Part I: My key problem
I have a problem in my classes. It’s not confined to only my classroom, but obviously one I’m keenly interested in solving. We have a significant achievement gap in our district. This means I have very highly skilled students in my classroom. It also means they have some very low skilled peers. What does this look like? In one of my sophomore English classes I had a girl who brought a 500+ page archive of everything the New Yorker published from 1930 to 1950. To read for fun. And seated right next to her was a student who brought Captain Underpants, after I’d hounded him to bring something, anything, for silent reading. The juxtaposition is huge. It’s no surprise that when we turn to pick up Of Mice and Men, that both students groan, even though it’s for entirely different reasons.
I am still charged to meet these students at their different skill levels, and teach both these canonical texts and a complex, increased literacy skill set that will prepare them for college and beyond. This is a Wicked Problem, and not one that has a one-hit punch solution. What I know for sure, is that my kids need to read and write-- with increased volume, frequency, complexity, and motivation.
There are tools that can help me-- and my students-- with this objective. I think a class set of mobile computing devices, tablets, can help me begin to solve this problem.
I am still charged to meet these students at their different skill levels, and teach both these canonical texts and a complex, increased literacy skill set that will prepare them for college and beyond. This is a Wicked Problem, and not one that has a one-hit punch solution. What I know for sure, is that my kids need to read and write-- with increased volume, frequency, complexity, and motivation.
There are tools that can help me-- and my students-- with this objective. I think a class set of mobile computing devices, tablets, can help me begin to solve this problem.
Part II: The transformation I would like to see
The problem I have in my classes finds itself embedded in so many areas. The “Gap” as we so affectionately term it in our district, manifests itself insidiously. It affects the groupings of my students, who operates with who, and even affects what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi terms the “flow” of my classroom community motivation.
Most importantly, of course, is that the gap itself shows evidence of a lack of skills in my students. It shows a demographic of kids in each of my classes that simply lack the comprehension skills to decode and make meaning from sophisticated texts- both narrative and informational. They reject the texts we read and often identify themselves as “not readers” or “bad at English”. This then becomes a motivational issue that leads to continued resistance with the next unit, month, or years. Sometimes, I see students who are so clearly trying to just “get through” the curriculum instead of unpack it.
Conversely, I see students who are very high skilled, who feel impeded by the low skills of their peers, and who will resist unpacking the curriculum that is before them because they feel it’s beneath them, or lacking in the subsistence needed to be a true challenge. I see disdain from these students that also manifests in a resistance to learn.
In both cases, the result is a lack of quality and depth in my students reading and writing, and worse, a lack of motivation to fix the problem that they do not want to acknowledge.
The transformation that I want to see will include students highly motivated, engaged in a curriculum tailored specifically for their needs. I want to see students engaged with one another on a common text, even though they are at different levels. I want to see my low-skilled students equipped to meet their higher thinking peers with their own ground to stand on. I want to see them build self-efficacy as readers and writers, and I want to see them engaged in these texts with a level of rigor that is worth their hard work and mine.
Most importantly, of course, is that the gap itself shows evidence of a lack of skills in my students. It shows a demographic of kids in each of my classes that simply lack the comprehension skills to decode and make meaning from sophisticated texts- both narrative and informational. They reject the texts we read and often identify themselves as “not readers” or “bad at English”. This then becomes a motivational issue that leads to continued resistance with the next unit, month, or years. Sometimes, I see students who are so clearly trying to just “get through” the curriculum instead of unpack it.
Conversely, I see students who are very high skilled, who feel impeded by the low skills of their peers, and who will resist unpacking the curriculum that is before them because they feel it’s beneath them, or lacking in the subsistence needed to be a true challenge. I see disdain from these students that also manifests in a resistance to learn.
In both cases, the result is a lack of quality and depth in my students reading and writing, and worse, a lack of motivation to fix the problem that they do not want to acknowledge.
The transformation that I want to see will include students highly motivated, engaged in a curriculum tailored specifically for their needs. I want to see students engaged with one another on a common text, even though they are at different levels. I want to see my low-skilled students equipped to meet their higher thinking peers with their own ground to stand on. I want to see them build self-efficacy as readers and writers, and I want to see them engaged in these texts with a level of rigor that is worth their hard work and mine.
