I have been at a loss for words because as a mom, a teacher, a wife, I cannot even imagine what these families must be feeling. How can these families ever recover? How can that school ever return to normalcy? Will it ever? Probably not. I keep thinking what if it had been my daughters, or my husband, my own mother who was a teacher. I keep thinking about the recent shootings at the mall in Oregon, and at the movie theater, and I think what kind of life are we living, where we are afraid to go to the mall, the movies or even send our children to school for fear that some psychopath will open fire and kill us or destroy our joy for life. I do not even know what to say to help these families deal with their pain. It is that feeling of helplessness that we cannot allow to set in...that feeling that it's just part of what life is like nowadays...you just never know when you're at wrong place at the wrong time. We cannot live with this type of fear. We must do something about mental health; we must do something about gun control; we must do something about our fascination with violence; we must do something so that not only the lives of these children and adults are forever remembered, but all those who have died these senseless deaths. I am positive that the shooter had to have had a history of violence and mental illness. No sane person goes on a shooting rampage. How was he able to buy guns? What laws made it easy for him, and make it easy for others like him to go out and buy whatever weapons they want so they can kill and terrorize us? Who is in control here? Where are the laws to protect our right to live without fear? I believe in the protection of our right to bear arms, but in our current society, I prefer the protection of my right, my family's right, and my neighbors' right to go out into the world and feel safe to study,work, play and just live without the fear of getting shot in the head. What solace can we give these families? The only thing we can do is write to our government, make phone calls, ask questions and demand answers and actions from our leaders requiring help for the mentally ill, and gun control laws so that this never ever happens again. We cannot become complacent and forget about this a month from now and just move on. We are getting too used to hearing about these massacres, and if we don't take action, what if these massacres become so commonplace that we begin to turn to the internet for our sole means of our education, our shopping, our interactions, afraid of leaving our homes for fear of being shot. What kind of society will we become if we allow this to continue happening? Regular people can't hire body guards. Where is it safe to go these days if we can't even send our children to school, or enjoy shopping and a movie?
My heart, my prayers, my tears, my hugs, and all my love go out to these children and these adults who lost their lives for nothing and to the families who are left behind. But that is not enough. My condolences will not change anything. My writing to Congress and calling them and letting them know they must do something may, but only if there are millions of other citizens that do as well. Let's ensure that these lives were not lost in vain...that we do something to make sure this never happens again. If there's a heaven, I'm sure these children and adults are praying that that's what we'll do. http://www.congress.org/
May God give these families strength and comfort to live on without their loved ones!
A few years ago, I had one of the most challenging groups of students and parents I had ever worked with in my entire teaching career. I must confess that Ray Bradbury helped me get through that difficult time because one of his stories in particular spoke to me and showed me I was not alone in what I was experiencing and feeling. I did a lot of soul searching that year about why I became a teacher, and if I even wanted to continue teaching. I thought a lot about expectations, especially what the "powers that be" expected me to expect from my students and from their parents. My decades of experience, and my National Board certification carried absolutely no weight. And, I found myself fighting against the dumbing down of quality teaching to make students and parents happy. Late one afternoon, as I scoured through old and new literature books, searching for the panacea to cure some of my students of their learned helplessness and entitlement, I literally stumbled across one of Ray Bradbury's gems "The Veldt". The minute I saw the name Bradbury, I knew the story had to be good. I also thought Bradbury's writing style might just help these students who resisted critical thinking connect to literature like no other piece they had ever read. Best of all, teaching "The Veldt" allowed me to express my civil disobedience of sorts by sending out the message loud and clear about our public school system's student, parent, teacher dynamic, that adults are often at the mercy of children's demands. "The Veldt" opened the eyes of some of the brightest students in my class, but as much as I hoped it would not, the story's true meaning went over the heads of my most rebellious students and their parents.
