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| endlessorigami.com/comic/group-projects/ |
Think about it. As soon as a group of people understood something they wanted the other people in their group to understand, they shared the information to increase the group’s understanding. That might have been the best methods for hunting, the skills for carving marble or how to read. If you’ve ever spent time on a farm or with puppies, you know it’s not just people who teach and learn, but also animals teach and learn together. Researchers suggest even moths and insects are not driven entirely by instinct and may be trained to smell for chemical weapons!!
The politics of learning: the what, when, where, how and why we learning, have existed nearly as long as learning itself. Once we know how to teach something at some point we also have to answer the question, “Is it ethical to train moths to smell for chemical weapons?” While there is plenty of room for debate about topics in education like standardized testing, or whole language vs. phonics, what can’t be debated is that kids who learn to communicate effectively, solve problems creatively and think critically will be more successful in their endeavors than those who don’t learn these skills.
Yet teaching these skills without a sense of connection to others developed through social interaction and collaboration can create more havoc than having a society of ignorant morons because that same creative, critically-thinking, smooth-talking problem solving student could end up another Bernie Madoff rather than an Irene Sendler. While both were creative, critical and perhaps even deceptively sneaky problem solvers and risk takers, one had a sense of concern for others and is considered a hero, while the other has been called a sociopath and diagnosed, probably without substantial counter argument, as suffering from anti-social personality disorder.
This is some of the thought process that goes on in my mind when I consider what we do every day as teachers. We must remember the importance and power of the decisions we make, the activities we assign and the way we interact with our students every day. On our good days we help student make sense of the world, of themselves, and of each other. On our best days, we inspire them to help others do the same. As they say, “A picture is worth a thousand words” - the difference speaks for itself.
We know as teachers if we want our kids to think well and communicate well, we have got to create opportunities that are interesting enough to engage them in new ways in order to challenge them to develop these desired skills. Helping them to tap into themselves to apply their inborn, natural creativity and curiosity to a situation or problem that challenge has to be interesting or rewarding, and preferably both or else we all know there are far more rewarding, easier ways for kids to distract themselves.
The rewards our system uses and the ones the kids are used to are grades. Grades are a reflection of assessment and are a great reward when the student does well, but there are others that can be very motivating like winning a competition or simple prizes (praise, stickers, money, pizza day, free homework coupon, special seating in the class, etc.), the enjoyment of interesting, meaningful work and the joy of being of service to others. There are other ways, but these are some intrinsic motivators for most people. The better assignments have more of these motivational rewards, which is why filling out a ditto isn’t too rewarding, but a grape smelly sticker for a 100% makes a not-so-interesting assignment better.
One part of teaching I love is where I get to create new one of these real-world activities that matter. The inspirations can come from the strangest places. In the late 90’s during my first years of teaching, my family was experiencing the changes and challenges of my uncle’s recent Alzheimer’s diagnosis. I started to learn much more about the difficult realities of this disease on my visits with my mother and aunt to my uncle in the Alzheimer’s facility. Talking with workers there I found out about the spectrum of the illness and found out that while some patients recall nothing, some can still clearly recall the past very clearly. My uncle was WW II Pacific Theater Veteran and shared stories about old cars, and his work in the space industry on the first space craft to go to Mars. He was sharing not just his, but America’s history.
It was from this experience of listening to stories that I developed an assignment for students to create oral history PowerPoints from interviewing patients and families that would be supported by scanning family documents and photos. Of course, an older person wouldn’t need to have Alzheimer’s in order to enjoy the interaction and experience of having their story compiled for the family to enjoy and share. It was only years later that I found out that my big, original idea was actually old hat and could be found in a number of different variations on the Internet.
When I was thinking about my Four C’s of February Blog Assignment, this Oral History Assignment was the first one I created myself that challenged students to engage in all four C’s in meaningful ways and I loved everything about it: meaningful connections between the students with the families and then with each other as they shared about their senior, meaningful use of technology to create a meaningful final product that used creativity and critical thinking to organize and plan the story in a format that could be enjoyed and shared by the family for a long time to come. I didn’t use that one because I am not doing that assignment currently, I am doing the one I want to share about!
The good news is there are lots of new ideas for creative assignments on the Internet, so I don’t have to work so hard. The even better great news is that many organizations, like newspapers and community interest groups, have created all sorts of classroom opportunities that even sometimes offer cash prizes and the groups are just looking for us to tackle them! In fact, there’s even a website that collects student competitions in every category from STEM to Arts in one place!!
I started a new job as teacher for the TPHS Peer Assistant Leadership (PALS) class here three years ago. That January I got an email from the Directing Change Program with an amazing contest that fit in directly with the our Yellow Ribbon Suicide Prevention Week activities in March.
The contest is part of statewide efforts to prevent suicide, reduce stigma and discrimination related to mental illness, and to promote the mental health and wellness of students by having groups of up to four students create 60-second Public Service Announcement videos that address Suicide Prevention or Eliminating the Stigma of Mental Illness and meet the criteria and requirements specifically outlined on the website’s contest rule section.
We submitted our final videos last week and there are some amazing ones that are totally student created. Check out two here:
This initiative is funded by the Mental Health Services Act (Prop 63) and administered by the California Mental Health Services Authority (CalMHSA). For High school students 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners are selected in each category from nine regions within the state of California by a regional judging panel with Regional Cash Prizes in each category of 1st place: $500, 2nd place: $250 and 3rd place: $250 plus schools associated with the winning film in each category, in each region receive $250! All regional first place winners will be provided with travel stipends to attend a legislative briefing at the Capitol and the award ceremony in Sacramento. Winning films will be featured on the Directing Change compilation DVD and the program website which are more props and motivation for the students.
I make it very clear from the start this is a big assignment worth 12% of their grade (One letter grade) and that if it is not accepted by the Directing Change Judges for failure to meet the requirements of the contest, they get a 0 on the assignment and lose a letter grade in the class. They also must meet the deadline, because a busted deadline is a 0 as well. The kids work together, communicate, delegate, use all sorts of technology and time management skills including the website’s checklist to meet all of the criteria of the competition.
The best news for me as a teacher, besides being amazed every year by the films some of the groups create, is that the ENTIRE assignment is already created! The rubrics, the requirements, the forms, everything! All I need to do is create time in class, set requirements and deadlines for the different parts of the process: I use previous examples of great storyboarding and a website with resources, I have students who have had Film Class do a lesson for the class on the different types of shots which the kids love to watch and hear and I show different examples to get the students thinking creatively and pumped up to take me back to Sacramento for the Awards Ceremony again!
Last year I saw first had the advantage of having students with technical film skills involved in the process so I invited Derek Brunkhorst to have members of his Advanced Video Film class join our teams to represent Torrey Pines and create the best videos possible. We all know success breeds success and the students have brought their filming to a whole new level this year as a result of the stories and experience I can share from the previous two years of competition. (think go pro cameras attached to flying drones for aerial shots of football players!!!)
Most students don’t like group work and they like out-of-class group work even less, but students LOVE this assignment because it’s real-world with a real purpose plus there’s the potential to win recognition, a trophy, cash prizes and an all-expense paid trip to Sacramento while being creative, using technology, doing work to reduce suffering and learning.
And to talk for a minute about the learning. The students become exceptionally knowledgeable about mental illness or suicide prevention by the end of meeting all of the film requirements because they are applying what they learn to what they are doing. They also learn about meeting deadlines, communicating with others, attention to details, the value of planning out a great storyboard, in addition to learning how creative and powerful their actions can be to help other people. I encourage you to find a competition that meets your coursework and motivate your students to compete and maybe win!
