Beyond the One Room School

Beyond the One Room School

Beyond the One Room School

P. Bruce Uhrmacher Kristen E. Bunn University of Denver, USA

SENSE PUBLISHERS ROTTERDAM/BOSTON/TAIPEI

A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN: 978-94-6091-285-6 (paperback) ISBN: 978-94-6091-286-3 (hardback) ISBN: 978-94-6091-287-0 (e-book) Published by: Sense Publishers, P.O. Box 21858, 3001 AW Rotterdam, The Netherlands https://www.sensepublishers.com

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DEDICATION

For teachers who make a difference in the lives of their students; and for the K-12 teachers that made a difference in ours, we would like to personally thank: Mr. Heide, Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Newport, Mrs. Portnoy Mrs. McEldowney, Ms. Wyatt, and Mrs. Rendon

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ................................................................................................. ix Foreword ................................................................................................................. xi David M. Callejo Pérez Introduction.......................................................................................................... xvii P. Bruce Uhrmacher and Kristen E. Bunn RISK-TAKING 1. Challenging Sacred Beliefs: Creating Controversy to Enhance Student Engagement ............................................................................................ 3 Terry Bramschreiber 2. Risk-Taking and the Dance of the Blessed Spirits............................................. 25 P. Bruce Uhrmacher CREATIVITY 3. Classroom Choreography: The Impact of a Creative Beat ................................ 33 Kristen E. Bunn 4. Lessons from a Barn in Hampshire: Care, Art, and Wonder ............................. 41 Kevin Cloninger 5. The Journey from School to One-Room Schoolhouse: Using Art and Drama to Address the Creative Void .......................................................... 55 Cheryl J. Craig and Sun Hong Hwang CARE AND COMMUNITY 6. Science and Math for Loggerheads: Creating Community in Rural Coastal Schools.................................................................................................. 65 William R. Veal and Ann Wallace 7. We are all People: Lessons from a Multiage Classroom ................................... 73 Regina Weir 8. We are Family: Providing a Second Chance for Over-Age Students ............................................................................................................. 83 Christine Finnan, Kristina C. Webber and Carolyn McPartland

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INTERCONNECTEDNESS 9. Ecologically Minded Teaching: Authenticity and Care .................................. 97 Christy Moroye 10. Ecohelping Educators.................................................................................... 115 Elizabeth Ozar 11. Snapshots of History: Engaging Students in Critical Thought ...................... 121 Caitlin Lindquist Conclusion ........................................................................................................... 135 Kristen E. Bunn and P. Bruce Uhrmacher Author Information .............................................................................................. 139

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We are especially grateful to Mary Rudolph who graciously read each chapter once and sometimes twice and offered sage comments and helpful edits throughout. Her dedication to the project made this book possible. Shannon Burgert volunteered to proof the final version and for all her “catches” we are eternally thankful. Also, thanks to Christy Moroye who commented on drafts of our Introduction and Conclusion several times. Thanks too, to all of the authors of this text. We admire your commitments to the field of education and we appreciate your desire to showcase exemplary education. Sense Publishers has been wonderful to work with. Thanks Michel Lokhorst, Bernice Kelly, and others for your assistance. In addition, Bruce Uhrmacher would like to thank his wife Lisa, and his children Arianna and Paul for making everything worthwhile. Also, I’d like to acknowledge our household of animals – dogs, guinea pigs, lizard, turtle, assorted fish and frogs, and a few wild birds – who remind me of the themes of this book on a daily basis. Thanks also to Stephanie who puts up with us. Kristen Bunn would like to thank her family and friends who have allowed her to become the person that she is. And to her dog, Bella, who reminds her to smile about the little things in life.

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FOREWORD

I never had a choice when I was a kid, so I always took a chance. Pee Wee Kirkland. The authors of this wonderful edition asked if I would write a foreword; and as I read I was encouraged by their proposal to capture “pioneering learning environments,” through the recounting of extraordinary activities that describe a unique educational setting, provide an interpretation, and create a context for others to argue for the possibilities in schools. Clichéd as it may seem, schools have become caricatures of what does not work. Vaclav Havel1 describes a meaningful way to organize the world and laments the lack of a moral and spiritual revival in society also eloquently argued for in Pedagogy of the Oppressed.2 Paolo Freire, like Havel provides language that depicts the current state of affairs of our schools. In describing how to overcome the dehumanization in totalitarian Czechoslovakia—ironically with many parallels to our current schools; Havel states that “the most important thing is that man should be the measure of all structures, including economic structures, and not that man be made to measure for those structures.3 As I was debating about an approach to this foreword that would honor the mission of Beyond the One Room School, I began to wonder about other examples of institutions where the standard is so ingrained in our psyche that choices never seem possible.4 I was thinking about the issue as I drove through the east side of Saginaw, Michigan, when I saw several men playing basketball at a playground. Staring at the ability of one young man to make the ball intertwine with his hand while moving through the court in a violent and artistic ballet, I wondered out loud how many playground players were good enough for the National Basketball Association (NBA) but never made it; and why they did not make it—what choices did they ever have? Like the monopoly schools hold on education, the NBA holds the same for basketball—it is orthodoxy for an aesthetic game played by many unique people who possess a variety of skills. Pee Wee Kirland is one of the most talented men to ever play basketball and never make it to the NBA. Kirkland is associated with Rucker Park like Michael Jordan was with the Bulls, as well as with the creation of the crossover dribble and the original spin move to the basket. In Gangsters of Harlem, Ron Chepesiuk describes the other exploits of the city’s most infamous organized crime leaders, including Kirkland, who is known as The Bank of Harlem for his exploits as a drug dealer.5 As Clipse raps in Gridin’, “Legend in two games like I’m Pee Wee Kirkland.” In From American gangster to crossover legend, Mary Buckheit asks: So isn’t that Pee Wee Kirkland in the Hall of Fame, or at least somewhere behind Dr. James Naismith in annals of hoops history books? … Kirkland is a xi

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product of two realities, the limiting choice of the NBA and the history of segregation in our schools.6 In the documentary Black Magic, Kirkland speaks about the “lives and legacies of people who cannot and should not be forgotten, but there was nothing commemorating the greatness of black accomplishments in sports, or life in general, at that time.”7 He understands that his place, much like his talent, is the exception to the rule. Kirkland was drafted by the Chicago Bulls but never played in the NBA because he made more money dealing drugs. He recalls that “Martin Luther King was preaching about strength of mind and character, but I didn’t get it.”8 Kirkland served time and today is a community reformer in New York City, coaching basketball, lecturing on the philosophy of basketball, and holding court for NBA players who come to Rucker to see the playground he made famous. Key to Kirkland’s story and its challenge to the NBA and ultimately schooling in America is that: whatever transformations or shifts take place in the intellectual and moral spheres are not happening somewhere outside or above the world, in some kind of other world, but here and now, in the terrain of our social life. They’re only visible, we only know about them all, because of their social impact.9 Neil Postman argues that American education in general is the pivot on which nationalism and patriotism revolves.10 He also asserts that schools help us re-invent ourselves by allowing us to “exalt our history, elucidate the present, and give direction to our future.”11 Schools should help us define our identity through the staging of intellectual conversations aimed at imbuing the qualities of critical thinking in the youth. In Arthur Miller’s Death of a Sales Man he delineates the seemingly unattainable ideal of pursuing the American dream.12 The protagonist, Willy Loman sacrifices his whole life working as a salesman and provides for me an emphatic realization of betrayal on the part of capitalist America—similar to that experienced by many of our youths. In return for selfless and dedicated service to his company, Willy Loman receives nothing. He painfully recalls: “...You can’t eat the orange and throw the peel away—a man is not a piece of fruit!”13 Loman’s betrayal still defines the demeanour of our schools, culture and our very thought process. In providing agency for the reader in the current reformist state of our schools, Beyond the One Room School guides the reader through a journey undergirded by risk-taking, creativity, care and community, and interconnectedness that asks we see the place of our schools as spaces to foment learning and cultivate a democratic society— ultimately calling on the reader to take action. Echoing Shapiro and Purpel, Uhrmacher and Bunn agree that a “real” educational experience should truly address the question of “human purpose and social vision.”14 In the conclusion, they challenge us to ask: what is the most effective way to reach each child? For me, schooling has to gravitate from trifling technicality; and metamorphoses into a hermeneutic understanding of what it means to be human. Neil Postman’s cynical description of what education has become where the market economy is worshipped and schooling becomes a worshipper on course to be sacrificed; he describes our dependent marriage to an industrial model of xii

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schooling that no longer makes sense for many of us. He writes that school offers the young, a “covenant” as it were, which promises economic utility (good jobs) if they remain submissive in the classroom and do well on standardized tests.15 Michael Apple and Ivan Illich echo the looming presence of economic utility as a measurement of our intellectual worth by exposing how capitalism has now become the “metric” that is used to evaluate one’s worth.16,17 Apple continues that anyone who falls short of the production of knowledge with economic value is subject to intolerable “moral condemnation” for an inability to “contribute to the failure of profit.”18 The authors in Beyond the One Room School demand that schools rethink practice and teachers their avocation to understand and act on influences from “outside the walls of the school house.”19 “The institutions and customs that exist currently and that give rise to present social ills and distortions did not arise overnight.”20 The authors do not intend to offer a paideia panacea, for there are far too many issues for anyone to address in this country. Joel Spring writes that the “free exchange of ideas and the diversity of ideas… are crucial to our democracy.”21 Elliot Eisner argues that “the school curriculum is a mind-altering device; it is a vehicle that is designed to change the ways in which the young think.”22 Schools and their teachers “need to be middle places that look simultaneously in directions: both where we are going and where we have come from: what we need and what we have; what society wants us to be and what we want to make of ourselves.”23 We should embrace the mission to embark on a journey of identity and exploration that transforms our schools. Providing spaces for the creation of language and its expression through curriculum, teachers can see and reinvent their biography through the sharing of narratives and shaping of the curriculum. As Giddens states, “a person’s identity is not be found in behaviour, nor—important though this is—in the reactions of others, but in the capacity to keep a particular narrative going.”24 While educators currently recognize that teaching and learning are complex activities that cannot be divorced from the social and cultural contexts that frame individuals and classrooms, research shows that most educators feel inadequate when it comes to addressing change in today’s classrooms. In Concierto para sordos (Concert for the deaf), Matias Montes-Huidoro writes about identity and its power to create individual and national memory through a narrator who we meet shortly after he is sent to the gallows and buried in the Christopher Columbus Cemetery in Havana, Cuba. He becomes one of a symphony of voices who each represent the diversity in Cuba’s past (Spanish, Indigenous and African) that can only be heard by the dead but not the living who tend to the dead without knowing the impact of their actions on Cuban history and Cuban’s identity.25 As Bill Ayers writes, with eyes wide open and riveted on learners, a further challenge to honest and righteous teachers is to stay wide-awake to the world, to the concentric circles of context in which we live and work. Teachers must know and care about some aspect of our shared life—our calling, after all is to shepherd and enable callings of others.26 Schools and their teachers today have to give future/current students’ beliefs a space to form, in order to conform and perform unencumbered those acts that xiii

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humanize learners and ultimately schools and society. Learning situations in the classroom (the curriculum) should capture the student, allowing connections of prior experience and interaction to occur; a sense of freedom and desire should take over, bringing with it “a sense of expectancy” and of “growing élan.”27 As we begin to deal with the changing landscapes education in 2010, it is a requisite that issues of sustained access to equitable education be opened for the thousands whose life experiences occur within our schools. Schools have a responsibility to promote the authentic conversation that nurtures tools of agency for individuals involved in teaching and learning. Discussions on schooling must include the words and lives of others, students, teachers, community members; involve critical decision-making; and ultimately transformation. The solution being proposed by educational reformers is that with higher standards, higher performance will come—given the results from the previous eight years what we find is that places who need the most attention are classified as “failing” and either passed on to private corporations who run charter schools or altogether closed. Their argument is that teaching and learning should be solely based on scientific research. The human loss experienced in this ideology may never be recovered. Uhrmacher and Bunn seek to foster teacher choices in developing what is good education for children and for society. The narratives in this volume rely on place-based knowledge to re/think multiplicity in teaching and learning and curriculum while continuing to address the place of identity in our worldview and the formal and informal curriculum in schools. The motivation I hope the reader obtains from Beyond the One Room School is a new way to examine schools while acknowledging the importance of compassion.28 The authors’ unique worldview epitomize the themes of risk-taking, creativity, care and community, and interconnectedness. We must remain true to our mission to change our schools to honor teachers’ work. In the case of the book you are about to read, the narratives represent a window into the world of school where educators attempt to do the moral part of their work in light of the amoral aspect of our schools. NOTES 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

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Havel, V. (1991). Freire, P. (1971). Havel, (1991). p. 13. Illich, I. (1971). Deschooling society. London: Marion Boyars Publishers. Chepesiuk, R. (2007). Buckheit, M. (2008). Korles, D. (2008). Ibid. Havel, P. (1991), p. 11. Postman, N. (1996). p. 14. Ibid, p. 7. Miller, A. (2010). Death of a salesman. New York: Penguin. Ibid, p. 82. Shapiro, H.S. & Purpel, D.E. (1998). p. 52. Postman (1996).

