Everything Is Better in Tights!

As a middle aged woman, I have never entertained the notion, or indeed considered the fact that everything is better in tights.However, today I was fortunate to be able to spend time with a middle aged man  who made me believe that it is, in fact, true. Of course it is simply a travesty to refer to Dave Burgess merely as a middle aged man, when in fact he is a true powerhouse of passion, energy and talent.

Dave Burgess is the New York Times best selling author of Teach Like a Pirate and president of his own publishing company, which empowers innovative educators to share their transformative practice.I was an attendee today at his presentation to the Galileo Leadership 2017-19 Cohort and I was absolutely captivated! At break neck speed he guided us through his pirate system and philosophy:

• Passion
• Immersion
• Rapport
• Ask and Analyze
• Transformation
• Enthusiasm

Passion oozed from this guy as he shared his inspirational stories and he implored us all to intertwine the passions we have in our personal lives into our professional lives. He invited us to build rapport and relationships with our students and to be completely and utterly present in the moment when we teach.He shared many of the "hooks" he employs to engage his students,constantly pitching, promoting and selling his content to ignite a desire to learn. He repeatedly reminded us of the need to create a psychologically safe learning space for our students and to "create experiences, not assignments."

His sheer presence, drive and personality made for a powerful presentation and at one point I felt a little intimidated. How could I possibly recreate his success in my own building without actually being him? He addressed this very directly and assured each and every one of us that we too can be creative and remarkable.The key is to retrain our brains to ask the right questions, which in turn will lead us to making rich instructional and presentation decisions for the greater benefit of our students.He urged us to be relentless is our search for ideas pointing out that, "It's not supposed to be easy. It's supposed to be worth it."

If you have not yet embarked on a journey with Dave Burgess I highly recommend that you do soon.Check out the ever growing library of books that he has written, co-authored or published at http://daveburgess.com/ and join the Teach Like a Pirate Twitter chat #TLAP. Today's highly energetic and entertaining presentation has left me exhilarated and determined to be more intentional in my craft. I want to braver, take more risks and tap into the power of music, set design and costumes both in and out of my classroom. Like the man said: Everything is better in tights!!