In my last post, I outlined in some detail my failure at Challenge Based Learning (CBL). I promised the second post would be more hopeful, and it is. I will tell you what I learned from last year and how I plan to get better results from this year's class.
1. Assign groups - While I thought it was a good way to get brainstorming going with only 9 people, I think I inadvertently sent the message that this was pretty casual. I didn't actually feel that way, but the formality of assigning groups implies a thoughtful process. It also allows you to mix your personality types in a way that encourages good discussion.
2. Be VERY clear up front - It would destroy the purpose of challenge based learning to give them the outcome you want and put it on a rubric. However, we wasted quite a bit of time when they didn't understand the point of the project. This year, I made a video using Screencastify, outlining the purpose of the project. It included a picture of a refrigerator and one of a fan. Also, I will be telling them a bit about last year's difficulty so that they won't think this is about a global energy crisis.
3. Don't tell - do guide (at the beginning) - When I heard discussions about war with Cuba and volcanoes, I should have realized that they didn't understand the project's purpose. I thought they were trying to be funny and waited it out. If I could do that one over, I would have stopped early on and said, "Tell me what you think the point of this project is." Your guidance should be MOSTLY in the form of asking leading questions.
4. Set benchmarks - I did this last year, but I don't think I did it enough. I should have been asking them to blog their progress each week or giving exit tickets on Wednesdays. While letting them sink or swim can be valuable, this might have been a helpful floaty in the pool.
5. Expect more - I never communicated this out loud, but I may have in my demeanor. Even as I talked through this project with our technology coach, I kept saying, "Who knows? I don't know what to expect from this group." This year, I have much higher expectations of these groups. I still don't know what they will come up with at the end, but I feel like they will have more interesting ideas.
6. Try to say "Yes" - When you first hear an idea, don't jump to the immediate conclusion that it can't work. There are limits to this; we weren't going to use electric eel tanks or steal electricity from the Dominican Republic. That said, when an idea that sounds "a little" out there comes up, don't just say it won't work. Ask the right questions. It could be that they are on a service road to a really good highway and just need to find the on-ramp. If they aren't, asking the right questions will allow them to come to that conclusion on their own.
I will be introducing this project on Friday, so I'll let you all know how it goes in coming weeks.
Monday, January 25, 2016
CBL - My First Attempt - Epic Fail (Post 1 of 2)
Last year, I had the interesting experience of experimenting for the first time with a Challenge Based Learning project, also known as a CBL. My experience was, to put it mildly, an epic failure. We accomplished little, and my students learned little. I hope that I learned a lot because I am about to try it again.
For those who don't know, a CBL is a project in which students solve a real-world problem. They are required to communicate, collaborate, think critically, and think creatively. My experience last year was a failure on every level. Let me start at the beginning.
Step 1: Present the Challenge - I already had a physics project related to our chapter on electricity, so I thought I would replace it with a CBL about electricity. I brought in a guest speaker, our IT director. He had lived in Haiti for several years, and he shared his experiences with them about inconsistent power delivery. He shared how it was really important for a family to keep their refrigerator running to avoid food spoilage and to keep fans running to blow off disease-carrying insects. I only had nine students, so I kept them as one group. I told them we would split into two groups if there were two viable ideas that came out during the brainstorming time.
Step 2: Begin Brainstorming - Houston, we have a problem. As my students began to make suggestions, I heard things like:
- "Steal electricity from the Dominican Republic"
- "Go to war with Cuba, and take electricity from them."
- "Let America solve it."
- "Electric eel tank" (I thought he was joking when he brought it up, but he was quite serious.)
- "Tap into a volcano for geothermal energy."
I had hoped that we were just getting the silliness out of the way, so I set a deadline for some serious guiding questions (part of CBL) and suggestions for real plans during the following week. Then I began hearing from other teachers. One of them said that a physics student had come to her, distressed that Miss Hawks was trying to get them to "solve the energy crisis." Huh?
Step 3: Reboot - Apparently, what I had thought was clear was not clear. I sent the following e-mail.
Hoping we were at least now clear on the problem, I reset some dates. We started over.
