Today’s Learning tASK is optional.

This is the frame. This is how I frame our daily work, our daily Learning tASKs. It’s an ASK. It’s a chance to learn. It’s a chance to make a choice. It’s a chance to make a commitment.

I talk a big game about commitment as the counter to compliance, something that has been at the heart of Project 180 since year one: The Year of the A. So, I have to walk that game, too. And for the last five years, my wandering walk has led me here. To this frame.

I am ready to put this around our work each day. I am at a place where I can say “Today’s Learning tASK is optional.” Of course, such a move doesn’t–and didn’t–happen overnight. It has taken me years to get here. Well, that’s not entirely true, I guess. It’s always been “optional” because I don’t grade practice, but it’s always been kind of quietly optional, meaning I haven’t always said it as publicly or pointedly as I do now. But I do now. I tell my kids each day that the tASK is optional, that I want them to make a choice, that I want them to commit. And, for the most part, they do. They choose to do the work. And many of them talked about that choice in their recent Learning Letters, which I shared in Monday’s post (http://www.letschangeeducation.com/normal-project-180-day-138/). And for those who choose not to do it, I simply ask them to share why.

When I set out to find better learning experiences for my kid five years ago, I pictured a room where kids committed to their learning. And though it’s not picture perfect, it’s beginning to fit the frame.

I have worked hard on the frame.

Happy Wednesday, all.

Do. Reflect. Do Better.