Wow. :o
This, today especially, was very special.
Writing more, but just getting the topic up in case people want to chime in.
I cannot put into words just yet all the thoughts in my head, crak. I'm still working off the buzz of this weekend, but until then, I'll let some photos do the talking for now...
Photo 001: Lexington Green
002: Buckman Tavern
003: The Road into Lexington
004: Buckman Tavern Sign
006: Statue of John Parker
007: Statue of John Parker
008: "Redcoats" ;D with their Kin on a Halloween Parade
009: Hanging out by Statue of John Parker
010: Marker of Parker's line on Lexington Green
011: Lexington Green
012: Standing on the spot of the Meeting House on Lexington Green
013: First Srike of the Match Break Out Session
014-021: Site of the capture of Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott
022: Presentation of Paul Revere's Capture
024: Site of the capture of Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott
A few more photos...
027: Commenting on Paul Revere's capture
028: Crazy New England Foliage
030: Monument at Paul Revere's Capture Site
031: Break out session: Events leading up to April 19, 1775 / Paul Revere's Capture
032: Break out session: Events leading up to April 19, 1775 / Paul Revere's Capture
033: At Concord's North Bridge
034: The Road to the North Bridge
035: The North Bridge
036-037: A view from North Bridge
038: Monument at the North Bridge
039: A Revolutionary War Reenactor at the North Bridge
040: A Revolutionary War Reenactor at the North Bridge
041: A captive crowd at the North Bridge
043: A captive crowd at the North Bridge
045: Statue of Isaac Davis at the North Bridge
046: The Training Hill in Concord
049: Third Strike Presentation at Merriam's Corner
050: Reviewing the placard at Merriam's Corner
051: Break out session for Third Strike
Sure, lots of pretty pictures of a nice walk in the park... ON DAY TWO!!!
What you're not seeing is how we earned that sunny day by trudging through the cold, rain and mud on Day One. I'd like to forget that too.
crak ran an outstanding session, with the most common thread being "what about this story/location/etc. resonates with you?" Over and over again, "..., but tell me what really rings true - the takeaway - what's most important to you!"
Looking back, what rings true for me about April 18 - 19, 1775 is how people came in numbers, from such diverse cultural, religious, ethnical and socio-economic backgrounds, and found a common cause. Then I turned my head and looked at the 25 or so Appleseeders gathered that day and saw the same thing.
This is important stuff we do, this Appleseeding.
Quote from: jimbtv on October 26, 2009, 11:11:44 AM
Sure, lots of pretty pictures of a nice walk in the park... ON DAY TWO!!!
;D Did
anyone take
any photos on Day 1? Besides, we have enough photos of folks at Harvard Sportsman's Club! :D
All joking aside, this was quite the weekend. Upon attending my first Appleseed earlier this year, I remarked to someone how it was the best investment time and money-wise I have ever made. I take that back. This weekend's IBC at Lexington and Concord tops that.
The sheer powerhouse of Appleseed knowledge was in full force this weekend with 6 red hats and crak at the helm. With a large group of Orange Hats (>20), the methodology used was presentation/teaching br crak and then break out sessions. Each break out was led by a Red Hat who then provided feedback on our presentations. Day 1 was spent at the Harvard Sportsman's Club, and true to fashion, it was raining...again. Huddled under one of the covered bays, our group listened intently while taking notes as crak went over the major pieces of the POI and offered tips, techniques and best practices around delivery. It was pure Instructor gold. O0 We ended the day with a mock Appleseed held inside the indoor pistol range which, curiously enough, was colder (but drier!!) than the outside.
Day 2 was no "walk in the park" although it was a fine fall day, as jimbtv points out. Our goal on this day was to find a deeper meaning of the heritage by giving our presentations at the actual historic sites. This allowed us to have much greater context when teaching the heritage. Not only could we literally visualize where these events took place, but the heritage became alive in many of our minds. We followed the same process as Day 1 - presentation/teaching by crak followed by break out sessions with feedback. In my line of work, we call TPI (Total Participant Involvement) "Action Learning." The best way to learn is to do. And what better way to "do" the heritage than where it took place?
Thanks to crak and all the Red Hats (smithy, ninsho, carl, firewall99, seano) who took time off and traveled to make us orange hats better instructors and better Appleseeders. I, for one, can promise your efforts will not go to waste. It was wonderful to meet for the first time so many of the folks whose usernames I see constantly on this forum, as well as those new to the project. I look forward to 'seeding with all of you.