FOREWORD 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

Apple, M.W. (1993). Illich (1971). Ibid, p. 5. Postman, p. 60. Dewey, J. (1938). p. 77. Spring, J. (2002). American education. Boston; McGraw Hill, p. 245. Eisner, E.W. (1991). p. 38. Grumet, M.R. (1993). p. 205. Giddens, A. (1991). p. 64. Montes-Huidobro, M. (2001). Ayers, W. (2003). p. 3. Barone, T. (1983). p. 23. Freire (1970).

REFERENCES Apple, M. W. (1993). Official knowledge. New York: Routledge. Ayers, W. (2003). Thinking about teaching and learning, equity, and the fight for small schools. In W. Ayers, M. Klonsky, & G. Lyon. (Eds.). A simple justice: The challenge of small schools. New York: Teachers College Press. Barone, T. (1983). Education as aesthetic experience: “Art in germ.” Educational Leadership, 40(4), 23. Buckheit, M. (2008). From American gangster to crossover legend. Retrieved from http://sports.espn. go.com/espn/blackhistory2008/columns/story?page=buckheit/080207 Chepesiuk, R. (2007). Gangsters of Harlem. Fort Lee, NJ: Barricade Books. Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. Washington, DC: Free Press. Eisner, E. W. (1991). What the arts taught me about education. In G. Willis & W. H. Schubert (Eds.). (2000). Reflections from the heart of educational inquiry: Understanding curriculum and teaching through the arts. New York: State University of New York Press. Freire, P. (1971). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Boston: Continuum. Giddens, A. (1991). Modernity and self-identity. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press. Grumet, M. R. (1993). The play of meanings in the art of teaching. Theory Into Practice, 32(4), 204–209. Havel, V. (1991). Disturbing the peace: A conversation with Karl Hvížćala (P. Wilson, Trans.). New York: Vintage. Korles, D. (2008). Black magic. An ESPN Documentary. Montes-Huidobro, M. (2001). Concierto para sordos. Tempe, AZ: Bilingual Press. Postman, N. (1996). The end of education: Redefining the value of school. New York: Knopf. Shapiro, H. S., & Purpel, D. E. (1998). Critical social issues in American education: Transformation in a postmodern world. Mawah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

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P. BRUCE UHRMACHER AND KRISTEN E. BUNN

INTRODUCTION

In the last 100 years, the American educational system has been dominated by a technical, efficiency-oriented approach (Callahan 1964; Tyack and Cuban 1997).1 Trying to emulate the great successes in medicine and business, educators endeavor to find the science of good teaching, an efficient way to monitor students, a behaviorist approach to thinking about educational goals, and an objective approach to evaluation and teacher education. At the same time, the business world is calling for graduates who can solve novel problems, adapt to change, and see the whole from a more connected approach. As the document produced by the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce states, “The best employers the world over will be looking for the most competent, most creative, and most innovative people on the face of the earth and will be willing to pay them top dollar for their services” (in Darling-Hammond, 2010, p. 1). Stanford professor Linda Darling-Hammond continues … “the new mission of schools is to prepare students to work at jobs that do not yet exist, creating ideas and solutions for products … that have not yet been identified, using technologies that have not yet been invented” (p. 2). But she asks, “Are we able to provide education that will develop these more complex skills— not just for a small slice of students who have traditionally been selected for the kind of ambitious learning represented in elite schools … but for the vast majority of children in communities across the country?” (p. 2).2 We know there are educators who are preparing students for the changing world—educators across the country and the globe who are dedicated to providing innovative teaching and learning activities. Many consider these educators great teachers because they seem to be able to think out of the proverbial box. But as Liesveld and Miller point out, “Great teachers don’t set out to be unorthodox—they don’t “do wrong” for fun. They do it because there are times when doing what conventional wisdom considers the right thing is actually doing the worst thing: betraying the education of a child” (Liesveld and Miller, 2005, p. 33).3 The purpose of this book, then, is to capture these pioneering learning environments so that others can learn from what they are doing. This book is largely journalistic in nature, undergirded by sound research. The goal is to highlight some of the remarkable activities that are already taking place for all to see. The essays in this book do the following: 1) they describe in detail a unique educational setting; 2) they provide an interpretation of what is taking place in this setting; and 3) they inform readers what can be taken away from the situation so that they (teachers, administrators, school board members, parents, and others) can emulate or argue for the activities indicated in this book. Some readers will appreciate the attention to descriptive detail, which will set their minds to imaginative xvii

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possibilities. Others may appreciate an author’s distillation of essential ideas from the essay which can be reflected upon and actually be used in classrooms. All readers, we hope, will appreciate reading about the varied and creative activities taking place around the world. When we started the project we solicited stories about educators who were conducting unique and effective activities in their classrooms. We collected a variety of essays and as we read them we realized that they all shared one major characteristic. Each essay was in its own way about increasing student engagement in schools and classrooms. While the discussion of student engagement varied in focus and points-of-view, we were able to interpret four themes that allowed these educators to draw their students into the content, thereby increasing the opportunities for learning. The themes that emerged from the stories have become the four sections of our book: risk-taking, creativity, care and community, and interconnectedness. These sections, somewhat uncommon as major categories for a book on teaching and curriculum, reflect the essential storyline of this text, which is for readers to examine innovative activities taking place in real schools and classrooms. Yet, while somewhat non-traditional, these themes speak to educators and interested stakeholders at all levels, whether elementary, middle, or secondary— and even P-20. RISK-TAKING

Risk-taking is rarely taken into account as a major pedagogical tool, but we see it as essential for good teaching (see Uhrmacher, 2009; Moroye and Uhrmacher, 2009).4 The essays in the Risk-Taking section of this book (by Bruce Uhrmacher and by Terry Bramschreiber) reveal not only why risk-taking is important, but also various ways to actually include risk-taking in the classroom. When we think of risk-taking in education, we refer to the idea of pushing oneself beyond one’s comfort zone to enhance the learning process. When one looks at a school that exemplifies risk-taking, one may note that the administrators encourage teachers to take risks in their own ways. This in turn encourages students to take risks, as modeling risk should be a large part of the process. A classroom that truly encourages risk is cognizant of the need to establish a safe and encouraging environment. When students are willing to take risks they are more likely to push themselves. This leads to increased rigor as students become comfortable taking intellectual risks. As we analyzed the different essays that were submitted to our study it became clear that the teachers in these two stories were conscious about the need to establish this type of atmosphere. The teachers were able to push student thinking and intellectual thought by rewarding risk-taking behavior. CREATIVITY

Being able to take new knowledge and apply it in novel ways takes creativity. And creativity is a skill that takes practice. We use the term “creativity” loosely to refer xviii

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to the ability to conduct work that is both novel and useful (see Sternberg and Lubert, 1999).5 In short, creativity involves both a new way of thinking and thinking that is relevant. We believe that it is possible to create classrooms that encourage or discourage creative thinking. And we believe that creativity is an essential element in learning. It makes learning more interesting for the teacher and for the students. Additionally, creativity encourages students to understand what they are learning. When students use creative thinking they engage with an idea or object and develop their own ideas rather than depend on knowledge being handed to them. To an extent, creativity is required in all problem-solving and with any manipulation of thought. In addition, creative thinking requires students to think about topics from multiple perspectives and to work through ideas rather than memorize them (see Sternberg and Lubert, 19996 for others who agree with this point-of-view). We also argue that creativity is an essential skill for the workforce that today’s students face. The research on what companies want from prospective workers points to the need for workers who are able to manipulate ideas and come up with new methods for problem-solving. This is true today more than ever before; the world is changing and the work force that students will face is different than it has ever been. The need for a more “whole-brain” approach is evident. According to the best-selling author and former policy analyst Daniel Pink, “The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind—creators … pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. These people—artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers—will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys.”7 The three essays in this section of the book (by Kristen Bunn, by Kevin Cloninger, and by Cheryl Craig and Sun Hong Hwang) demonstrate that creativity spreads from the teacher to the students. CARE AND COMMUNITY

We created the category of care and community to capture two elements that we see as working together to create an excellent education for all students. Great schools take into account three types of community: the classroom community, which is displayed throughout the book, the school community (see the essays by Regina Weir and by Christine Finnan, Kristina Webber, and Carolyn McPartland), and the school and its larger community relationships (see William Veal and Ann Wallace). A school can have connections with its extending physical community as we see in the Veal and Wallace essay or it can have relationships with a community farther away such as a sister school across the globe. But in any case, in all of these situations it is important to establish a certain quality within the community. There are all types of communities. We may describe them as functional or dysfunctional, violent or peaceful, and cutting edge or slow-paced, among others. In our view, the key element found in any “good” community—whether that community is urban, rural, or suburban—is caring. A caring community is one that establishes “attentiveness,” “engrossment” or “mindfulness” toward all of its members—including animals xix

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and the biophysical world. See Noddings (2003)8 for an elaborated perspective on the importance of care; see Oliver (1976)9 for a critical discussion on community. INTERCONNECTEDNESS

In order for students to be engaged they need to be connected to the content. This can happen through various means, but at some level, students need to see learning as relevant and connected to their lives. As we looked at the essays collected, we noticed that some had the theme that could be called “environmental education” or “ecological education.” In particular, Christy Moroye’s and Elizabeth Ozar’s essays both discuss environmental aspects of education. While we believe that this theme is important in its own right, we suggest that the essays fit under a broader concept. We selected the notion of “interconnectedness” because we see it as the larger abstraction under which ecological and environmental education both fit. In our view, interconnections or interconnectedness refers to the idea of mutual or reciprocal binding.10 The key to this relationship, which may be mutually agreed upon or through natural events, is that people, events, and the natural world are all connected to and impacted by one another. Interconnectedness is a key issue facing the next generation. When one looks at the world today it is impossible to ignore the fact that we are connected more than ever. When one financial market falls, the effects are felt the world over. Likewise, with communication and technology—both information and people travel the world at rapid speed (see Caitlin Lindquist’s essay for an example of political and social interconnections). It becomes clear that today’s students need to understand the idea of a connected world, which helps make learning relevant and important in the lives of the students. SUMMARY

Most teachers recognize that if students are not engaged they will not learn. Recently researchers have come to study how closely engagement is tied to motivation, academic achievement, and student attitudes toward learning (for further information see: Blum and Libbey, 2004; Fredricks, Blumenfeld, and Paris, 2004; Klem and Connell, 2004; Audas and Willams, 2001; Marks, 2000; Connell, Spencer, and Aber, 1994; and Finn, 1989). Perhaps most importantly, engagement is imperative because it is one thing that schools and teachers can target. Unlike socioeconomic, family, and racial influences, engagement can be manipulated by educators. Understanding engagement as a multifaceted dimension that impacts student experience can enable teachers to better meet individual needs. The four themes in this book will help all teachers engage students in their learning. Additionally, we think all teachers and those concerned with educational issues want students to push themselves intellectually and to try new things. They want their students to be creative as well as informed. They want to know how to envision education in the larger community environment in a caring way. And now, more than ever, educators want to know the ways in which they can help students understand the concept of how connected the world is. xx

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By encouraging students to take risks, be creative, care and be cared for, and to reflect on the interconnected world in which they live, teachers will effectively reach all of their students. Our hope is that these themes speak to you and help you not only engage the students you know, but also better prepare them for the world in which they will live. NOTES 1

2

3

4

5

6 7

8

9

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Callahan, R. (1964). Education and the cult of efficiency. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Tyack, D. & Cuban, L (1997). Tinkering toward utopia: A century of public school reform. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Darling-Hammond, L. (2010). The flat world and education: How America’s commitment to equity will determine our future. New York: Teachers College Press. Liesveld, R. and Miller, J. (2005). Teach with your strengths: how great teachers inspire their students. New York: Gallup Press. Uhrmacher, P. B. (2009). Toward a Theory of Aesthetic Education. Curriculum Inquiry 39(5): 613–636. Moroye, C. & Uhrmacher, P. B. (2009) Aesthetic themes of education. Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue. 11(1–2): 85–101. Sternberg, R.J. and Lubart, T.I., (1999). The handbook of creativity. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. IBID. Pink, D.H. (2006). A whole new mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. New York: Riverhead Trade. Noddings, N. (2003). Caring: A feminine approach to ethics and moral education (2nd Ed.). Berkeley: University of California Press. Oliver, D. W. (1976). Education and Community: A radical critique of innovative schooling. Berkeley, CA.: McCutchan Publishing Corporation. Inter stems from the Latin prefix that means “between and “among,” “in the midst of,” “mutually,” “reciprocally,” “together,” (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/inter-). Connect stems from “nect(ere) to bind, fasten, tie)” (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/interconnect).

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RISK-TAKING

“You have to take risks. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen.” ~ Paulo Coelho, Brazilian writer and author of The Alchemist

TERRY BRAMSCHREIBER

1. CHALLENGING SACRED BELIEFS Creating Controversy to Enhance Student Engagement

INTRODUCTION

Controversial issues in the classroom are bound to get a reaction from students—be they positive or negative. By manufacturing an artificial controversy, teachers can stimulate student engagement while setting up ground rules for actual contentious issues in the curriculum. SETTING THE STAGE

As the students find a seat in the classroom on the first day of school, they see the four words written in large block letters on the whiteboard in the front of the room—THE WORLD IS FLAT. I watch quietly as they try to make sense of the sentence before them. The silence is a dead give-away that this is a freshmen class. These students do not yet have the confidence of sophomores or the arrogance of upper classmen. Mine is the very first of several science classes these students will experience over the next four years. As freshmen, they do not know what to expect from high school science courses, or even high school in general. Discovery Canyon Campus is an unusual school in Academy District 20 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Though sometimes referred to as a science and math magnet school, it is really a neighborhood school where the curriculum incorporates science and mathematics concepts into all of the content areas. The science curriculum itself emphasizes space and aviation as central themes. This PK-12 school is an International Baccalaureate school, and one of only a handful in North America where are three International Baccalaureate programs (Primary, Middle, and Diploma) are housed on the same campus. The building is enormous. Covering almost half a million square feet, it sprawls east to west on a hill in the northern end of the city. There are five levels, but because of the sloping geography, no elevator makes stops at more than three floors. Students and staff are reminded of the scientific flavor of the school by the architectural layout. The campus has six outdoor plazas, incorporating scientific and mathematical themes such as Fibonacci Plaza, which contains a spiral based on the mathematics sequence; Proto Plaza, which has a mural representing the big bang and the origin of life; and Earth-Sky Plaza, which has plaques showing the relative distances of the planets to the sun. In addition, the campus houses a large sundial, a P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 3–24. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

BRAMSCHREIBER

Foucault pendulum, a large statue of the DNA double helix, several painted murals, and other educational commodities. “Good morning,” I state. “I am Mr. Bramschreiber, and this is Earth and Space Science. You may call me Mr. Bram, Mr. B, Coach Bram, Coach B., and I will even respond to ‘El Guapísimo.’ However, if you use my full name, please pronounce it correctly, and I will give you the same respect.” As the students decide what to call me, I continue to speak to them. “Before I hear more about all of you, I need to see what I have to work with this year. You have already read the statement on the board. Since this course deals with the Earth, what better place to begin than to discuss the shape of the planet on which we all live? I would like you to talk with the students around you and list all of the evidence a person could give that the Earth is flat.” As students work on this task, one states that we don’t have any evidence, and we know that the world is round. She tells me it only appears flat because it is such a large sphere. I reply that I’m not concerned whether or not we have explained the evidence to suit a round Earth, only the evidence or observations that we have that could support a flat Earth. “After all,” I tell her, “an explanation doesn’t change how we see things, right?” This is an important point to make. We all have had experiences where our observations do not accurately represent reality. For example, we see what appears to be water in the road up ahead on a hot day, only to see it disappear as we drive closer. The sun appears to orbit a stationary Earth as a result of the planet’s rotation. Giving a logical explanation for our observations doesn’t affect what we observe. After several minutes of time, I ask the students to finish their brainstorming. I call on individuals to present one piece of evidence at a time and write it on the board. – Maps are flat – Historically, people, especially sailors, believed it was flat – The horizon looks flat – The ground looks very flat from an airplane – We don’t fall off the sides – Water doesn’t spill off (as it would if it were poured on a ball) – It feels flat while traveling—we don’t feel like we are always moving up or down a hill – Round objects don’t constantly roll (as they would if placed on a ball) – We don’t feel like we are spinning (as the globe theory suggests) – People don’t hang upside down in the Southern Hemisphere After exhausting their ideas, we do the same exercise, but this time the students brainstorm evidence that we have for a round Earth. The students come up with a few more ideas for this category, and I list them. They include: – Pictures from space show it is round – Globes are round – Other planets are round – We have latitude and longitude – Time zones – Seasons occur 4

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– – – – – – –

The Earth’s shadow on the moon is round Day and night occur simultaneously in different places There is no edge—people haven’t fallen off The sun appears to follow a curved path through the sky We can orbit the Earth We can circumnavigate the Earth and end up in the same place When a ship sails away from you, the hull disappears first while the mast disappears last I ask students if they have ever done experiments themselves to prove that the Earth is indeed a sphere. No one responds in the affirmative. I follow up by asking them how they know the actual shape. Some state that they “just know” without offering any more information. Others state that they learned it when they were young. Finally, they agree that they just accepted the idea without really questioning it. It is a fact that they have taken for granted, and since it doesn’t seem to have any direct impact on their lives, it is not something they bothered to confirm on their own. Large scientific breakthroughs may seem to be few and far between these days. Physicists, astronomers, chemists, and biologists use increasingly complex methods to learn more about the natural world. Since students, or secondary teachers for that matter, have limited time, knowledge, and resources, which make it impossible to verify new scientific findings, they must accept some of them as dogma. Therefore, a lot of scientific knowledge becomes intangible to students. According to Jean Beard, co-director of the Evolution and Nature of Science Institute (ENSI), “A danger in teaching science as a body of knowledge is that such acceptance of what others have figured out encourages good minds of all ages to ignore their own observations and intuition” (2007). Once there is agreement that all evidence has been listed, I have them look over the inventory for both. “Based on what you see here, which is the correct shape of the Earth?” All respond that the Earth is round. “Which has more evidence?” Again, the response is round, though they agree that there isn’t a large difference. A boy from the back of the room also points out that we may not have all of the evidence listed for either, since we have only been thinking about it for a little while. I agree, and praise him for his assessment. “Which has better evidence?” I ask. The hands shoot up quickly. Some students don’t wait to be called upon to holler out “round” again. “Do you all agree?” The nodding heads confirm that they do. “Why is it better?” I inquire. “Look at the evidence for the flat Earth. Isn’t this evidence that we can all observe? Isn’t it all objective evidence—evidence that isn’t subject to individual interpretation?” The nods show that it is unanimous again. “But Mr. Bram, couldn’t you say the same for the evidence for the round Earth?” This time the question is from the front row. I commend the student on her challenge. Some students are not comfortable questioning their teachers and are used to seeing them as experts. This perceived difference of power can lead to inhibited participation by students, especially when dealing with controversial issues (Lusk and Weinberg, 1994). However, engaging kids in a discussion for which they have 5

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extensive background knowledge and allowing their questions to be heard increases participation in this lesson. “What do you think, class?” I reply, putting the burden of thinking on them. Yet again, we have agreement throughout. “How do we decide between the two theories?” The chatter begins. Some mention that our technology has improved so we know it is round. “What technology?” I ask. Several answers are blurted out simultaneously: “The pictures from the moon.” “GPS!” “Film and pictures from the Space Shuttles!” I am careful not to confirm or deny any answers, but just listen. Finally, I let them know that it is my turn. “I am going to propose a theory, one myself, and many others, believe to be the true shape of the Earth. I want you all to hear me out before you react. Understood?” The students watch as I draw a large circle on the board. “The world is round.” I then draw a long, thin, horizontally positioned rectangle next to it. “Yet it is flat.” A confused murmur travels over the lab tables. “The circle is the top view, while the rectangle represents the side view. I like to call it the Pizza Model.” A TEACHER FINDS FOCUS

I began my teaching career the same as any new, inexperienced science teacher. In the typical survival mode that many first year teachers experience (Moir, 1999), I spent time drilling the kids with the scientific method, lab procedures, and facts that related to the state and district standards. Over the next couple of years, I found and developed some fun activities and labs, a couple of projects, and even incorporated a field trip here and there. However, students displayed no significant level of engagement for any extended period of time. They looked to me for the next activity to “wow” them, and I struggled to keep up. My lesson planning became increasingly geared toward entertaining my students, rather than educating them. Elliot Eisner, emeritus professor of Art and Education at Stanford University, stated, “The most significant kind of learning in virtually any field creates a desire to pursue learning in that field when one doesn’t have to” (2002, p. 90). He went on to say, “The aim of the educational process inside schools is not to finish something, but to start something.” My students were not beginning anything in their pursuit of scientific knowledge, but merely tuning in for the next firework show. Despite the effort I put into my attention grabbers, they were not “sufficiently powerful to motivate students to pursue that interest outside of school” (2002, p. 90). My efforts were all frosting, no cake. In my third year of teaching, I found a professional development seminar offered by ENSI. I had always had a passion for the teaching of evolution, and although the topic wasn’t in the physical science curriculum I was currently teaching, I enrolled in the course. Unbeknownst to me at the time, my teaching would never be the same. The seminar focused on what science is, what it is not, and how we can tell the difference. Teaching kids about the nature of science helps students to understand how science works and why the theory of biological evolution, as well as other 6

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scientific theories, is strongly supported. When students know the parameters within which science must work, it takes the mystery out of theory development and reduces the tendency to object without examining the evidence. Science has rules it must follow, and its findings rarely go on without rigorous scrutiny. I realized that this information was applicable to any and all science classes, and I used the information not only in my introductory unit, but as a theme woven throughout all of my units of instruction. My teaching of science finally had a focus, and I was finally actively engaged as an educator. The flash, although always entertaining, could finally be backed by substance. I would strive to deliver lessons that would not allow students to be inanimate buckets of the knowledge I was trying to pour in. It is not human nature to be passive when one’s sacred beliefs are challenged. I would confront my students’ dogma so blatantly that their own emotions would not allow them to be passive learners. Now that I was a teacher engaged in my own curriculum, I could focus on engaging my students. The flat Earth lesson itself is a revised version of a lesson plan created by Jean Beard (1999). Some kids begin to chuckle at the model as I continue. I place a dot in the exact middle of the circle. “This is the North Pole if you were looking down from space.” More confused looks. “If someone was standing on the North Pole on a round Earth, any direction that person travels is what?” I ask. “South,” comes the reply, “because you are heading toward the South Pole.” Several kids ask where the South Pole is on my map. I ask them if, when explorers in Antarctica believe they are standing at the South Pole, they see a large barber shop pole sticking out of the ground. They agree, eventually, that they do not. I explain that in my model, there really is no South Pole. Surrounding the planet, like the crust of the pizza, is a large wall of ice standing several hundred feet high. Known as the Great Southern Ice Wall, it can be approached by traveling any direction from the central North Pole. I draw a smaller circle halfway between the North Pole point and the ice wall, and label it the equator. I continue my model by sketching continents around the circle so all are visible from a top view. The drawing starts to resemble the United Nations flag which, by no small coincidence, adorns the wall above my whiteboard. The Earth, drawn in white and surrounded by olive branches, lies upon a light blue background. The letters UN are printed above the Earth, while the motto “WE BELIEVE” is printed below. I draw a few, small, random islands near the ice wall and explain that those explorers who believe they are in Antarctica are really on one of these islands. “Why don’t they see the ice wall?” comes the question from more than one student. “The weather there is so severe, they can’t get there. Do you know how many ships and planes have been lost in those parts of the world? Countless!” I reply. At this time, I turn to the horizontal rectangle, or side view of my Pizza Model. “It is not a thin-crust pizza,” I explain. “It must have some depth since we know magma is inside of it. I imagine it is around fifty kilometers thick, but no one knows since we have never drilled down that deep. Hot magma would melt any drill we could create if we get down too far.” I ask students whether they are familiar with any ancient beliefs about what holds up the Earth. Some of the responses include an elephant, Atlas, and large stone pillars. 7