Step 4: Communication and Collaboration
Our school schedule is different on Wednesdays because we have chapel services. For that reason, I have physics the last period of the day. Since it is harder for them to pay attention to me, I try to make project presentations, work days, and videos on Wednesdays. For seven weeks, every Wednesday was a project work day. They could use it for research, collaboration, figuring out timelines, or actually building something. For the first three weeks, it was silent in my room. I don't mean it was kind of quiet. I mean it was exam-time-graveyard-is anyone here today quiet. These were nine people who were supposed to be collaborating. At the end of the third week, I asked them about it. "You want us to talk in class?" was their response. I told them that most people, when given a project work day, did talk about what they were doing and what they were going to do. It got a little better. I started hearing some murmurings about something with a lawn mower motor, so I considered that progress - until the following Wednesday. One of my students showed up with a bag full of lemons and a pile of wires. He sat at the table, stripping the insulation off of the wires. When asked what he was doing, he said, "stripping wires." Some of the others were baffled because they had a plan with a lawn mower motor that had nothing to do with lemons. Some were baffled because they hadn't even known there was that plan.
As a teacher, it was naturally my first instinct to jump in and solve this for them. I knew that wouldn't be best for them and that they needed to have this bizarre conversation, so I wrote a blog post about not helping just to keep myself from getting involved.
Step 5: Execute Your Plan
As we got further along in the project, I asked the students what their plan was for building this generator device. "Wait, what? We have to build it?" I reminded them that while we were having the electric eel tank / war with Cuba discussion, I had said several times that I didn't think we could do that as a class. I had told them we would be building their idea, not just having an idea. They collected some money as a group. On the last day of the project, one of them had attached a two-inch solar panel to the world's smallest fan. Another brought in a handheld steam generator, which lit a 10W light bulb. Needless, to say, I felt like my experiment with CBL was a bit of a failure.
Step 6: How to I Grade This?
Despite the obvious failure of this attempt, I didn't feel like I could just chuck the entire experience. I needed to give them some kind of credit for what they did do and, more importantly, require them to reflect on the experience. I created a list of questions based on those four C's I mentioned earlier - Communication, Collaboration, Critical Thinking, and Creativity. (Apparently, I can't attach a document to this post, so comment if you would like my list of questions.) They had to take a hard look at themselves. If they gave it some honest, deep thought, I gave them credit. If they gave the answer they thought I wanted, they lost points. I don't know how this will impact them in the future, but I know that John Dewey said, "We do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience."
My next post will be more hopeful. It will tell you what I learned from this experience so that it can go better this year. We start on Friday, so I will keep you updated.
For those who don't know, a CBL is a project in which students solve a real-world problem. They are required to communicate, collaborate, think critically, and think creatively. My experience last year was a failure on every level. Let me start at the beginning.
Step 1: Present the Challenge - I already had a physics project related to our chapter on electricity, so I thought I would replace it with a CBL about electricity. I brought in a guest speaker, our IT director. He had lived in Haiti for several years, and he shared his experiences with them about inconsistent power delivery. He shared how it was really important for a family to keep their refrigerator running to avoid food spoilage and to keep fans running to blow off disease-carrying insects. I only had nine students, so I kept them as one group. I told them we would split into two groups if there were two viable ideas that came out during the brainstorming time.
Step 2: Begin Brainstorming - Houston, we have a problem. As my students began to make suggestions, I heard things like:
- "Steal electricity from the Dominican Republic"
- "Go to war with Cuba, and take electricity from them."
- "Let America solve it."
- "Electric eel tank" (I thought he was joking when he brought it up, but he was quite serious.)
- "Tap into a volcano for geothermal energy."
I had hoped that we were just getting the silliness out of the way, so I set a deadline for some serious guiding questions (part of CBL) and suggestions for real plans during the following week. Then I began hearing from other teachers. One of them said that a physics student had come to her, distressed that Miss Hawks was trying to get them to "solve the energy crisis." Huh?
Step 3: Reboot - Apparently, what I had thought was clear was not clear. I sent the following e-mail.
Hoping we were at least now clear on the problem, I reset some dates. We started over.