CJ
Day 1 was great in its own way. Sadly, I seem to have neglected to take pictures... probably because like everyone else, I was running around under crak's direction, and trying to stay warm and dry.
A lot of people got a chance to practice their delivery and absorb some new (or re-learn some old) ideas on how to teach concepts. A good and worthwhile day.
Its hard to describe what I learned this weekend but the short list goes something like this - no particular order:
How to present - Acutely, Quickly, Topically - I'd use more words here but that would defeat the purpose
What to present - the technical side of shooting instruction is far easier than heritage
Have a theme - key for heritage sessions
The difference between "History" and "Heritage" - History is facts, figures, names & dates. Heritage is the spirit behind the actions of those names on those dates.
It's easy to boggle the audience with too many facts & details
Inches Minutes and Clicks is close to a dark art magic but with a little smoke and one mirror, the groups go in the black square.
What is my style of presentation - what do I use to keep the audience hooked
There's more but I'm a touch frazzled at the moment - been a long couple weeks. My goal now is to put into practice what I've learned and to find my themes within each phase of the heritage so that when it's my turn to tell the story I can use the examples to rapidly get to the point...
The Revolution started in my backyard but I never went to see the places - now I have read about the events & people. I've seen the places - missing were the sounds and smells of the time. I think the spirit is strong there but you have to pay attention to see/feel it - When you're on the line and hear the volley of a Rifleman Cadence drill, you can feel it and see it and hear it. I would like to see a reenactment soon to get a clearer image.
Thanks (in "batSh*t-crazy" high letters) to the cast and crew that made my experience worthwhile and effective.
On a critical point, the format of placing a IIT3 with both an IIT2/1 and IIT was very effective - the most senior IIT demonstrated/presented, then the middle, then the newest IIT at the end - I learned from the critiques of/and from both presentations and could deliver short monologues.
As with the first shoot I participated in, a mountain of information was stuffed into my 5lb brain. At times, especially in the "post lunch" period, I was numb from it all. Again, as with the first shoot I participated in, I'll be chewing on the lessons for a while, better overall for the experience.
Good morning!
If you guys are psyched, how do you think your instructors felt?
First of all we were bowled over by your enthusiasm, your intelligence and your teachability. That made it the greatest two days of my Appleseed life. I can't thank you enough for that.
Now then, here's a reminder on something that I should have pointed out when we were talking about presentation. I'm sure you noticed it at the time, but I hope you made special note of the way Crak made his presentations. He didn't lecture (like a smarter-than-thou professor). He didn't sermonize (like a holier-than-thou preacher). And he didn't do the self-absorbed star turn (like the re-enactor at the bridge). He talked to you. Like a regular guy. Friend to friend. He talked out of the fullness of his reading, his experience and his love for the heroes of April 19th. Something for you to shoot for.
I can't tell you how inspiring it was associating with you. You showed me the future of Appleseed and the country. And it is you.
My best to all, Sean O'
I'm going to move past the obvious in person experience that I won't even attempt to put in to words.
Glad we had such a great turnout, I was glad to see many new IIT faces, all off which I'm looking forward to the opportunity to work with in the future.
Crak did a great job as well. If everyone in appleseed approached it with the same honest and straightforwardness that he does the program would be unstoppable. Hopefully thanks to this past weekend were one step closer to that dream.
We go out and do something like this, and while I'm typing this up a bunch of chucklehead flyover-country yahoos (I mean that with warmest regards and in the kindest sense >:D ) post more nonsense about border raiding in their 12 person appleseed AAR than our 20+ person IBC AAR. >:( You guys better get to work.
First off thank you to all of the red hats (SeanO, Firewall99, Ninsho, Smithy, Redchrome) who came and made the whole thing manageable. I believe that we broke a record for the size of this thing. Extra special thanks to Brother Mark for keeping his flu at home. I kept thinking "Man, he'd be loving this stuff" all up and down battle road, so I guess we'll have to do another one of these some day for him, CetmeMan, Dwarven1, JonJ, Mr. Twigg, Buzzworth, GMB, Nickle, and kDan (and every other red hat in the country).