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I begin to draw a large turtle below the side view of the pizza and ask if anyone has ever heard of this myth. Some say they have, and one student asks what is below the turtle. “What is he standing on?” Remembering an old anecdote told by physicist Stephen Hawking, I respond, “It’s turtles … all the way down.” A chorus of chuckles, as well as furrowed brows meet this explanation. I explain that I actually do not accept the turtle theory, and draw flames to represent the fires of hell below the Earth. There is no gravity, at least not in the sense that round-Earthers believe in gravity. Down is one direction, no matter where you are. On Earth, down is toward the ground. Even beyond the borders of the Great Southern Ice Wall, down is still in the same direction. If a person is able to get beyond this wall of ice, he or she will fall to the depths and “sleep with the turtles,” so to speak. I demonstrate by dropping my pen. It falls on the desk, or the Earth, before me. When I hold it to the side of the desk, it falls to the floor—the depths of Hades, the unknown, or H-E-double hockey sticks. The kids cannot hold their tongues any longer. “What about pictures from space?” they ask. “You can’t see all of the continents at once! If your model was correct, you’d see all of the Earth at one time!” “Ah, space travel,” I respond. I answer a question with a question. “How many of you have seen the movie Apollo 13? Do you think it was filmed on location? Was it filmed on the moon? Now, how many of you have ever seen the footage of the first moon landing?” Several hands go up. “Its fuzzy, it’s green, and in short, it’s bogus! The entire moon landing was a hoax!” IMPORTANCE OF STUDENT ENGAGEMENT

When I remember my high school classes, few actual activities come to mind. Those that I recall best are those to which I had a strong sensory or emotional reaction. I remember the poetry project where I compared the Coleridge poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” to a heavy metal song of the same name (Iron Maiden was my favorite band at the time). I remember the stench of the dogfish I dissected, wondering if that is the last smell a human would encounter upon being swallowed alive by a great white shark. However, I do not remember all of the allegorical significance of the epic ballad, nor do I remember the form and function of all of the innards of that large fish. I recall little content from lectures, films, filmstrips (hand-turned slides usually accompanied by a cassette tape for those readers who were born in the 80’s or later), or even readings from textbooks. The content that I do remember, even after all of these years, is that which engaged me by challenging my own cherished beliefs. I recall debating whether President Roosevelt actually knew about the attack on Pearl Harbor before it happened, using the act as a vehicle for America to enter the war. Just the idea of a president knowingly allowing Americans to die generated a visceral reaction. My assignment was to argue that FDR was innocent of this charge, and I made it a primary focus to review the potential evidence against him. Since I felt as if my personal beliefs 8

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were being called into question, a lack of engagement would feel as if I were selling out a part of myself. In a meta-analysis of dozens of studies, Johnson and Johnson (1989) found that engagement in controversial issues produced higher achievement and retention than did debate, individualistic learning, and concurrence seeking. Students who participated in academic controversy recalled more correct information, were better at practical application of knowledge, and were able to use more high-level reasoning skills in recalling and transferring information that they had learned. Hahn (1984) also reported that students participating in controversial issues acquired better understanding of particular issues, developed stronger analytical abilities, displayed stronger decision-making skills, and displayed more democratic values than students who did not. It is little wonder that John Dewey, the influential educational reformer, once said, “Conflict is the gadfly of thought. It stirs us to observation and memory. It instigates to invention. It shocks us out of sheeplike passivity, and sets us at noting and contriving” (1922, p. 300). Sheep-like passivity should not be tolerated in any classroom. The room bursts into fervor now. Kids are yelling, laughing, and sneering at me. I let them voice their disdain for a moment, and then bring them back to attention. “Listen, there is a saying sometimes used in medical schools. It states, ‘If you hear hoof beats, think horses—not zebras.’ Does anyone think they know what that means?” The room quiets down as they ponder the expression. Finally, the hands start to lift. “Does it mean that if you hear something that sounds familiar, you should assume that you know what it is?” one girl questions. “Good. If we were in this room, in Colorado Springs, and heard a bunch of animals galloping outside the window, would you think it was a herd of horses or zebras?” The crowd overwhelmingly states horses, minus the student that argues that a circus train might have derailed in the parking lot below. “Why would you, at least most of you, believe that?” The same girl responds, “Because zebras don’t live around here. It makes more sense that horses would be outside than zebras. Zebras live in Africa.” “Well said,” I reply. “Now, how would that apply to medicine?” This time every student in class is quietly contemplating. No hands come up. After adequate wait time, I offer a hint. “Let me give you an example. Let’s say I have a headache. What are some of the reasons that I might have one?” A slew of answers are thrown my way: “You have a cold!” “The flu!” “You have a tumor!” “You had a concussion!” “You hit your head against the wall!” “You’re dehydrated!” “I get a headache if I’m really hungry.” “I get one when I’m stressed.” “My mom gets one if it’s too loud in the house.” “You’re hung over!” 9

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The laughs that follow this outburst present an opportune time to interject. “Good. There are probably a hundred other diseases that have a headache as a symptom. So, suppose you are a doctor and a patient comes in complaining of a headache. Do you tell them it’s probably malaria even though they haven’t left the country?” “No, you probably start with the most common cause,” another girl blurts out. “Bingo! You begin with the simplest explanation unless something rules it out. Science has a similar principle known as Occam’s Razor. It states that all things being equal, the simplest explanation is probably the best. Now I ask you, what is more likely—that we built a spaceship, way back in 1969, before you were born, before I was born, that took us into outer space? Or is it more reasonable that the entire thing was a hoax created by your government—mainly NASA?” “But why would NASA fake it?” a student howls. CREATING CONTROVERSY

“Think of this. NASA’s budget is about $17 billion a year. Where does that money come from?” “Taxpayers?” another student asks. “Exactly. Do you think our government is just generous enough to let you keep that money? Instead they tell the public what they want to hear, collect their income, and produce a film, a bad film at that, which shows a man walking down a ladder onto some floor covered with flour. And I’m not the only one who knows this. How many of you are Red Hot Chili Pepper fans?” Several hands go up. “Complete this verse,” I sing, “Space may be the final frontier, but it’s made…” “In a Hollywood basement!” (Kiedis, 2000), several kids sing back in harmony. Laughs break out among the students. References to popular culture, especially music, have been linked to student achievement, motivation, and engagement (Moore, 2007). Iron Maiden lyrics helped to inspire me twenty years ago, and the Chili Peppers help to nail home my point here. In biology classes I have taught, I have been known to have kids dissect cow eyeballs to the background music of Thomas Dolby’s “She Blinded Me with Science” (Dolby and Kerr, 1982). I invite them to research the moon-landing hoax on the Internet on their own time. I go back to my side view drawing of Earth. I draw a large semicircle covering the Earth. Inside this, I draw a couple of smaller circles near the top. “The dome of heaven is about four thousand miles above the Earth. The sun and moon are about thirty miles in diameter. The stars and other planets are very small compared to the sun and moon. And it is the sun and moon that move around, not the Earth.” “Yeah, right!” one boy yells sarcastically. “Okay, how fast do Round-Earthers—I prefer to call them Globularists—believe the Earth is spinning?” I ask. “What do they call you guys, Pizza-lurists?” comes a jab from the back. A few giggles follow. “Some call us Flat-Earthers, but most of us prefer Zetetic Astronomers,” I reply. I remind them of the question posed before them. 10

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The first response comes without any thought, “A million miles an hour!” “Let’s calculate it. Does anyone know the circumference of the so-called round Earth at the equator?” After some more wait time, the kids start to narrow it down. We agree it is roughly twenty five thousand miles. “And how long does it take for the round Earth to spin around once?” “One day. Twenty-four hours.” “Okay, so someone sitting on the equator travels about twenty five thousand miles in one day. How fast is that person moving? To make the math easier in your head, let’s round down and say that the person travels twenty four thousand miles.” The light bulbs start to turn on, as do the students’ voices. “One thousand miles an hour!” “Right. That’s the claim of the Globularists. On a globe you would be traveling slower as you head toward the poles because the total distance traveled in a day would be less. Let’s say, for argument’s sake, that we are traveling at five hundred miles an hour. Do you mean to tell me that we are moving that fast and don’t even know it? Some days, even though we are moving as fast as an airplane travels, we can sit still and our hair doesn’t even move from the breeze? Think of Occam’s Razor. Does that seem simple and logical? I mean, come on! You stick your hand out of a car window traveling sixty five miles an hour, and the wind resistance pushes it back with a lot of force. If you were in a car going six hundred miles an hour, your arm would be ripped out of its socket!” Several guffaws follow this explanation, but it is obvious that the wheels are turning. “But that’s just because–”one girl begins. “Wait!” I interrupt, “you’ll get your chance. Just hear me out. Now, as we were discussing before, how do we decide between two competing theories? We decided that both theories have evidence on which everyone can agree. If you have evidence that seemingly goes against one theory, you have to be able to explain it if that theory is any good. If you can’t explain the evidence that goes against the theory, you must either revise the theory or throw it out completely.” CONTEXTUALIZING INFORMATION

“Let me give you an example. I have a theory—called the theory of gravity. Some of you may have heard of it.” A few blank stares let me know that my attempt at humor has fallen as flat as my Earth model. “Part of my theory of gravity states that things fall to the ground when I let them go.” I grab a tennis ball off of my desk and let it go. It falls to the ground. I grab a football and repeat the experiment. Of course, my theory is again confirmed. Next I pull a helium-filled balloon out from under my desk. I hold it out in front of me and let it go. “Whoa! I just disproved the theory of gravity kids!” I exclaim as the balloon rises toward the ceiling, “and you all were here to see it!” “No, you didn’t!” cries a girl from the side of the room. “The balloon is just lighter than the air!” 11

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“But don’t the balloon and the helium have mass? Why is it floating away? If we were outside, would it just float into outer space?” There is debate among the rows for several minutes. I decide to give them a hint. “How many of you have ever held a beach ball underwater?” The hands go up. “What happens when you let it go?” In a choral response, several students call out that the ball rises up to float on the surface of the water. Tying in experiences from the students’ own lives may help contextualize information that may otherwise be abstract. When kids are able to synthesize the new information with prior, personal knowledge, understanding is increased. Dr. Robert Marzano, a widely known educational researcher, notes that the biggest indicator of whether a student will learn new content is how much they already know about it (Marzano, 2004). “Right. The helium balloon is still attracted to the Earth, but is less dense than the ocean of air that it is floating on. If the balloon is let go outside, it will continue to rise until the surrounding air is less dense—or the helium escapes from the balloon and is replaced by air. These rubber balloons are fairly porous.” At any rate, I was able to explain an observation that went against the norm—an anomaly—and still be able to hold on to my theory of gravity. “So, if I want to hold on to my Pizza Model of the flat Earth, I must be able to explain why we observe the evidence that we do for the round Earth.” “This should be good!” yells the same student who is convinced that runaway circus zebras inhabit our school bus lot. POKING HOLES IN A SOUND THEORY

“Let’s start with the easy ones,” I say as I approach the list of evidence that was generated for the round Earth model. I remind them that the entire space program is just a means for the government to separate us from our hard-earned money. I emphatically scrape my dry erase marker through the first line on the list, making a satisfying, audible squeak. The next one on the list refers to the shape of globes. This is irrelevant, I explain, because it is just a human-made model. We could make a model of Earth shaped like a pyramid, a cube, or a doughnut. That doesn’t mean the Earth must be that shape, it is shaky evidence at best. The marker comes out again and draws a heavy line through these words. “Other planets are round,” I read from the next bullet on the list. “Big deal. We have a special planet. The dome of heaven surrounds us, not the other planets. Besides, we cannot confirm that they are not pizza-shaped themselves. We can only see round little dots when we look at the planets. Perhaps they are oriented toward the Earth so that they are never seen edge on. But regardless, the shape of other celestial bodies has no bearing on the shape of our own.” “What about the pictures from Voyager missions?” one girl, who obviously subscribes to the Science Channel, belts out. “There you go with the flying saucers and spaceships hoax again. I suppose Yoda and Mr. Spock were riding on them. Do you think every picture you see in books or the Internet is real?” 12