Step 4: Communication and Collaboration
Our school schedule is different on Wednesdays because we have chapel services. For that reason, I have physics the last period of the day. Since it is harder for them to pay attention to me, I try to make project presentations, work days, and videos on Wednesdays. For seven weeks, every Wednesday was a project work day. They could use it for research, collaboration, figuring out timelines, or actually building something. For the first three weeks, it was silent in my room. I don't mean it was kind of quiet. I mean it was exam-time-graveyard-is anyone here today quiet. These were nine people who were supposed to be collaborating. At the end of the third week, I asked them about it. "You want us to talk in class?" was their response. I told them that most people, when given a project work day, did talk about what they were doing and what they were going to do. It got a little better. I started hearing some murmurings about something with a lawn mower motor, so I considered that progress - until the following Wednesday. One of my students showed up with a bag full of lemons and a pile of wires. He sat at the table, stripping the insulation off of the wires. When asked what he was doing, he said, "stripping wires." Some of the others were baffled because they had a plan with a lawn mower motor that had nothing to do with lemons. Some were baffled because they hadn't even known there was that plan.
As a teacher, it was naturally my first instinct to jump in and solve this for them. I knew that wouldn't be best for them and that they needed to have this bizarre conversation, so I wrote a blog post about not helping just to keep myself from getting involved.
Step 5: Execute Your Plan
As we got further along in the project, I asked the students what their plan was for building this generator device. "Wait, what? We have to build it?" I reminded them that while we were having the electric eel tank / war with Cuba discussion, I had said several times that I didn't think we could do that as a class. I had told them we would be building their idea, not just having an idea. They collected some money as a group. On the last day of the project, one of them had attached a two-inch solar panel to the world's smallest fan. Another brought in a handheld steam generator, which lit a 10W light bulb. Needless, to say, I felt like my experiment with CBL was a bit of a failure.
Step 6: How to I Grade This?
Despite the obvious failure of this attempt, I didn't feel like I could just chuck the entire experience. I needed to give them some kind of credit for what they did do and, more importantly, require them to reflect on the experience. I created a list of questions based on those four C's I mentioned earlier - Communication, Collaboration, Critical Thinking, and Creativity. (Apparently, I can't attach a document to this post, so comment if you would like my list of questions.) They had to take a hard look at themselves. If they gave it some honest, deep thought, I gave them credit. If they gave the answer they thought I wanted, they lost points. I don't know how this will impact them in the future, but I know that John Dewey said, "We do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience."
My next post will be more hopeful. It will tell you what I learned from this experience so that it can go better this year. We start on Friday, so I will keep you updated.
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Make a Memory
School, like a lot of long-term experiences, can become a monotonous series of similar days. To some extent, that is good and necessary. Routines are important to safety, security, and proper function. If, when you went to work each day, you had zero idea of what to expect, your job would be difficult to master. It might seem fun for a few days; but after a while, it would result in a lack of security. Get ready for a big however.
HOWEVER, the days you remember from school are probably not the everyday ins and outs of grammar and math and foreign language. They are the days where something different happened. My most memorable experience of elementary school is the day we read the story of the Gingerbread man. We went as a class to the school kitchen and made a giant Gingerbread man. When we returned at the end of the baking time, he was gone. We went from room to room, seeking out our gingerbread man. We learned directions. We learned to talk to older kids and their teachers. We learned the joy of finding something lost (which was the point, if I remember correctly). Each year after that, I would enjoy reliving the experience as small people came into my classroom in search of their lost gingerbread man.
My most memorable experience from high school came at the end of our reading of The Great Gatsby. It was school tradition that when all of the English classes had finished Fitzgerald's masterpiece, there would be a party worthy of the time. As students, we were assigned to committees (decorating our English classroom or the hallway, food, music, etc.), and our work on that committee comprised half of our grade. We were required to dress in period costume (the other half of the grade) and were given extra credit for dressing as a character from the novel. We could attend this party during our English period and our lunch time, but since party crashing is a frequent occurrence in the novel, we felt obliged to try it and didn't get into too much trouble if we did. The school has stopped this tradition for a variety of reasons, and it makes me sad. The memory of that day is still connected to my enjoyment of the novel.
