think:lab

Transformation in Classic Wolf's Clothing

Hey, Mr. Lehmann.  Earlier today, I Twittered the following (to which you responded "Sure." soon after):

"One of my favorite times of school day: whenever I can steal time to read & add customized response to each of my student's blog responses."

I wasn't kidding when I responded to your Tweet:

Part 1:  "You might suspect irony in my 'voice', but truthfully -- sincerely -- I LOVE this project, even with 100+ (responses received) every Sunday night".

Part 2: "Why? Exponentially increasing relationships w/ the kids.  & many (other) teachers now mention "Your kids are talking about...""

You see, I really meant that business.  Completely transformative element in what is otherwise a 'classic' classroom dynamic.  Really.  Sincerely.  Truly.

Out of the Mouth of Babes

After 5 weeks of testing out the classroom blogging project with my 4 Eng II classes, I thought I'd ask my students to evaluate the process so far. 

The questions I asked ranged from asking them how much time they spend each week submitting entries, the value (to them) of having me comment on student entries, the grading/selection process, to the quality of prompts.  Fortunately, they are a forthright group of kids...so getting honest feedback was a guarantee.

The range of comments were generally positive (in fact, they seem really invested save for a few -- and actually, I can respect where they're coming from knowing their stories).  Certainly positive enough to give me confidence that it will be worth pursuing this project through the rest of the year (with a few minor tweaks to ensure I don't overwhelm my students' workload in the process). 

Of the many student evaluations back to me that caught my eye, however, this is the one that has me laughing even hours later.   Out of the mouth of babes:

"Personally, I am shocked that a teacher of any sort could think of an interactive homework assignment that involves the Internet."

Let that one sink in for a second.

I think this one pretty sums up EVERYTHING I've spent the last 3+ years wondering about in my previous professional life.  Hopefully, however, such a response won't be the norm too far into the future.

Unless we really have a sense of irony.

Would You Enter "The Experience Machine"?

Note:  The following post was given to my 10th grade students this week.  Thought someone out there might appreciate playing around with the premise, perhaps even offer a reaction to the free ride on "The Experience Machine". 

***

During our visit to Austin College this past Friday, Dr. Rod Stewart (from the Philosophy Dept.) presented a striking question to us based on Robert Nozick's thought experiment commonly known as the "Experience Machine".

Background:  The experiment came from Nozick's 1971 book, Anarchy, State, Utopia.  The link gives you the entire book for free if you want to start reading now -- wink, wink; nudge, nudge.

Want to learn a little bit more before reading the entire book?  Check out this link for the Wikipedia article associated with this part of Nozick's research.  Pretty interesting.

Okay, let's get back to us.

I thought it'd be interesting to have us discuss the "Experience Machine" a bit more since so many of your classmates had their hands in the air last Friday even though we didn't have nearly enough time for everyone to add their voice. 

I also thought he'd be interested in reading your responses now that you've had a few days to think about the original idea, too. 

Here is the original question Dr. Stewart asked us:

"Suppose there were an experience machine that would give you any experience you desired. Superduper neuropsychologists could stimulate your brain so that you would think and feel you were writing a great novel, or making a friend, or reading an interesting book. All the time you would be floating in a tank, with electrodes attached to your brain.

Should you plug into this machine for life, preprogramming your life's desires?...

Of course, while in the tank you won't know that you're there; you'll think it's all actually happening. Others can also plug in to have the experiences they want, so there's no need to stay unplugged to serve them. (Ignore problems such as who will service the machines if everyone plugs in.)

Would you plug in? What else can matter to us, other than how our lives feel from the inside?" (Anarchy, State, Utopian, 43)

Your challenge is to answer the 3 following questions:

A. Tell us if you'd 'plug in'.  No combined answers.  You have to pick one.  And remember, if you choose to 'plug in' -- for the sake of our conversation -- it is forever (or at least far longer than any normal life we could have now).

