this is what it looks like to triumphantly write 846 words in one day (it's so good that a split infinitive is not only acceptable, but necessary). thanks maura for kicking my ass into gear.

a lovely early summer morning in chapel hill means that i had to force myself into my office to get anything done. work so far this a.m.: 1. read someoneelse's dissertation chapter on alcott and feel the same old frustration that arises when you realize someone got there first, and perhaps, did it better than you could hope to. at the very least, they've used the same sources you use, and it's hard to resist the urge to feel defeated. 2. worried that "new organizational scheme" is no scheme at all but rather a desultory collection of random speculation. 3. affirmed that emily's hoodie sweater is indeed the only garment one needs when writing a dissertation.

I woke up this morning realizing that I had spent the last several months thinking through a set of ideas that now feel a bit like a mirage. I’m fighting the urge to wash them all down the drain... I was reading about the swiss pedagogue pestalozzi this afternoon and feeling sluggish and somber. a group "study" at the coffee shop this evening means that once again temptation gets the better of me. this is my friend oren's best attempt at encouragement. he's failing to convince me as i type. write anne, write.

There are many difficult things about writing a dissertation – too many temptations, too many books to read, too many people to talk to – but for me it’s often impossible to sit down and move my fingers. I ran into a professor friend this morning at breakfast (someone I used to speak with a lot and someone whose thinking I really admire) and we ended up arguing about the problems in American education for over an hour (he claims that I’m an educational conservative, wanting to bring back the strict study of grammar and pour knowledge into the students’ brains). I justify these conversations by thinking them directly related to my work, but really, I realized that I often prefer talking about pedagogy to writing about it. Bronson Alcott confides something similar to his journal in 1834: “My ideas, at present, are better than my style, and for many ideas, distinct and vivid in my own mind, I have no signs. This, more than anything else, is, I believe, the cause of my failure.” Alcott decided that if his writing failed, he would walk the country and converse with schoolteachers across America. Perhaps I should find a new pair of walkin’ shoes....

thinking about bronson alcott and jesus this morning. a motley crew of sorts. alcott is always trying to emulate his savior's "unimposing guise" and attempt this kind of seemingly egalitarian pedagogy. but after sitting with my pal alcott for the better part of a year, i just don't know that i buy it. it seems to me that like jesus -- especially in the parables -- alcott always has a rigid telos in my mind. he may seem democratic in his questions, but his specific educational goal for any moment is unchanged by his students contributions. this seems one of the essential hypocrisies in contemporary student-centered classrooms. as teachers, we claim that students will run the show and we will simply guide the discussion. such guiding, however, seems much closer to directing. we let students feel some measure of control, but we're quick to redirect when they depart too radically from our plan. it's still our plan. i for one think we should have a plan, but i also think we need to be honest and forthright about it.

hooray for a quieter coffee shop this morning. the simultaneous departure of undergrads and the dying of the cafe's espresso machine means that i can think in peace. so i better start that thinking...

sometimes i think -- and write -- best directly after a run. i used to run in the woods with a pen and a piece of paper stuffed in my jog bra. whenever the moment of clarity came, i was prepared. now i just talk and talk and talk out my argument as i go. my good old mutt arlo listens patiently and then gets bored and chases squirrels. like walt whitman, i suppose, i believe in kinesthetic learning. i believe in it less as a mainstream pedagogical model (do we really need 7th graders acting out algebra?), but i think many of us do our best thinking on the move.

day 1 of new organizational scheme

it's all about finding a working organization today and deciding what to cut in this darn alcott chapter. it pains me to have so much research and so few places for it. my friend emily told me that a famous historian once told her that one should strive for making use of 10% of the research you accumulate.