My students that year had been conditioned not to think and technology had been used to baby sit them, not to make them think. My high expectations and my attempts at getting them to think proved to be too much for them to handle because they were not used to being challenged. I realized their resistance to work was natural since no one had ever really expected much from them to begin with. Like Wendy and Peter, the children in the story, they had been used to doing what they wanted, when they wanted. And like Wendy and Peter, they naturally fought back when I threatened their status quo, imposed rules for the first time just like the parents in the story, or expected them to use their imaginations or critical thinking for the first time.
Reading "The Veldt" was like holding up a mirror for these kids and their parents, and yelling, "Hey, learn from George and Lydia’s mistakes! Stop enabling your kid to resist thinking and working in my class!" So it was natural, that the message fell on deaf ears. There was a small minority who did realize after our class discussions and activities, that the story was a social commentary about this type of dynamic between parents and children, and so much more. Their efforts to stay after class to converse and provide their own insights about the story proved to me they wanted to learn, and they knew what I was trying to tell the rest of them, but the rest of them interpreted the story at face value: children who think up the world of the veldt, a grassland in Africa so they can have their parents eaten alive by lions. What Bradbury wanted to convey through this ending was difficult for some students to swallow…pun intended, but in the end "The Veldt" fascinated all the students, making them think and wonder how someone had the nerve to write about children killing their parents. Akin to the children's character in the story, some questioned whether I had permission to allow them to read such a disturbing piece. (Luckily the selection was featured in the state’s approved text.) Unlike the parents in the story, I stood my ground, feeling successful at getting them to at least question why I wanted them to read this. And standing my ground, setting high standards, demanding that they learn and work, and produce original thoughts are what I realized students and their parents resisted the most. Like the children in "The Veldt", they threw tantrums whenever I asked them to think, and their parents, like George and Lydia, enabled the students to do the bare minimum, protecting them from ever experiencing failure, reaching their potential and expecting their children to earn As with little to no effort. If I refused to accommodate these needs, I risked unhappy parents and students.
For me, Bradbury's "The Veldt" poignantly captured my dilemma with these types of children and their parents, who as Bradbury characterized want to “do nothing but look, listen and smell…what else was there to do?” Shockingly for my class and for me, we learned Bradbury wrote and published the story in 1950. These behaviors, which I thought were part of a growing trend of insolence and indolence, I realized were not new, and were Bradbury's warning of future generations gone awry because of technology.
Although he wrote about the future, and described technological advances in prophetic detail, Bradbury criticized technology, i.e., television, cell phones, the internet, etc., and always warned us of the coming dystopia if we allow technology to replace our most human needs. My classroom that year was a glance into the future Bradbury warned about children, parents and technology. “The World the Children Made” as Bradbury originally titled “The Veldt” existed in my classroom. The children had in years past been allowed to make a world with rules convenient for them, allowed to use tech in ineffective ways, and there were plenty of adults who allowed them to enforce these rules.
But my students, like the children in the story were not blameworthy as Bradbury underscores in his story. In our public school system, as adults, sometimes, we try to protect children so much by expecting less from them. For a variety of reasons, students are often conditioned to do the bare minimum. We end up doing them more harm than good, stifling potential rather than encouraging it to develop. Like George and Wendy, the doting parents, we throw money at the problem, ignoring the root causes of the academic problems, as well as failing to educate parents about the importance of rigor and allowing students to learn from mistakes.
We all need to be more cognizant of academic expectations for children’s success in school and for later in life. Both teachers and parents need to constantly reflect on how we can most effectively implement technology at home and at school so adults do not lose children’s respect, and attention, and children do not lose their imagination and ability to think for themselves.
Bradbury's stories wanted us to think about all of these issues, our relationships with each other, and the price we pay in our relationships when we abuse technology. Technology can never replace the human bond we must make with our children. Technology, if abused, reduces us to a base state. The children in “The Veldt” lost their humanity and thought nothing of killing their own parents. Their parents’ attempt to provide the best life for their children backfired, and they failed to connect to their children.
