Think Like a Teacher

I am no longer spending day to day life in a classroom with kids, but I continue to learn from my job. My connection with kids may be more vicarious than it was before, but I continue to learn as part of education world. So for the New year, I stop to share my top learning moments of 2010.

Things I learned this year:

It’s worth asking.
In the spring I received a letter inviting me to join a group of professionals involved with technology in education on a trip to China. If I had not formulated a plan delineating how TeachersFirst could benefit from my participation in this trip and then had the nerve to ask whether The Source for Learning would share in the cost, I would have assumed that such a trip was simply not possible. Many months and many thousand miles of travel to China later, I am very glad I took the risk to ask.

Laryngitis does not mean the absence of a voice.
In June, I gave my first full hour “lecture” format presentation at ISTE in Denver. Twenty-four hours beforehand, laryngitis completely erased my ability to speak. Over the next day, I communicated silently with pencil and paper, pantomime, nod, and smile. I discovered the kindness of many complete strangers and the willingness of others to do anything they could to help promote healing of my voice. You can read more about the experience in my post. The bottom line: my “voice” came through in far more ways than simply from that presentation. Not only did the sound re-emerge from my mouth amid the presentation; my passionate interest in creativity and facilitating it as essential to learning (and often with technology tools) echoes in upcoming articles and presentations — and my desire to refine the voice of creativity together with other articulate professionals.

Comparison can hinder vision.
The China trip showed me so much about how people on the other side of the Pacific view learning, how they “teach,” and how Chinese parents and society expect education to look. The easy way to talk about everything I saw in China is to explain it in comparison to what we know in the U.S. The skies are more polluted than ours. The level of laws concerning health and safety is far less than in our litigious society, etc. But I find myself stopping mid-paragraph as I continue this comparison. What is important is not the side by side comparison of “them” and “us.” In fact, the very comparison to us blinds me to nuance and sounds, thoughts, philosophies too different for comparison. There is no one-to-one, force-fit, side-by-side way to understand China. If we focus on competition and comparison, we will never hear the intellectual phonemes the Chinese articulate that simply are not part of our thinking language. We will learn far more from dialog.

Watching learning is learning, too.
I am lucky enough to have two grandsons, one born in 2010. Watching them learn reminds me of what classroom teachers do every day. We watch learning, and in the process we learn, too. That experience never stops. At the end of every day, each of us– even those in no way involved in education– should ask, “What did you see someone learn today?”  If everyone pondered this, society might find a whole new approach to what education is and should be.

Zero technology days are a good idea.
Although I had perhaps 3 of these during 2010, the days when I do not touch my iPhone, listen to MP3s or Pandora, check in on Facebook, watch the news, connect to the Internet, or answer email are precious indeed.  Not only do I focus entirely on people and places. I also return to the  grid with new perspective and energy. Lithium ion is not the only kind of recharge.

To all who care to stop by and read here, Happy New Year. What did you see someone learn this year?

During my stay in China, I received notification that my two proposals for the ISTE conference in June, 2011 had BOTH been accepted. I am flabbergasted, excited, and a bit daunted by the challenge of putting together two very different presentations to be given within the same morning. What an opportunity!

One is on the cyclical nature of creativity and how that can be respected and fostered in an education world of linear, point-A-to-point-B accountability. The second is on taking the control of IWBs (interactive whiteboards) out of the hands of teachers and making them student centered for learning. While I will be sure that both presentations have practical, learning-friendly strategies that teachers can envision and implement, they begin from very different directions. One springs from a deep philosophical discussion about the nature of creativity (born of my interests in the humanities and listening/reading/teaching about creative process). The other bounces defiantly out of the back alleys of argument that began with Bill Ferriter’s blog post almost a year ago, “Why I Hate Interactive Whiteboards” and the unfortunate practice of distributing technology hardware as a teacher-centered panacea for student achievement.

So I have a lot of work to do between now and the spring to piece and quilt two separate presentations.  In the meantime, I will enjoy “collecting things” for both. Sometimes the pre-presentation, messy time is the highlight of my own creative process as ideas, images, and examples collect like scraps for a quilter. The virtual floor of my office (a.k.a. my MacBook) is going to be deep in material.

