discrimination just goes a little further under the surface to do its evil. In a strange series of events, I became a diversity guru and educator in the middle- to late- 90s when HR was hot on this topic. With some colleagues, I coauthored a journal paper on diversity findings in the workplace and made recommendations to honor differences and boost productivity. That turned into a job traveling and facilitating workshops around the country for the USDOE/University of California. A lot of really screwed up things go on in workplaces, let me tell you! I was also the only Anglo-Saxon member of the UC’s Hispanic Diversity Working Group, selected by Hispanics.

3. Raised in a Foster Home
I didn’t know who my real parents were until I was 7 years old. My natural brother and I were raised in a foster home for 7 years, since 3-month’s old. During that time, we were never told the truth. Our foster parents posed as natural parents and even had our last names changed (in school records, not legally) to theirs. Life was normal for 7 years. Loving parents, tri-level suburban home, elementary school across the street, and church on the other side of the house next to ours. We were the “Stepford Children” in a way. We played in the backyard with neighbor kids, had fun with our dogs, went to church every Sunday, had dinner guests, just a normal Midwestern life in the suburbs. That soon ended the day that my brother and I were kidnapped by our biological mother (she died in 2004). Apparently, she still had legal custody all those years. She convinced our foster parents to let her take us out for the day just to go to a movie. We never returned home again. In one second, my name changed, my home changed, my family changed, my life changed, and my identity was turned upside down. I wasn’t really “me.” I learned then that EVERYTHING can change in an instant. How would your children feel if the same happened to them? My biological father and his wife, my stepmother, are super people. We have a great relationship still today. My foster mother died many years ago before I could find her and thank her for the values and foundations that she gifted me during my formative early years. I am who I am today in large part because of those 7 years; my personality, my disposition, my way of seeing things, etc. No matter how hard it was to go through that, I still have that gift with me today.

4. Animal Lover
I love animals, all animals. But I have a spiritual fondness and love for dogs (probably from my foster family). I have a sweet Corgi named “Amiga.” Many people here in Mexico find the name “Amiga” odd as they don’t use it for pets. “Amiga” is Spanish for “girl friend.” Just seemed like a natural fit to me. In the US, there are oodles of dogs named “Amigo” but for some cultural oddity you never hear “Amiga.” Well, now you have! You want to see me get upset and angry and violent (well, constructively violent)? Harm an animal in front of me and see what happens. Let me warn you. If you care for your own safety, don’t do it. I WILL respond and HAVE responded in the past. I have had dogs my entire life and even a spell with a Siamese cat that had no home. I don’t really like zoos too much; I don’t like that the animals are not free. But, hypocritically, I do go because I love to be near them. I always say, “dogs are such special people.”

5. 4-Year Music Scholarship
My younger brother played clarinet and he was a virtuoso. He drove himself to perfection. He was 1st-chair clarinet as long as I can remember: in grade school, in junior high, in high school, at Interlochen and later at Eastern Michigan University youth band. I was musical too, but somewhat in his shadow. Interestingly enough though, I went on to university on a 4-year music scholarship for saxophone and violin, both of which I played. I majored in music for 1 year then gave it up. I didn’t want to teach or compose, and I couldn’t see how I would survive in the field. I abandoned my right-brain predominance and took up boring accounting and graduated with a BS in Business Administration. Yuck! Now I had a career path and a respectable job in Management and Administration that I dutifully carried out until retirement. I betrayed my soul. But, I am still here .. and probably is the reason that I love working in education now. Working on honoring that right brain once again. Even though I played the tenor sax and the violin, they weren’t even my favorite instruments. I have always loved the oboe and the cello, and will until I die.

6. On Breathing
Please don’t refer to me as a nonsmoker. I really dislike being defined or labeled for something that I am not. It seems really stupid to me. If I am a nonsmoker, then I am also a nonsardine-eater, a nondiaper-wearer (at least for now) and on and on. I am a lot of nonthings, aren’t you too? Besides that I simply loath cigarettes and smoking of any kind. My mother died of emphysema at age 62 in 2004 and my aunt (her sister) died of lung complications at age 57 the same year. They both did a lot of damage to their bodies and loved ones with cigarettes, I’m afraid. And even though I was a Diversity Educator, I do discriminate. I do not have any close friends that smoke. I do not go to clubs. And, I hang out at Starbucks not for the coffee or music, I do so because smoking is not allowed and they DO enforce it. Incredible for Mexico, where smokers still do as they darn please. Just remember, someone may be a smoker, but I am NOT a nonsmoker.

7. Special Talents
Ok, now the weird stuff. I have some extraordinary talents that I want to come out of the closet with. Soon I will be uploading a video to YouTube of my Corgi and me singing duets. She loves to sing with her Daddy. She lets me take the lead while she does backup vocals. She is quite gifted, I am not. I never could sing, especially not at 8AM when my sight-singing teacher at college would hit a note on the piano and order me to sing number 8 on page 34. I am sorry, I can’t sing at 8PM, certainly not at 8AM when I am still asleep and my vocal cords are cold. Nonetheless, I do enjoy singing for pure pleasure with my doggie void of the pressures of academics. My other talent is that I can make the little toe on only my right foot dance. Yes, I said dance. All the other toes are perfectly still while the little one twists and turns and grooves to a beat. This must be a genetic deformation of sorts, as the only other person that I have ever seen do the same is my mother. When I have dared show anyone, they were stupefied by both the dexterity of my lil’ toe and the absurdity of it all. I have never be asked for an encore performance by anyone.

So, there you have it. Seven things or facts about me that you may not have known before (I have many more, trust me!). And now I will keep with the rules and tag the following 7 people from my Personal Learning Network: Sharon Elin, John Martin, Mindelei Wuori, Daniel Voyager, Maru del Campo, Larry Ferlazzo, & Dan Gross.

Enjoy, Frank (metaweb20 in Twitter)

Meetsee gives you a virtual office online filled with rich ways to communicate, share content, collaborate on documents, and build rapport with remote co-workers.

Mexico Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (MEXTESOL), 35th International MEXTESOL Conference.

On October 16 – 19, we will be live blogging select MEXTESOL sessions, mostly plenaries, keynotes, and those sessions covering technology and 21st century skills. Here is the tentative schedule with live blog links.

Full Program here.

Traditionally when we think of poverty, we have images of underdeveloped countries or regions where there is no or little hope to help or participate. We see stark images of human suffering that seem so distant and detached . But the truth is that there is always a way to join in. And poverty existing only in the aforementioned areas is a stereotype. Poverty exists in every reach of the world, and in every country. Just extending a hand locally can make huge differences in closing the gap.

Since education is one of many factors that keeps this divide wide open, I am calling on all teachers, teacher trainers, and educators of any discipline and skill level to participate in a project, any project. Perhaps hold a remedial reading and writing class for illiterate members of the community. Join a Big Brother or Big Sister program (or similar project) then use that time to mentor, educate, and be a role model for a disadvantaged youth in your area. There are a million possibilities of something that would suit both your interests and meet community needs. Let’s work together to close the gap of poverty forever. It can be done!

If you don’t have the time to participate in a program, then consider donating a small amount of money directly to a family or a child, or buy them some school supplies or clothes, etc. If there is an organization that you trust in your area that works to combat poverty, donate through them.

There is a way. There always is. Won’t you please help, yes today. Thanks