First a few notes on "what was he thinking?" going into this. This being the first IBC I've ever been at (never mind run), I tried to get a lot of feedback (feedforward?) up front from past attendees, heard the good and bad, and tried to work that all in. Also, we have the unique privilege of living right on top of the April 19th, 1775 sites, so I'd be a fool to not make good use of them. I'm walking up and down that Battle Road with Paul, John, Isaac, Hezekiah and Fred every weekend I tell The Story, so I wanted to pass that on to the next batch of instructors. On top of that, I'd been tasked by Funfaler (as the best part of a really long phone call) to give some thought to how we could train IITs to do history heritage better. Finally, Fred told me something a few weeks ago that was ringing true: "It breaks my heart to have to sit there and hear somebody else butcher The Story." Mine too.
So the plan was Day One: Marksmanship. Day Two: Heritage. Equal importance with equal time. Just like on the RWVA logo. If I had a third day, I'd probably use it on the 7th step, because that one ends up being the third wheel of the bicycle all the time instead of the third leg of the stool.
We started with some points about presenting. Simplicity and Precision in all things. Tell 'em what you're going to say, Tell 'em, then tell 'em what you said. One angle up front, and more later if they need them. TPI.
Then we went into some bad habits to avoid. The right and wrong way to use notes (read and leave them, then speak). Interrupting with one more thing. Asking OK? Recording: Ball and Dummy for presenting that will diagnose and cure all of your um's, ahhs, likes, you knows, and fidgets. Next time I will add talking politics too and how to stop the shooters (well meaning or not) that try to drag us over the deep end.
Next came Appleseed vocabulary. Prep vs. load, rifle vs. gun/weapon, COT vs. COM (a universal "yuck" erupted), stable vs. comfortable/better, snug vs. tight, ride vs. release/letup, trigger vs. sear, and how/why we need safety and line commands to be exact.
Then Marksmanship.
We did all of our presentations (including mine) "on the clock" to see if we were giving the right amount of info with the right amount of simplicity and precision. 5-10 minutes for a position. 10-12 for the six steps. 10-15 for IMC, and less for NPOA. For each section, I'd talk a little about the subject and then give the same exact presentation I'd give to shooters at a normal Appleseed. I also tried to get the point across about what to present to everybody and what to save in your back pocket only for shooters who need it. Then the red hats each took a group of 2-3 IITs into groups where the IITs did their own presentations in order of seniority, so the newest one had the benefit of hearing several corrections first. Each subject took about an hour give or take. With each new subject the IIT groups stayed the same but RHs rotated.
The IBC POI recommends doing all of the work on positions up front, so that's how I tried it. I've never been so happy to talk about the six steps. Then we did IMC/comeups, NPOA, Rapid fire, and FBJ.
Then came troubleshooting. What to look for. What you can see, what you can't see. Engaging. Firing Line and Target Line. Group shapes. Different stages of troubleshooting skill: Going out and looking for who's doing something you know how to diagnose to growing bigger eyes and seeing the whole shooter at once to growing even bigger eyes and seeing a whole line at once. Angle being an answer to many seemingly terrible cases. And going through the checklist logically when stumped (it's going to be something in the steps/position/npoa/cadence) to find some likely causes.
It got dark at 5:45ish. Not only was that too early to stop, but we weren't done!
We went inside the pistol range for the Mock Appleseed with the stocks/sticks. The red hats huddled up and decided what errrors to do, then went out on the line and did them. The IITs went up and down the line studying them and wrote what they found in their notebooks, and brought the notebooks to me for marking and getting sent back to the ones they'd missed. After some reasonable amount of time where most of the students had gotten it, we went over what the errors were. These exercises started out fairly guided (They all have something wrong with their position, or they all have something wrong with their triggers) and the last was freestyle. The sling was always fair game though. >:D
I won't soon forget poor Firewall wearing himself out being the "obvious" bad cadence guy while Ninsho did the subtle version next door and confounded many IITs. At some point Redchrome went from whatever he was supposed to do to putting his support elbow way too far under the rifle. That's usually one of the first times an IIT will say to themselves "I didn't think that was even possible to do" so that became a perfectly valid answer. Smithy couldn't keep a straight face with his stick rifle. I regret giving SeanO the "too straight on target" error without thinking about him actually having to stay in the worst position possible that long. You should've come over and clownbatted me for that!
Alright, up until now this sounds like your usual IBC. Here's the new stuff for Sunday.