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My point made, I scribble out that bullet from the list of round Earth evidence and continue down the line. “So far, so good.” Latitude and longitude are human constructs, I explain. We don’t see these lines on Earth or in the water. They are just lines we place on maps or globes to provide coordinates to locate things. We don’t physically see lines of longitude getting closer together as we approach the South Pole. A hand goes up to my left, and I decide to give him a chance to voice his discontentment. “But why do GPS units tell us latitude and longitude?” he asks. “Computers can tell us anything they want. It is just a way to tell us where we are. Just because a few numbers appear on a screen doesn’t impact the shape of the Earth. Let me ask you, have you ever used a GPS in the Southern Hemisphere?” “No, just around here,” he replies. “Right. Not only is there no hemisphere, but also the numbers would be very confusing since the lines of longitude do not converge in the areas south of the equator. Lines of longitude converge at the North Pole and spread apart as they approach the equator. If real, they would continue to spread out as they head toward the Great Southern Ice Wall. Global Positioning Systems, though I don’t like the word ‘global,’ work fine in the areas north of the equator. “Time zones, like lines of latitude and longitude, again are human constructs. We don’t see lines on the Earth running through states indicating which hour it is. Do you think humans always used time zones? Of course not. It is just a way to help people on different ends of the country to keep similar office hours.” I expected that this would generate some controversy. Not every freshman student has used a GPS unit or has even used latitude and longitude on a regular basis, but all know what times zones are. I decide to field some questions. “But, on your model, when the sun is up, it is light all over the Earth! How can you have day and night on different places?” The question is on the mind of all of the students. I look at my model on the board. “Hmmm …” I say. “Ha!” comes a voice from the back, “you can’t explain it! Your theory doesn’t stand up!” The room erupts with the satisfaction that can only be felt by teenagers who see someone in a position of authority being proven wrong. I think the Germans call this phenomenon “schadenfreude.” “No class,” I begin, “I meant, hmmm… how can something so obvious be missed by so many people? There are obviously some polarizing bodies up there that block the sunlight from getting all the way down to Earth.” The puzzled faces glaring at me seem to state, “Huh?” “Look,” I say, pulling out two pieces of polarizing film. “When I orient them one way and put them together, the light from the ceiling passes right through them. Then I turn one perpendicular to the other and the film goes black. Light cannot pass through them at this angle.” The kids look at me as if I’ve pulled off one of the best magic tricks they had ever seen. “It’s not a trick! It’s the nature of light itself. We’ll get into this later in the year, but polarization is a well known phenomenon in science.” 13

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I approach the side view of my Earth model and draw some dotted ovals below the small circles of the sun and moon. “These polarizing bodies move around as the sun and moon do. When they are oriented one way, we have daylight. When they are oriented another way, darkness.” I demonstrate with the polarized film several more times. “Additionally, these bodies can get in the way of the moon, which make it appear that it is a round shadow—not the shadow from the Earth.” While the students are contemplating their retorts, I quickly move on by scratching out three bullets about time zones, the shadow of the Earth, and day and night occurring simultaneously. I point to the bullet indicating that we experience seasons on the Earth. “What causes the seasons?” I ask, putting an end to the rumblings about the day and night argument. “Globularists believe it is because we are closer to the sun in the summer, right?” “Isn’t it because of the angle of the sun?” a small voice from the front asks. “Ah, you’d be surprised how many round-Earthers get that wrong. You are correct. That is what the round Earth theory states—during the summer the Northern Hemisphere receives more direct sunlight because it is pointed toward the sun while in the winter it is pointed away from the sun. Therefore, it is warmer in the summer and colder in the winter. But let me ask you this, do you think the sun is the only thing that determines the weather?” “No!” come several replies. “Right. Living in Colorado Springs, you know that it can be sunny and ten degrees above zero. You know it can be seventy degrees one week in February, and below freezing the next. The point is, there are lots of things that affect the weather— altitude, humidity, ocean currents, air currents, and other factors. It has nothing to do with the angle of the sun’s rays. If only the sun’s rays determined the weather, it should always be warm in the summer and always cold in the winter.” “With your spherical model, why doesn’t the sun melt the ice wall?” asks a boy, a hint of contempt in his voice. “With your model, why doesn’t the sun melt all the ice in the Arctic in the summer? Why do many mountains have snow on them year round?” I fire back. I cross out the bullet on the board and ignore the rest of the chatter. A couple more pieces of evidence are easy to refute. We have never seen the edge because no one has ever been over the ice wall. We know the ice wall is there because it holds in the world’s oceans. If the ice wall were not there, the water would drain right off the edge of the Earth. Of course, many people may have disappeared from this Earth. Perhaps, Amelia Earhart found her way over the edge and never returned. “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence,” I tell them, referring to the edge of the Earth itself. “Just because we don’t find something isn’t proof that it doesn’t exist. Just because I haven’t caught the leprechauns that steal my socks does not mean that I have proved they aren’t real, right?” There are some heads shaking, but most students understand it was a rhetorical question. “The sun does follow a curved path, it follows the curve of the dome of heaven,” I explain. “Just because the Earth is flat does not mean that the sky above is flat.” I cross it off the list. “The next two pieces of evidence can be explained by 14

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similar logic. Of course, as I explained, astronauts cannot orbit the Earth, because we have never been in outer space. Nevertheless, some of you may argue that airplanes can travel all the way around the Earth. How would someone in an airplane know that they have circled, or we can say orbited, the Earth?” After a little while to think about it, the students zero in on an answer. One girl states that to orbit, someone has to travel in the same direction and end up coming back to the place where they started. I confirm this answer, and praise her detailed explanation. I then move to my drawing of the Earth as seen from the top. I find the continent, which vaguely resembles North America, and place a dot in the general area of Colorado. “Let’s say we begin in Colorado in an airplane. We travel west, continue around the Earth, see all of the continents, and return to Colorado again.” I demonstrate by drawing a circle around my map and ending up in the same point. “I can fly either direction, see the rest of the world, and end up where I started. I have just, in essence, orbited the Earth. I basically can do the same thing in a ship and circumnavigate the Earth.” The line drawn by my marker, simulating the path of a ship, curves around the capes of the continents on my flat Earth map. It weaves around the landmasses and ends up where I started, representing a complete circumnavigation. With a satisfied smile, I scratch the evidence from orbits and circumnavigation off the list. There is only one piece of evidence left supporting the round Earth. I begin my final assault on the theory. “Finally, why would the hull of a ship disappear first and the mast disappear last, when watching it sail away?” I ask. “Because as it goes over the curve of the Earth you can’t see the bottom,” a reply comes back. “Why not? What doesn’t allow us to see it?” I ask, probing for understanding. One girl, the one who knew about the Voyager missions, speaks up. “The light from the hull can’t curve around the surface of the Earth. Light travels in straight lines.” The rest of the class gets quiet, obviously impressed with the knowledge base of this young lady. “Impressive,” I tell her. “You seem to know a lot about light. Therefore you must know that light can be bent by gravity.” I don’t give her a chance to respond. “This idea was proposed by a fairly smart guy. Some of you may have even heard of him—Einstein! He said that large masses have enough gravity to bend light. Well, Earth is the largest body in the universe! What does this have to do with the hull of a ship? I’ll tell you!” I draw a stick man on the board. Several feet away from him, I draw a ship. With dotted lines, I indicate the light rays leaving the hull of the ship and entering the stick man’s eyes. I explain that when close enough, the man can still view the hull. I erase the ship and redraw it even further away from the man on the shore. This time I draw the dotted line curving closer to the Earth and hitting the ground before it reaches the stick man. “As you can see, the Earth bends the light from the hull, and the light rays don’t reach the observer’s eyes. He can no longer see the hull.” I draw the dotted lines

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from the mast and curve them down to the stick man’s eyes. “The mast, as you can see, is still in view until it is too far away.” Students stare at the board. I can tell that they understand what I have just told them but don’t quite know how to argue against it. This argument was borrowed from a video entitled “In Search of the Edge” (Barrie, 1990). In fact, several of the arguments I use to defend my flat Earth model are presented in this tongue-incheek documentary. The film shows “scientists” making arguments to an interviewer in a fashion similar to 60 Minutes, interwoven with the adventures of an early 20th century explorer named Andrea Barnes. “So, I can hold on to all of my evidence of the flat Earth,” I state, sweeping my hand down the pieces of evidence that are not crossed out, “and explain all of the round Earth anomalies. I think it is obvious now that the flat Earth model is superior.” The hands in the room dart up. Some are stretched so high that they appear to be reaching for the little holes in the acoustical tile. Others sway in an invisible wind, while others bob up and down as if the student will drown if I don’t call on him. I concede, and give them their chance. “Let’s go back to Occam’s Razor for a minute. What’s the simplest explanation, that all of my own senses, all of your senses, have been lying to you—or that the whole round Earth theory is just a mindless idea shamelessly promoted in the schools and by the government and media?” The room again falls mostly silent. “Now, for you nonbelievers, what questions do you have for me and my theory?” Though many students are begging to be called upon, one girl who hasn’t said much the entire day is chosen. I tell her to go ahead. “Going back to flying in a plane, we can fly a shorter route between countries by flying over the South Pole. You can’t do that on your model.” The rest of the class hoots as if to say, “Yeah! Take that!” However, I’m disappointed that by now they don’t know that I will always have a retort. “Okay, bear with me on this one. This is really an optical illusion that pilots experience.” The eye rolling indicates to me that they are expecting a lot of smooth talk. Nevertheless, they want to hear how I’ll explain the apparent conundrum. I begin to set up my point, again by borrowing the logic of the pseudo-documentary. “You can’t have light without darkness. Just as simply, you can’t have hot without cold. Would you all agree with that?” I wait for the confirmation. “Okay. You can’t really experience something without knowing the opposite. The same goes for time and space. If there is time, there must be “no time.” If there is space, there must be “non-space.” It takes time to move through space, so it takes no time to travel through non-space. Are you with me? Now, strange things happen when you get outside of the boundaries of the flat Earth.” I go to the map of the Earth as seen from the top and place my marker on the North Pole. I draw a line straight up to the edge of the circle, or the ice wall. “Now, if somehow, some way, an airplane is able to make it over the ice wall and under the Earth, it can reappear on the other side. But it takes no time! Once you leave the area around the Earth, though I’m highly skeptical that anyone really does, you enter this area of non-space.” 16

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I rub the marker back and forth under the side view of the Earth, indicating the area of non-space. I again repeat that it takes no time to travel through nonspace. I then go back to the top view of the Earth and draw a line from the bottom of the circle up to the North Pole. “The plane could reenter space on this side of the world, and not realize they have traveled below the Earth. To the people flying, it would appear as if nothing happened, other than they flew all the way around the Earth and ended up in the same place! Of course, I still believe that the people who claimed to have flown over the South Pole were actually flying around one of those islands near the ice wall. They probably become disoriented from the weather and merely think they are flying over Antarctica when they really turn back from the ice wall and arrive at their destination.” “What else have you got?” FUELING THE FIRE

By this time, most students argue about points I have already made. I repeat my arguments in several areas that have been previously discussed, but haven’t been stumped with any new ideas. As the excitement tends to die down, I decide it is time to drop an intellectual smart bomb. “I have yet to tell you the most compelling evidence. That evidence comes from an age-old book that has never been disputed. Some of you might have even heard of it—the Holy Bible! “Now, this particular book is divided up into two main parts. Does anyone know what they are?” “You can’t talk about religion in school!” kids cry out more than once. “This isn’t religion, this is science. Bear with me for a while. Can anyone answer my question?” “The New and Old Testaments?” a girl in the front asks, not sounding too confident. “Right. Now, the New Testament is mostly about this one guy. Anybody know his name?” Again, the response comes from several kids at once as if rehearsed. “Jesus!” “Right again. So the story goes that this guy, Jesus, died one day. Does anyone know what happened a few weeks later?” I ask. “He came back from the dead!” a boy shouts. “Actually, I believe the book says ‘he ascended into heaven.’ Now, what does ‘ascend’ mean?” I call on a small boy who has been paying close attention, but hadn’t said much all day. He replies, “Go up?” “Exactly. Jesus ascended into heaven. Now, what region on Earth did this guy supposedly live?” After we agree that Jesus supposedly lived in the Middle East, I draw a round Earth on the board. I indicate where the Middle East is on this globular planet. “Is the Middle East on the top of the round Earth?” I ask. When they reply in the negative, I go to the side view of my Pizza Model. I draw an arrow pointing up from it. 17

