Krstovic's Thoughts on Education

A few days ago I talked to my Grade 12 students about the quantum model of an atom. Anyone who has studied the quantum model will tell you that this stuff is very abstract. How do we visualize atoms and the subatomic particles? What is an electron and how does it really behave? How do we account for electron’s wave and particle-like behaviors? How do students’ make sense of this abstractness?

After going over the quantum numbers and having the kids assign quantum numbers to electrons in an atom, I asked myself this question: “Is this even worth knowing at this point in kids’ lives?”  To soothe my curiosity, I asked the students to brainstorm in groups a list of 10 things that are worth knowing in life.

One student said: “This is hard!”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“ Do you mean any 10 things?” asked the student again.

“Yes, any 10 things that you would consider worth knowing in life!” I said.

Students took about 5 minutes to brainstorm their list, and then, I asked a member of each group to write their list on the blackboard. Here are the things that a class of Grade 12 students thinks are worth knowing:

• Your name (identity)/ Self (X2)
• People skills
• Reading
• Defend yourself / How to take care of ourselves
• Make food
• Basic knowledge of survival (X3)
• After life? (X3)
• Truth about religion / God’s existence? (X2)
• Knowledge about your future
• How people first developed theories
• The Big Bang Theory / Beginning of existence (X2)
• Why are there geniuses and regular people?
• Extraterrestrial life, does it exist? (X2)
• Unified theory
• Finding out our roles in society
• Communication (X2)
• Language
• Distinguish between myth and reality
• Morality (X2)
• History
• Technology
• News around the world
• Point of life

This is certainly an interesting list. The numbers in the brackets represent the number of times that the common answer or theme appeared. As you might imagine, this list served as a platform for an extremely rich conversation.

One student wrote to me after class stating: “By the way, the discussion during the latter half of the period was refreshing. Glad we had it.”

I had to ask him to be more specific and tell me what stood out for him and what made this a refreshing discussion.

He replied with: “I just found how some students found it more necessary that certain questions that haunt society are more important than the everyday activities we indulge in to sustain ourselves. I remember a couple questions being around the ideas of higher beings and extraterrestrial life forms and through the discussion it sort of amazed me that students take this approach.  I interpreted the question to be based around our necessities and not around these questions and so I found the discussion sort of refreshing to see that there are different perspectives and different answers to every question.”

Insightful reply from a Grade 12 student! Thanks S.F.!

I will end it here. Feel free to comment! What do you think of this list? What does it tell us about students’ perception of the 10 things worth knowing?
Image credits: http://theraffaellas.bandcamp.com/

My students felt that they were learning more ‘things’ that would make them ‘street-smart’ rather than ‘book-smart’ while learning about activism and developing actions on issues that affect the wellbeing of individuals, societies and environments. This was concluded after a group of five student volunteers agreed to be interviewed by Prof Larry Bencze (from OISE) as part of the  study of the  implementation of the STEPWISE framework in my Grade 10 Academic Science.

Excerpt from October 17, 2011 Journal Entry – Inspiring Activism and Allowing Time for Students to Work on Research and Planning their Actions!

“Today I showed the photos and videos of my visit to St. James Park in Toronto during the Occupy Toronto event. Many students did not know about Occupy Toronto or other related movements around the globe. We discussed some of the images that I was showing and I related them as much as I could to student action projects. My ‘take action’ pep-rally lasted 20 minutes and after this I took the students to the computer room, where they had an hour and a half to work on their research.”

[Reflection: When look back I realize that this lesson on October 17^th was motivating and it supported the idea of activism. I modeled this to students by going to Occupy Toronto event. In terms of the streetsmarts, the images and videos that I was showing to kids were real and current! I talked about the sings that the protesters made and the information they included on their posters. I stressed the idea that masses should to be educated for a protest or a movement, like Occupy Toronto, to make sense. We talked about violent protests and what is and  what isn’t accomplished during such public upheavals. All of these conversations fed into the idea of streetsmarts more so that just booksmarts.]