Our attempts to make concepts easier for students to understand often backfires too, and we end up underestimating their true abilities and condition them to perform at standards below their true potential.
When it comes to technology, we must also be careful not to allow our desire to integrate technology to overshadow our need for rigor in our classrooms.
As much as I love technology, hence this blog, I know we must always maintain a balance between the analog and digital world and never ever ignore the human facets of teaching and learning. Some concepts are learned best without technology, and we can't ever lose sight of that.
The point of my entry is not only to write in memoriam of Ray Bradbury and express how much I loved his writing, but also to reflect on our expectations of students in the classroom, and our expectations of how we will use tech in the classroom to teach students how to think, not just play. If we don't, as Bradbury and the band deadmau5 who wrote a song based on the short story said, “this happy world of technology” we have designed for our children will end up consuming us and dehumanize them; if we make them "fall in love with the way they are", the children "will not ever want to leave", or try anything new but “looking, listening and smelling”, they will not want any authority figure unplugging them from their state of complacency.
Thanks Ray Bradbury for your bold imagination, for inspiring my civil disobedience and for teaching me to recognize when it's time to shut off the machine.
"The Veldt" - song lyrics by deadmau5
Happy Life, With the Machines;
Scattered around the room.
Look what they Made; they made it for me...
Happy Technology!
Outside, the Lions roam, feeding on remains...
We'll never leave, look at us now;
So in love with the way we are...
...Heeeere!
The world that the children made...
The world that the children made, Heeere!
The world that the children made, Heeere!
The world that the children made.
Every night, the World goes to sleep,
Digital Family!
Is it real? Or is it a dream?
Can you believe the machine....
Outside, the beating sun, can you hear the screams?
We'll never leave, look at us now.
So in love with the way we are.
[Chorus]
[Long Pause/Instruments, then a slightly less happy tone]
Happy Life...With the Machines,
Scattered around the room.
Look what they made, they Made it for me;
Happy Technology!
Outside, the Lions roam, Feeding on remains.
We'll never leave, look at us now;
So In love with with the way we are.
Heeere!
[Chorus]
If you haven’t met TED, TED is waiting to inspire you and your students! TED is a non-profit organization first created to spread ideas about Technology, Entertainment and Design; however, since it’s inception in 1984, TED has expanded to spreading ideas online about so much more through TED Talks. Our technology has made TED Talks easily accessible anytime, anywhere on the web. TED Talks feature short presentations of leading experts in all fields of study. From celebrities, scientists, writers, to directors, magicians, heads of state, and Noble Prize winners, TED Talks are profoundly moving and thought provoking. TED presenters promise to keep you and your students engaged because presentations are no longer than 20 minutes long! No snoozing or mind wandering with TED, promise!
How can you use TED Talks in the classroom?
TED has over 900 different talks exploring all aspects of life and the human condition. Speakers explore topics we can all connect with, and in 20 minutes or less, we leave feeling smarter and more aware of our world and ourselves.
Imagine if you could create your own TED Talks in your elementary, middle or high school classroom. After reading a novel, or non fiction piece, students could explore one or more of its themes; research the theme in more depth using primary sources for support of the theme, and then write a moving speech to deliver as a TED Talk. What about writing and delivering a TED Talk as a character from a short story, or the speaker of a poem? In science, students could explore the moral implications of cloning, or in history class explore patterns of human behavior to determine if we truly do fail to learn from our mistakes. In math, students could offer TED Talks to explain mathematical applications in life. These are obviously just a few ideas off the top of my head, but if teachers of all subjects brainstormed ideas with their students of possible TED Talks, I’m sure the topics would be worth a listen. Kids want to talk and express their views, opinions and perspectives of the adult world. It's in every human being's nature to seek knowledge. Creating mock TED Talks, and viewing actual TED talks can channel that human instinct to learn and help students make sense of topics they struggle understanding.