Part III: Presenting the total PACKage
There is a reason why a class set of iPads is the most generic request to ask for. Ipads are powerhorse machines that can offer a multitude of education applications to facilitate classroom needs. However, it is this reason that I want them.
Context
I teach in East Lansing Public Schools, at the high school. We are situated not even a mile from Michigan State University’s campus. There I teach American English to 11 graders. In this coming year, I will be teaching three sections of American Literature, and two sections of Pre-AP American Literature. This past year, we have just been labeled a “Focus School” in Michigan, even though all of our other schools k-8 have been Focus schools for several years. According to the Michigan Department of Education, Focus schools, “consist of the ten percent of schools on the Top-to-Bottom list with the largest achievement gaps between its top 30 percent of students and its bottom 30 percent, based on average scale score.” While the reason for our achievement gap cannot be unequivocally explained, we know that we have to take responsibility for what we have control over-- in my case bolstering students’ reading and writing skills in an effort to “close the gap” or to support our bottom 30 percent of students to bring them closer in achievement to our top 30 percent.
We are well equipped for a very basic technology integrated classroom. We have a strong wifi connection that only fails sometimes, and a network that only forgets my students logins maybe once a month. We have six netbook carts of thirty devices each, and two full computer labs able to host a class of thirty kids. However, given that we have over 1200 kids for four grades, competition for these devices is fierce.
We are well equipped for a very basic technology integrated classroom. We have a strong wifi connection that only fails sometimes, and a network that only forgets my students logins maybe once a month. We have six netbook carts of thirty devices each, and two full computer labs able to host a class of thirty kids. However, given that we have over 1200 kids for four grades, competition for these devices is fierce.
Content
Basically, I want to support my students’ literacy so that they are able to succeed on high stakes tests and entrance applications to college and beyond. Not-so-basically, I want them to approach American literature with an authentic appreciation for the history of our thinking as Americans. I want them to understand where our story starts, and how they have a role within that story. I want them to understand how our nation is built on a religious and elevated work ethic (for better or worse), and I want them to think critically about what that means. Just as importantly, I want them to see how “form follows function” as they investigate a variety of writers through each of the literary movements our nation has undergone. Students need to understand rhetoric, and how we can build a variety of appeals into our writing in order to sway an audience to our point of view-- and also consider the differing point of views of someone who has a different experience than their own.
In practice though, I often hear students express frustration with the curriculum because it is so far removed from their experience. American Lit is commonly referred to as reading from the “dead, old, white guys.” They have a hard time seeing authenticity in what we read, and why we read it. They read The Crucible and instead of understanding the effects of mass hysteria as it applied to the Salem Witch Trials and The Red Scare alike, they see just a moronic story of a group of tattle-telling little girls. They have a hard time connecting to the perspectives of people who existed so far from their own.
In practice though, I often hear students express frustration with the curriculum because it is so far removed from their experience. American Lit is commonly referred to as reading from the “dead, old, white guys.” They have a hard time seeing authenticity in what we read, and why we read it. They read The Crucible and instead of understanding the effects of mass hysteria as it applied to the Salem Witch Trials and The Red Scare alike, they see just a moronic story of a group of tattle-telling little girls. They have a hard time connecting to the perspectives of people who existed so far from their own.
Technology
According to John Dewey, technology is a media. He compels us to, “view the effects of technologies as operating to a large extent through the ways that they alter the environments for thinking, communicating, and acting in the world” (Dewey, J., 2011). I want to bring in a device that allows us to alter the environments for thinking. I want something that allows us to publish, to communicate with a greater community than our classroom. I want something that gives authenticity to our assignments-- that will generate its own inertia toward more learning. I want something that offers a space for creating-- for writing, drawing, directing, and consuming media. I also want something that will allow me to deliver individualized curriculum that offers kids the ability to tailor their own instruction.
A tablet for each of my kids would give them the ability to blog their reflections, to listen to videos and lyrics, to direct their own videos as they synthesize their understanding. They would also be able to search the web for supporting materials, to take notes, and compile evidence for their scholarly writing. It would offer them apps that could scale up or down their texts, offer vertical and horizontal e-text sets, for free, and could also offer an audio version to support their reading. Best of all, it would support their technology literacy and habits of mind as they work, so that they can build functionality and apply it to other academic avenues.
Because this is a mobile device, and a tool that includes the ability to take pictures, record video, download, upload, and store media, it has the advantage over a desktop computer or a smaller mobile device, which might not have the ability to travel or host as much media as a tablet can offer.
A tablet for each of my kids would give them the ability to blog their reflections, to listen to videos and lyrics, to direct their own videos as they synthesize their understanding. They would also be able to search the web for supporting materials, to take notes, and compile evidence for their scholarly writing. It would offer them apps that could scale up or down their texts, offer vertical and horizontal e-text sets, for free, and could also offer an audio version to support their reading. Best of all, it would support their technology literacy and habits of mind as they work, so that they can build functionality and apply it to other academic avenues.
Because this is a mobile device, and a tool that includes the ability to take pictures, record video, download, upload, and store media, it has the advantage over a desktop computer or a smaller mobile device, which might not have the ability to travel or host as much media as a tablet can offer.
Pedagogy
Mihály Csíkszentmihályi coined the term “Flow” to represent the idea that there is a sweet spot for motivation. If a student’s skill level is low and the challenge is high, motivation to complete the task is low. If a student’s skill level is high and the challenge is low, motivation is also low. Flow is achieved when the student’s skills are are adequate to meet an elevated challenge- a task worth completing. I am constantly hunting this Flow in my classroom. I have a lot of underchallenged and over challenged individuals. To meet this, I try to incorporate a project into my teaching in whatever unit I teach. I find that when students have control of their learning, they find more opportunities to engage with the curriculum than I could ever have manufactured.
If I could “flip” some of my lectures, I could offer exactly what a student would need in a learning menu of sorts. They could target exactly what they needed help with. Flipped learning implies that students would watch curriculum delivered via a video at home, and come into my classroom ready to workshop and ask questions of me. I’m not ready to flip everything I do yet, mostly because the skills we learn in English are so cyclical. But if I could flip my feedback, offer a list of tutorials in response to that feedback, then students could control their own curriculum-- responding to the objectives and standards that I set before them, in a way that would maintain Flow, and therefore motivation.
If I could “flip” some of my lectures, I could offer exactly what a student would need in a learning menu of sorts. They could target exactly what they needed help with. Flipped learning implies that students would watch curriculum delivered via a video at home, and come into my classroom ready to workshop and ask questions of me. I’m not ready to flip everything I do yet, mostly because the skills we learn in English are so cyclical. But if I could flip my feedback, offer a list of tutorials in response to that feedback, then students could control their own curriculum-- responding to the objectives and standards that I set before them, in a way that would maintain Flow, and therefore motivation.
Total PACKage
I want my students to build up their reading and writing skills-- and to do that they must write and read routinely, over and over. It must be a habit. So often I find myself bogged down by the process of giving feedback-- I can’t turn it around fast enough. Or I find myself giving the same feedback repetitively. In my four years of teaching, we haven’t been able to develop a routine because high quality, targeted feedback is nearly impossible to do in time to make changes to students misconceptions of how to write. Also, when it takes so long, so many of our writing assignments become summative, which doesn’t encourage taking and implementing feedback.
If I could flip my feedback, and provide videos to combat the common misconceptions that my kids have about writing, I could truly make writing a routine and formative process. Additionally, I could implement a digital feedback program to make giving constructive feedback a habit. We learn best when we teach to someone else.
Having a mobile, video creating, wifi enabled device in class would allow my students access to these tutorials, my video feedback, and the quick feedback of their peers. It would literally deliver it to their fingertips.
Additionally, I want to inspire a curiosity with the literature we read. Giving my students the ability to target their learning will free up their time and cognitive load to pursue what interests them, so that they are consuming and reading even more relevant media supporting our unit objectives-- and they can go find it!
Increased motivation, targeted feedback, targeted curriculum based on student self-assessment, and inquiry based assessments and reading would go miles toward building a more rigorous routine of reading and writing in my classroom.
If I could flip my feedback, and provide videos to combat the common misconceptions that my kids have about writing, I could truly make writing a routine and formative process. Additionally, I could implement a digital feedback program to make giving constructive feedback a habit. We learn best when we teach to someone else.
Having a mobile, video creating, wifi enabled device in class would allow my students access to these tutorials, my video feedback, and the quick feedback of their peers. It would literally deliver it to their fingertips.
Additionally, I want to inspire a curiosity with the literature we read. Giving my students the ability to target their learning will free up their time and cognitive load to pursue what interests them, so that they are consuming and reading even more relevant media supporting our unit objectives-- and they can go find it!
Increased motivation, targeted feedback, targeted curriculum based on student self-assessment, and inquiry based assessments and reading would go miles toward building a more rigorous routine of reading and writing in my classroom.
SAMR Model
After considering the SAMR model, I’m determined to aim for “redefinition” in a variety of the ways that we will use these devices- but I’m prepared and comfortable to be moving in and out of “modification”. Of course we will have Google Drive at our fingertips as a word processor (simple substitution), but we’ll also have a network of peers to interact with, and the ability to implement it as a routine. We’ll also, quite literally, have a global audience and infinitely expanding resources to inspire and maybe even satisfy our curiosity. Students will investigate and acquire both an appreciation and their own adaptation of author’s craft, as they find examples of rhetoric on the web-- not just in speeches and sermons-- but in art, advertisements, commercials, images, etc. We won’t be contained to the thirty minds in my room plus the authors we read, we can find an infinite and/or specific mind with which to share ideas.
Part IV: Evaluation
Admittedly, it will be difficult to evaluate the effectiveness of this transition and it’s unfortunate that so much of the evidence of transformation we see in English is anecdotal. Evaluating student thinking and writing ability is plainly subjective. Additionally, this kind of a transformation, while radical in implementation, is going to produce slow change. However, an additional advantage to this plan is that we’ll have a wealth of data to examine.
Previously, my students would read one large anchor texts, or three maybe short anchor texts in a six week period. In addition to the short reflective responses that we write along the way, we would also write a unit assessment- either spontaneously in class, or an extended essay out of class. In both cases it takes me sometimes upwards of 2-4 weeks to grade and give feedback on these writings, and then return them. It’s embarrassing, but it’s my reality. Most of my time is spent writing feedback on student work-- oftentimes the same thing over and over, but for different kids in different classes. If I had the ability to attach a previously made video tutorial, record my voice giving them personal advice, AFTER expecting the same of them beforehand? If I could offer them their pick of the world wide web for research and publishing, with applications that can synthesize their learning, offering a variety of media modes for them to analyze, reflect, and make something new with what they learned-- simultaneously? We could write a polished piece twice a month. I could give them feedback BEFORE they turn in their paper. They would give me a higher quality product that required less feedback to begin with, and I could turn it back to them to use before they submit their next assignment!
Since students are reading an increase of complex texts, and writing about them at an increased volume, and repetitively, I will have the ability to juxtapose their early and late writings by the end of the year to see their growth through a portfolio. This will be a self-developed portfolio, crafted by my students, so that they can hunt for and examine their own growth. How hugely motivating it will be for them to look back at the volume, complexity, and maturity of their work over the past year!
Since Flow is also a goal of this transformation, I’ll be using bi-monthly surveys throughout the year to measure students’ self assessment of their motivation and satisfaction with their classroom environment. I’ll do this via Google Forms, so that I can run a Summary of the data they give me so that I can display for them the results (whole class, anonymously) and open a dialogue about what I can change. I think that this gets a little murky too, though, because there are a variety of factors that can affect motivation and satisfaction, especially taking into account my students developmental leaps, and outside factors that may be out of my control, but are brought into my classroom just the same.
Previously, my students would read one large anchor texts, or three maybe short anchor texts in a six week period. In addition to the short reflective responses that we write along the way, we would also write a unit assessment- either spontaneously in class, or an extended essay out of class. In both cases it takes me sometimes upwards of 2-4 weeks to grade and give feedback on these writings, and then return them. It’s embarrassing, but it’s my reality. Most of my time is spent writing feedback on student work-- oftentimes the same thing over and over, but for different kids in different classes. If I had the ability to attach a previously made video tutorial, record my voice giving them personal advice, AFTER expecting the same of them beforehand? If I could offer them their pick of the world wide web for research and publishing, with applications that can synthesize their learning, offering a variety of media modes for them to analyze, reflect, and make something new with what they learned-- simultaneously? We could write a polished piece twice a month. I could give them feedback BEFORE they turn in their paper. They would give me a higher quality product that required less feedback to begin with, and I could turn it back to them to use before they submit their next assignment!
Since students are reading an increase of complex texts, and writing about them at an increased volume, and repetitively, I will have the ability to juxtapose their early and late writings by the end of the year to see their growth through a portfolio. This will be a self-developed portfolio, crafted by my students, so that they can hunt for and examine their own growth. How hugely motivating it will be for them to look back at the volume, complexity, and maturity of their work over the past year!
Since Flow is also a goal of this transformation, I’ll be using bi-monthly surveys throughout the year to measure students’ self assessment of their motivation and satisfaction with their classroom environment. I’ll do this via Google Forms, so that I can run a Summary of the data they give me so that I can display for them the results (whole class, anonymously) and open a dialogue about what I can change. I think that this gets a little murky too, though, because there are a variety of factors that can affect motivation and satisfaction, especially taking into account my students developmental leaps, and outside factors that may be out of my control, but are brought into my classroom just the same.
Part V: Connection to key issues
As an English teacher, I am particularly interested and invested in the variety of literacies my students need to all avenues of their lives. While we fundamentally invest in the literacy of reading and writing, I am also interested in Digital literacies- in play, information literacy, in knowing how to approach an unknown technology, in visual literacy, etc. In English, we examine the ways of seeing, and mindsets we use to approach a task, a text, and idea. This proposal addresses all of these as we interact and problem solve together while interacting with the technology.
This project also touches on Digital Equity, as I seek to “level the playing field” so to speak in addressing our achievement gap. A class set of nice, functional, devices, is more than a lot of my kids have access to-- and if I flip my instruction and assessment, this is crucial.
Last, I’m keenly interested in modeling Digital Citizenship and Netiquette for my students. So often I hear teachers ban the use of online devices in their classrooms. They go so far as to send a student to their locker to store the offending device away from class-- effectively removing the student instruction. There are very good reasons for this; students are ill-prepared to know when and how to use their devices appropriately. But I think, what a shame it is to send them away-- what a missed opportunity it is to show them the appropriate use for their tech. Additionally, I think we ask our students to build a digital footprint that is often haphazard and randomly crafted, when we should be teaching our students how to make their digital footprints work FOR them instead of against them.
It’s with these in mind that I approach this project, and I’d demand the same of my students.
This project also touches on Digital Equity, as I seek to “level the playing field” so to speak in addressing our achievement gap. A class set of nice, functional, devices, is more than a lot of my kids have access to-- and if I flip my instruction and assessment, this is crucial.
Last, I’m keenly interested in modeling Digital Citizenship and Netiquette for my students. So often I hear teachers ban the use of online devices in their classrooms. They go so far as to send a student to their locker to store the offending device away from class-- effectively removing the student instruction. There are very good reasons for this; students are ill-prepared to know when and how to use their devices appropriately. But I think, what a shame it is to send them away-- what a missed opportunity it is to show them the appropriate use for their tech. Additionally, I think we ask our students to build a digital footprint that is often haphazard and randomly crafted, when we should be teaching our students how to make their digital footprints work FOR them instead of against them.
It’s with these in mind that I approach this project, and I’d demand the same of my students.
Works Cited
Dewey, J. / Bruce, B.C. & Levin, J.A. (2011). Media for Inquiry, Communication, Construction, and Expression.
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