Returning to Middle Earth

I recently had the pleasure of spending the afternoon with a number of returning graduates at our school.  In the bubble that I live in here, I'm proud to say that this is not an unusual event, but every so often I back-off and look at this from an outside point of view.

High school students, and beyond are coming back year after year to hang-out at their Junior High School.  I am certain I am not the only one that finds this to be a little "alarming".
They come on a Friday afternoon most often to drop in on their old teachers and meander their old stomping grounds.  Sometimes they sit in on our chapels, more often on old classes and once in a while their teacher convinces them to stay and speak to a lesson that is going on.

When I say I had the pleasure of spending the afternoon with a number of returning graduates, I mean it with all sincerity.  It was a pleasure and they came and spent the afternoon in my rooms, with my students, a part of what we are doing.  They speak as peers, as guests, and as mentors to my students.  They share their stories, their lives, and their wisdom with us when they come back.  They envigorate, entertain, and envy-- yes, envy-- our students... they wish they could still be here.

And they remind us (as teachers) of the lasting impact christian education has had on their lives well beyond the disharmony and dissatisfaction they had during their time of high-stakes exams, homework overload, uniform discipline and so-on.

If there are greener-pastures out there, I can not imagine them.  If there was something more positively impactful to happen near the end of a long year, I can not imagine what it would look like. 

Our school website would tell you this:

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Mission:

To educate children in a dynamic Christian environment dedicated to excellence in learning and life development.

Core Vision:

We envision a school dedicated to the education of each child as created in God's image, with students who pursue learning, desire to be responsible citizens, and who graduate, knowing what it means to have a passion for God.

Core Values:

To honour God in all aspects of the school program
To nurture the partnership and a growing sense of community among students, staff, parents and alumni

To challenge and support students to:

• embrace a Christian worldview;
• demonstrate Christian character;
• achieve their personal best in academic pursuits;
• be physically active and healthy;
• have an appreciation for the arts; and
• develop respectful relationships.

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I would simply show you that picture of a Grade 10 Student working with Grade 6 students collaboratively on a Monday afternoon, just because.  (There were four other Grade 10's with her...)
Then I'd say, it's ALL about relationship.
BTW:  I used SnapSeed to edit the photo in the interest of maintaining a modicum of privacy...  It's fabulous, and every so often it goes on sale (free).

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Check out this application on the App Store:

Snapseed

Nik Software, Inc.
Category: Photo & Video
Updated: Apr 19, 2012

 141 Ratings

Three Sides to Every Coin

In the recent past our school opened a new wing for our Jr. High students to enjoy.  As we took our fledglings under our new wing we hoped to see development toward a new and innovative approach to the system called "school".

Created on the iPad2 by @dramaticscience with cinemagr.am

My own goals included:
a) the ability of students to modify their space to suit their learning needs
b) the ability for teachers to modify their space to suit their learning needs
c) the ability for all to use technology that was appropriate to them
d) the ability for all to disrupt the status quo to discover new ways of doing age-old things.

...backfire...

It worked well, but it's happening in the wrong places, or for the wrong reasons.

From wikipedia:
A back-fire or backfire is an explosion produced by a running internal combustion engine that occurs in the air intake or exhaust system rather than inside the combustion chamber. The same term is used when unburned fuel or hydrocarbons are ignited somewhere in the exhaust system. A visible flame may momentarily shoot out of the exhaust pipe. Either condition causes an objectionable popping noise, together with possible loss of power and forward motion.

But a coin has two sides doesn't it?  When I sit back to look at this scenario it is easy to see both.

powered by Fotopedia

Side 1 @dramaticscience: This wk stdnts have switched their own scheds around, prioritized work-time over reg class time, & assumed control of learning life.#yay?

Side 2 @dramaticscience:  I.O.W. they skipped drama class to work on science projects last minute. Am I kewl with that? #morethanyoumightexpect

Side 3
But there's a third side, isn't there? The side of the coin that connects the two sides.  The side that circles both, and the side that you can carefully and precariously balance the coin on.  That's the side that we tend to forget about.  That's the side that sometimes we need to look at.

When we don't go together in a unified direction, when we don't support each other as we take risks to innovate, to improve, and to progress then we end up on two sides of the same coin, and that means we will fight to decide which side is up.

The tendency is to want to be on one side or the other.  Why not bring the two sides together and stand together on the third?  Perhaps then we'll prevent the backfires.

Ancient Greece and the Theatre

Mention "thespian" to a middle schooler and they all crack up. Humor is such an important method to teaching the younglings, especially when it borders on the inappropriate.