If your school has its own TV broadcast system, imagine students creating brief TED talks on bullying prevention, drug awareness, cyber bullying, social media safety, and other student issues. How would these student TED Talks impact a school culture?
Kids are more creative than adults; if given the opportunity to create their own TED Talk network, students regardless of learning challenges and ability level could literally change the cultures of their schools through their own TED talks. If the TED founders have been able to inspire the world, then our children can do it too if we give them the chance to express themselves.
Here’s one of my favorite TED speakers, Ken Robinson, on how schools kill creativity. I hope that whether you teach elementary, middle or high school, you can think of a way to create your own mock TED talks in your class. Even if some of the TED talks are too mature for your students, you can apply the concept of TED to your classroom by allowing your students to teach and inspire one another through the power of speech.
Please also visit TeachingWithTED to see a wiki listing great TED Talks, and a Glog created by one of the wiki contributors. (Couldn't find the name to credit the person who created this awesome Glog):
What did one control freak say to another control freak? "Get your hands off my wiki!"
If you've heard the word wiki, but are not quite sure what it means or how to use it, then you've come to the right blog! Wikis are webpages created for ongoing editing and revision by one author or multiple authors.
Control freaks and wikis do not mix well because a wiki is meant to be in a constant state of revision and editing by multiple authors. (The control freak will want to keep that wiki all to himself!)
Wikis can be messy and should be! A wiki promotes collaboration and critical thinking. All students can throw in their two cents, and see every contributor's thought process, but they serve an even better purpose! They teach students about the writing process. In many classrooms, writing is not taught as a recursive process. Students are given writing prompts, but rarely receive feedback to understand how they can improve their writing skills. If they are lucky enough to receive feedback, students may not know what to do with that feedback, nor do they have the opportunity to revisit a writing piece to polish it. (And by the way, kids do read feedback if they're taught how to read it, apply it and and give it...another post for another day.) Here's where wikis are a breath of fresh of air and give new life to teaching the writing process!
Teachers can create wikis for pairs of students who have different writing strengths, small groups of students or an entire class. These wikis can be safely shared online locally, nationally or globally by joining wiki sites like Wikispaces so students can receive writing feedback and participate in collaborative writing projects with their peers.
If you're worried that wikis may be too messy for your taste because content may get deleted, Hakuna Matata, no worries! (Oops, not a Hawaiian expression, but let's pretend!) When you create a wiki, there is a "revision history" so the wiki creator knows who edits, what is edited and even at what time the editing took place. Issues that may arise with wikis include:
allowing students practice time to learn how to use a wiki
building a community of trust so contributors feel confident their contributions will be valued
ensuring the quality of the content students add to the wiki
assigning authentic writing topics so students will be excited to write and collaborate
assigning subtopics to each student and/or roles so students have a distinct contribution
determining how you will assess the content added to the wiki
safeguarding your wiki so it is not vandalized or deleted
Luckily, wiki sites offer monitoring controls to wiki creators. You decide to make your wiki public or private, and who contributes and edits. Students can also add videos, images, audio or links of websites that support their content. So, fear not and hang ten!
A wiki can change students' attitudes about writing because they will participate in different aspects of the writing process. Students will learn from their mistakes, recognize their peers's mistakes so they can help them, but most importantly they will collaborate with peers, and internalize the process of revising, editing, polishing and presenting their writing.
Students at any grade level can create wikis on any subject, and even share their wikis with classrooms around the world to receive input from other student or teacher authors.
Check out these educational wikis looking for student and teacher collaboration!
