The Craziness In My Brain...

For starters, I want to say thank you to anyone who cares enough to read the musings of a teacher with a need to think-out-loud.  It means a lot to not just be talking alone in the dark!

Along that note - I LOVE MY JOB! I have ben having a great time, developing great teaching and learning experiences, and growing with every minute.  While it is extremely overwhelming at times, I feel like I am submerged in a culture where I am free to explore new ideas and really live my passion - education on the edge.  On the edge of what? Everything! The freedom to take risks in an effort to provide engaging and authentic education rocks!  

That being said, I am struggling with trying to know how to deliver the CONTENT, while still keeping with the framework for exemplary teaching and learning.  Today my teaching partner and I combined our classes (for a grand total of 50 students), and in the library they experienced a (brace yourself) LECTURE. It was not your typical lecture, there were videos and a dramatization challenge, but I walked away feeling like I did not support the students well enough before jumping into the Charter of Rights & Freedoms and it's relation to the Indian Act...  I decided to jump into it so that they will be prepared to consider such things next week when we are in Bamfield BC - but am wondering if it was the right choice, and if I will be able to backpedal a bit to make sure that we don't superficially cover something so important.  

But - Bamfield! On Sunday we (4 teachers, 6 parents, 2 administrators, and 94 students) are going to the Bamfield Marine Science Center for a week long field trip!  We will be doing all kinds of science during the day (for the Science 9 Biodiversity unit), and diving into some Humanities in the evening.  I am excited to challenge the kids to let themselves be inspired by their beautiful surroundings and amazing experiences.  Stay posted for pics and more!

I have so much more to say - other online platforms that have found their way into my classroom, upcoming projects, there's too much!  (Posting more regularly may solve this dilemma!)

Thanks again, talk to you soon.

:)

Innovation & Collaboration

Well, with day two over, and the students coming in the morning, I am as ready as I am ever going to be :)
After spending two days with my team and really beginning to understand what collaboration is at CSS, I am more encouraged than ever.  The flexibility that is required is a challenge, but planning time and having grade level teams means that you are never going to be floundering by yourself.  I have completely enjoyed meeting everyone that I will have the extreme privilege to work with, and know that we are going to have an amazing year!

But, with the kids coming tomorrow I am understandably nervous!  I want to focus on my excitement and passion for what CSS is doing, but think I am still a little in shock that I even have this job, or moved to Calgary!  So, with less than 12 hours to go until 600 students descend on CSS and the year officially begins, I need to realize my new reality and focus!

I cannot wait to begin sharing more of the teaching and learning that is going on in my classroom, and less of my personal thoughts!  Please bear with me, if you are listening :)

ttyl

More Planning Brain Waves

I know that I have taught both English and Social 9 before, but I feel like this year is going to present an unlimited number of opportunities to really engage students in authentic learning.  After our staff retreat today, I truly feel like I am in the right place and am going to have a great (but also greatly challenging) year! 

Here are some more ideas that I have rolling around in my brain...

Dragon's Den Performance Task
-I did this project with my 9s last year, to culminate our unit on consumerism and marketing.  I am so excited that my teaching partners are interested in doing this once more, and cannot wait to see how we can jazz it up!  Some thoughts we have had include: trying to get a real dragon (or some other expert) to come in and assist in judging the student's pitches; having multiple people on the panel evaluting pitches; giving students free reign to decide what they are going to bring into the den, and how they are going to try and get the dragons to invest.  I think that in order to tie this somehow to the CBL "Making Sustainable Food Choices" project, I would like to challenge the students by declaring this a 'eco-friendly' edition of Dragon's Den - I cannot wait to see what they think could improve our world.

The Alice Project
-I stumbled across this project while exploring various edu-blogs, and would LOVE to adapt it to use with my 9s.  I am thinking about using Nancy Farmer's "House of the Scorpion" for a full class novel study, and think that it shows definite potential for this kind of 'higher level' novel exploration.  Check it out, and thank you to the creator!

Lessons That Change Writers
-This book by Nancy Atwell (one of my favourite ELA teacher researchers), she explores a variety of lessons designed to (obviously) change how our students are writing.  I am really looking forward to continuing the focus that CSS is carrying over from last year on student writing, and think that this book is an awesome starting point to engage students in meaningful writing.  Stay posted for more on this wavelength!

