Tag Archives: perspective

Lines: SOLC #28

Exploring with my camera is a way to clear my head, to relax, and to pay attention to the world. But I have to admit, the monotony of a lockdown year has taken its toll. I’ve had to work to find new ways to look at the things I have seen over and over again.

For a change of pace, today we headed up the coast to a seaside town about 30 miles north of here. We did a bit of shopping and then, of course, headed out to the beach to walk and take photos.

I know, I know…I take beach photos regularly. But a different place offers a different vantage. Today I found myself focused on lines. We parked near the train station and right away my eye was drawn to the parallel levels of lines…the train tracks, the fence line, and the horizon line of the ocean behind. (And the blues were magnificent today!)

As I stepped up closer to the fence to peer over at the ocean, a series of horizontal lines came into view.

We had intended to walk the seaside trail parallel to the shore, but on the east side of the train tracks. Unless the tide is low, there isn’t much beach to walk on this beach. We started off–but the summer-like weather brought out the crowds–and the trail was feeling pretty uncomfortable with a combination of runners and walkers, dogs on leashes, and bikes (both electric and pedal-powered) whizzing past. At the first staircase access to the beach, we headed to the sand, realized the tide was low and getting lower, so decided that the shoreline was out best walking choice. There were still people, but they were much more spread out–in the water and laying in the sun–giving us a wide, unencumbered walking space.

As we passed the pier, I could hear aircraft. Helicopters are pretty usual. We have military bases nearby, coast guard copters, and of course people out to see the sights from above. But when I looked up I noticed a small plane cruising by…right over the pier. More lines.

Every time I visit a pier I feel compelled to take a few shots from beneath. There is something about the view of the ocean through the elaborate under structure that fascinates. Each pier is a bit different–some have a specific “door” to look through. This one does not, but it does have lots and lots of different lines to look at.

Even the pigeons managed to get in on the line action today. They were hanging out not far from the fishing people on the pier. Just waiting.

So is there anything significant about all these lines? This would be the time for the pithy conclusion to give meaning to a series of photos featuring lines. Instead, I appreciate a day slightly different from the ones that preceded it. And a perspective that took my eye in some different directions. Hope you also enjoy these lines, in all their insignificance.

A Treasure Hunt: SOLC #23

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I like to think of each day a treasure hunt. I look for those hidden gems–sometimes only unseeable because of my own shortsightedness.

On those days when everything seems unbearably humdrum, monotonous, with sameness coloring my every thought, I have to stretch myself to find something, anything at all, that I can classify as treasure.

I was finding myself in the humdrum doldrums on a recent walk at the beach. Impossible, you say! The beach couldn’t possibly be boring or mundane. Except when my brain fills with negative thoughts…all the I want-tos that just can’t happen…yet.

Time for a treasure hunt.

Winter tides bring lots of rock onto the shore. And sometimes, when the light is right and I look at just the right angle, I’ll notice the glint of buried treasure. Sea glass comes in a variety of colors, sizes, shapes, and degrees of ocean sanding. It’s always such a treat to come across a piece during a walk along the shore.

Sometimes the treasure is all about just how you look at something. There’s a place along the beach that we call “the corner.” The cliff juts out a bit, making it tricky to get around when the tide is high. But when you look at that corner, the cliff itself, just right, a face appears. Another treasure. Judge for yourself.

You never know when you’ll come across the remains of someone’s work of art. It might be a stack of stones: a beach cairn. It might be an image raked into the sand. And sometimes it’s a sand castle. This treasure caught my eye because of its creative use of algae. Even in its tumbledown ruin, you can see the brilliance of the design…and the cloudy light also brings a certain feeling of low-key ambiance that whispers treasure in my ear.

Reliving this treasure hunt brightens my day. Remember that treasure is in the eye of the beholder–that the littlest of bright spots can make all the difference in the way you feel at the end of the day. Make time for a little treasure hunt. I’d love to see what treasures you find!