B.  Tell us why in 7+ sentences.  Remember to stay focused on the experiment.  As tempting as tangents are, it is far more interesting if all of us remain focused on the original conversation so we can see how our ideas really overlap.

Psst.  Here comes the biggie.   Here comes the one where you have to peel back the layer beneath the layer beneath the layer beneath the experiment itself.  In other words, here comes the is-your-thinking-cap-on question.

C.  What was Dr. Stewart really doing by involving you in this question last Friday?

FYI: Photo Image.

MP3's For "Macbeth"

Best 'accidental' assignment I've given my students this year?

Goes a little like this: 

Dear students,

Musically speaking, I wonder what the soundtrack for Act III of Macbeth would sound like.

Even better, I wonder what it would sound like if you were the DJ putting that soundtrack for the play (or even a film version) together.

Here's what I'm thinking.

Now that we're regularly discussing how a director and his/her actors would perform parts of this play, perhaps we ought to think about how to create the right atmosphere/tone that would make the actions seem believable, hint at the future, and in general engage the audience.

So, send me a series of songs -- one for 4 of the 6 scenes in Act III -- that you believe really set the tone/vibe for both the actors and audience.  Oh, and pick 1 that you want to take time to really do a deep-dive, 'big idea' written explanation for so you can "wow" both me and your classmates.

Snap, crackle, pop!...MP3's for Macbeth are in the house!

And the flood gates (along with the obvious YouTube visits) have opened up wide, wide, wide!

Been one of the most enjoyable gold rush moments in the last day or so as students have responded with crackin' good lists of potential soundtrack candidates.  More importantly, however, I've been really blown away by the rationale they offer for tying their music choices to the plot and themes of this center act in Macbeth. 

Not only are the kids loving it (and asking me to give them more 'bloggy-blog-blog' prompts like this in the future -- go figure -- requesting homework!), but I'm also rebounding from my 'becoming old and irrelevant' music stylings as of the last few years. 

God bless the children.

So, I'm curious.

What's the best assignment you've ever given your students this year?

In other words, what assignment did you give this year that not only allowed your students to hit a home run out of the content ballpark but also gave you access to their inner machina? 

Oh, and gave you a bit of street cred in the process?

Photo link.

My Students Rock (part 2)

The other day, I briefly mentioned a little 'writing workshop' gig my students and I are playing around with via this new-fangled blogging apparatus that some of you may be familiar with.  I mentioned -- also -- that I had recently asked my 10th graders to respond to Patrick Awuah's TED talk about the university he started in Ghana a few years back (first graduating class:  2006).  One of my students offered a bang-up response I posted on that earlier link. 

Here is what yet another student of mine wrote about this TED video and 'leadership' question sometime this weekend, with a specific focus on how our own schools should foster leaders:

I believe the most important thing for teachers/administrators to do regarding the ability of students to become true leaders is to have the students constantly analyzing. To not just think, but to analyze and discover can lead a number of students in the right direction of becoming a leader in society.

Students should discuss issues that exist in the real world, and try to develop intelligent ways of solving them. Students should be given the opportunity to learn how to confront any conflict and deal with it in an understanding and responsible manner. The ambition of becoming a leader can't be forced into a student, but gradual education about how the role of leadership in a society should work can easily inspire any student to want to become a leader.

In other words, it should not just be the job of the teacher to embed information about leadership into the minds of students, but students should have a genuine desire to learn also. With the correct intention of teachers and natural ambition of students,the ability to develop leaders is possible. With time, education and desire, future leaders will understand the real purpose of leadership:  'to serve humanity'.

Amen!

The more I read her response (just a fraction of what she wrote, actually), the more I realize she's hinting at something we're all talking about.  Something far richer than techlust often suggests.

Why this TED video writing prompt for my students?  The mission of the university:  "educate inspired leaders".    Keep in mind, my students are at a college prep, independent school so the 'leadership' issue comes up a lot. 

