So much for The Passion-Driven Classroom

I tried my best to get into this book.  Lord knows I love the topic.  But I couldn't stomach another page. I admire the authors and follow them on Twitter and subscribe to their podcasts, but I couldn't stand their book.

The problem?

It's just too 'touchy feely' for me.  It's like it's aimed at an elementary school audience (though it certainly wasn't marketed that way), and I hate being talked to in that 'let's get in touch with our inner feelings and sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya' style voice.

I hate it.  That's one thing I loathed about nearly every education class I took at BSU.

I want a serious approach to passion and especially how to instill it in my students.

I thought the intro was okay - a little elementary schoolish, but okay - and then chapter three had this phrase, "Walk into a Passion-Drive Clubhouse Classroom and you will see . . . " that phrase "Passion-Drive Clubhouse Classroom" did me in.

What do we have to put on our Micky Mouse hats and sit in circles?

I just couldn't take it seriously after that.  Sure enough, though, from the "clubhouse" our students go to the "boardroom" and then to the "learning clubs" where teachers act as C.L.O.'s or "chief learning officers."

That's my dose of elementary school for the year.  Thank you very much.

I have the utmost respect for what our elementary folks do.  And I believe firmly we need our very best teachers in the 1-3 grades.

I just don't want to have the same type of PD.  And I'm sure an elementary school teacher wouldn't want to sit down and read something by Leon Botstein or Alfie Kohn or Neil Postman, but I do.