What’s Your Angle? SOLC 2019 Day 21

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When was the last time you used a protractor? Drawn a circle? Measured an angle? We spent time earlier this week doing all of those things in my classroom. There’s nothing like a new tool to pique students interest…and the protractor did just that. Students were fascinated that protractors also have rulers on them, they couldn’t wait to experiment with them!

We used those protractors to draw a half circle on the fold and then open the full 360 degrees of circle. Each student then had to measure an angle–one randomly assigned–and cut that angle out of the circle. The cut out angle became the mouth of an “angle fish,” the piece removed became the caudal fin. Some designing soon resulted in a whole school of individual angle fish!

Why bother with angles and protractors? Simply for a cute crafts project? You probably know me better than that. My students are just beginning to pay attention to angles, to recognize those perfect square corners that measure 90 degree. To understand that triangles exist that are not perfectly equilateral, with equal angles as well. They are starting to understand that attributes can categorize without diminishing the diversity of possibilities within those categories.

I hope geometry lessons can teach ideas that transfer far beyond polygons, sides, and angles. I want my students to recognize that each of us brings our experiences, genetics, family backgrounds, and opinions to who we are. That they will learn to see diversity and difference as opportunities to enrich their own experiences, to add value to our world, to push beyond their own status quo. That they will step outside the comfort zone of sameness, and consider the view from another perspective.

I’m pretty sure my students understand the categories of acute, right, and obtuse angles…the rest will continue to be a work in progress. After all, I’m still working out my angles too.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Perspective

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With 5 more student days of the school year ahead of me, I’m working to keep myself focused and in the moment. These are those bittersweet endings that are inextricably intertwined with the anxiety of pending deadlines (report cards, classroom organization, classroom musical…), the excitement of summer, and the uncertainties of the changes ahead. So this week, my photos remind me about perspective.

A meeting earlier this week to do some planning for this year’s Invitational Summer Institute (SI), brought me into contact with a friend’s dog. I couldn’t resist this photo of Siggy curled up in a favorite chair, complete with a red wrap to both give him that fashion flair and to keep him comfy. Siggy definitely reminds me of the importance of self-care and the value of down time.

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This is the last year of my beloved multiage class. We have so many traditions…one of which is taking our third graders rock climbing as a way to celebrate the end of their three years with us. Rock climbing seems like such a perfect metaphor for all that happens over the course of three years with the same students. We get to witness such growth in confidence and risk-taking as they take on more and more leadership within the safety of the classroom. And who can resist the perspective of a student in flight, hanging in midair perfectly relaxed, enjoying the view from new heights?

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The fair’s in town! The state fair is always here in June, running through the 4th of July. I’ve been going to this fair my whole life, walking through exhibits, sitting through cooking demonstrations, viewing student art, and petting goats. Living where I do, the arrival of the fair also means an increase in already heavy traffic. I knew I would be dealing with fair traffic as I headed home from the university the other day. I started to feel annoyed, knowing the commute would crawl through Del Mar. Instead, I decided to change my perspective and pull off to take some pictures. I found a parking place and walked up to the mouth of the lagoon where you can see the fun zone of the fair from the back. It was fun taking photos and looking at the fair with fresh eyes.

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I crossed the street and found this dramatic entry to the beach. I ended up walking back to my car by strolling on the shore of the beach, enjoying the sea breeze and watching egrets navigate the surf. When I got back in my car, the traffic was no longer irritating me!

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Back in the classroom it’s been Ocean Week. Every year our entire school takes a week to focus attention on the ocean (it is right outside our door, after all!). Traditionally we have a sing-a-long and ocean parade on the last day, with all our young students wearing ocean-themed “costumes.” In our class, we decided to stretch the definition of costume this year and instead have the kids make signs to carry. They came up with informative slogans for one side, collected beach plastics and other trash in the week or so before the parade, and created a watercolor sea creature to swim among the trash on the other side of the sign. Wearing all blue, we became a sea of activists advocating for the sea! (And hopefully changed some perspectives about this precious resource along the way!)

A Friday afternoon walk on the beach has become a pretty regular habit for me, and as the weather warms, for others as well. As I knelt to take a picture of some trash I was picking up, I ended up with this shot of a woman reading as she walked along the beach. You can see that I missed the trash in my shot, but I kinda like the blurred shot of the reader.