It is important to help our students create memories of their school experiences. At my school, the elementary campus really excels at this. When the kindergarten learns about Antarctica, they come dressed as different types of penguins for a day. They march around the building, squawking and having a great time. If they remain at the school, they will experience it again each year, much as I did with the gingerbread man. When fourth grade learns about planets, they come dressed on different days with some item that is meaningful about that planet. One day, they wear sunglasses and surgical masks to represent Mercury and Venus. When they learn about the civil war, they set up tents on the school lawn and come dressed as either union or confederate soldiers. They spend the day eating as soldiers, learning to darn socks, and hearing from experts on the war. Years later, I still hear them reference this experience, especially if it was particularly cold or raining their fourth-grade year.
By necessity, this looks a little different in middle and high school. Because they travel from class to class, it would be logistically rather difficult to have an all day experience (although that can and does happen from time to time). Rather, we tend to work our memorable experiences into projects. The two physics teachers do climb to the top of the school building every year to throw egg drop projects down to the parking lot, and I like to think they will look back fondly on that experience. Our math teachers give students all kinds of mathematical memories, like flying kites they make themselves. Our foreign language departments take advantage of holidays specific to French and Spanish speaking countries. The Latin club even marked Saturnalia just before Christmas break. This week, my physics students are presenting projects that I call Free Choice Projects (I think I'll do a post on that project at some point because it is a great project). They decide what the memorable experience will be. I've had years in which students analyzed blood spatter by smashing balloons of colored corn syrup. I had a student build a hovercraft, which we all enjoyed riding. One of my groups this week is presenting the physics of swimming. They asked if they could do a live demonstration rather than a video, so we will be heading to the area aquatic center for one class period. As students gather around the pool, I believe they will create a better connection of memory to Newton's laws than they would if they were watching a video, not to mention they will think of more interesting questions, which the experts can address on the spot.
It isn't always possible to break from the day to day experience of class time. When it is possible, make every effort to do it. After all, we want them to learn the curriculum; but what we really want is for them to love learning. It is that love that will make them want to learn as much as possible for the rest of their lives.
Do you have a favorite memory of school? Feel free to comment.
HOWEVER, the days you remember from school are probably not the everyday ins and outs of grammar and math and foreign language. They are the days where something different happened. My most memorable experience of elementary school is the day we read the story of the Gingerbread man. We went as a class to the school kitchen and made a giant Gingerbread man. When we returned at the end of the baking time, he was gone. We went from room to room, seeking out our gingerbread man. We learned directions. We learned to talk to older kids and their teachers. We learned the joy of finding something lost (which was the point, if I remember correctly). Each year after that, I would enjoy reliving the experience as small people came into my classroom in search of their lost gingerbread man.
My most memorable experience from high school came at the end of our reading of The Great Gatsby. It was school tradition that when all of the English classes had finished Fitzgerald's masterpiece, there would be a party worthy of the time. As students, we were assigned to committees (decorating our English classroom or the hallway, food, music, etc.), and our work on that committee comprised half of our grade. We were required to dress in period costume (the other half of the grade) and were given extra credit for dressing as a character from the novel. We could attend this party during our English period and our lunch time, but since party crashing is a frequent occurrence in the novel, we felt obliged to try it and didn't get into too much trouble if we did. The school has stopped this tradition for a variety of reasons, and it makes me sad. The memory of that day is still connected to my enjoyment of the novel.
It is important to help our students create memories of their school experiences. At my school, the elementary campus really excels at this. When the kindergarten learns about Antarctica, they come dressed as different types of penguins for a day. They march around the building, squawking and having a great time. If they remain at the school, they will experience it again each year, much as I did with the gingerbread man. When fourth grade learns about planets, they come dressed on different days with some item that is meaningful about that planet. One day, they wear sunglasses and surgical masks to represent Mercury and Venus. When they learn about the civil war, they set up tents on the school lawn and come dressed as either union or confederate soldiers. They spend the day eating as soldiers, learning to darn socks, and hearing from experts on the war. Years later, I still hear them reference this experience, especially if it was particularly cold or raining their fourth-grade year.