Posted once I was off the plane and back online after some sleep…

As I write this, I am flying past Mt. Fuji on our way back to the U.S. The plane is packed with people, including more Americans than I have seen in the past two weeks. It seems strange to encounter strangers who speak to me in English! The long flight (10+ hours with a tail wind) gives me a chance to reflect a bit on the trip. I have many more posts to come with corrections to some of my early observations and a lot more to tell about each place we went.

Ten + 1 things I will miss about China

1.    Surprising juxtapositions of smells, foods, colors, people, and buildings

2.    Ni hao, xie xie, and “smiling”

3.    Traveling and learning amid forty amazing educators who see education as a dynamic, personal journey for both student and teacher

4.    Profound, broad Chinese pride without hubris, a pride in their historic ingenuity, current progress, and rising status in the world

5.    History unfathomable for those of us from a country a mere 235 years old and the Chinese people’s love for that history as their common anchor during times of trial

6.    Our national guide, Shawn (his English name), and his willingness to respond insightfully and respectfully to every question; his head bobbing slightly to the side as he began each response with a smile. His English was impeccable and quite sensitive to subtlety.

7.    Symbolism, spirits, dragons, earth, and heaven, feng shue (sp?) surrounding us until we actually began to notice the details on our own

8.    Streets, sidewalks, and highways swept spotless by lone workers with large, curled, natural straw brooms

9.    Learning to resist the urge to compare everything to the U.S. and to simply observe and learn

10.  Laundry opportunism: city apartment buildings tall or low, decorated with laundry drying in hazy sunshine, row after row of gadgets suspending sheets or shirts stories off the ground. Laughing to see more clothing left hanging from street lights by residents who climb to snag available drying space

11.  Crowds of petite, pony-tailed women in fitted wool or bright puffy jackets, short skirts, and fur-topped boots and men in black puffy coats and skinny black pants, waiting to dodge deftly across traffic

Things I will not miss: 

1.    Chicken knuckles

2.    Chinese traffic/drivers, especially motorbikes

3.    Crossing multiple lanes of Chinese traffic as a pedestrian

4.    Air pollution!!!

5.    “Pretty lady, you buy —!” yelled in my ear and grabbing my arm

6.    Nonwestern toilets/bathrooms bereft of toilet paper, hot water, soap, or paper towels

7.    Coins worth .10 yuan (about 1.5 cents)

8.    Small coffee cups with no refills

9.    Creepy Santa decorations with haunting, Chucky-esque faces and Christmas music played with odd rhythm or instrumentation, making Christmas into a cheap imitation holiday

10. Paper napkins big enough for no more than a cocktail and serving dishes placed beyond human reach in the center of the giant, glass lazy susan — and without a serving utensil. But at least I finally mastered chopsticks!

Ten things I will DO with what I have learned:

1.    Launch XW1W- a worldwide chance for students to exchange a taste of their daily life, coming soon from TeachersFirst

2.    Never again assume that I know what the Chinese want for themselves or for their schools

3.    Continue working to help make creativity a core classroom value and offer practicable ways to talk about it, value it, help students build it, and help parents (and those less accustomed to living it) find ways to appreciate and foster it in their own and their children’s lives

4.    Continue to ask questions and feel about for answers on the complexities of Chinese culture

5.    Try to keep a finger on the pulse of what is happening in Chinese education

6.    Never ignore a lost or confused international visitor in a U.S. airport or tourist attraction

7.    Stay in touch with this group of educators and continue to learn from their prism-like way of separating new light into different ideas

8.    Try to make TeachersFirst approachable and helpful for Chinese educators and those in other non-Western countries

9.    Get back together with our delegation at the ISTE conference 2011

10. Continue posting on this blog as I assimilate all that I have collected from the trip

I leave for China (via the U.S. west coast) on Monday. Four days from now. One day to go west, another to fly across the Pacific. Some things I learned already, some geeky, some mundane:

Some hotels in China answer email, some do not. I contacted hotels about my Internet access there and what it will cost. The one that responded quoted me $7.50 for 24 hours, slightly cheaper than U.S. business hotels. I suspect that my English email was indecipherable to those on email duty at the other hotels.

It is hard to teach a computer calendar program (iCal) about time zones. It keeps converting China time back into U.S. EST. I guess it will get smarter when it discovers itself on China time?

Activating an iPhone in China is WAYYY too expensive: $2.30 a minute for any phone traffic, including the time while people leave me voicemails. I am leaving it in “airplane” mode and using it on wifi when I can. At least the calendar will still work, but none of the cool apps that connect to the web, unless I want to pay BIG bucks for data roaming.

According to the book I have been reading on Chinese culture, I am probably going to appear a boor at least once a day. I simply cannot memorize what to do in every situation. Two taps on the table to say thank you when someone pours your tea? And I am a klutz with chopsticks, but will persevere. I wonder what weird behaviors we have in the U.S. that others have trouble remembering? In my neighborhood, you always wave and step aside for passing cars when out for a walk — facing traffic, of course, on our quiet but narrow streets. My dog even knows where to stand in this neighborhood’s culture.

I will stand out on Chinese sidewalks, though many of my clothes were probably made there. I am a blue-eyed blonde. Oh well.

My random wondering is flowing now:

Will I have a chance to talk with any kids?

Since mandatory retirement age in China is 55 for women, would I be seen as really old (I am NOT that old!), or “revered”?

Who designs fixtures like lights and faucets? Does every culture have their own designers or do some countries lead while others mimic? When I visited Europe, some showers were fascinatingly confusing. How does one go to school to design faucets internationally? It kind of gives new meaning to company names like American Standard, eh?

I am sure many other odd thoughts will occur to me before I am immersed in China. I can’t wait. Please join me by adding comments, wonders, or your own cross cultural experiences. The faucet is on.

W: What we want to know

Here are some questions about China that I have received from U.S. and Australian teachers. Feel free to add your own in comments, whether you are a teacher or a student:

• What would they [the Chinese] like us to teach about them? What resources can they offer both on line and hard copy?
• How can we better create strong educational bonds between us?
• Are there any universities there that accept foreign post grads, like us, and yet do so in English and on line?
• What sites do Chinese teachers use to 1) provide resources to students? 2) to connect globally and interculturally on projects? and 3) for Web 2.0 learning?
• Are teachers paid on par with other professionals?
• I would want to know what resources they are using, what they are teaching, and how. I’d like to see us move beyond knowing the “Big C” of culture into the “little c” in order to change our misconceptions and create a more accurate perception.
• I teach early childhood….I would like to see what happens in a China Classroom, what they eat, read, and study.
• I would be interested in knowing more about what the school day is like..do they switch classes, have special area teachers, do they have learning centers or are the more structured? I am really thinking about the primary level.
• What do kids want to know? What’s it like at school? What are you into? How are you the same as me? How are you different? We are human beings. Whether kid, teacher, adult..in roles as parent, teacher, student, athlete, artist, administrator, teacher, specialist, counselor, what do you do? what do you like? what do you use? what works? what challenges do you face? what do you in the face of adversity (financial, administrative, etc etc) to meet the challenges? what would you never want to do without in your class?

In short, most of us want to know,

“What is it like to be YOU?”

“How are you the same as me? How are you different?”

I will try to share the experience of finding out. Stay tuned.

I have so much I want to know about China. Two weeks from now I will be over the Pacific! So I have started to organize my W list of things I Want to know. If you have any you would like to add, please feel free to comment here. Students welcome, too.

Unfortunately, I can’t embed the KWL here interactively because we need to upgrade this version of WordPress. Here is a static version:

And here is a link to the interactive visual map of my KWL. And here are my lists so far, simply in verbal form:

K -What I know:

• Chinese students learn English and like to practice it.
• Chinese history is rich and very complex, much older than the U.S.- Students must have a LOT to study about history!!
• Reportedly, teachers are treated very respectfully.
• High stakes tests determine student opportunities for higher education. The highest scoring students have a chance to study science/math/medicine. The second highest tier study business. Teachers are from the third highest  scoring tier.