I’ve included quite a few shots of stacks of rocks along the beach lately. And yesterday there were more stacks in some different places along my route. I was drawn to this tall stack that looks out on one of my favorite parts of the beach.

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So head out in search of a new perspective. What will you find when you look at the world from a different angle? You might literally move behind a familiar scene or kneel low to change you view or simply change your outlook and look with fresh eyes.

You can post your photo alone or along with some words: commentary, a story, a poem…maybe even a song! I love to study the photographs that others’ take and think about how I can use a technique, an angle, or their inspiration to try something new in my own photography. (I love a great mentor text…or mentor photo, in this case!) I share my photography and writing on social media. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter using @kd0602. If you share your photos and writing on social media too, please let me know so I can follow and see what you are doing. To help our Weekly Photo community find each other, use the hashtag #perspective for this week and include @nwpianthology in your post.

Grab your camera and change your perspective. What will you see? Be sure to share your photos with us here!

Find it! January’s Photo-a-Day Challenge

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Keeping myself motivated to take photos and to write are dual challenges. Some days it seems that I’ve already taken photos of all the things around me, that everything feels the same–ordinary, boring, done–without inspiration. But then I zoom in, turn my camera, snap from another angle, find a different frame, crouch down or climb a hill…and everything changes.

I’m lucky to live near the beach, just a short drive takes me to the beauty of the ocean, the waves, the birds, and endless sunsets. But sometimes it seems that I have hundreds of images of those very same things. Yesterday I decided to use my zoom lens at the beach, hoping for some pelican and other sea bird sightings. The birds were scarce, but as I looked up I noticed this wind flag against the brilliant blue of the December sky.

The monotony of long car rides makes me prefer planes and other modes of transportation. Some motion sickness keeps me from reading or using my computer in the car…and face it, there’s only so much to talk about on an eight hour drive! So I started playing around with taking photos out the car window. It’s not the best of photographic environments. You have to dodge the bug splats, the reflection through the window, the rear view mirrors…you get the idea! But sometimes, you can catch a moment that turns that monotony into something beautiful like the glow of the coming sunrise as we headed away from Walnut Creek toward the I5 to head home from a visit to my son and daughter-in-law.

Or the sun peeking above the horizon, illuminating the power lines that stretch out along the long, straight freeway that connects northern California to southern California.

Sometimes I find that I have to open myself up to the serendipity of noticing something usual in a new way. Finding kelp on the beach is usual…noticing the curve that reminds me of a smile is something quite different. I got down low, kept my camera field large, and found this!

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And anyone who follows this blog knows that I take tons of photos of seagulls. Seagulls in flight, seagulls in silhouette, seagulls alone, seagulls in groups… And sometimes you find a pair of seagulls sitting on a railing that you simply can’t resist. I love these seagull butts!

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So for the month of January, take our your camera and find it! Find that new angle, the light that casts the magical glow you hadn’t noticed before. Find the treasure among the things you see everyday and take for granted. Find inspiration. Find perspective. Find ways to make the ordinary extraordinary, find the interesting in the mundane.

Here’s some prompts to get your creative juices flowing:

1. look up

2. crouch down

3. inside

4. through the window

5. beneath

6. find the light

7. on top

8. move closer

9. reflects

10. on the go

11. find a natural frame

12. movement

13. climb

14. something you can smell

15. a new angle

16. zoom in

17. seek color

18. play

19. get close (macro if you can)

20. texture

21. monochromatic

22. above

23. weather

24. people

25. a worm’s eye view

26. ordinary

27. under

28. try a filter

29. black and white

30. everyday

31. right in front of you

As always, our challenge will allow us to learn from each other as we shoot our own photos and study the photos others shoot. The prompts are there to help you find new ways to look at your world, to find the unexpected in the ordinary and the beauty in the mundane. You can use them in order or pick and choose as you like–you are welcome to add a new prompt into the mix if you are so moved. You can post every day, once a week, or even sporadically throughout the month…whatever works in your life.

Be sure to share and tag your photos with #sdawpphotovoices so we can find them! You can share on Twitter (follow me @kd0602), on Instagram (@kd0602), in the CLMOOC community on G+, on Flickr, or even link back to my blog here.

Let’s find it as we focus our camera lenses in January…whatever “it” might be that inspires, motivates, and keeps us all learning and growing–one photo a day!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Perspective

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I love when I can see the world in a new way, from a new perspective. Sometimes those opportunities pop up when I least expect them…like sitting in the window seat on my flight home from Seattle a couple of weeks ago. I’m an aisle sitter…but when I fly with my husband, I tend to sit in the middle seat to sit next to him (and it’s easy to get him to move if I need to get up and wander around!). But on this day, I decided to take the risk and sit by the window, hoping the middle seat would remain empty. And what an opportunity that happened to be…as we took off and gained altitude, I could see the top of a mountain rising above the clouds. And even when I heard the ding signaling that we had reached 10,000 feet, that mountain was clearly higher. As we continued to climb and came closer to the mountain…Mount Rainier…I was able to take this shot.

Earlier during my trip to the rainforest, I came across the world’s biggest spruce. While I’m not sure how those determinations are made, it was a very large tree. And looking up definitely gave me the perspective of big!

A trip I took early in January enabled me to take a surprise snow hike. And on that hike I came across this sled, clearly broken and lodged between these trees. I hope there were no injuries involved with the abandoned sled, but I can imagine the perspective of landing head first, upside down among the branches!

Over the weekend, after an inspiring leadership group meeting with our local writing project, my husband and I headed off to make a final decision on granite for our kitchen countertops (we’re deep in a kitchen remodel!) and choose flooring. Once those stressful decisions were made, we headed downtown for an early dinner…and a lovely gelato just as the sun was beginning to dip low in the sky. I like this urban perspective, watching the sun set beyond the street and traffic.

And each day when I get home from work, the cats and I explore the changes to the kitchen. At first the perspective was dramatic, tearing out cabinets and counters, appliances and more. Lately it has been more subtle as new drywall appears…and you can see Jack going in and between for a closer look!

At the beach on Sunday I played with my telephoto lens. It was fun to zoom in on birds and surfers and waves and planes and more. I could capture images of seagulls and other birds that they don’t stand for when I have to come close. I like this perspective of the seagull…looking out to sea. And I love his little knock knees!

Yesterday took me out of my classroom to the university to work with a group of teachers exploring what “Smart Tech Use for Equity” means in their classrooms. As part of our work we created paper bag “bricks” that included our hopes for our students, our strengths as educators, our fears, potential barriers, and ways we might create a bridge to climb over those barriers. We worked together to create a bridge to scale those barriers. It was fun to hear folks describe this structure as a bridge…to possibilities for our students! (It’s all a matter of perspective!)

So this week’s challenge is all about perspectives. How are you viewing the world this week? Any new perspectives? From above, below? Through the eyes of a bird, a cat, another animal? What other images of perspective can you find?

I share my photography and writing on social media. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter using @kd0602. If you share your photos and writing on social media too, please let me know so I can follow and see what you are doing. To help our Weekly Photo community find each other, use the hashtag #perspective for this week and include @nwpianthology in your post.

What’s your perspective on perspective? I’m looking forward to seeing perspective through your lens!

On Top…Perspective Matters

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There are so many ways to see the world and each has its own advantages…and drawbacks. All too often, we see the world by looking at eye level. We often don’t consider that things will look different if we crouch down, climb up, or change our angle.

This week’s photo challenge from the Daily Post is On Top. And that had me thinking about how my photos reflect that theme.

This first photo shows the scaffolding on the top of the bridge over the Cumberland River in Nashville. But what I think is even more interesting than the bridge structure is the clouds on top of that. I love the layers in this photo and the dimension and depth visible in the clouds.

And in another picture from Nashville, I looked up to see this fire escape on top of me. I have found that I like to take pictures looking up into the sun through structures (both man made and living). I notice so many interesting things about the sky, clouds, buildings…when I shoot from this perspective.