Except from October 21, 2011 Journal Entry – Students’ Presentations of their Actions!

“I learned that students have tremendous potential to be creative and innovative as I watched their STSE action presentations. They like this project since it was customizable allowing them the freedom to do what they wanted as far the issues they decided to study and the kinds of actions they pursued….”

 [Reflection: One of the words that stands out to me is ‘customizable.’ Nowadays teenagers want most things around them to be ‘customizable.’ Classroom experiences are still traditional, for the most part. They are not very customizable by the students. Students should be able to ‘customize’ their learning experiences by tailoring them to their interests. The STSE action projects allowed students to do exactly this – to ‘customize’ their learning  by choosing their own topic, forming same interest groups and deciding on what actions to take. The concept of ‘customizable education’ relates more to street-smarts rather than booksmart since it has more in common with kids' everyday life experiences.]

 These are just two short and recent reflections of many more reflections to come (not necessarily on this blog), but as part of my effort to try to understand the factors or events that have made the students feel that they were learning street smarts over book smarts in my Grade 10 Science class.

Please feel free to share your thoughts about the value of street smarts in education and what kind of teaching would promote street smarts over book smarts.

Image Credits:  http://www.themichelpage.com/Humor_StreetSmarts.htm

This semester I have been working on implementing the STEPWISE framework in my Grade 10 Science. In light of this innovation, I’d like to review several stages of staff concern about an innovation based on the Concern-Based Adoption Model (CBAM) by Hall, Wallace and Dosset (1973). Here they are:

• Awareness. The science staff becomes aware that the innovation exists (ie. that someone is implementing something different). Details of the innovation are lacking. Colleagues may see evidence of some of the work in the school hallways or in the classroom.
• Information. The individuals who are interested want more information. They begin to wonder if the innovation can help them. They may actively seek out new information, both explicit and tacit, to gain greater awareness of the innovation.
• Personal. What will the demands of innovation do to my time? My energy? Colleagues who are interested in implementing an innovation have personal concerns over how the innovation will impact them personally.
• Management. The focus is on the process of implementing the innovation in the classroom and various tasks that are part of the process of implementation. Colleagues may have curriculum concerns and how will they manage the innovation so that certain parts of the curriculum are not compromised.
• Consequences. These are also called impact concerns. The focus is on the impact of innovation on students and others involved in the implementation of the innovation.
• Collaboration. This stage of concern refers to coordination and efficiency with which the innovation is implemented.
• Refocusing. This last stage is focusing on exploration of more powerful alternatives.

The above stages suggest that interventions and professional development should address the specific expressed concerns of the teachers. Research indicates that expressed concerns permit the identification of acceptance or adoption of the innovation on the part of teachers. Teachers must first have their concerns reduced in the Awareness, Information, Personal and Management stages, before the three adopter stages: Consequences, Collaboration and Refocusing (For more thorough research visit: http://www.ucalgary.ca/iejll/vaughan)

Reference:

Hall, G. E., Wallace, R. C., & Dossett, W. A. (1973). A developmental conceptualization of the adoption process within educational institutions (Rep. No. 3006). Austin, Texas: The University of Texas at Austin, The Research and Development Center for Teacher Education. (ERIC Document Reproduction No. ED 095 126).

About a year ago I wrote a post on Critical Thinking and Student Engagement. In that post, I reviewed some data on student engagement. I don’t know the author of that study (I’ll try to find out), but this is what’s suggested:

• Students in arts and tech classes were more engaged than students in ‘academic’ classes
• Students were more engaged in science than math
• Students were more engaged in math than history

This suggests the following about engagement (which is nothing new to us): For students to be engaged the following three criteria need to be met:

1)      Interactivity

2)      Concentration

3)      Relevance

Interactivity: students need to be doing something hands-on and they should have an opportunity to interact with other students in class

Concentration: it is not enough that students are doing in hands-on activities; their minds must also be engaged.

Relevance: if it is not directly relevant to students’ lives, the chances of students staying engage are lower.