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“Ascend means that way,” I state, as I point to the ceiling. “It’s the opposite of down. As I explained before, down is toward the Earth, and is the same direction even if beyond the borders of the Great Southern Ice Wall. Up is only one direction.” I draw a line pointing up from the Middle East on the round Earth drawing. The line intersects the circle of the Earth, showing that something going the same direction would actually have to go through the top of the planet. “You cannot ascend from a round Earth unless you lived up in the Arctic Circle!” I draw another arrow pointing up from the top of the round Earth. “It doesn’t say that Jesus burrowed through the Earth to exit out the top of it to ascend into heaven!” The murmurs escalate to loud grumbles in the room. Several kids let me know in no uncertain terms that they want to argue this point. “Up is the opposite of the ground. He ascended out away from the Earth,” a kid says adamantly. I draw an arrow extending out from the Middle East on the round Earth. It sticks out to the right of the circle. “But that’s not what it says,” I respond. “Is heaven over there to the right of Earth? It doesn’t say that Jesus traveled right into heaven!” “Well, that’s not what it means!” several kids shout. “Blasphemer!” I shout at the top of my lungs. The sudden yell, partnered with the antithesis of my usually calm demeanor, makes a large portion of the class jump in their seats. “You mean we can interpret the Bible any way we want? What’s next, Thou shalt not kill, except those people that bother me? Thou shalt not steal, unless it is something my parents won’t buy for me? When does it end? Let’s just rewrite the whole thing for our own convenience! People who don’t accept the flat Earth are just trying to make a joke out of the entire Bible! Man oh man, is it getting warm in here, or do I just feel some peoples’ souls burning?” The class is in an uproar by this time. There is no silent kid in the classroom. Some in the back are actually standing and pointing up at the board. Others are shaking their heads and still others are laughing loudly. Discovery Canyon Campus lies in a politically and religiously conservative area of a traditionally conservative county. The United States Air Force Academy can be seen to the west. To the south lies Focus on the Family, as well as New Life Church—a non-denominational mega-church founded by the former pastor Ted Haggard. In 2005, National Public Radio deemed Colorado Springs a “Mecca for evangelical Christians” (Brady, 2005). Needless to say, religion here, especially in the public school, is a touchy subject. Kids in this district are not used to having their religious beliefs questioned or challenged, and especially not by a teacher. Since I know my clientele, I know that this will stimulate engagement—even more so than what the class has demonstrated up to this point. “Okay, let’s calm down,” I say after giving them a moment to air their grievances. “I’ve heard some of you saying that this is a crazy idea, but I am not the only one who believes this theory. Look up at the flag above the board.” I point to the United Nations flag. “The leaders of many nations believe this. So much that the flat Earth dons their flag! And look at the motto: ‘We Believe.’ What more evidence do you need?” 18

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“That’s not what it means!” a student protests. “They just drew the map like that to show all of the countries at once.” “Even though they say ‘We Believe?’ Are you saying they put one symbol on there and claim their allegiance to it, but really mean to say that they believe in something else? Does that make sense? That would be like me flying a flag of the Golden Arches, putting a motto on it that says ‘my favorite place,’ and claiming that Burger King is my favorite restaurant!” At this time I draw the kids attention to a series of three pictures of older men above the board. They consist of Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, and another older gentleman with groomed white hair and white beard. When asked if they could name these three “great thinkers,” almost all could name Einstein, and a handful could name Darwin, and not a single student could name the last. “This is Charles Johnson, the president of the Flat Earth Society. Chuckie J. to those of us who were close to him. Actually, I should say former president as he passed away in the year 2000. Let’s all stop and have a moment of silence for him.” I bow my head and pretend to have a solemn moment. Half of the kids are quiet, but the others are giggling and one even yells out, “Good. I’m glad he’s dead!” This sparks even more laughter among the rest. “Oh great. Very classy.” In a mocking, spoiled child’s voice, I whine, “His ideas are different than mine. He doesn’t believe what I believe so he should die.” I put on a serious face, “You know, that’s how the Salem Witch Trials began. They do things I don’t like! Burn the witches!” Again, amusement fills the room. By this time I am tired of talking, and the kids are emotionally drained. As the end of the class period approaches, I ask my students to do some thinking that night. I ask them to come back with evidence, if they can, that could prove my theory wrong. I ask them to think about whether they have actually ever taken time to think about, or even tried to prove, many of the “facts” that they have been taught. After giving them the proper definition, I ask them to think about any “dogma” that they have been taught. Finally, I ask them to think about whether it even matters in their own lives which theory represents reality. LASTING ENGAGEMENT

The next day no kids are tardy, and all are actually sitting in their seats when the bell rings—disregarding the short line of kids before me trying to plead their case. When I get them all quiet, many are leaning forward in their seats as if they are dogs that have been commanded to sit and stay while a prime rib steak is placed before them. I don’t need to give them directions about what we will be discussing. I simply call on them one by one and say one word. “Go.” Most of the kids have good evidence to refute my theory. They talk about the Earth not having enough mass to bend light, the atmosphere and our bodies moving with the Earth so we don’t feel as if we are moving at huge velocities, and the 19

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evidence for the moon landing. One girl, Miss Science Channel, describes in detail how sailors used the North Star for navigation. Since the North Pole is pointing at it, the North Star will appear to rise as a sailor travels northward. It would only be directly at an observer’s zenith if he or she was at the North Pole, and it is on the horizon at the equator. The North Star is not visible to observers in the Southern Hemisphere. I hear each and every student out without agreeing or disagreeing with the evidence. When everyone has exhausted their new ideas, I ask them how I responded to their evidence the day before. How did I explain away their evidence? How did I react when they disagreed or ridiculed my evidence? Some say I made up crazy claims with little proof. Others note that I ignored some of their evidence, or mocked it. Several claim that I just dismissed large amounts of evidence by waving it off as a hoax. But, what they all noticed was how I reacted when the class didn’t agree with my evidence from the Bible. “How many of you felt insulted or personally attacked?” I ask. A mild ruckus begins as most of the hands go up. I didn’t want to hear their explanations or interpretations; I simply attacked their own beliefs if they didn’t jive with mine. Finally, I ask them how we determine what is true science and what is not. Together, we come up with several characteristics of science. Science deals only with the natural world and assumes that natural phenomena have natural explanations. Supernatural topics, and therefore supernatural explanations, are out of the realm of science. This is not to say that they do not exist, but humans must use means other than science to study them. Science assumes that humans can understand the natural world, but since the universe did not come with an instruction manual, the answers are not always in the back of the book. What we know about the natural world, we had to figure out ourselves. Since our knowledge of the natural world is always increasing, science is tentative and revisable if new findings overthrow the old. Science is based on empirical evidence, which can be measured by our senses or technology that extends our senses. It is true that science can be influenced by personal beliefs, as demonstrated by my Biblical argument, but peer review and verification can flush out these biases. After a solid discussion of the nature of science, I write a statement on the board. It reads: “If education is to serve society, then the educational process should address the needs and interests of everyone” (In the Name of Education, 1989, p. 1). We discuss what this means and how it applies to the flat Earth theory. What if a group wants the theory taught in the public schools? Should we do it? How do we decide what to teach in a science class? Should all topics be given equal time, and we let students decide which one to accept? What if we know that one has a lot of evidence to disprove it? I return to this conversation throughout the rest of the year. In a class that covers multiple, potentially controversial, topics, such as those scientific theories that some perceive as challenging their religious beliefs, it is important to revisit this discussion, as well as the entire lesson. The big bang theory and the theory of biological evolution are often seen to conflict with evangelical Christian doctrine, and students frequently object to having to learn about them. The flat Earth lesson 20

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helps students to understand what science is, what it is not, how it is studied, and how it is different from other ways of knowing. By allowing students to evaluate the validity of criteria that are used to form a scientific theory, the mystery is removed from scientific studies, and students may feel less intimidated by learning about such topics (Pace, 2003). GUIDELINES FOR TEACHING CONTROVERSY IN THE CLASSROOM

There are several ways to approach controversial issues. Hess (2005) offers four strategies: 1) 2) 3) 4)

refusal to admit that an issue is controversial complete avoidance of the topic teaching only one side favored by the teacher presenting fair representations of various positions.

I can verify that the third strategy listed above will typically generate the most controversy in a class. This approach, referred to as the advocacy approach (Hermann, 2008), is characterized by a teacher assuming a particular viewpoint without allowing students to discuss their own beliefs. Alternative beliefs are only discussed as an aid to overcome students’ misconceptions and replacing them with scientific understandings. Of course, my spin on this approach is to present the flat Earth model as the only scientific explanation whereas any disagreement must be invalid. Somehow, Hess left out the strategy where the teacher creates controversy where none truly exists. Of course, the purpose of this approach is to generate interest and engagement rather than actually addressing the controversial topic itself. At the end of lessons like this, it is important not to leave kids with a lasting impression that is incorrect. I have been the recipient of emails from confused and agitated parents who claim that I am teaching their kids wrong information. You do not want to keep up a façade such as this for long, and you certainly don’t want to have a classroom full of aggrieved students for the rest of the year. After stepping out of my Zetetic Astronomer role and working with students to break down the arguments made for the flat Earth, I ensure them that the evidence for the round Earth is solid, verified, measurable, and accurate. Although it may seem on the surface that I use the flat Earth lesson to merely generate controversy, I also use it to lay the groundwork for addressing future studies of controversial topics. Though some students actually believe that I accept the flat Earth model (I’m an excellent actor), not all take it seriously enough to feel as personally offended if I were to criticize their beliefs of Creationism or Intelligent Design. While I make it very clear that biological evolution is an exceptionally strong scientific theory supported by mounds of evidence, I would not dare tackle the discussion as I do the more tongue-in-cheek approach to the shape of the Earth. Such a strategy would not only lead to resentment and mistrust, but may cease student engagement immediately—the exact opposite effect of what I am looking for. By drawing attention to the way that I handled the “simulated” controversy, 21

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I can create ground rules for the next contentious and divisive issue upon which we will embark. Although many papers have been written in order to provide guidelines for teachers when dealing with controversial issues, several themes are common. A simple bulleted list is provided by the Center for Teaching and Learning out of the University of North Carolina (2004) as well as Teachable Moment (Shapiro, 2003) and Pace (2003). The most important guideline when discussing potentially disputatious material is to create an intellectually safe learning environment. This is done early when creating the climate of the classroom. Students must be permitted to question ideas and know that they will not be ridiculed if they do not conform to teacher views or commonly held beliefs. When establishing this guideline, I ask students to recall how it felt to be mocked. I apologize for making them feel this way, and assure them that there was method to my madness. I would never criticize, nor allow any students to criticize, someone’s cherished beliefs. All people in the classroom demand and deserve respect. Shapiro (2003) recommends involving students in decisions about the classroom and having procedures to resolve conflicts in place before tackling such discussions. This may contribute to an environment in which students are more likely to speak freely and take risks. It is important to emphasize that, when students challenge others’ ideas, it is the position that is being critiqued, not the individual. The teacher can help to separate the position from the students by listing all possible positions on the board without giving credit to the contributor. This will create a sense of comparing ideas rather than comparing people. Students may feel safer to critique a stance rather than their peer or teacher. Likewise, such a strategy may help students detach themselves from a single position and be more open-minded about others. They may even be able to detect errors in their own logic or use of evidence, when they see all points of view listed equally without being attached to an author. When challenging an idea, it is important that students do so with factual evidence and appropriate logic (Center for Teaching and Learning, 2004). Students need to understand the difference between evidence and inference, between observable facts and opinion. Arguing against a point has little merit, especially in a science class, without supporting evidence. I remind kids of how I used the Bible as my major source of authority—not physical evidence. This point, incidentally, is repeated frequently when we study evolution. Students typically answer their own questions about why we do not study Creationism alongside evolution. By then, students understand the game of science, the rules by which it plays, and how physical, measurable evidence trumps any religious or professional authority. Debates pitting religion against science are doomed when they don’t use the same playing field. Both are different ways of knowing and tend to use different methods of studying and understanding the universe. Finally, teachers cannot ignore the importance of knowing their audience. Stradling (1984) warns that there is difficulty in attempting to lay down hard and fast rules when teaching potentially hot topics. The teacher must consider specific constraints that are operating in each school. Indeed, for these types of lessons to be effective, the teacher must thoroughly understand the culture of the community. 22