W – What I want to know:

• What is a teacher’s day like? A student’s?
• What do teachers and kids wear?
• Do  students ever use computers at school?
• How do schools view technology and the web?
• Would a Chinese class ever do project-based learning?
• Can I explain what TeachersFirst is so they can understand it?
• Will I talk too much for them?
• Can we set up a way for schools in China to communicate easily with U.S. and other classes?
• Do parents help with schoolwork or leave it up to the tutors and late evening school?
• Do parents have any input into what schools do? Do they want it?
• Will I have to eat things that I can’t identify or don’t WANT to know about?
• What web-based tools that I am used to will be unavailable in China?
• Is sense of humor valued/suppressed at school?
• What happens to divergent, gifted thinkers?

L – What I have learned: Watch here and see!

For twelve days in December, 2010, I will be traveling in China with a group of educational technology professionals. We will be meeting educators there and –I hope– seeing schools along with the usual tourist fascinations. I would LOVE to meet some kids, but am not sure if that will happen. I will be blogging the trip here. Please plan to follow the trip and ask questions or make comments at will. As a teacher, I am sure I will not be able to resist asking a few questions myself. Maybe you and your class would like to stop by once a day to learn something new about China through the eyes of an American teacher!

Many years ago while completing certification as an English teacher — post B.A. in English — I took a course on linguistics. Probably one the thing that stuck most from that class was an awareness of how we change both what we say and how we say it, depending on the others in the room. Flip a switch and your vocabulary adjusts, the level of sarcasm changes, and  “filters” for prohibited topics kick in.

Now fast forward to today’s rapidly evolving technology world. I find myself adding another layer of techno-contextual adjustment to nearly every conversation I have. Is the person I am talking with techno-familiar, techno-phobe, techno-braggart? Is she an iPhone user? Have I heard him mention Facebook? Is her face buried in her Blackberry? Do I hear a txt msg notification buzzing in her pocket? Did he contact me by email? Are we having this actual conversation on Twitter? Does she print out her email? Did he just say something about AOL? Where did I see her look up that phone number? Does he have a landline? When the conversation ventured into the unknown, did we wonder aloud or Google it?

We collect these techno-portrait bits in every face to face and digital interaction, and we adjust accordingly. I sit in a meeting in my community and realize that sharing a newsletter by pdf or on a web site will eliminate 50% of the people in the room from ever seeking it, much less finding it. Ten minutes later, I mention having seen an article on my feed reader, and I get odd looks from many and one knowing nod among a group of ten. When the subject of travel comes up, I do not mention the fact that I will blog my China trip since I know (from a Twitter contact) that my blog is accessible there. How would I even explain that?

Linguistics experts say we learn the skills of situational language adjustment over time. Young children do not have these skills yet. Teens and young adults develop adjustment skills more quickly, and seasoned, sensitive adults can establish phyllo–like layers of subtlety in their vocabulary and speech. Our students have less experience and motivation for adjusting the what and how of what they say for the techno-levels around them. They may also have widely varying techno-levels among their classroom peers. But we expect them to function well at a techno-level unlike their own in our schools and in dialog with adults around them. No wonder they lose patience or simply do not want to bother.

What a conversation you could have today with your middle and high schools students, as well as with your adult work colleagues: How do you “read” the technology experience/expertise of those around you? How do you change the what and the how of your conversation because of it? Do you think you should have to adjust your language for others’ technology expertise/experience? Why or why not? How is such adjustment different from or comparable to other adjustments you make to your language all the time?

All my life, I have been aware that teachers volunteer for everything. Having grown up as the child (and grandchild) of teachers, I saw it in my family and those of  fellow faculty-brat friends. Teachers do church school, coach their kids’ teams, are choir moms, help out with scouts, run neighborhood food drives, and so much more. During summer, we may have a few moments free to fantasize about what else we would do if we weren’t working so hard all through the school year (and most of the summer). If teachers were suddenly independently wealthy and could quit our jobs, what volunteer efforts would we be likely to do? How would all those fantasy volunteers change the world?