So, this may now explain, why students are least engaged in history classes. Traditionally, we students ‘stuff’ and then we invite them to think. However, it should be the other way around. Students should be first invited to think – the driver needs to be thinking –  other ‘stuff’ can be added along the way. In science, this ‘stuff’ is usually theories, laws and basic knowledge and understanding, which so many teachers stress over more important things like applications of this ‘stuff’ to everyday lives.

This past week my Grade 11 Chemistry students raised $202.20 for the Terry Fox Foundation in just three days. The whole school participated in the fundraiser, and the class that raises the most money will win a pizza party. We still don’t know if we won a pizza party for our class, but I am sure that we are one of the top, if not the top class in terms of the amount of money raised! But winning a pizza party is not what is important here – it’s about positive classroom community!

I am tremendously proud of my Grade 11 students who showed their generosity through charity. I feel that this fundraiser brought us closer together as a community and I have no doubt that this will spill over and have a positive effect on students’ achievement. The more the students feel that they are part of a community, where everyone feels like they belong, the safer the learning environment will become and the better their performance will be in my class.

I want to congratulate all my Grade 11 students for being such a wonderful group of teenagers. I want to encourage each and every one of them to continue to look for opportunities where they can collectively make a difference in this world. Together everyone can achieve more in life!

Recently I completed a 10,000 word report on science education reform for one of my Master’s courses. I started writing on July 5 and I submitted the final report on July 14. Throughout these ten days, and at least five days prior to starting to write, I had reviewed the suggested literature about the nature of science, and spent hours absorbed in my thoughts and ideas trying to find something that would connect to what I believe is seriously lacking in science education.

As a science teacher of six years I have realized that a lot of teachers teach for coverage, rather than for deeper understanding of concepts due to the overwhelming number of specific expectations that teachers feel like they need to cover. In addition, there seems to be a greater focus on the knowledge and understanding of the fundamental concepts, than on thinking and investigation and the application of science to students’ lives. There is a lot of room for improvement when it comes to how we address issues that relate science to technology, society and environment, and the way that STSE issues have been weaved into other learning activities, such as labs and projects.

While reviewing literature, I came across the STEPWISE framework, developed by Larry Bencze, who also happened to be the professor of the course that I was taking. STEPWISE stands for “Science and Technology Education Promoting the Wellbeing for Individuals, Societies and Environments.” The intent of the STEPWISE framework is to give students the opportunity to take actions on STSE issues that matter to them, while also engaging in student-lead, open-ended inquiries and projects. The concept of WISE (Wellbeing for Individuals, Societies and Environments) activism is at the center of the STEPWISE framework. Students acquire the necessary knowledge and understanding as well as build the required skills as they engage in learning that motivates them to act on an issue.

I based my reform on the STEPWISE framework, calling attention to the need to do a better job in the way that we teach students about STSE issues and the nature of science. I also called for a more balanced approach in the curriculum, where adequate attention is given to each domain of learning. There needs to be a common thread, a unifying theme, and a connection between each domain of learning: knowledge and understanding, thinking and investigation and application.

Lastly, students should be learning more about science!  I italicize about to stress the importance of the nature of science education. Students should be learning more realistic conceptions about the processes and products of science and technology. Their pre-conceived ideas about the nature of science should be assessed, and re-assessed as they progress through each course, and high school. If introduced properly, the reform should yield better overall learning experience for students, increased confidence in science, greater awareness of science in the real world and better preparedness for a life as global citizens entrenched in this technoscience world.

Credits to: http://webspace.oise.utoronto.ca/~benczela/WISE_Activism.html (Larry Bencze, 2008)

I once read somewhere that education should be about creating experienced for students – experiences that students will talk about for years to come. Just the other day I was talking about ecology, ecosystems and frogs. I showed my Grade 9 Applied and Locally Developed students a preserved bullfrog. Most of the kids were squeamish, but interested to see it up close; some wanted to touch the bullfrog. One kid asked me: “Sir, did you ever eat ?” “Yes I did, and they taste alright, “ I replied.  “Did any one of you ever try frog legs?” I asked the kids. No one put up their hand or said yes. So I asked: “Would you like me to bring you some so you can try?” Most of the kids put up their hand to show that they were interested in trying this delicacy.

