Looking for a way to make Thomas Hobbes more to your students than life as “nasty, brutish, and short”? Today, I shared with my 4th-6th graders Dr. Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas. You’ve no doubt seen the Chuck Jones animated version, but I’m going to visit
In Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jerod Diamond makes an interesting observation about peninsulas: the landform, much like an island, isolates a people. Peninsulas act as a force multiplier, granting a space easier defense, so that a polity might survive invasion by a much more powerful culture. (Think: Hot Gates and
You might remember a New York Times contest to craft a six word motto for the United States. We turned the powerhouse of Academy thinking at the question. Laura suggested a phrase you might recognize… “MUTUAL GUARDIANS OF OUR MUTUAL HAPPINESS” I think that phrase resonated as a result of
[http://www.oxy.edu/x6328.xml] The Rangeview building is nearly quiet this afternoon. It isn’t that the exchange students all went to the beach today but that this year’s National Academy has run out of time. The machines still hum but the electricity of rigorous academic work
At the National Academy today, Kevin Fox presented his thoughts on his own constitutional thinking and teaching. In the Academy tradition, his inquiry started with, “What is it?”. His answers included… Reasoned Reflective Creative constructive imaginative Present on-going Whole ordered (not orderly) Scientific systematic experimental Balanced (between extremes) Inclusive (of