I'm not sure, however, that it matters in terms of what all of kids oughta be able to do over the course of their lives, regardless of the organizations & affiliations they are part of as 'leaders' and voices.  This 'leadership' business is universal, not a privilege of private schools alone.

But back to my student's response above.

I just wish her voice was in our faculty rooms.  Each of our faculty rooms. 

In a New York minute  I'd bring this student -- and any of her peers that continue to impress me with similar class writing as of late -- to the edu-conference of your choice or faculty meeting you could name...just as long as the adults in the room would do an honest deep think as to what the 'kiddos' are able to grasp that we, ourselves, are still trying to puzzle through.

What I love about her writing is the lack of the typically divisive "tech or not to tech" mindset that seems to be the undercurrent of so much that dominates the education conversation these days. 

She gets it. 

I just hope the educators/adults mentoring her (and her peers) will be able to get it also.

Dude: Why My Students Rock...Even If We're Not Selling Tickets to the Show

Today one of my 10th grade students wrote to his classmates (and me) his reaction to Patrick Awuah's TED video discussing the education of inspired leaders via a college he started a few years ago in Africa.

I had recently asked my kids to react to the video with regards to the issue of whether schools should be charged with creating 'inspired leaders'...or just successful students and workers. 

He wrote:

a.) According to Patrick, being a true leader is the ability to resolve a countries' imminent problems by developing innovative solutions. Professionals have a unique charge in their field not only to be efficient and effective at their work, but to do this in an ethical and responsible manner. His terrible experience with the hospital shows that "leaders" can be ineffective even with sufficient resources because the staff refused to give care to the ill. Greed or inaction can ruin a personality.

c.) Society should definitely encourage the development intelligent, benevolent individuals who ensure the prosperity of a country. As Patrick tells, however, this is a bit like "Mission Impossible" because in a world with so many different paradigms it is not easy to select what values to teach. As we have learned from our studies, for example, I am undecided as to whether the concept of honor is harmful or not. Avoiding this minefield will be a challenge in itself.

d. ) From what I have seen, education has been extremely resistant to changes in methodology. In my sincere opinion, technology is greatly underused. The strategies used to grasp concepts still rely largely on the memorization of facts. Instead of chapter-by-chapter progression to learn "tools" that can be used to solve a larger "problem". (As is currently done in my mathematics class), it would be more intuitive, helpful and fun if it could be done as part of a more immersive environment. Imagine how much more interesting a 3D simulation of a historical event or scientific process would be than reading words on paper. Granted, this would take monumental skill to execute impeccably, not to mention unimaginable amounts of capital, but think about this: We are simply using computers as an extension of a piece of paper, not as a true revolutionary aid. You could go a step further and make this environment challenge-response(A true interactive virtual reality) Yes, there will be new challenges and goals, and perhaps the whole school structure will be eventually be reworked. We are taking small steps into the future, like inserting references to applications in mathematics, laboratory experiments in science, and links to popular culture in English.

Patrick's participatory culture is only the beginning.

Dude. Do I love that last line! 

Better yet, I love that this kid -- along with ALL of his classmates -- are writing responses like this to daily/weekly writing prompts that ONLY grant them a 'participation' grade at the end of the semester...all while still maintaining a crazy academic pace and writing program that actually serve their GPA far more directly.

Oh, and they're doing so via a quirky little bloggy-blog-blog that was casually set up a few weeks ago just to test the waters of keeping the classroom open 24/7.

Oops.  I said it.  Bloggy-blog-blog project.   

Drats, Batman, I've gone and done it now. 

Note to self:  Guess my students now gotta go global and be a poster children for something esoteric and divisive that some new age guru will frame in yet another bestseller spanning the bookshelves of educators and business tycoons alike, something that will pit IT jocks against old school librarians and everyone in between, all piggybacking on the good will of my kids in the process.   The rabbit and Alice are officially out of the bag.