We met at 9AM Sunday on Lexington Green under John Parker's statue. A parade of dragons, cowboys, pumpkins, and ninjas marched by and after confirming they weren't redcoats in disguise, I began the proceedings. We took a walk around the green showing where the regulars came down Mass Ave and took the wrong fork, Buckman's tavern, the monument marking Captain John Parker's line, Jonathan Harrington's house, and finally the monument atop the final resting place of the first eight fallen Revolutionary War Veterans: Monroe, Parker, Hadley, both Harringtons, Muzzy, Brown, and Porter. We stood on the site of the meeting house (no longer there) and talked about how to deliver the heritage. SeanO and I tag teamed on the importance of Heritage over History, relating the story to today, choices, performance, and respect. As many anecdotes I could think of to demonstrate tough choices. We let out Fred's delivery secrets (he doesn't even know we know). Not letting details clog up the story. I gave my First Strike, and they broke up into the groups.
Now, the presentations in Saturday's groups were about completeness, simplicity, and precision. Marksmanship mechanics. Technical stuff. Sunday's were something else. Their job was tell us about what the most important thing to them was. Not the most important thing that happened in 1775. The most important thing we should all be learning from those guys today. The most important thing we never should have forgotten. Why we should even bother telling anybody about 1775.
If these IITs go to their next Appleseed telling their students what they told me... wow. Straight from the heart. Something special was going on. If they knew some facts they told those too, but that wasn't going to be good enough. I was going for the real stuff. If it wasn't immediately forthcoming, I'd try and draw it out with more questions until something real came out. Some took more pulling than others, but I hope they all got the idea. Those Maine guys (one 2-week-old IIT and two 1-week-old IITs) were naturals with it. Very cool.
After wrapping up there, several people wanted to see the inside of Buckman's tavern (heck, the NH guys all wondered why we didn't eat there the night before) so I gave them a few minutes for that and we headed off to the Paul Revere Capture site. Most people ate their lunch while I did a little time shift to fill in the backstory and Paul Revere's ride and Dawes and Prescott, and then we broke up for the same drill with the same IIT groups but different red hats. I was lucky enough to be with Jimbtv, who told us about being a modern day Paul Revere, confident he could get 100 of his neighbors out.
Being animated by the usual weekend Appleseed otherworldly force instead of my usual weekday worldly self, I wasn't really thinking about stuff like bathrooms and food and water. Luckily there was a restroom/fountain at the Old North Bridge. I'll put warnings about that in the next EIP, but probably not the suggestion about "You should've told us to bring Depends." ;) Speaking of the otherworldly force, I forgot to mention that. Instructors: If it hasn't already, it will find you after a few Appleseeds and work through you. It's the surest sign to me that Appleseeding is the right thing to be doing.
While I was letting people soak in the site, we got hit by a reenactor in colonial garb. What did he do to reel us all in like a bunch of hooked tuna? TPI. Questions. Lots of them. There was also a poor lonely redcoat reenactor not getting much action... well except from the ranger (maybe not so bad a plan)...
Anyway, here we were, on the North Bridge, with Redcoats afoot and Fred and the Guy were nowhere to be found. Sheesh, Guy... this is starting to become a habit with you. ??? We marched up past the bridge to the muster hill. The muster hill is where Lt. Hosmer asked The Question and Captain Davis drew his sword with The Answer. That, after a whole morning of arguing, disunity, indecision, retreat, was the pivotal moment when the Choice was made for all. And that's where we stood.
As soon as I finished giving my second strike, I knew I could've done much better by starting down the hill towards the bridge at "I have not a man afraid to go" and making it to the Isaac Davis statue for the first British volley. Good thing there will be a next time. We did our small groups again, some people got some North Bridge Water, and we stood on the grave of some British soldiers. The inscription (powerful stuff) read "They came three thousand miles, and died/To keep the Past upon its throne/Unheard, beyond the ocean tide/Their English mother made her moan." which launched me into my favorite thing to say every weekend: How far those guys came: to Miss!
We headed to Miriam's corner, which has the end of the ridge, Miriam's house, Miriam's corner and the small brook the redcoats crossed as they were being shot. It also has somebody else's active modern day house right in the middle of it all! I did my whole third strike here, and we broke into the groups again. I brought the official IBC to a close at Miriam's corner, wrapped up with some stuff I thought needed emphasis had been forgotten, and we brought the carpoolers back to their cars at Lexington green.
