Reflection

One Word. Joy.

/ Catherine Cabiness-Atkinson, Ed.D. / Leave a comment

For the past five, maybe six years now, I have chosen to define a new year with #oneword, as opposed to selecting a resolution that rarely makes it past the second week in January.

The purpose for selecting one word to define a particular year is so that you can life your life according to a particular theme. You can consider your one word as a guidepost or a beacon to (re)direct you, your thoughts, and your actions as necessary with the goal that by the end of the year, you will look back and see how your year was defined by that one word.

My #oneword for last year was JOY. It was a word that was easy to remember, and more importantly, as I reflected on 2024, I was able to see the many, many, MANY times that JOY made an appearance in the big and little things. Last year was a year of change. Last year, we officially made the move from California to Michigan. We traded the fast-paced life-style of Southern California for the slower-paced small town life of Northern Michigan. Last year, we lost several very dear friends and family. I don’t know that I’ve ever lost so many loved ones in one year.

So while there was joy in trading the known for the unknown, there was also joy in knowing that the pain and suffering from loved ones had also ended. Joy was present as we settled into our new home. We found joy exploring the various local lakes and rivers. Countless, beautiful sunsets from our deck brought joy every single evening. I also found joy in new responsibilities for projects that expanded my skillset.

As such, I’ve decided that I am going to keep the word JOY as my #oneword challenge for 2025.

While I typically seek JOY in my personal life, I am going to make a concerted effort to also find JOY in my professional endeavors as well. Writing has always been a passion of mine, even from a very young age. But as we can all attest, life can get very busy and many of the things that bring us JOY quickly fall to the wayside. So, this year — 2025 — is the year that I will purposely seek JOY in both my personal and professional life.

To that end, today’s JOY is two-fold: (1) falling snow that shimmers like glitter in the morning sunlight and (2) sharing one of my favorite edtech tools (Newsela) with a group of social science educators from Elmwood Community SD.

I cannot wait to see what JOY comes tomorrow.

A Guiding Light for the New Year: The #OneWord Challenge

/ Catherine Cabiness-Atkinson, Ed.D. / Leave a comment
This little guy inspires me to find the JOY in everything. 💚

New Year’s resolutions are extremely hard to keep. Take a minute to think about how many New Year’s resolutions have persisted for you…if you say “not many” or “none,” you are not alone! In fact, a health survey conducted by Forbes found that the “average resolution lasts just 3.74 months” (Davis, 2023).

When reflecting on past New Year’s resolutions, I am no different from the average person. So I decided to shift perspectives!

In 2018 I decided to choose one word that would guide my thoughts and actions for the year. The idea behind the #oneword challenge is that when you take stock of your life (past 365 days), how would you summarize it in one word? 

After hearing about this idea, I introduced the #oneword challenge to my middle schoolers and had them write their word in their agenda book (1) to keep themselves accountable and (2) as a reminder of the word they wanted to use to describe their year. Periodically, I would have students return to the page where their #oneword was written to reflect on whether their actions, words, and thoughts aligned to the one word they chose for themselves. To make sure that my students knew that I had skin in the game, I also participated in the #oneword challenge and shared my one word with them.

I even brought in a few good friends (middle school colleagues) to join me in the #oneword challenge. The more, the merrier. 😁

Having one word that guided my course of action, words, and thoughts came in very handy during the pandemic when my #oneword challenge almost became a sort of lifesaver. Suddenly separated from daily in-person contact and fear of the unknown added another layer of stress. But the #oneword that my friends and I each chose not only bonded us but also gave us something positive to focus on. Throughout 2020 and 2021, we would regularly share whether (or not) we were aligned by our #oneword which kept us accountable and gave us the opportunity to provide encouragement and support to each other as needed. 

And it was sorely needed.

Now the #oneword challenge is a bit different than creating a New Year’s resolution. I’ve found that choosing one word (e.g., trust, simplicity) instead of a resolution (e.g., regularly exercise, eat better) is more compassionate. It’s a mindset that guides one’s thoughts and actions. There is room for failure, opportunities for grace and empathy, and a chance for do-overs. After all, those who take on the #oneword challenge have 365 chances (or in the case of 2024, 366 chances – #leapyear) to live out their one word. But it’s not just enough to choose one word to describe your year; it’s important to think about why you’ve chosen that one word and how you plan to follow-through with it. By consciously thinking about your why and how, you are setting yourself up for success as you now have a game-plan. And, if you share your one word with friends, you now have an accountability system. 

Full disclosure, there are some days where the #oneword is front and center in my life, and there are other days (or consecutive days) where the #oneword is notably absent. Last year, my #oneword was present, as in I wanted to be present in the moment and not think about the past or future. But last year was a crazy year with family and personal obligations pulling me in a multitude of different directions. I found myself going down quite a few dark and long rabbit holes, but when I remembered my #oneword, it brought me back to my goal of being present, being in the moment. It reminded me to take a breath and just be. 

Aside from using #oneword to guide my thoughts, words, and actions, an indelible benefit of sharing my #oneword with friends is that when we get together at the end of the year, we share our ups and downs, our challenges and triumphs, the good, bad, and the ugly of our year. While we spend time in introspection, we also have a chance to build each other up, to remind each other that the #oneword is a guiding light and not an all or nothing deal. While we may not have lived by our #oneword for all 365 days, if we can define the pivotal moments of our year by our #oneword or even lessons on how we can do better with our #oneword going forward, then that’s what matters most in my book.