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An emotional response will not be generated by topics that are of little significance to the kids and their parents. By finding controversial topics, or taking the side of an argument that is known to go against the emotional grain of the classroom, a teacher can generate heated debates and discussions in which students cannot wait to engage. Shapiro (2003) recommends a lot of direct questioning, group discussions, and journal writing to determine what students already know about an issue before embarking on a debate. Engagement of students can be perpetuated in a variety of ways. Contextualizing information to make it relevant to students’ lives is frequently helpful in getting kids involved (Cordova and Lepper, 1996). Building social relationships and making personal connections with students may also enhance motivation. A curriculum which focuses on inquiry-based learning where students are posing and answering their own questions can also serve to get kids involved in their own learning (Palmer, 2009). However, when students become emotionally involved in the topic, they have a strong desire to be heard. Johnson and Johnson (2000) claim that teaching should be like a modern novel. If conflict is not created within the first few pages, the novel most likely will not be successful. Likewise, if a teacher does not create intellectual conflict within a few minutes after class begins, “students won’t intellectually engage with the lesson, and their attention may drift off to other things” (p. 30). Posing a problem or question, presenting a relevant story or anecdote, or showing an awe-inspiring demonstration may kindle active engagement in a lesson. These are usually enough to stimulate interest for a particular lesson or class period. However, by making an investment in an emotionally charged activity, a teacher may nurture the students’ engagement, as well as other skills, over the course of a unit or even throughout the year. REFERENCES Barrie, S. (Director). (1990). In search on the edge: An inquiry into the shape of the Earth and the disappearance of Andrea Barnes [Motion picture]. United States: Pancake Productions. Beard, J. (2007, January/February). Using historical explanations: Teaching how science works. Connect, 20(3). Retrieved from http://www.synergylearning.org/cf/displayarticle.cfm?selectedarticle=641 Beard, J. (1999). The flat earth. Retrieved from Evolution and the Nature of Science Institutes Web site: http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb/lessons/flaterth.html Brady, J. (2005, January 17). Colorado Springs a Mecca for evangelical Christians. National Public Radio. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId= 4287106 Center for Teaching and Learning, University of North Carolina. (2004, September). For your consideration #21: Teaching controversial issues. Retrieved from http://cfe.unc.edu/pdfs/FYC21.pdf Coleridge, S.T. (1798\2003). Rime of the ancient mariner. In M. Gardner (Ed.), Annotated ancient mariner: The rime of the ancient mariner. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Publishing. Cordova, D.I., & Lepper, M. R. (1996, December). Intrinsic motivation and the process of learning: Beneficial effects of contextualization, personalization, and choice. Journal of Educational Psychology, 88(4), 715–730. Dewey, J. (1922). Human nature and conduct: An introduction to social psychology. New York: Random House Publishing. Dolby, T., & Kerr, T. (1982). She blinded me with science. In On the golden age of wireless [record]. Los Angeles: Capitol Records. 23

BRAMSCHREIBER Eisner, E. W. (2002). The arts and the creation of mind. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Hahn, C.L. (1984, June). Teaching controversial issues: Case of peace and security. (Eric Document Reproduction Service No. ED 247162) Harris, S. (1984). Rime of the ancient mariner. On Powerslave [record]. Nassau, Bahamas: Compass Point Studios. Hermann, R. S. (2008). Evolution as a controversial issue: A review of instructional approaches. Science & Education, 17, 1011–1032. Hess, D. (2001). Teaching students to discuss controversial public issues. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Social Development Center. Retrieved from www.indiana.edu/~ssdc/ cpidig.htm Howard, R. (Director). (1995). Apollo 13 [Motion picture]. United States: Universal Studios. In the name of education: A case study. (1989). Retrieved from Evolution & the Nature of Science Institutes Web site: http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb/lessons/flaterth.html Johnson, D.W., & Johnson, R.T. (2000). Constructive controversies: The educative power of intellectual conflict. Change, 32(1), 28–37. Johnson, D.W., & Johnson, R.T. (1989). Cooperation and competition: Theory and research. Edina, MN: Interaction Book Company. Kiedis, A. (2000). Californication. On Californication [CD]. Burbank, CA: Warner Brothers Records. Lusk, A.B., & Weinberg, A.S. (1994, October). Discussion controversial topics in the classroom: Creating a context for learning. Teaching Sociology, 22(4), 301–308. Marzano, R.J. (2004). Building background knowledge for academic achievement: Research on what works in schools. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Moir, E. (1999). The stages of a teacher’s first year. In M. Scherer (Ed.), Better beginnings: Supporting and mentoring new teachers (pp. 19–23). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Moore, J. (2007). Popular music helps students focus on important social issues. Middle School Journal, 38(4), 21–29. Pace, D. (2003). Controlled fission: Teaching supercharged subjects. College Teaching, 51(2), 42–45. Palmer, D.H. (2009, February). Student interest generated during an inquiry skills lesson. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 46(2), 147–165. Shapiro, A. (2003, January). Teaching on controversial issues: Guidelines for teachers. TeachableMoment. Retrieved from http://www.teachablemoment.org/ideas/teachingcontroversy.html Stradling, R. (1984). The teaching of controversial issues: An evaluation. Educational Review, 36(2), 121–129.

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P. BRUCE UHRMACHER

2. RISK-TAKING AND THE DANCE OF THE BLESSED SPIRITS

INTRODUCTION

What do you imagine when you think about the opera? Perhaps dramatic scenery, flamboyant tenors, or singing so rich and clear it brings tears to one’s eyes? Whatever image you conjure while contemplating opera, you most likely do not imagine third graders performing Orpheus in a packed public school gymnasium. This essay is about having students take risks in and out of the classroom for the purpose of advancing their learning. It is also about a teacher who takes these risks by teaching elementary school children opera. Let’s take a look at this teacher and, in the process, we1 will show you why risk-taking is essential to learning and how to incorporate it into the classroom. But first, let’s examine the notion of: RISK-TAKING

Risk-taking, as a way to foster academic learning or educational experiences, is not a topic often raised in teacher education courses. Why this is so, is not difficult to infer. Standardized tests do not generally measure students’ willingness to take risks. Also, risk-taking, which could be anything from asking questions during classroom discussions to turning in unique class projects, potentially opens up a set of classroom management issues. The student who turns in an art film as a way to represent her learning, not only gives the teacher a quandary about how to evaluate the project, but also sets the class up for issues related to the organization of time—finding a projector, allowing the film to be shown, etc. No wonder that many teachers prefer to refrain from taking risks themselves and entering into the unknown with student assignments. But, we argue, having students take risks in the classroom can have numerous benefits that outweigh the problems. There is scholarly evidence that demonstrates that encouraging students to take moderate risks (placing learners in situations where they can make mistakes or feel discomfort) can, when used appropriately by a capable teacher, deepen the educational experience (Clifford, 1991) and increase students’ cognitive development (Clifford, 1991);2 creativity (Beghetto, 2006);3 selfmotivation (Clifford, 1991); and student interest in subject matter, such as science (Beghetto, 2009).4 One could go so far as to argue that learning is defined, at least in part, by taking risks: no risk, then no real learning (Vygotsky, 1978).5 Different theories of risk-taking have been suggested over the years. Initially, ideas related to risk-taking were found in the academic disciplines of economics P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 25–30. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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and psychology (Clifford, 1991). Today, some researchers focus on risk-taking as related to learning specifically. Intellectual risk-taking may be defined “as engaging in adaptive learning behaviors (sharing tentative ideas, asking questions, attempting to do and learn new things) that place the learner at risk of making mistakes or appearing less competent than others” (Beghetto, 2009, p. 210). Related to, but in contrast from these types of risk-taking, we offer the idea of aesthetic risk-taking: the willingness to participate in actions that deepen the learning experience by acting outside one’s comfort zone, and, therefore, opening oneself up to new and novel ideas, emotions, and ways of being.6 This notion has its roots in the arts (everything from the visual arts to theater), but can be found in all acts of learning that are particularly deep and rich. RISK-TAKING IN ACTION

The “opera” takes place in the elementary school gym—a traditional school gym with high ceilings, dark colors, and few windows. The school district is known to be of high academic caliber and has individual schools that vary in socio-economic status diversity. This particular school has an 80% free and reduced lunch. The teacher, Mr. Ruiz, has been at the school for 20 years and has taught opera there for 17. One year he received the Opera Colorado Teacher of the Year Award. Mr. Ruiz notes, “I was interested in opera and my interest evolved. I got hooked up with Opera Colorado and I would take the kids to see the plays. Later, whenever the Opera Company put on an opera, I rewrote it so that kids could understand it. I write the libretto into a small play.” A backdrop has been created for the opera: it is about 5 feet high and painted blue to show sky with clouds. Greek columns have “fallen” in front with plants around the bases. Like many traditional gyms, there is a wall behind the set that serves as a stage. It is not being used for this production, as the set has been built on the floor in front of the stage. Over the stage hangs a large U.S. flag. Kids trickle into the gym until almost two-thirds of the floor space is taken over by restless children. When the classes finally settle on the floor, Mr. Ruiz comes out and yells, “Are you ready?” “Yes!” “Are you ready?” he shouts louder. “YES!” Mr. Ruiz continues the call and response until the volume fills the room. From here, Mr. Ruiz begins the narrative for the opera. The presentation is a mixture of Mr. Ruiz as narrator and as director, with the students as actors. Mr. Ruiz tells the audience what is taking place. He also, at times, tells his actors or the audience what to do. “I don’t think I’ve done this one in 5 years,” he says to the audience. “This story is 2,000–3,000 years old.” To help students understand the time period, Mr. Ruiz provides some context, “The ancient Greeks wore sandals … believed in Zeus and Cupid.” He searches for something with which the kids can relate, “Hercules, think of Hercules.” 26

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The audience listens. Mr. Ruiz points out, “The very first thing in opera is an overture. It gets you in the mood.” Nine kids wearing black togas enter the stage and line up on the left side. Three kids wearing black togas are on center stage. One actor has a green leaf headband. “The Greek Chorus,” Mr. Ruiz tells the audience, “comes in and makes comments. They speak together.” Mr. Ruiz looks over the set. “We’re going to start with a sad funeral. So everyone wipe your eyes.” The audience laughs. “Mr. Powel, play that sad funeral music.” Mr. Powel, in a white shirt and necktie, controls the music via computer. The Chorus walks from the left to the right side of the stage. Two boys carry a body, wrapped in black, through center aisle. The actor playing Orpheus is center stage looking sad. Mr. Ruiz says the actors’ lines, and then the actors repeat them. In this way the kids do not have to worry about too much memorization. Mr. Ruiz has a great voice for this kind of format. He can turn on a loud and expressive voice at will. Mr. Ruiz: “This is the worst day ever.” Orpheus: “This is the worst day ever.” Mr. Ruiz: “Now everyone, this is the worst day ever.” Audience: “This is the worst day ever.” Mr. Ruiz: “Sweet Eurydice is gone, taken away to the underworld by a snake bite.” Orpheus repeats the line. Mr. Ruiz: “No one can help me now.” Orpheus: “No one can help me now.” Mr. Ruiz: “The only thing that would make me happy is to see Eurydice again.” Orpheus: “The only thing that would make me happy is to see Eurydice again.” Mr. Ruiz says to the audience: “Everyone, poor Orpheus.” Audience: “Poor Orpheus.” CREATING A RISK-TAKING ENVIRONMENT

Teachers and students will take risks when they believe that it is in their interest and that it is safe to do so. We suggest that taking risks to deepen one’s experience is a risk worth taking. Remember, we define aesthetic risk-taking as the willingness to participate in actions that deepen the learning experience by acting outside one’s comfort zone, and, therefore, opening oneself up to new and novel ideas, emotions, and ways of being. There are explicit steps that school administrators and teachers can take to create such environments for aesthetic risk-taking. We can witness these aspects in Mr. Ruiz’s intentions and in the vignette above. We recommend, from our observations of Mr. Ruiz, seven important steps. These include: 1) modeling risktaking, 2) building trust, 3) teaching to your passion, 4) creating a safe community, 5) respecting each individual, 6) taking advantage of self-correction, and 7) staying focused on the potential rewards. 27

