A Synthesizing EssayLast November, I found myself staring blankly at a blinking cursor on my computer screen wondering how in the world I was going to get through the holiday months while teaching Rhetoric in my junior level American Lit class.The crisp, white, unit guide that I had been handed at the start of the year was basically the syllabus that I then handed to kids outlining unit titles and associated readings. This unit read “Founding Fathers” with readings from Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and Patrick Henry. That’s it. And where there might have been something more concrete at some point, it was certainly not available to me on the eve of the holiday season. Rhetoric includes the basic appeals that we include in our writing in order to persuade a reader to our point of view. Rhetoric is easily identified in advertisements, commercials, speeches, and even narratives that try to sway their readers with poignant descriptions aimed at garnering sympathy. It is subversive and tricky because we are subject to it so often. I was more than a little stumped in trying to make a certain-to-be-dry unit interesting after we had already beat a dead horse with Arthur Miller’s, The Crucible, a 1950’s drama set in Puritan times, with allusions to the Red Scare. My kids were pro eye-rollers by this point. I re-read the Declaration of Independence, and heard again the indignation and desperation that Thomas Jefferson knit carefully in his letter to King George. I read Patrick Henry’s Speech to the Virginia Convention and rediscovered the rage and scorn that he hoped to bring out of his listeners as he called them to arms against the British. I read Benjamin Franklin’s On the Constitution, where he humorously and humbly offered the recently drafted Constitution as an imperfect best-we’ve-got solution to the failed Articles of Confederation. How could I get my kids to hear these elements in the dry and archaic words of men, the “dead, old, white guys” according to my kids, who existed nearly two hundred and fifty years ago? How could I bring it alive so they can hear the depth of these men’s hearts- so different from their own? And how could I survive the holidays with a unit that was not too homework heavy for my students and myself… How often do teachers find themselves looking for solutions to problems like these? How often do we hear the rhetoric that teachers must make the curriculum “relevant”? It is true, of course, that we must reach our students wherever they are. However, I do not think there is a one hit punch that will solve this quandary. Actually, it was this quest that prompted me to look into an Ed Tech program like Michigan State University’s MAET (Master of Arts in Educational Technology) program. What I found was not a cure-all, but a new mindset that allows me to work within the constraints of the tools I have around me. As I entered the program, I was not so naive that I thought that technology would be a solution to all my problems as a teacher. However, I saw the world around me morphing to underscore a technology literacy that I was dangerously close to lacking. When I entered MSU as an undergraduate freshman, I had a flip phone that I treasured because it was my first real piece of technology. By the time I graduated with my teaching certificate five years later, nearly everyone I knew had a smartphone, that emblem of modernity, and I too was thinking about saving my pennies for one. Two years after that, it somehow seemed irresponsible to be without one. I could not believe how exponentially fast technology grew to be adopted around me. Suddenly everyone had an online presence, a miniature computer in their pocket, and I was fielding interview questions that demanded how exactly I embed technology in the classroom. After finally joining the district where I am currently hired, I became adept at interacting with the technology my district provided and soon became a go-to resource for my teacher peers. When they needed help using their document cameras to record lessons, they called me. When they wanted to scan and review data in Illuminate Ed., or even create a survey with Google forms, they emailed me. When they wanted help navigating SchoolCenter, our district provided website creator, they stopped by my classroom. When it came time for me to select a graduate program, MAET made sense. What I did not expect to find, but I am so glad I did, is that the program modeled how to use tools in general. In CEP 812, my first class and where I perhaps expected a list of tech apps that might revolutionize my teaching, I discovered a list of mindsets grounded in educational psychology that included the necessary language to speak about and use technology to leverage student success. I exulted in that knowledge! In CEP 811, I was taught that a tool can be repurposed to solve a problem in my classroom-- so the tool was not even important, but how I used the tool. I was taught to look at “problems” as “constraints”, and that constraints are sometimes necessary to foster creative solutions. I learned that they are not prohibitive and that sometimes we learn more through a productive struggle with these constraints than an easy success might ever have afforded us. I learned first hand how motivating that can be. In CEP 815, I learned that interacting with technology is interacting with media, which