This year, I shared my #oneword challenge with a wider group of friends and family. It brought a smile to my heart to know their #oneword and the reason for choosing it for 2024. To what extent they will have achieved their #oneword challenge remains unknown, but you can bet that I’ll be reaching out to them come December 2024 to reflect on our respective #oneword journeys.

In case you’re wondering, my #oneword for 2024 is JOY. It was inspired by the Bible verse James 1:2 which begins with the phrase “Count it all joy.” I chose this #oneword because no matter what life throws my way this year, I want to find joy in all of the things. I won’t pretend that it will always be easy to find joy, but I am putting it out there to the universe that I will make a concerted effort to find joy no matter the circumstances. I will reframe my thoughts and find the silver-lining, if need be. To help with this, each day I plan to write down one thing that brought joy–with the idea that by December 31, I will have 366 reasons for being joyful with the life I have.

For today, my JOY is sharing the #oneword challenge with you. ❤️

References

Davis, S. (2023, December 18). New year’s resolutions statistics 2024. Forbes Health. https://www.forbes.com/health/mind/new-years-resolutions-statistics

Operationalizing the Variable

/ Catherine Cabiness-Atkinson, Ed.D. / Leave a comment

While at Johns Hopkins, I had to take several research methods courses to ensure that I knew not only how to conduct research, but how to define, collect, and analyze data. One of my professors (I took two of the three research methods courses with her because she’s nothing short of amazing but that’s a story for another time) always reminded us to operationalize the variable. Now, I realize that if you’re not in the research world that phrase may not mean anything to you, but for those of us who are studying change and program effectiveness in schools…this phrase means everything.

To operationalize the variable means to define it in clear terms–preferably in terms that can be measured.

By operationalizing the variable, it should be clear to everyone exactly what you mean.

If the variable is clearly defined, then it makes it easier to determine if change occurred.

To be clear, just because you operationalized the variable doesn’t mean that the program or change initiative worked. A lot of factors can and do influence change. However, to determine what changed, to what extent change occurred, and what possibly contributed to the change, one needs to start with clearly defined variables.

For example, if one wanted to measure the effectiveness of a program change, then one needs to:

  • Identify a problem of practice (what it the gap? what are potential drivers to the problem?)
  • Design and conduct a needs assessment (how do you know it’s a problem? what does the literature reveal?)
  • Operationalize the variables (what is it that you want to see changed?)
  • Clearly define the instruments (what is going to measure the change? how will data be collected? when will data be collected? how will the data be analyzed? who will analyze the data?)
  • Clearly define the program or intervention (what is change initiative? foundational theory of change? program details? duration? who is the target of the program initiative? what are the proposed proximal, short, and long-term outcomes?)

All of that is the bare minimum. I didn’t include all of the steps, but I’m sure by now you get the gist that conducting a program evaluation is not a simple or quick task.

For the evaluation to mean anything, however, it is imperative that all of the variables are defined–that is, operationalized.

I bring this up because I’ve been doing research on social-emotional learning and culturally responsive teaching. And, although these two can certainly work in tandem to build a warm and supportive classroom community, they can (and in my opinion should) be implemented separately if one wants to truly measure change.

Definition: social-emotional learning is the “process through which all young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to develop healthy identities, manage emotions and achieve personal and collective goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain supportive relationships, and make responsible and caring decisions” (CASEL, n.d.).

Definition: culturally responsive teaching uses “cultural characteristics, experiences, and perspectives of ethnically diverse students as conduits for teaching them more effectively” (Gay, 2002, 106).

One of the biggest problems I see in education is the morphing of definitions. We’ve all been privy to buzzwords in education–most of these which likely started with the best of intentions, but because many of the terms were not clearly defined–operationalized–educators, parents, community, general public, and the media have put their own spin on it. They’ve redefined the terms according to their understanding or they’ve taken similarities in terminology and made the assumption that the terms basically mean the same.

And therein rests the problem.

So, what initially appeared to be something that might actually effect change, instead became watered-down, redefined, or morphed into something quite different or less effective than what was intended.

Now, I’m not saying that teachers and schools cannot implement two different frameworks, pedagogies, theories, etc. at the same time. Heck, we’ve been doing that (and more) for years. But doing so makes it impossible to know what exactly changed, to what extent it changed, and even what caused the change.

And if the end result isn’t what one expected, what happens? The theory, pedagogy, framework, or strategy is scrapped and something new is put into place.

And what a shame since many of these theories, pedagogies, frameworks, and strategies are backed by research. Evidence that it can work. But we’re hard pressed to know if it could work in certain situations since educators were juggling multiple and competing initiatives–so it’s hard to tell what changed, what caused the change, or even why didn’t the expected change occur.

So, if you truly want to see if a (new) program is effective, then it’s critical to (1) operationalize the variable and (2) remove competing initiatives.

I would love to not see social-emotional learning or culturally responsive teaching reduced to buzzwords. Each of these has its merits, and I truly believe that they can effect positive change in the classroom. However, these need to be implemented with fidelity but more importantly, clearly defined for everyone at the outset so that there’s no confusion as to what the terminology means.

References

CASEL. (2022). Fundamentals of SEL. Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL). https://casel.org/fundamentals-of-sel

Gay, G. (2002). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 53(2), 106 – 116. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.294.1431&rep=rep1&type=pdf