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/

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!

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!  

The impact of storytelling in my science classes has been tremendous in terms of    ‘hooking’ students into learning. I tell my students a story of how Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin accidentally to make them understand that curiosity and persistence are important characteristics that imaginative people posses. In my senior chemistry class I tell the story of how the structure of benzene was first realized in one scientist’s dream of a snake biting its own tail. I tell the story of Benjamin Banneker, an African-American scientist, who studied the inner workings of his friend’s watch and then carved the wooden replica of each piece to make a clock that kept time until his death in 1806.

I especially favor the story of Nikola Tesla who channeled his childhood imagination into some of the most important inventions of the twentieth century.  I tell my students stories about scientists and their discoveries to make them appreciate the nature of science and the importance of creativity and imagination to innovation and development of new knowledge.  I want my students will realize that science is the foundation of an innovative culture.

When I introduce my Grade 9 students to Space unit I tell them a personal story of when I was lost in the Black desert in Egypt, and how I relied on the night sky to help me find my way back to the camp site.  I show them a few photos from my trip in to the Black and White deserts to make the story even more personal and convincing. I select stories that are relevant to a particular unit of study and that are representative of the diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds of my students. There is something about stories that captivates students’ imaginations. It gets them excited about a subject.

What’s your favorite science story that you tell your kids?

In public schools spirituality is not a subject that is often discussed with our science students. The rich cultural diversity that exists within our classrooms has many benefits as well as some challenges. Teacher’s awareness and sensitivity to various cultural and/or religious differences make it relatively challenging to incorporate elements of spirituality into a science classroom. I think that most science teachers in public schools avoid incorporating spirituality as it is largely a “sensitizing concept” lacking in specificity and relevance to science education.  Science and spirituality are almost always seen as two separate things. Spirituality is also mistakenly confused with religion. I argue that there is a place for spirituality in our science curriculum, and that science teachers should weave spiritual education into science education provided that they are comfortable with it .You may disagree.

Nurturing the Spirits of our students is part of a holistic approach to education. Even though the Spirit is not something that we can examine under a microscope, or test by a deductive or scientific method, it is a force or an energy that grows, develops and infuses all living things. You may disagree, again.

The First Nations spirituality is rich in personifications and anecdotes that embody many of the concepts that we teach in science. It may provide a starting point for science teachers to weave spirituality subtly into their science curriculum. We might be surprised to find out that we already incorporate elements of First Nation’s spirituality. For example, the Tribe’s community circle is a communication method used by the First Nations to teach patience, listening, trust and speaking. The question is how to make spiritual education an even stronger part of our daily practice in science classrooms. I am not suggesting hour long lessons on spirituality education, which may have their place in public education, but rather a subtle approach such as  posting quotes up on the classroom’s walls with spiritual innuendos such as: “the Earth is our relative and we learn to take care of her because we know that our survival depends on her.” Couldn’t this quote from the First Nations lead a class into a discussion about stewardship, sustainability and one’s personal responsibility for the health of our planet?

I am opening a discussion on how to bring spirituality in science classrooms because I see the importance of nourishing the souls of students. By using quotes, imagery, art, journal writing, etc. we deepen our students connection to both the world of science and spirituality.  Finding connections in the curriculum that can tie science learning outcomes to spirituality may be a bit of a challenge, but I believe that it is worth it.  You may disagree.

As I sit alone in my apartment in Guangzhou, China, I am reminded of how fragile life is. I am thinking about how anything can wipes us out, and we do not know when that moment will come.

Today would have been my father’s birthday if he was alive. He would have been 55 years old had he not been killed in 1992 in the civil war in former Yugoslavia. Thoughts about my father lead me to question the purpose of my visit to Guangzhou on a deeper, spiritual level. Besides just coming here to teach E.S.L, which in itself is an important purpose, I believe that I am also here to discover something about my spiritual self.

As a religious man, I am convinced that my visit to the Holy Mount Athos in Greece last summer triggered a series of intricate changes in my life. This trip is one of those changes. I have not led the most “normal” life as a child or as a teenager or even as a young adult. Each of these periods in my life carried with it challenges and obstacles that prevented me from reaching a certain potential. But I think that I succeeded in other ways.

The journey to my thirties has been an unimaginable process of self discovery. Although I may have missed out on a “normal” childhood, or a thrilling teenage hood, I have grown to become a deeply intuitive and culturally sensitive individual. My trip to China has extended my cultural awareness and my way of thinking about the world in which we all live in.  China has been special for another reason. Everyone here has been calling me Momo, which was the name of my father, and the name that I decided that everyone in China should call me by since Mirjan proved to be too difficult to pronounce for the Chinese. The two-syllable name, Mo-Mo, has been very easy for all of my students, colleagues and friends here in Guangzhou. Momo became recognizable very quickly and in a matter of days everyone called me “Momo” around the school and in the community.

The name also took on a special meaning for me. Every time a student would call me Momo, every gene in my DNA that was given to me by my dad at conception would ‘hear’ it. After a few weeks I felt that some of my father’s dormant genes started to wake up. Even though my father has been dead for 18 years I started to feel a part of him. This trip to Guangzhou has brought me closer to my father. As I look at the two pictures of myself from my recent trip with the students to an amusement park in Fushan city, I see Momo. When I can see his reflection in me I am happy and I am overcome by intense emotions. I suppose that some of these things would be natural or normal for someone who has grown up with a father all his life, but for me the memories of my father’s physical presence on this planet are slowly fading away as years pass by. My father was with us for only a short time, but I am learning now that his spirit never left us.

We need our parents to guide us, to teach us and to help us when we need them. As much as this is Mirjan’s trip to China, it is equally Momo’s trip. I can now say that I travelled to a new country and experienced this fascinating culture with my father. Thank you dad for being here with me.

There is another father, our heavenly Father, that I have to thank for enlightening me with this experience. I praise my Lord and hold up my hands as I say: “Thank you God for everything that you have given me, and for everything that you have taken away from me. Without you my Lord I would be nowhere and I would be nothing. Thank you God for giving me patience in times of fear and pain. You are my beacon and I praise all that you are! Amen!”