Fall Equinox

Tomorrow marks the end of summer and the beginning of fall [for my acquaintances in the southern hemisphere, of course, it is the other way around – welcome spring they say].

This post was going to be about 21st century skills – the subject of a meeting I attended last week. I have a data stick full of information, articles, reports, bibliography and blogs to read. Alas, I haven’t seen one of them so the subject of 21st century skills will have to wait for a better day.

To get the gist of the whole thing – see the September 7, 2009 New Yorker magazine cover www.newyorker.com. In the context of a back-to-school theme, the cover shows a typical classroom but now lead by a student directing a room full of adults who are struggling and stressing at their desks with computes, laptops and other electronic gizmos. This is the new 21st century learning landscape.

Here in Florida – in terms of weather - not a thing will change tomorrow: it will be hot and humid and there will be rain in the afternoon. The lakes and ponds are filled to capacity after two months of steady showers.

In the northern climes cool autumn weather is already present, the calendar notwithstanding. I always wonder at these moments if Mother Nature is anxious – perhaps fretting that the change to another season goes according to plan.