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WeCroak: An app that does what my brain already does

My friend, Kim, alerted me to a new app called WeCroak. It does one simple thing: Five times per day, at unpredictable intervals, it sends you a message that says: “Don’t forget, you’re going to die.” The app was created by Ian Thomas, a 27-year-old freelance app developer, and Hansa Bergwall, a 35-year-old publicist,  “I would…

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An unusual and exhausting but unforgettable weekend thanks to a July night in 2011

I’m often astounded by the places that a story told on a stage in 2011 has taken me. This weekend I had the honor working with caregivers at Yale New Haven Hospital, teaching them how to tell stories about their own experiences as patients and the spouses, parents, and children of patients to doctors, nurses, and…

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Someone wrote a song about me! About me!

Spotify recently added podcasts to its offerings. Wondering if my podcast, Boy vs. Girl, had been added, I asked Alexa, our Amazon Echo, to play Boy vs. Girl. She told me that she couldn’t find it on Spotify. Then I asked her to play “Matthew Dicks,” hoping it might pick up my name as one of…

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TEDxTheCountrySchool: Speak Less. Expect More.

This is a TEDx Talk that I delivered in April of 2016 at The Country School in Madison, CT. The conference was run almost exclusively by the students of the school, who were of middle and high school age. It’s a variation of a talk that I have delivered before about the idea that teachers…

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11 thoughts on yesterday’s TEDxBU event, including observations from the restrooms and my advice for future TED speakers.

A few observations from yesterday’s TEDxBU talk at Boston University. 1. I will never understand what possesses organizers like Ben Lawson and Salma Yehia to give up hundreds of hours of their time to pull off an event like this. I have spoken at four TEDx events in the past three years, and in each…

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Less lecture. More learning.

In 2013, I did a TED Talk entitled “Speak Less. Expect More.” Unfortunately, the audio engineer failed me that day, and the recording was poor. Although my voice is discernible in the video, the audio is of such low quality that the talk never received any real attention despite initial excitement by the organizers to…

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Teachers: Stop commenting, positively or negatively, on your student’s physical appearance. It’s only hurting them.

As an elementary school teacher, I have made it my policy for more than a decade to avoid commenting on a student’s physical appearance. A student’s appearance should be the last thing of concern to a teacher, but more importantly, these comments, even when positive, can be damaging and hurtful to kids. This policy has…

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Megan Washington’s stutter is just perfect

I’m not sure why this effected me so much. Maybe it’s because I also spend a lot of time onstage, taking to strangers,  and can’t believe Megan Washington’s courage. Maybe it’s her honestly. The grace and humor that she exudes. Her unwillingness to accept our sympathy. It’s a beautiful talk, and it’s a beautiful song.…

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The three great leaders of my life

Truly great leaders are hard to find. In my professional life, I have worked for three. Allison White and Jalloul Montacer were McDonald’s general managers. Plato Karafelis was my principal for fifteen years. Allison taught me the importance of being the thing that you expect from your employees. She taught me that every job, as…

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Stop and watch.

These two TED Talks, published on the TED Talk podcast feed last week, are extraordinary. The first, by author David Epstein, is on the science of athleticism. Are athletes of today really stronger and faster than the athletes of the past? The answer will surprise you. The second talk deals with autism in no uncertain…

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