What is Flecks Time?

Over the years, my wife, Janet, and I have been renovating our house. We have found these projects enticing, thought-provoking, and, at times, overwhelming. Although we are not skilled do-it-yourselfers, it was important to us to engage in the process as fully as possible. We found a way of doing this through designing the projects and then leaving it to the builders to make the designs come to life. Of course, this process kept us engaged in the renovations as we would have to check our designs against what was actually happening as the demolition and rebuilds evolved. Often, our thinking would have to be completely altered by what was discovered when a wall was torn down. In times like these, which were more often than we would have expected, we would constantly revisit our thinking, trade magazines, Google, and reams of graph paper to edit and sketch out our next steps. Renovations never went completely according to plan - but the plan always led us to a decision, a new plan and a commitment to the next best step.

As Janet and I enter retirement together, it is feeling, yet again, like another renovation project. The strange combination of careful planning and commitment to the unknown seems to be the order of the day. We have learned that this strange combination leads to an exhilarating process as well as a satisfying product. We have also learned that it can be an addictive state. No sooner would a renovation project be over and we would be talking, thinking, and planning what was next.

So what does all of this have to do with 'Flecks Time'? 

Janet and I are both educators who have spent a good portion of our careers in and around high schools. At one point in our careers we were working together on a project - much like a renovation - which challenged us to look at the organization, structure and programming of high schools. We worked together with a number of colleagues from around our province thinking about the nature of learning, the incredible potential of our young adult students and the ways that we could rethink high school practice together to engage our students more deeply in their learning and their communities. One common belief that emerged among our colleagues in this work was that high schools were relatively rigid organizations that did not necessarily support students in 'finding their way' through their learning. It occurred to a number of us that providing more flexible environments for our students, including portions of the day that students could make decisions to guide their own learning, rather than respond to the directions of a timetable and a teacher, might lead to deeper engagement in learning - for both students AND teachers. 

This high school redesign project occurred for Janet and I at a time that we were renovating our kitchen. We were drawn in our planning to the beauty of granite countertops. This was one feature that we knew we wanted to incorporate into our renovation. In shopping for granite we discovered that the 'quality' of the granite came from its distinctive look. It was the variety of different rocks that made the conglomerate that led to its beauty. In short, the more varied the 'flecks' in the rock; the better the granite. This notion of the variety and diversity of 'flecks' in granite became a bit of a theme for us in our work with high school redesign. We knew that the work we did with our provincial colleagues would add diversity and strength to decisions made by each of us individually. We knew that by fully considering the diversity of our students we would make much better decisions for our schools as a whole.

It wasn't a fluke that the notion of giving flexibility (flex) to students was a homonym for the flecks in granite. Honouring the diversity of students and committing a school to the uncertainty that comes with handing time and decision making to students ended up being a rather important realization for our work.

As we enter into our retirement together the notion of 'flecks time' rises to the surface. One of the things that both of us have realized is that having the flexibility of time is a precious gift that we do not want to squander. And as we have a new landscape opening to us, we want to engage with, as deeply as possible, the diversity of the world we live in. It is our latest renovation project. Join us for the ride!