That same evening I went to a restaurant that prepares the best frog legs in Mississauga. I asked the chef if he could prepare an order of frog legs stir-fried in lemongrass and pepper sauce. The next morning I warmed up the frog legs when I got to the school, and served them on a plate for the kids. I covered the plate with another plate so that the frog legs wouldn’t get cold. When the kids saw the plate, napkins and forks, they knew immediately what was under the plate!

After first getting the students to complete a quick minds-on exercise to review the key ecology terms, then I asked them to help themselves to a delicious frog leg, if they wanted to – no pressure.  I loved watching their facial expressions as they bit into the frog leg and gulped it down. One of my girls screamed as she bit into the meat. One boy encouraged the girl by saying: “It’s got the texture of chicken, but it kind of tastes like fish! It’s not bad!” One other boy didn’t mind the frog legs at all. He helped himself to a few frog legs, before taking the whole plate to finish whatever was left over, including the lemongrass. He said that the didn’t have any breakfast!

This was an exotic experience for the kids. They talked about it the whole class. Everyone was that much more interested in frogs, even the kids that didn’t eat the frog legs. The students completed a case study called “Why are the frogs disappearing?” which was ironic, given that we were just eating them! It’s experiences like these that make school fun and learning interesting!

I have come to accept that nothing is ideal. I was once an idealist, but not any more. Even when one feels passionate about one’s career one can experience moments of boredom and tiredness. Sometimes teaching can be exhausting, frustrating and disappointing. One needs a lot of courage to carry on!

Teaching is a highly demanding career that constantly requires us to enthuse our students and inspire them to learn our subject matter. This is extremely exhausting considering how much mental exertion goes into thinking, planning and delivering great lessons. Sometimes all that time and energy that went into planning a wonderful activity is wasted when a group of kids decide to come to class late in the morning or after lunch break, and a few others seek attention from their peers by refusing to keep quiet when the teacher tries to introduce the activity. It can be very frustrating when kids do not behave appropriately, or when they do not appreciate the amount of work that went into planning the activities for the class. I always end up working harder than my kids, and teachers shouldn’t really work more (or harder) than their students. It disappoints me when I show my weaknesses in front of my kids, and when I let the good students down by losing my enthusiasm in the lesson.  In his book The Courage to Teach Paker Palmer said: ” teaching is a daily exercise in vulnerability. ” It is equally disappointing when the goals of the lesson are not met for a variety of reasons that sometimes seem out teacher’s control.  In addition,  I rarely ever hear a ‘thank you” after I had poured out my heart and soul into a lesson, or “let me get the door for you Sir” as I walk with a pile of marking and other materials. I take teaching personally, maybe too personally.

Thank God that not every day feels like what I just described – that may lead one to insanity and a change in the career path. For me the motivation to teach comes from the fact that each day is a new day, and an opportunity to start anew. I don’t want to get into all the clichés of where the motivation to teach comes from, because the purpose of this post is to point out the fact that it takes a tremendous amount of courage to continue to teach!  

Not too long ago I read a book by Todd Whitaker called “What Great Teachers Do Differently – 14 Things That Matter Most.” It was a short and easy book to read in which Whitaker summarizes some of the most important things that matter in teaching. Out of the 14 things that Whitaker outlines in his book, a few have stood out for me.

i) Great teachers know who is the variable in the classroom: They are! Good teachers consistently strive to improve, and they focus on something they can control – their own performance.

ii) Great teachers have a plan and purpose for everything they do. If things don’t work out the way they ad envisioned, they reflect on what they could have done differently and adjust their plans accordingly.

Recently I came across this YouTube video from TVO – What makes great teachers great? One of the guest speakers was Mary Kooy, who was one of my professors at OISE. She is the Head of Center for Teacher Education and Development at OISE/UT. Take a look at the video: