After a long break, the gang was reunited on January 25th. Eager to catch up, we ate some tasty breakfast provided by Terri and Chris and got down to how our new year was going.
We began our day with a bit of venting and reevaluating the darkness in our lives through the writing into the morning activity, “Writing From a Place of Darkness.” The first part of our writing reflected the dreary weather outside, while during the second half, we revisioned bringing light back into the situation.
After some important announcements, we all got comfy and read “Tempered Radicals” using doodle notes to help solidify the most important aspects of the article, or to 
represent the questions we had. Conversation then ensued about whether or not being a Tempered Radical was a realistic way to make a change or not in Education. In the end, the group decided that we could all be considered Tempered Radicals.
The theme of drawing to think continued after lunch when we took the time to draw maps of our schools and identify “allies” and “blockers” in our school community. Our papers were an array of green and red.
Chris introduced a “Heuristic Model” close reading strategy and led us to think about the “Interactional Leadership” infographic. We began to think more deeply about the cyclical nature of the action for change and how we might initiate change in our buildings and step into leadership roles as educators.
As our brains began to percolate possible leadership projects, we used our Heuristic notes to discuss the different discourse moves necessary when approaching others with our goals.
Finally, 
At the end of the day, we had fun practicing how to navigate changing the minds of our “blockers” using the sentence stems in the Interactional Leadership infographic. Not only were we entertained, but we also practiced valuable discourse moves through role-playing. 
ECLInstitute - HVWP 2019-2020 