Mention teaching theatre history to middle school students to most drama teachers and you might get a very similar response... Still I have decided to give teaching theatre history to Grade 6 a shot to see what happens...

My Grade 6 lab rats seemed like a great place to start particularly because they are studying ancient Athens in their Social Studies Curriculum.

Working with @bar_qu means that I also have a partner in crime allowing me to continue my xcurricular pursuits. This time around though I was sure to Incorporate the Art teacher.

To be clear what I know of ancient Greece is very similar to what most of my students remember about being thespians... It has something or other to do with myths and "phallusies".

So I asked my students directly if they would like to receive a lesson and worksheet based on note collecting from a PowerPoint I found on "Ancient Greece for Kids" or if they would just prefer to research and perform their own Ancient Greek play about "A Day in the Life of an Ancient Athenian". (credit to @bar_qu for that one)

Funny... Only six of forty said they'd prefer me and notes over self-directed research... Currently I'm battling the urge to feel hurt and the urge to feel elated.

I assigned them small groups (SOLE methodology) with one tablet per group. I gave them a Greek letter as a group name for them to look up so they could inscribe it for themselves on their books. Then I asked, "what makes for an Ancient Greek Production?"

All the World's A Stage

They have currently had only 90 minutes to work but already they are telling me about:

• Comedies, Tragedies, and Satyr


• That the Agora was a pretty cool place to gather


• That our school Theatre is actually a lot like a Greek theatre and in fact some of the names are still the same.


• That men were the stage folk, and that if we're going to be doing this we're also going to need some masks.

I am a verbose lecturer at the best of times. They could have listened to me describe these things for an hour, retained less and had less fun. I guess I'm elated after all.

Currently they are taking pictures of our theatre to compare with schematics of a Dionysian Theatre and putting it all together using "Show Me"... But mostly they are eager to to start writing their scripts.

One girl asked if I was going to let the girls act? "Of course" I said, to which she responded: "Even though that wouldn't be authentic?"

Another girl asked if they would be allowed to use the social text to gather information to put in her play.

Folks, I can't make this stuff up... Oh yeah, and THIS (what your are reading) is my lesson plan.

The art teacher agreed ahead of time to give them time to build masks. The SS teacher will use his time to research A Day in the Life... And I will use the drama time to build costumes and scenes for our burgeoning chorus of players.

And I couldn't be more pleased with the learning, engagement, and attention/retention of details. Yes, I had a couple of Spartans vying for attention as they practiced for the Trojan wars. Man were they disappointed when they discovered that the Greeks let all the action occur off-stage; another detail they'll be sure to recall if there happened to be a test on this down the road.

Next up: A blog entry on why I'm making grade 7 students do monologues from Shakespeare's First Folio...

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The App' I discussed above is called Show Me. There are other great apps out there like this for free. This just happened to be available to the kids on the Apple Cart at school.

If all else FAILS improvise.

Today was the culmination of a project that (though not ill conceived) was certainly bred from a trial and error hodgepodge of good intention and the type of foresight you might expect from a gnat.  Gnats have foresight, I'm sure of it, it's just not very much I presume.  I did not look this up on wikipedia so please don't quote me on that.

Anyway...  Our journey along the path of mystery-story-telling-for-grade-6-science-students came to an end today, and that WAS planned for, and deliberate and rather last minute as school ends for the season come Friday.

Last week we used technology to create, manage, and curate EVIDENCE that students would provide to those who did not participate in the project.  The non-participators (heretofore referred to as: investigators) would then take said-evidence and try and solve the mystery story that was created.

Things needed to succeed?

We successful stored date, properly catalogued it but due to (again) this boiling pot of good intention and gnat-sight we have not yet found an effective or efficient method for retrieving data from a class set of iPads.  We leave our data at the whim of the Apple Cart users.  (aside: we call it the "Apple Cart" because Apple makes iPads and we put them on one big rechargeable wagon.  Clever right?)  I digress.

Today we arrived raring to go, only to find that our data had been wiped for an unanticipated software upgrade.

Four weeks of work finally stored and it was all for naught... or was it?

What to do.  I have 20 sixth grade students ready to participate in a project they have been waiting patiently to close for four weeks, and another 20 sixth grade students who have lost their proverbial mittens and didn't know where to find them.

This is where good structure, and a bit of flexibility comes in.

Because the students spent four structured weeks building the stories they had timelines, story-boards, documents, and mind-maps of the work they had done.  They were intimately familiar with the work that went into building an evidence bank (that was sadly wiped) and they were able to tell a good story.