Now no offense to Lawrence Welk. I have fond childhood memories of watching the show on our analog TV with my grandfather. I remember the bubbles while the big band played, the pretty singers in the flowing pastel dresses, the young female Mexican singer, and the African-American tap dancer. When I think of it now, Welk was ahead of the game in terms of multiculturalism. He featured minorities as regulars on his show when most shows in the 60s were not. Maybe that was one of the many reasons Welk's show became a hit with American audiences. He was progressive! However, that was in the 50s and 60s! Some people reading this blog may not even know who Lawrence Welk was, which serves as a case in point. When it comes to teaching and learning, many schools are still operating in the Lawrence Welk era...students are still being required to sit in quiet rows; answering questions at the end of a textbook; forbidden to speak to each other, or even to the teacher for that matter; forbidden to ask questions; bored to tears listening to monotone lectures; copying notes from poorly lit overhead projectors; forced to answer multiple choice questions, and fill in the blanks on worksheet after worksheet, and punished to write lines, or behavior modification essays at the slightest sign of dissension. The Lawrence Welk era came and went. It served its purpose for our needs then, and maybe it didn't because we didn't know better. But when we realized there was something better, we embraced change. When we discovered that there were "Moves Like Jagger", and our needs were no longer being met, we created and searched for ways to do better. We progressed. Our lifestyles and perspectives evolved; we said "adios" and good riddance to so many aspects of society that the Welk Show represented, and we embraced something different: we embraced progress. However, how have we truly progressed inside our classrooms since then? It's human nature there will be those who forever argue life was better in yesteryear, and that teaching and learning of yesteryear was superior to ours. They are not wrong because society then is nothing like society now. Students then are nothing like students now. However, inside our classrooms, why do we hold on or revert to antiquated methods, turning on Welk and ignoring the rock and roll?
If we were to visit every American school classroom, public and private, how many schools do you think are still tuning in to Welk rather than Maroon 5? ("Moves Like Jagger" reference full circle here, and another case in point if you're over 40 and have no idea what I'm talking about.) If you're an educator of children, tweens, teens or young adults, it's essential that our classroom culture and technique is not a relic of the past, but a constant thriving and evolving source of inspiration where the next generation discovers their voice and identity, and is not held hostage by our own.
As Lawrence Welk and his singers used to say every night:
"Here's a Wish and a prayer that every dream comes true":
Be not afraid to use at least one web tool in your classroom per week. Remember you can't break anything by clicking and pointing; the majority of web tools are super user friendly; you won't lose data as long as you remember to save it beforehand. You will save time; you and your students will have fun in the teaching and learning process, and most all, you will engage and challenge students to think so everyone can have "moves like Jagger" and not Welk. Sorry Mr.Welk! Adios, Au Revoir, Auf Wiedersehento analog! (P.S. For those under 30, these words were part of Welk's "Good Night" song lyrics.)
So on Monday, you assign your students 20 vocabulary words; give them a menu of tried and true vocabulary exercises on Tuesday to challenge them to learn and use the words throughout the week; test them on Friday, yet half the students fail the vocabulary test. A month later, most students say they have never heard those words in their entire lives. Does this routine sound familiar?
In many ways, how are we still living in the stone age when it comes to vocabulary instruction? How can we evolve our vocabulary instruction to the next level?
What benefits result from assigning long lists of vocabulary words that students have never seen and cannot pronounce? In what ways do we ensure students continue to use the vocabulary they learn in and out of the classroom?
Fotobabble can revolutionize how we teach vocabulary! Students can choose or create an image to show how it represents the meaning of a word; they can use artwork, photos, original drawings, etc. Students can scan graphic organizers to analyze a word, and record themselves explaining the graphic organizer. The possibilities are endless!
How do our students benefit from vocabulary worksheets and workbooks? Are these resources working to help students internalize words if we are only requiring them to fill in blanks to memorize words for a weekly test, and never see, hear or use the words again?
Kylene Beers, author of When Kids Can’t Read:What Teachers Can Do(http://www.amazon.com/When-Kids-Cant-Read-Teachers/dp/0867095199)shares an interesting teacher experiment proving students feel overwhelmed “learning, using and remembering” long lists of words if they have never seen the words, and never hear their teachers use the words in a meaningful, relevant context. Beers suggests students learn more words when teachers focus on fewer words and model the word for students in everyday classroom speech.
Fotobabble.com is a site that allows you to upload images and add your voice to an image.
