First impression...

...ho, ho, hum.

Started to pitch it, but it is a new year...resolutions to improve mind and body still fresh.

And...

...I know diddly about Microsoft Excel.

Oh, I once followed the directions in a manual to create an Excel worksheet that would allow simple dollar or percentage manipulation of salary schedules...for submission to the BOE during negotiations. (Talk about time wasted...the BOE never considered any of them. The eventual salary schedule was achieved when CAT finally accepted one of theirs.)

But...

...those self-taught skills have long-since evaporated.

Then again...

...there is not much call for spreadsheets in the cat cave. My credit card company already tracks my spending habits...complete with a color pie chart showing areas of expenditure - i.e. food, books, and DVDs.

But...

...another round of negotiations is afoot.

And...

There is our Interim Superintendent/CEO in waiting...

I believe that Justin Miller dreams in spreadsheets...he with the twin monitors that are the envy of novices such as myself.

Case in point:

Rather than repeat our past futility with amateur dabbling in spreadsheets and KNOWING that it already existed on Mr. Miller's computer hard drive, CAT requested the current employee scattergram early on in negotiations.

When this Excel-challenged dinosaur opened the file...nothing, simply the salary schedule that is printed in the BOE-CAT Contract.

WTF?! (What's this foolishness?!)

Ahhh, the mysteries of spreadsheets...the tabs that lie beneath!

A truly amazing world of numbers awaits s/he who clicks...

...everything we asked for an more.

Talk about feeling stooopid!

So...

...maybe it's time for this old CAT to "go back to school."

Or not!

On my way to the wastebasket, I opened the seminar brochure and my eyes were drawn to the Q & A at the bottom of Page 3...

...specifically the Q & A on the far right:

Q: Will I spend the day in front of a computer?

A: No! You can learn more in less time with our dynamic hands-off teaching approach! You'll be able to concentrate and learn without being slowed down by keyboarding or having to wait for the entire group to catch up. ... Your workbook provides all of the information you need to try everything you've learned later, at your own speed and convenience.

WOW!!!

Bears repeating:

"Dynamic hands-off teaching approach!"

LECTURING...by another name. Smelling so sweet!

And...

"...try everything you've learned later..."

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is HOMEWORK!

Makes an old saber-toothed CAT sigh with fond memory.

After all the dissing and pissing about lecturing that has dominated the media in recent years, the call for small-group/hands-on learning...finally a change of name to protect the guilty.

I can once again hold my head high. When the discussion of colleagues turns to teaching methods and they bandy about the latest education buzz words, I don't have to slink down in my chair and try not to be noticed...don't have to fear being outed.

I can boldly go (where men and women have gone before.) I will seize the day with my new innovative approach using electrically charged words:

"My fellow educators...small-group, hands-on is so first decade, 21st Century. Have you not heard of the new wave, as practiced by Business Guru Fred Pryor?

"Since recent studies using the results of the latest standardized tests (can I get an "Amen"?) have shown that small group, hands-on learning has failed to raise test scores (another "Amen" please) and that those same methods have failed to close the achievement gap (sad shaking of head will suffice), I have cast off those failed ways.

(Think about it...focus on the group, denial of the individual. Socialism is obviously alive and well in the public schools! Also, this "teaching approach" is probably a conspiracy by teachers' unions to allow their members to sit on their lazy butts and draw their fat paychecks whilst masquerading behind the glorified title of "guides on the side".)

"And...

"These failed methods spread by false prophets have damaged our precious children, conditioning THEM to sit idly by on their lazy, widening butts in their little groups, awaiting to be delivered by one of their own who experiences an "Aha Moment"...conditioning them to look for a savior rather than apply themselves to providing for their own needs!

(Again, with the teachers' unions. No wonder, George W. Bush called them terrorists! They have hijacked his noble law to serve their own evil motives. I trust you uttered a few "Amens".)

"No, my colleagues, it is time to repent, time to seize the stage, time to stop those who would guide our innocent youth down the path to ruin.

"Join me now...release the energy within, adopt the dynamic hands-off teaching approach!

"The survival of the "American Dream", yeah, the security of our nation is at stake!

"Amen!"