Digital Curation

With minimal preparation they were able to welcome in a flurry of eager investigators and lead them through a story our drama students had carefully crafted collectively and collaboratively.  In a style similar to 20 questions the investigators were allowed to ask about the evidence they would have seen and then report their assumptions and conclusions to an online Google Form that would help them document their thinking.

After one failed attempt (which we applauded due to the fact that it inevitably led to successful learning so we could just as easily have labeled it the more PC "practice attempt") the students were able to (within 30 minutes) visit two different groups, hear two different mystery stories, and document two different conclusions with absolutely no direct intervention from resident adult "expert".

Things that were lost: physical data
Things that were gained: an adequate end to a project, and a set of data illustrating student thinking, and students capable of being flexible in how and when they show their learning.  They did a great job cleaning up after the mess that had been created.

Cleaning Up

One important item that I have purposefully left until now to reference is that there was one group who did not use their data.  Rather than trust the school "blanket" of iPads they chose to use their own personal devices (privately because of course they wouldn't want to get caught having their own personal devices out on school time) and so when they arrived today they had their entire project organized, itemized, and digitized for dissemination.  Suffice it to say, our investigators were over-joyed to be allowed to interact with this group.

I have, myself, compiled my own digital portfolio of work on my own personal device.  As you may have already realized I am working at incorporating a strong and appropriate use of modern technology in the drama classroom, and documenting processes and strategies for making work -- well -- work.

What follows is a short list of links and apps that have helped make the process easier and more "expressive".

My digital booklet showing the students' good work:
http://ebooks.scribblepress.com/book.php?g=LXLMZ4ZN

The app used to create the book on the iPad:

The app used to create annotations in the pictures shown (and published):

The apps are both free - and I like them.

Getting a Mark versus Leaving a Mark

Yesterday's post included a reference to students using the latest and greatest to create better opportunities for them to succeed.  Today I noticed through my twitter account that people had started to share that information.  The feeling I got knowing that the work we're doing is being seen, understood, and appreciated by others brought about a significant positive response in me.

I could not keep the news to myself so I shared what was written, and who shared it with the students of the class the post involved.  The next ten to fifteen was a remarkable exercise in listening to students about what they want versus what they get.

I have been encouraged in the past by work being done by other teachers.  The work that SCIL is doing to publish students work with a global outreach is the number one thing in the back of my mind today because my students actually ASKED if they could publish their work publicly.  They wanted to know if what they're doing is valuable to others.  Seeing the public response to my work made them wonder if the mark that they were getting for some class assignment was as important as the mark they are leaving behind.

In a christian institution such as the one I teach in, the value of outreach (evangelism) is certainly forefront in what we do, and yet we so rarely value our students work by saying "This is worthy of publication".  Even if it is just short snippets, digital summaries, or brief vlogs it is becoming so very apparent that students are hoping their work is looked at not only for an evaluation of common learning outcomes, but for the value it has in the growing database of global knowledge, world-view, and editorial.

If I can use the world-wide-web as a place to promote strong educational practice, and curate my own sense of what counts as "good work" then I can model the practice for a growing number of students who would like to do the same.

The video embedded here is a brief example of that digital curation. It can be done so quickly and easily now-a-days.  Imagine this in the hands of students who want to show what they are most proud of...

The app used to create and upload the video is Videolicious.  It's free, very simple to use.  The only drawback is the length of video is restricted to 50 seconds.  I appreciate brevity, but sometimes it's a little restrictive.

Game Changer

I have been looking to find a secure way to bring live chat into the classroom without having to create accounts, join social networks, or hire out to a consulting firm who will simply create accounts on another silly social network. I figured Bluetooth was the solution but not having a degree in computer science my best effort is what shows up on 'gadget blogs' or @wired.

Last night I started to think my dreams might one day be fully realized.

I don't want to be an app reviewer. The Lord has anointed several thousand of those already. I want to inform good practice with better tech by remaining old ideas in new ways.

BT Chat for iPad and iPod.

I wasn't sold on a school set of iPads. BUT we have one which means we're moving forward and it is time to manage and problem solve... Or problem solve our management system... I digress.

Each iPad has Bluetooth capacity. That's kewl, I wonder why? They're all on our network after all?

This is an app that allows two apple devices to chat back and forth without having to be part of a network. Not that useful. More useful: BT Chat allows a user to host a group chat on their tablet over a local network... GAME CHANGER.

This means I can create a closed chat room on my school network that any number of students can join. I can screencast the chat to a nearby projector and now I've got my own local twitter-roll.

Plus... It's free with very modest advertising.

I can't wait to put it through the Grade 7 CE Bootcamp.... Or chat at the next Twitter-blocked EdConference!