I'm late, I'm late...and I have these pesky little essays to grade!  Where goes the clock?  And the soul?  And why is this little lost girl following me down the rabbit hole?

So.

So.

So, I have this little bloggy-blog-blog project that my 10th grade students have been playing around with for the last few weeks with an expiration date of this coming summer.

Not really much of a global audience fishing net, to be honest. Certainly not a 'flat classroom' gig. And hardly something I'm trying really to 'market' (or blog link) outside of the 4 classes of kids who honor me with their presence, writing and imaginations every day. Heck, I don't even say "blog" when my kids and I talk about the project in class.  Silly word that 'blog' thing, to be honest.  And I say enough Ministry of Silly Words gaffs in their presence to not need to dumb it down any further.

Here's what goes on.

I throw up a few prompts each week on the bloggy-blog-blog. Some are rigorously focused on analyzing the literary elements we're discussing.  Some are free-writes.  Some are vocabulary list exercises.  Some are 'big picture' questions.  All demand that they write...and write well.  No apologies there. 

The kids pick the ones they want to react to.  They have 7 days (by Monday at 8am each week) to get as many done as they choose. It's old skool 'challenge by choice' stuff.  They know the grade they'll get each week (x-number of 'quality' responses based on a clear rubric will get them x-grade; easy; simple; and a great weekly/quarterly 'participation' grade to off-set the big projects, essays, regular quizzes, etc.). 

I read/edit/comment on every single submission...before I publish them. 

The kids' names are removed and replaced with "Student #7" (like being "Caller #7" on the radio) based on the order that comment responses arrive.  They can't comment on other students' responses until they've successfully published 3 responses each week...but then they get extra credit (or can vie for it) if they do.  Even then they must show serious respect for their audience (even if they disagree) for their comments to go 'public'. 

And when I opt to pull out the WiFi-powered laptops, occasionally I give the kids time in class to work on the latest prompts...unless it interferes with the real business each day:  our class talking F2F about the literature and their growth as writers. 

And nothing interferes with that.

As my teacher friend and fellow-daddy-blogger Ben Wilkoff said not too long ago on the phone to me:

"It sounds like a classic writing workshop, as opposed to a global project."

Yup.  Double yup.

I've thought about the irony of what I do today as a classroom teacher M-F while having spent much of the last few years trumpeting the potential blogging -- amongst other wild-eyed technology that is so often toyed about in these collective waters -- as a means to help kids master their global voice in an ever-changing learning landscape. 

Ironic, n'est-ce pas?

Heck, I even had the unmitigated audacity to suggest -- without apology and often paid very handsomely to do so by amazing professional audiences -- that it was about kids developing their global 'learning brand' in the process.

But here I am today, back in a real-live classroom with a kid-driven blog that is far surpassing my early expectations, ready and able to go global, a hop-skip-n-jump away from winning some tech-friendly award (I imagine) and in the process getting more Google Juice and digg-love than I can hold in 2 really, really, really big hands, no matter how much I tried to hold back the rising tide of good will.

And I'm not even sharing the links.  Or caring if my kids are the only ones that ever cannonball in these waters when all is said and done.

Why? 

Because that kid whose response lies above is kicking 'backside' (along with all of his classmates) without ever stepping over the garden wall.  And without any link love.  Or virtual podium clapping. 

Nope. 

They're doing it the same way we would have done it a generation ago.  Inside the classroom.  For their immediate peers.  And without needing to carry anyone's systemic banner in the process.

And as geeked out as I might personally be by inviting the world to Skype-sit down at the blog-table with all of my kids (because my students rock), the truth is that my students ain't for sale.

Not now.

And definitely not on my terms. 

And.  NOT.  Just.  Because.  I.  Can.  2.0.

2 questions for the brave-hearted William Wallace types out there in virtual teaching land:

Just how much is YOUR career and reputation being fueled (and confirmed) by putting your students' work out on the global front lines? 