By necessity, this looks a little different in middle and high school. Because they travel from class to class, it would be logistically rather difficult to have an all day experience (although that can and does happen from time to time). Rather, we tend to work our memorable experiences into projects. The two physics teachers do climb to the top of the school building every year to throw egg drop projects down to the parking lot, and I like to think they will look back fondly on that experience. Our math teachers give students all kinds of mathematical memories, like flying kites they make themselves. Our foreign language departments take advantage of holidays specific to French and Spanish speaking countries. The Latin club even marked Saturnalia just before Christmas break. This week, my physics students are presenting projects that I call Free Choice Projects (I think I'll do a post on that project at some point because it is a great project). They decide what the memorable experience will be. I've had years in which students analyzed blood spatter by smashing balloons of colored corn syrup. I had a student build a hovercraft, which we all enjoyed riding. One of my groups this week is presenting the physics of swimming. They asked if they could do a live demonstration rather than a video, so we will be heading to the area aquatic center for one class period. As students gather around the pool, I believe they will create a better connection of memory to Newton's laws than they would if they were watching a video, not to mention they will think of more interesting questions, which the experts can address on the spot.
It isn't always possible to break from the day to day experience of class time. When it is possible, make every effort to do it. After all, we want them to learn the curriculum; but what we really want is for them to love learning. It is that love that will make them want to learn as much as possible for the rest of their lives.
Do you have a favorite memory of school? Feel free to comment.
Monday, January 11, 2016
Introvert and Extroverts
I am an extrovert. Anyone who has ever met me would agree. I'm loud, and I talk all the time. While neither of those is the definition of extrovert, they are certainly signs. I don't like small talk and schmoozing at our annual meet and greet, so I must be on the mild end of extroversion; but if I spend more than one day at home alone, I get a little stir crazy. Last year, we had 3 snow days following a four-day weekend, and I was about to lose my mind before we got back to school.
As a teacher, I have a blend of personality types in my classes - extroverts and introverts, verbal processors and artistic processors, kids with autism and kids who are social butterflies. Those that are not like me are harder for me to understand, but I must still give them what they need. It is not loving to care well only for those who are like yourself, so I must learn to care for my introverts. Some of my favorite students have been introverts, once I figured out a way to get to know them without talking.
If you are like me and are looking for a resource to help you understand your introverts, I recommend the book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain. If that's too much reading for you, let me recommend her TED Talk. A self-professed introvert, she will give you a glimpse contributions that introverts have made in our world and let you see that they are busy mentally while the extroverts are busy verbally.
As I listened to her talk the first time, it occurred to me that this is one of my pendulum swings in education. Education is always trying to address the needs of some group that has been marginalized when the pendulum was swinging the other way. For decades, we treated school as a quiet place where students only listened and rarely spoke. If a teacher assigned a group project, that teacher was considered extreme. This left the extroverts feeling anxious. As the educational system started analyzing who they weren't serving well, they made radical changes. Now, it is odd for students to have a solo assignment. Collaboration is the default position. Desks are in pods to facilitate collaboration, and students are expected to communicate for much of their day. While this is great for the extroverts, it has left the introverts feeling anxious.
Neither of these models is the right way. Neither of them is really wrong, either, except that they both address the needs of only one type of student. We know that we have many types of students in our classrooms, and while we cannot give them perfectly what they each need every minute of every day, we can address each of their needs within the week or day or class period, depending on how our schools are structured.
I recently heard a speech by Cynthia Tobias, and she gave some great practical advice. Each day, she said, give your students
- an opportunity to talk.
- an opportunity to visualize something.
- an opportunity to move.
On behalf of my sweet introverts, I would add one thing to that list. Give them an opportunity to spend a few moments in quiet thought. You can actually incorporate all of these into one activity. You can give them a question that requires visualization and say, "We will spend 1 minute thinking about this. Paint the picture in your own mind without talking. Then, get up and walk to your partner (who would, in this situation, not be the person next to them) and spend one minute telling them what you were thinking. They will spend one minute sharing with you. Then come back to your seat." This gives the introverts, the extroverts, and the movers what they need in three minutes. You might not be able to do that every day, but you could probably find a way to work it in once a week.