How can you fearlessly use this web 2.0 tool in your classroom?
Whenever you teach vocabulary, you can use fotobabble so students can upload a visual cue for a vocabulary word and record their voice to:
define the vocabulary word.
use the word in context in an original sentence, or paragraph.
explain multiple examples for the vocabulary word, such as connotation, pronunciation, spelling, part(s) of speech, suffixes, prefixes, roots, synonyms, antonyms.
use context as a clue revealing the word’s meaning.
use other words that share the same root, prefix, suffix as the word being studied.
use the word in different contexts.
compare and contrast the word to other words to reveal relationships between particular words.
explain the graphic organizer that analyzes the word.
share an excerpt from a fiction or non fiction passage where the word is used.
use the word to create a figure of speech.
use the word to create an analogy.
These are just a few ways to use Fotobabble, but most importantly use fotobabble so STUDENTS LEARN HOW TO CREATE THEIR OWN CONTENT! Fotobabble allows teachers and students to create critical thinking activities that include voice and imagery, guaranteed to improve vocabulary skills. When students have the opportunity to create their own content, they are collaborating with peers and experiencing multiple opportunities to see, hear and use vocabulary.
Research shows students do not make any gains on vocabulary sections of standardized tests because they are not internalizing vocabulary if they never hear the words used again in the classroom. (http://www.reading.org/General/Publications/Books/BK698.aspx)
Poor readers have poor vocabulary, and longs lists of words kids can't even pronounce and may never see or hear again produce nothing but boredom and frustration! Learning new words should be exciting for students, not a tedious chore!
Please share how you have used Fotobabble to teach vocabulary!
Check out the lesson plan in the lesson plan section, and the Fotobabble tutorial by anamariacult so you can begin to change the way you teach vocabulary. Whatever the subject, or grade level, we all teach vocabulary, and Fotobabble can help our students improve their vocabulary skills!
I have been at a loss for words because as a mom, a teacher, a wife, I cannot even imagine what these families must be feeling. How can these families ever recover? How can that school ever return to normalcy? Will it ever? Probably not. I keep thinking what if it had been my daughters, or my husband, my own mother who was a teacher. I keep thinking about the recent shootings at the mall in Oregon, and at the movie theater, and I think what kind of life are we living, where we are afraid to go to the mall, the movies or even send our children to school for fear that some psychopath will open fire and kill us or destroy our joy for life. I do not even know what to say to help these families deal with their pain. It is that feeling of helplessness that we cannot allow to set in...that feeling that it's just part of what life is like nowadays...you just never know when you're at wrong place at the wrong time. We cannot live with this type of fear. We must do something about mental health; we must do something about gun control; we must do something about our fascination with violence; we must do something so that not only the lives of these children and adults are forever remembered, but all those who have died these senseless deaths. I am positive that the shooter had to have had a history of violence and mental illness. No sane person goes on a shooting rampage. How was he able to buy guns? What laws made it easy for him, and make it easy for others like him to go out and buy whatever weapons they want so they can kill and terrorize us? Who is in control here? Where are the laws to protect our right to live without fear? I believe in the protection of our right to bear arms, but in our current society, I prefer the protection of my right, my family's right, and my neighbors' right to go out into the world and feel safe to study,work, play and just live without the fear of getting shot in the head. What solace can we give these families? The only thing we can do is write to our government, make phone calls, ask questions and demand answers and actions from our leaders requiring help for the mentally ill, and gun control laws so that this never ever happens again. We cannot become complacent and forget about this a month from now and just move on. We are getting too used to hearing about these massacres, and if we don't take action, what if these massacres become so commonplace that we begin to turn to the internet for our sole means of our education, our shopping, our interactions, afraid of leaving our homes for fear of being shot. What kind of society will we become if we allow this to continue happening? Regular people can't hire body guards. Where is it safe to go these days if we can't even send our children to school, or enjoy shopping and a movie? 