Calling All Radical Teachers...

Goodbye to teaching that is smug and self-satisfied, teaching as authoritative and proud, hiding its conflicts and uncertainties behind a lectern, a textbook, or a "social science" conceit.  Goodbye to teaching as clerking - something quickly learned, easily assessed, instantly remediated.  Goodbye to teaching as a trivial pursuit of the obvious.

Welcome to an approach that is overflowing with life, crackling with the surprising and contradictory harmonies of intimacy and love, stunning in its hope for a better world.  Welcome to teaching as value laden, aspirational, and imperfect - a never-ending voyage of discovery and surprise, a continuous work in progress.  Welcome to a life of no easy answers.

Goodbye to being in control all the time.  Goodbye to overthinking and underexperiencing.  Goodbye to deference, didacticism, ego and the need to always be right.  Goodbye to prisons and border guards and walls - whether in Palestine or in Texas or inside our own hearts and minds.  Goodbye to all that.

Welcome to the unknown, to jumping off the edge, to the new and the now, to endlessly learning how to live again and how to love anew.  Welcome to relentless curiosity, simple acts of kindness, the complexity of humanity, the wonder of it all.  Embrace teaching with one foot in the here and now, and another striding toward a world that could be but is not yet.

From: "Controversies in the Classroom: A Radical Teacher Reader" Series Foreword
By Joseph Entin, Robert C. Rosen, & Leonard Vogt, Editors
Foreword by Deborah Meier

Gaming in the Twenty-First Century Classroom

While teaching high school social studies, working at the local Blockbuster, and sitting in my own living room, I have become aware of the incredible educational potential of some popular video games.  My grade eleven students asked me about the depictions of World War II in the popular game "Call of Duty: World at War", and my grade ten class enjoyed a class of playing Risk and thinking about world domination.  In both cases the students were genuinely engaged and thinking deeper about the media that they are exposed to.

However, some would argue that video games have no place in the classroom, and that we should be discouraging students from engaging in this type of entertainment.  Due to these protests, any teacher interested in bringing commercial games into their classrooms must be aware of WHY.  That is, what does the research say about this?  How can we justify using video games in the classroom?

I was assigned a literature review in one of my classes at the University of Lethbridge, and was immediately eager to see what research there is to support (or discourage) the use of video games in the classroom.  My main concerns were that the articles be empirical (that is, based on real data collected systematically in the classroom), and that they consider commercial, as well as educational, video games. The results of my labor are summed up in the following review...

Gaming in the Twenty-First Century Classroom

I also found this incredible study by Richard Sandford, Mary Ulicsak, Keri Facer and Tim Rudd; in collaboration with EA Games and futurelab.  Teaching With Games: Using Commercial Off the Shelf Games in Formal Education 

Prezi soon to come!!

My Latest Brain Child: The Digital Citizens Project

With all of the cool things available online, it can be hard for a teacher to use technology effectively... It seems that students lives are so saturated with digital media that it is not 'special' in the classroom anymore. I designed the Digital Citizens Project to challenge students to use technologies in new and creative ways... It is still in development, only the first quarter is complete, but there will be more soon so stay posted!

Tell Me Your Story, I'll Tell You Mine

I have been working on a paper for my Psychological Anthropology class, and decided to write on narrative after being introduced to it by a mentor teachers master's project.  People's lives are influenced by the stories that they tell (and those that are told) about them and their surroundings.  This understanding has powerful applications in anthropology, psychology, and (most importantly for our Creative Craniums) in education.  Educators who are willing to listen to the stories that students have to tell about their lives, and who can collaborate with them to focus on the positive aspects of such stories, will forge stronger relationships with their students. 

It is important to remember that the goal of the narrative approach is to understand the metaphors contained in people's stories, and to work with the individual to discover alternate plot lines in their tale.  This approach can be powerful with our teenage students who may have a harder time seeing the larger picture, and their place within it. 

I created this Prezi for a presentation on the paper that I am writing (and will post soon if you are interested), check it out for more information on narrative and education, anthropology and psychology.