Using technology will also involve introverts in a way a class discussion might not. My school as a learning management system that gives us the option to have discussion boards. I have found these to be a powerful tool for my introverts. If we have an in-class debate, there are a handful of students that will lead that discussion. I have always required that everyone must contribute at least one substantive comment, but I had to drag it out of some students. After we adopted the learning management system, I added something to our debates. I created a discussion board. I didn't have the introverts in mind when I did this; it was really just to keep the discussion going. What I found, however, was that those who had said nothing out loud in class contributed very strong opinions on the discussion board. They were more articulate and contributed far more than what I tried to pull from them while they were uncomfortable.
Thursday, January 7, 2016
My Favorite Chapter
My first year of teaching began in 1998. Since I taught freshmen, I was less than 10 years older than my students. Most of the time, they didn't make me feel old because we had a shared experience of most movies and music. That changed the first time I referenced the explosion of the Challenger. They didn't know what I was talking about. Granted, I was only in the 4th grade when the shuttle exploded, but it was such a big event in my life that it seemed strange that it wouldn't be in theirs. As we talked about it, I realized that they were only two years old when it happened. I started looking at history curricula and realized that there was nowhere in a student's education where they learned about the history of manned space exploration.
I decided to add this to my own curriculum. I created a two-week unit. We begin with a discussion about Sputnik and President Kennedy's "before this decade is out" speech. I used a few episodes of the excellent HBO mini-series From the Earth to the Moon (Thank you to Ron Howard and Tom Hanks for making those). We then turn our attention toward the possibility of putting a man on Mars. My students must look at the risks, the benefits, the costs, and the logistical issues of such a trip. They write a five paragraph persuasive essay on whether or not we should try it.
This unit has become a favorite, not only of mine, but also of my 8th graders. It is a great way to return from Christmas. They love the videos. The idea of going to space just captures the imagination in a big way. Even the day we talk about the fatal events of the Apollo 1 fire, the Challenger explosion, and the Columbia disaster, they are fully engaged with the material. Just as it would be with anything else, I don't get them all interested; but there is at least one student every year who catches the bug. They start learning about NASA and watching space documentaries. They return from their DC field trip and tell me excitedly about seeing the Apollo 11 capsule at the Air and Space Museum. Alumni often contact me when they learn of some space news or visit a rocket center. It sticks with them more than any other unit I teach.
A lot of curriculum is dictated to us by our school, school system, or state. Even the federal government now thinks they need to dictate our curriculum. The response of my students to this chapter always reminds me to balance those dictates. The decisions for my classroom should be made out of passion for learning, curiosity, and what is best for my kids, not just what is required. If all my students needed was the book and a list of objectives, they wouldn't need teachers.
I decided to add this to my own curriculum. I created a two-week unit. We begin with a discussion about Sputnik and President Kennedy's "before this decade is out" speech. I used a few episodes of the excellent HBO mini-series From the Earth to the Moon (Thank you to Ron Howard and Tom Hanks for making those). We then turn our attention toward the possibility of putting a man on Mars. My students must look at the risks, the benefits, the costs, and the logistical issues of such a trip. They write a five paragraph persuasive essay on whether or not we should try it.
This unit has become a favorite, not only of mine, but also of my 8th graders. It is a great way to return from Christmas. They love the videos. The idea of going to space just captures the imagination in a big way. Even the day we talk about the fatal events of the Apollo 1 fire, the Challenger explosion, and the Columbia disaster, they are fully engaged with the material. Just as it would be with anything else, I don't get them all interested; but there is at least one student every year who catches the bug. They start learning about NASA and watching space documentaries. They return from their DC field trip and tell me excitedly about seeing the Apollo 11 capsule at the Air and Space Museum. Alumni often contact me when they learn of some space news or visit a rocket center. It sticks with them more than any other unit I teach.
A lot of curriculum is dictated to us by our school, school system, or state. Even the federal government now thinks they need to dictate our curriculum. The response of my students to this chapter always reminds me to balance those dictates. The decisions for my classroom should be made out of passion for learning, curiosity, and what is best for my kids, not just what is required. If all my students needed was the book and a list of objectives, they wouldn't need teachers.
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