By the end of the day Sunday, the whole group (even Buckskin and Cathy!) was yelling the safety rules back at me. I think I spent the right amount of time on those...(hah!) ;D
In true Midnight Ride (ok, 6:30 walk) fashion, those who wanted to check out Battle Road a little past sunset went back for more. In a living TPI exercise (me being a participant totally involved in exercise) of letting the most gung-ho student pace things, Sprocket launched us past the Bloody Angle all the way to Brooks Hill. I confirmed to myself the wisdom of that kind of thing because looking back on it, I'm glad he did even though at the time I was less than ecstatic. After a bit of confusion between the Battle Road and the Battle Road trail (remember that nonsense, Fred?) we ended up at Brook's House but no hill. Perhaps that little info placard about "landscape changes" I didn't read could've answered where the hill went, but I'll have to go back and figure that one out during the daytime. We moved on to Menotomy for some BBQ but missed the restaurant closing time by three minutes. So we saluted Sam Whittemore as we rode past him on the way to Pizzeria Regina to finish out the night to trade stories of Canadian invasion.
As good as this was, we have to be getting better all the time. I asked for and got a lot of feedback during and after. The big goal for the next one is to get some bit of Battle Road in before dark. Between hartwell and the bloody angle at least, but brooks hill through the bloody angle to hartwell tavern would be better. All that marshy nonsense with the boardwalk WAS part of the battle road.
Every last one of you there taught me something. Thank you.
We're going to do four of these in 2010. After the next one, it'll run like a well oiled machine, and I expect all of you to be running it with me.
Crak's report gives you some idea of why I think of this as the best Appleseed event I've ever been to - and that's saying an awful lot. I think that everybody was really inspired to be where the heroes of April 19th once fought, died and made it possible for us to live the American dream.
It should be the aim of every serious seeder to make the pilgrimage to Lexington/Concord, if at all possible. Preferably for an IBC. There's nothing like it for getting the patriotic juices flowing. It's where it becomes most obvious that Appleseed isn't just a marksmanship clinic with some history thrown in. It's a heritage appreciation program masquerading as a marksmanship clinic.
Best to all, Sean O'
Lexington/Concord definatly needs to be on the to do list (and of course everyone elses).
QuoteWe go out and do something like this, and while I'm typing this up a bunch of chucklehead flyover-country yahoos (I mean that with warmest regards and in the kindest sense ) post more nonsense about border raiding in their 12 person appleseed AAR than our 20+ person IBC AAR. You guys better get to work.
;D No need to be jealous Crak ;D you just need a little polishin' on your delivery ;D (I mean that with the warmest regards) ;D
As a younger IIT and someone who is relatively new to the program (about 6 or 7 months), I thought this IBC was absolutely fantastic. My deepest thanks go out to Crak and all the other Red hats who gave up a weekend to teach us the ropes. I had a great time both days and learned/reviewed a ton of information. The first day was very information dense and was a great review of the marksmanship side of the program. The second day was particularly moving as we are lucky enough to be so close as to visit the sites that must seem so distant for many Appleseeders. It really brings the entire program to life. Planting your feet on the same ground where those original patriots stood and thinking about what must have been going through their minds, if just for one fleeting second, was awe inspiring. It's funny that years ago I lived only moments (even walking) from most of these sites and had even visited some of them, but the true impact never really hit me. I have always had a solid appreciation for history, but I think that this weekend I began to truly appreciate and understand the heritage. It was an incredible experience and again I want to thank everyone involved in making it happen.
-Garrett in NH
Quote from: CortJestir on October 26, 2009, 01:53:56 PM
;D Did anyone take any photos on Day 1?
Yes! As a matter of fact I just figured out how to get this off my phone.
So here it is, from the way home. The spot where Sam Whittemore gave those Redcoats The Business. Yes it's dark and rainy, but captures the spirit of Day 1 quite well! ;D
Notice it has different numbers than Fischer cites, a clear signal that IITs should relax about all that stuff when giving The Story!
In the spirit of making Lex-Concord area available to as many RWVA instructors as possible, I suggest, crak, that you schedule AS every weekend next year at Harvard, so that all those instructors qualified under the SAP program can travel free with their spouses to Lex-Concord - where you will be able to give them The Tour.
Note, no smiley faces - we need to do this! (Maybe not every weekend, next year, but, as the program expands, 2011 for sure...)