And what proof do you have -- spreadsheet or anecdote; your choice -- that they really signed up for that program with clear insight into the long-term ramifications...just because you could flip the switch in a 21c kinda way?

I'm curious.

Really.

And perhaps it'll lead to a poster-session or workshop or bloggercon meet-up podcast at the next edu-conference in the process.   

'cause the more time I spend in the classroom these days, the more I'm wondering -- not in the tech-or-not-to-tech question actually matters kinda way (psst...it doesn't!) -- if we've all become like shaky heroin junkies unintentionally pawn-shopping off the raw intellectual evolution of our students just in order to feed our own latent middle-school popularity fears (hello, Technorati, anyone?), our own cravings for being 'taken seriously' as 'professionals' in a world that doesn't stand as impressed by the faculty room as it once was, and super-ego longings for legitimacy in the public arena of professional sword-play and semantics when worse comes to worse and we turn on each other in the nuanced corners of the edu-blogosphere without even the slightest sense of geez-shucks-gosh humor in the process.

I could be wrong.

Maybe someone can get their class to blog about it.  And send us the link.

(he smiles)

Just Like Shelley Did

Tomorrow the kids will walk into class with pristine copies of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. 

The first thing we'll do is look at a blank calendar.  4+ weeks until Winter Vacation will be highlighted.  The calendar will otherwise be empty 

Instead of being 'English students' dutifully following my syllabus and daily plan as is so tempting from the teacher's side of the desk, each of my 4 classes will become real-time archeologists, detectives, and futurists in an effort to co-develop a strategic plan for mastering this literary masterpiece.  The standards will be blatantly put forward: become an expert.  By any means necessary.

I'll present them with the pros/cons to all of their decisions (assigning nightly reading, what types of assessments will give them a reasoned 'final grade', etc.).  I'll present them with a 'menu' of elements they must accomplish (solo and in rotating small groups) before the project comes to an end and the semester exam is handed out.  I'll offer myself as a 'free' consultant for a specific # of days that they can 'hire' when they feel that they have exhausted their own instincts/research.  And I'll present them with a series of sink-or-swim options to allow those who are invested in learning to succeed and those who want to tread water to avoid absolute drowning along the way, all the while being a sheep dog with an eye on those that near a current they can't escape on their own. 

My bet? 

They'll come out knowing far more than they would have if I had assigned the 'perfect' syllabus.  The first-hand Mary Shelley "creation" metaphor will not be missed either, once they reflect back on the project a few weeks from now.  Forget talking about it.  Let's live it and see if a bit of intellectual empathy comes our collective way.

And I can't be more excited to bend the boundaries of the teacher/student role along the way.

P.S. Not even sure if I need a single computer to pull this off.  In fact, I'm just going back to a tried-n-true playbook from long before I even cared about email as a teacher, let alone all the digital horizon lines (that also geek me out).   

First Week Highlights

Highlights are funny things.

Sometimes they imply fireworks. Sometimes they just imply knowing where the stapler is.

In no particular order, here are a few shapshots that completely won me over in my first week back.  Can't wait to see what they'll be in a week's time (in addition to this list).  While this is hardly a complete list, each has been a particularly striking part of my return to the teacher's life once again...

Turning the Page

Dear Beowulf, Lord of the Flies. The Canterbury Tales, Frankenstein,

Thank you for re-entering my life over the last few days and weeks.  The semester ahead promises to be a remarkable journey.  And I hope that you find yourself falling in love with the adventure that we'll take together...and the students who will travel with you.

We've got battles to forge, pilgrimages to begin, creatures to stir electric life into, and moral questions of enormous importance to wrestle with in spite of answers not always being clear.  And we have a way to put our own unique punctuation point on stories and epic tales explored by countless generations before.

Falling in Love with Science

Invisible water?  (Thanks to DK/Mediasnackers for the link/story)

Man, if ONLY my high school science teachers realized that something like this would have won me over...and pay attention in the process!