I would start an after school program at my neighborhood community center. We have tons of kids and tons of retirees. We could have fun and have a time for kids to get homework done in a cheerful place, maybe with healthy, donated snacks. The cooler kids could use computers to edit digital pictures or show other kids how to make glogs or the like. I would hope I’d be wise enough to help steer the computers on a positive path with cool, creative tools.  (After years in middle school, I can usually sense the inappropriate giggles and actions before they happen). In a couple of hours, all the frenzied parents could come home to find kids who did more that afternoon than watch 25 year old re-runs or defeat yet another level of a video game.  Do I think parents should be responsible for their kids? Yes. Do I know it just doesn’t happen? Yes, again. Besides, the relationships of community would do more than foster parental convenience. It might make the kids less likely to smash a mailbox or defiantly skateboard across the road in front of the “old lady” who read Harry Potter with them a couple of years ago. It might decrease the number of retirees who complain about “those kids.” And it might just let us share some laughter. We might even play music or dance or play basketball together. That’s my fantasy volunteer job.

As the economy makes each of us question whether we will ever be able to retire, I worry that the world will be robbed of all the fantasy volunteers who might otherwise have moved from teaching into important roles as enthusiastic, younger retirees. In my more idealistic moments, I wonder what impact it would have on society happen if we rotated 5% of all teachers into fantasy volunteer roles (subsidized as some sort of sabbatical) once every 20 years or so. What would your community look like?

My creativity presentation at ISTE 2010 was surprising in unexpected ways. After months of anticipation and 30 hours of speechlessness –trying to regain a laryngitis-starved voice — I DID it, croaking into the most powerful mike the techies could find.

The gist of the presentation: using Guilford’s oldie-but-goodie model of creativity as four components (FFOE): Fluency, Flexibility, Originality, Elaboration, as a lens to analyze the tasks we assign and the projects students complete.  What I enjoyed most were the conversations I had after the session was over.

One teacher talked of his concern that the hindrances to creativity in schools are followed by societal pressures in general as kids move up through high school. As kids assimilate into young adulthood, they have even greater barriers to risk-taking in their thinking. He feared that they might even use creative opportunities to reinforce some of those barriers. A valid concern. Together he and I ventured the possibility of challenging  HS kids with this very question: what prevents you from sharing your off-the-wall ideas aloud? What can we do to take down those barriers?

The middle school teacher who cleverly tossed in a divergent response during the presentation stopped me in the hallway to say he planned to use the FFOE terms in rubrics and was excited to have a creativity vocabulary to use. We talked a bit about middle school as a great place to talk about creative self awareness while kids are becoming so aware of their bodies, individuality, and relationships with others.

A HS English teacher wondered aloud how to individualize creativity elements in rubrics for 150+ kids in a standards-based classroom. We hypothesized trying 4-5 rubric elements for everyone with an additional 2-3 agreed upon with individual students for  each marking period. The elements do not even have to have “points” associated with them necessarily. He could discuss them as importnat for real life instead of  grades. (Too bad that grades don’t relate to real life, though!)

During the waning hours of the conference, another middle school person stopped to talk with me at the SFL booth. We brainstormed a bit on what the rubric elements for FFOE might look like. As we talked, ideas began to pop up between us:

• What if you had kids form project groups by FFOE strength? One each string at fuency, flexibility, originality, elaboration? Would you find even numbers of each in a class? Probably not, but it would be an interesting experiment.
• Have kids  contribute copies of brainstorms they did in their own best creative place/circumstance and hang them a bulletin board to celebrate individual creative process. The actual brainstorm materials or decorations should signal  their best creative circumstance: a brainstorm on a scrap of towel or shampoo bottle for shower-thinkers, notes atop music or a CD wrapper for those who find music a creative lubricant, etc. Maybe a brainstorm written on a leaves from your “thinking tree”? We really liked that idea and agreed to stay in touch as she tries including FFOE in her teaching.

Many teachers, many thoughtful reactions. I cannot even relate all the discussions here. All from one hour together while my audience’s creative energy seemed to will my voice back from a painful, empty croak to fully voiced vibration. There was an audible gasp when one word suddenly came out with VOICE behind it, then another … and another. That VOICE is what every classroom community should help every learner feel: the experience of a newfound voice that emerges amid a surprising, vibrating rush.