changes the landscape for thinking or acting in the world, and that it requires developing a literacy that can be refined with continued use. The best part was that “play” counted as a literacy, and one I had not considered before. Previously, I had sheepishly termed my learning as “tinkering” which seemed so diminutive and illegitimate. MAET not only validated my process, but it sort of granted permission for me to integrate this philosophy into my classroom with renewed enthusiasm. So with these elements in mind, I refocused on my problem. I created a video project and asked students to pick a famous speech, to reenact it in a video, and to publish it with purposefully chosen effects. I placed them in pairs so that they could work through and collaborate on both the speech they chose and the technology they selected. I asked them to cut their scenes according to some basic principles of design, to keep their scene cuts close to ten seconds, to be purposeful with their humor and props, and to ensure that whatever they included in their scenes did not compete too much with their words. Most importantly, I asked them to have fun with it. In the meantime, I acted out some of the pieces listed above, and we hunted down tone, audience, and methods of rhetoric in each of them. Two days before school was out for Christmas break I brought in holiday donuts and orange juice, to celebrate our hard work, and we presented our videos. After watching their videos, they explained the tech they used and the design moves they incorporated into their shots. It was a hit. We heard words from Dr. King, JFK, Malcolm X, and even Ronald Reagan. We heard from suffragettes and First Ladies, and a slew of other great people whose passion dripped into their words and came alive in my students’ mouths. We talked about the rhetoric of their videos, the what and how they crafted into their scenes, since video directors also shape the emotion and understanding of their audience as they build rhetoric into their editing. It was a little rough in some spots. I did not have time to teach kids how to video edit. I relied on their own tinkering to counter the inevitable constraints of their project. I would only point them in the direction of some free online software that could teach it to them in their own tutorials. Some of them had difficulty sharing their finished work with me in time for the big reveal. Some of them, who were more tech challenged, chose to simply reenact their speech live with homemade props or costumes, and that was ok too. However, their excitement, their personal sense of accomplishment, and their grasp of the concepts I was so afraid they would reject, was energizing for both of us. This is the kind of teacher I want to be. I want my kids to master English. I want them to enjoy English. And I want to do so without sacrificing discipline, equity, or my own workplace sustainability. I know this is only one example. Just because I successfully integrated technology into one unit does not mean I am done with the work I have to do. However, it serves as an encouragement to me-- that I can take what I learned-- what I am committed to keep learning-- and embed it into my practice. My goals are lined up in a row, and they have not changed much. I am still working toward the success of my students in this technology driven era. I am still committed to being the best resource I can for them. But the implementation of these goals look a lot different than I imagined. Where in my naivete, I saw my students in quiet, neat rows, dutifully studying their texts, I now see them talking excitedly together. I see them with their heads together, tinkering with a craft, piece of tech, and maybe a book too. I see them presenting and gesturing toward my whiteboard with that look of pride that says, “I made this,” and I do not see myself at the center of it all. I think the role of a teacher has many hats. Some days I might be presenting or constructing materials, as I model my expectations. Mostly I see myself as a curator-- of texts, of medias, of materials, and that mostly I will step out of the way and let them develop their own understanding as it relates to their experience and their needs. Lastly, I learned about the scholarship of teaching and learning, a principle that dictates that we cannot teach in a vacuum, or an echo-chamber. We have an obligation to share, and to accept the creativity of others. This means developing a PLN (a professional learning network) that is continually growing. This is begun already through the professors and peers whom I have met through my studies. They have introduced me to an even vaster network online via Twitter, Facebook, and Google. It is also begun via this site, a compilation of everything I have done and intend to do with this program. It is the publication of my endeavors inside and outside my classroom, so that others can learn from my mistakes and successes. I have an obligation to share with my students and my fellow “curators” what I am working on, so that they can help me, and be helped by me in helping kids learn. And that starts here, in the space, on this page, where I can make public my efforts. This space is to remain as a tool for my kids, my colleagues, and myself as I archive my hard work and theirs. Want a printable copy of this post?
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