This third Nashville photo captures the tourists on the different balcony levels of the honky tonk…as the country music blasted into the streets. Even before noon, these folks seemed to be having a great time on top of the different levels of this establishment.

This final photo is from on top of the Ocean Beach pier looking towards the beachside community. The funny thing about this photo is that it looks like the large kite is well off into the distance, over the beach goers on the shore. In fact, this was a tiny kite flown by a girl standing on the pier…probably not ten feet away from me when I shot the photo.

When I look through my lens, I find myself intentionally looking in new and different ways. I try to see places and things and people anew…through a fresh perspective. And when I do that, I see what I had often overlooked or seen differently before. On top, from below, up close, from a distance…perspective matters.

Considering Perspective

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“If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

With play as my word this year, I’m trying to approach my life and work by playing more and looking through a more playful lens. But sometimes it’s hard and those feelings of being overwhelmed and overworked creep up.

I’m lucky though. I work with kids in the classroom every day. And they remind me that when we are having fun, even while going about our work of learning, time flies by without us even noticing. This week has been like that.

And it’s not that we have done anything so very different than usual…but I think it’s just about the way we’ve been looking at our work. One example is playing with our math. Today a small group of third graders were challenged by a tricky math problem. They knew they needed to multiply 62 and 27, but they didn’t know how to multiply those numbers. Some tried adding 62 twenty seven times…but it’s so easy to make mistakes doing that. They consulted each other to see if someone had a workable strategy. And there was some good thinking going on. Another student tried breaking the numbers down to multiply easier combinations–more good thinking–but didn’t quite have all the pieces in place. Yeah–I had to work at it too…and think through where they were going wrong.

The point is that even though we were trying to figure out the correct answer, we were learning through our efforts and through our errors. As we talked through our strategies we could see where things weren’t working and wondered why a promising approach wasn’t quite right. But it was fun and we weren’t ready to give up…even when we ran out of time.

Perspective is everything. When I remember to be playful, my students play more too. When I look for the light, the darkness doesn’t seem so daunting. I love this image of Jack, my cat, finding the light. Cats are like that…they seek out the sliver of sun and squeeze themselves into that space to soak up the warmth.

I’m working to keep my perspective positive and playful this week. In spite of too many meetings, writing report cards, trying to adjust to Daylight Savings Time, and so many people being sick (what is the deal with the horrid cough that everyone seems to have?), I’m looking for the metaphorical garden. And better yet…I’m finding it. It’s all about perspective.

Reach for the Sky

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I spend many Saturday mornings immersed in professional learning. This morning was our first meeting of this year’s SDAWP Study Groups (a hybrid of book study and teacher research). Sixty teachers met this morning to participate in one of five groups…and the energy in the room was palpable!

In three hours we wrote, discussed our writing and the connections of our processes and preferences to the students we teach…and then broke into smaller groups to get to know one another, explore our new book, and make plans for reading and exploring ideas in our classrooms. All this on our own time, because we want to grow professionally with others who are also passionate about teaching and learning.

As I was leaving, I noticed hang gliders and paragliders soaring in the sky near the university. I remembered that the Torrey Pines Gliderport turn off was nearby, so I turned and followed the road down to a dirt parking lot. And there, along the cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean, was a spectacular view of the gliders and the ocean!

In spite of the cooler weather (after our 80 degree temps earlier in the week), the conditions were perfect for gliding…and for watching and photographing the gliders in action.

While I have no real desire to glide over the beautiful beaches of San Diego, I understand the urge to fly…to experience the freedom and excitement of soaring with the wind currents and looking at the world from a new perspective.

In some ways my experience in study groups this morning was a lot like hang gliding. There is energy and excitement in gathering with other interested educators to continue learning together. Interactions with teachers of all levels (K-college) and a variety of schools, districts, and teaching demographics offers new perspectives and views of teaching. Rich conversations stimulate thinking and encourage actions…we can’t wait to come back next month to share our beginnings and continue our conversations and learning.