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First, teachers need to model risk-taking. Mr. Ruiz models risk-taking by doing opera in the first place. In an interview he tells me, “It’s hard to get up in front of peers and do something no one else does. My peers, too, may think I’m crazy. It’s a risk to do this.” Kids want to see teachers walk the talk. Telling students to take risks while not modeling it yourself is not likely to get you very far. It is important that students see you taking risks in the classroom, and since many students may not know what is risky for you, tell them. Let them know that you are going to take a risk, or having done so, let them know that what you just did was risky. Second, in addition to modeling risk-taking, Mr. Ruiz also needs to build trust with his students. It’s important that they have confidence in his leadership. At this point in his career, Mr. Ruiz has been teaching opera for 17 years and has quite a reputation for doing so. His reputation precedes him. But at first, he had no reputation, and as he indicated above, “When I first started doing this, it was scary. Now it’s a school expectation.” In either case, whether you are just starting something new or repeating an activity you have done for many years, students need to trust you. Mr. Ruiz builds trust by feeding the actors’ lines, using humor, and keeping the play moving by providing a constant narrative. Mr. Ruiz’s students trust him because they know that he will do whatever he can to make them look good in front of an audience. When students know that you support them, in whatever endeavor, they will begin to trust you. In addition, Mr. Ruiz always has the children perform the opera toward the end of the year. This way he can build a risk-taking environment as the year develops. By the spring, he knows which students are willing to take what risks and can support them in pushing their own comfort levels. Third, and perhaps a little surprising as an important element in risk-taking, is teaching to your passion. Mr. Ruiz says, “I think it’s important for teachers to remember what inspired them in school. I loved school plays. I have the passion for the school play. I’ve taken something I’m passionate about and shared it with the kids.” Passion is infectious. When educators teach to their passions, students cannot help but become absorbed in the experience, which yields a deepened experience for students.7 Fourth, it is important to create a safe community. Mr. Ruiz builds community before, during, and even after the play, and everyone has some kind of role. Mr. Ruiz says, “The week before we perform the opera, we get together in the gym and work on small pieces. I take my kids and we’ll practice different scenes and think about how we want it to look.” Mr. Ruiz makes sure everyone has something to do. He continues, “The kids who don’t have a part help the stage crew or move things around. For those who want a part, I tell them that this time there may not be a part, but there will be one next time.” Mr. Ruiz also notes that the opera activity also works for kids learning English. He says, “ELA kids get involved but may not have anything to say. Once I had this student from Africa whose grasp of English was iffy. He played an angel. He didn’t have to say anything, but he had a great time doing it.” Mr. Ruiz has also noticed that “Even kids who don’t speak invite parents to watch.” 28

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Fifth, it is important to respect each individual. What is risky for one student may not be risky at all for another. Teachers need to know their students well and they need to respect their differences. Mr. Ruiz knows all of his students very well. Sixth, teachers have the opportunity for self-correction. Especially when working in an environment where risk is taking place, teachers may make mistakes. A teacher may push too hard or too little. Mr. Ruiz said to me that he occasionally makes mistakes in casting. But by respecting each individual and working at understanding students’ feelings, teachers can learn about the mistakes they may have made and self-correct. If possible, the teacher can reorient the whole activity so that it works for the student. Or if the activity has already ended, the teacher can at least reflect with the student about what happened. The teacher can validate the student’s feelings and assure the student that next time things will be different. In Mr. Ruiz’s case, sometimes he was able to recast students. At other times he made the best of the situation by continually self-correcting—that is working with the students so that they could do the best they could. Seventh, as we indicated early on, students need some kind of reward from risky behaviors. Mr. Ruiz notes, “I have students who contact me even 20 years later. They ask, ‘Do you still do the opera?’ They will say that’s the best experience ever. They do remember those operas. It kind of gets you in the heart.” Generally, the experience itself is the reward. We end this essay where we began, by encouraging teachers to think about and to take risks in their teaching. We have shown how one teacher takes great risks and has found it rewarding both for himself and for his students. As Mr. Ruiz pointed out, students remember these experiences for a long time. In a final note, Mr. Ruiz said that the students know they are performing for the whole school and it can be scary: “I try to make it an experience they can embrace. I’m willing to make a fool of myself and do crazy things. I think all teachers need to do that. Put yourself out there and not worry about your colleagues and let them see that you are passionate.” AFTERWORD

This essay is the result of a qualitative research study conducted by Bruce Uhrmacher and Kristen Bunn in the spring of 2007. The specific research method employed was educational criticism and connoisseurship (Eisner, 1991; Uhrmacher and Matthews, 2005).8 Uhrmacher and Bunn observed Mr. Ruiz for several days and interviewed him twice. In this method one is able to exploit what one knows as well as what one sees. In this case, it should be pointed out that Uhrmacher has known Mr. Ruiz for more than 12 years and Bunn has known him for 7 years. NOTES 1

2

I use the word “we” because this essay was taken from a research project that Kristen Bunn and I conducted. Clifford, M. (1991). Risk taking: Theoretical, empirical, and educational considerations. Educational Psychologist 26 (3–4), 263–297. 29

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4

5 6 7

8

30

Beghetto, R. (2006). Creative self-efficacy: Correlates in middle and secondary students. Creativity Research Journal 18 (4), 447–457. Beghetto, R. (2009). Correlates of intellectual risk taking in elementary school science. Journal of Research in Science Teaching 46(2), 210–223. Vygotsky, L. (1928). Mind in society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Thanks to Christy Moroye and Kristen Bunn in assisting me with this definition. There are moral implications entailed in risk-taking. Teachers could take students on a journey through negative as well as positive adventures. Eisner, E. W. (1991). The enlightened eye. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. Uhrmacher, P. B. and Matthews, J. (2005). Intricate palette: Working the ideas of Elliot Eisner. Columbus, Ohio: Merrill Prentice Hall.

CREATIVITY

“The principle goal of education is to create men who are capable of doing new things, not simply of repeating what other generations have done—men [and women] who are creative, inventive and discoverers.” ~ Jean Piaget, Psychologist

KRISTEN E. BUNN

3. CLASSROOM CHOREOGRAPHY The Impact of a Creative Beat

INTRODUCTION

While watching a truly spectacular dance it is easy to get caught up in the moment. All of the pieces meld as one; the costumes, the music, and the steps come together to create a magical experience. Even if one is unaware of how much work and dedication came before the show, it is easy to get engrossed in the pure energy of the piece. It was remarkable to see this type of performance in a classroom; the days flowed from one activity to the next, switching tempo, but never missing a beat. At times the teacher led the dance and at other times she followed the rhythm of the children, but at all times there was a continuous flow. The energy of the room pulled me in and encouraged me to learn more about what was taking place. After awhile, I realized that what made the dance possible was a dedication to creativity. The teacher intentionally created a classroom that encouraged creativity from all angles. “The year is 3006. Our society is located on Darwin Four. It is an actual planet that is 6,000,000 light years away. Our society left earth because of global warming and the evacuees traveled by space shuttle to the new planet. Our government is socialist/democratic. We have a president that is elected by the people. The government owns some businesses and the health care system. Our society does not have homelessness, and we do not have extremely rich or extremely poor people. Education is completely paid for and our taxes are very high. We have three branches of government: Judicial, Executive, and Legislative. If people have conflicts or break the law, the Darwin Republic has a judge and a jury system. Competitions are held on a giant chessboard to solve disputes.” The above description comes from a booklet written by first and second graders at the Jones Center for Gifted Children* on a city’s university campus. A class of 17 first and second graders decided upon the research, the design and building of the future society, and all of the ideas described above during a ten-week unit on the future. The school uses an integrated curriculum that encourages students to explore topics in-depth over 10 weeks of study. Approximately 250 students, ages three through eighth grade, attend the school. According to the Jones Center website: “The curriculum at the Jones Center is designed to address the whole child, including his or her emotional, intellectual, aesthetic, physical, and social needs.” Along with these needs, I observed a classroom that encourages creativity and a life-long love of learning through an engaging, student-centered curriculum. * Name of the school and teacher have been changed. P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 33–40. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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The teacher in this paper, Ali Parsons, was recommended to me because of her reputation for creating an environment that encouraged students to be life-long learners. And over the month that I spent in her classroom, it quickly became clear that something special was occurring in the class. The inventiveness inherent in her teaching allowed a creative environment to emerge. This creative energy created an environment that pulled you into the dance that was taking place. IMPORTANCE OF CREATIVITY

So why is creativity important in a classroom? What is the importance of creativity in today’s world? Innovation and creative problem solving played a major role in the history of America and appear to be necessary job skills for the future. Summarizing the Summit on 21st Century Skills meeting, Still (2007) writes: “In general, businesses want graduates who know how to communicate, who can solve problems alone and in teams, who embrace innovation, and who will function as contributing citizens in their communities, state, nation, and world” (p. 1). Memorizing facts and ideas is counter to the goals expressed here. Creative thinking, on the other hand, encourages students to find new solutions and ideas. When students are encouraged to create their own solutions they learn the process of struggle and discovery. Researchers have found that there are certain techniques that encourage creativity. In particular, a leader in creative practices, Torrance (1977) found that there are four ways to enhance student creativity. The first is to provide opportunities for creative behavior. The second is to develop skills for creative learning. Third, teachers need to reward creative achievements. The final skill is that teachers need to establish creative relationships with children. As you’ll see in the coming descriptions, Ali’s classroom and the Futures unit continually expose students to these four elements. CLASSROOM OBSERVATIONS

When I first met Ali, I was struck by her passion and spark. Before starting the observations, I interviewed her. When she was asked about the unit, she answered: We do hope to have a science-based unit. But embedded in that is the fantastical. I mean, because how fun. Who knows? Who knows what mankind will look like, if there will be mankind? And to have them use their knowledge of what is possible, in a scientific setting, you know, and even the craziest adaptations are grounded in reality. Organized chaos explained the feeling of the classroom. Markers, cloth, building supplies, and other craft materials seemed to pour out of every bookcase and cubby in the room. Evidence of student projects abounded—everything from student made outfits for their fashion business to artistic homework assignments. One particular homework assignment was carefully hung on the wall. It consisted of natural items 34

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found on a walk put together into a sculpture-like design. Ali pointed it out when we were talking: Those two leaves with the needles. Those things are beautiful. I mean the girl who made that, she just turned 6. The assignment was to go on a fall walk and create something from the walk. And that is what she brought back. A large loft structure filled one corner of the room, it was built to encourage a quiet place to work. It was clear that the layout of the room was intentional—it was meant to create an atmosphere that was supportive of kids discovering and creating. The Futures unit had several projects built into it; for example, assignments included designing a school of the future, creating the essential elements of a future society, and writing a book of the class’s dreams for the future. Throughout the projects, the children in this classroom were able to discover and solve problems as they arose. Researchers agree that students can develop problem-solving skills and that it is, therefore, imperative to give them the opportunity to do so (Burnard and Younker, 2004). Ali refrained from telling students what issues to expect or how to solve them. Rather, students were given tasks that required knowledge acquisition and compromise, and Ali supported them along the creation process. The first time I observed the students, the kids were furiously working, divided into groups of three. There were 15 kids in the classroom that day; two of the groups were all girls, one group was all boys, and the remaining two groups were a mix of two boys and one girl. The students had started the Futures unit two weeks before and had just been given the newest task—to design a school of the future. Ideas were flying and the room was charged with energy. The room itself was full of stimuli. A large, green, fake leather couch filled the middle of the room. The significant area of the classroom was empty carpet space and the more traditional working space (tables) was pushed to the side—almost as if saying, “We’re really learning here, not pretending.” The tables were six trapezoids pushed together to make three hexagons. Kids called the teacher by her first name, and demonstrated a certain casual ease in their relationships. “Are we supposed to color this?” one student asked another. “I don’t know, let’s ask Ali,” responded his friend. “Ali, are we supposed to color these?” asked the first student. “You decide; I want you to do what you want,” Ali answered. Another project I observed the students working on was a journal prompt that asked them to write about a classroom in the future. Students were encouraged to push what was currently possible and to imagine what may be possible in the future. Students wrote their own responses, but while they worked they discussed possible ideas and shared the things that they thought would be the coolest. As an example, one student wrote: All of the schools use e-books and do not use any paper. Notes are taken with electronic pens. At each child’s workstation they have a personal computer and a 3-D holographic projection system that enables students to hold teleconferences with students in other schools and with their teacher. The schools 35

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have virtual reality so that they can learn about far away places like they are really visiting. As this description of a future school demonstrates, many of the projects that the students worked on during this unit were transforming what is currently possible into what could be probable in the future. The students were expected to learn about the possible and then add their own spin and imagination. During the process, the students learned that there is more than one solution to problems. They learned to push their own thinking and to work together to come up with even better ideas. The observations took place in the spring quarter—so the Futures unit was the final unit of the year. The school is set up with multi-age classrooms, so a teacher has students for two years. The students had, therefore, been with Ali for at least most of a year, and half of them were finishing their second year with her. Having the students for a longer period of time allowed Ali the luxury of really understanding where each of the student’s interests and skills were, and to base instructions and projects around the students. The Futures unit was chosen because of a passion that one of the students had expressed the previous year. “A lot of ideas came from the Future is Wild series. They take a certain place on Earth and talk about the consequences of another Ice Age.” Ali further explained that the interested student brought in some books and a movie on future inventions. These sparked the curiosity of the others in the class, and she decided to plan a unit around their wonder. “I want them to take the current information and discern it, research it, and see how it will apply to the future technologies, and then to create their own society from that. It should be based on fact, but be their own.” I pushed her more on how the kids helped create the idea for the unit. Ali explained that to begin the unit, she engaged her students in a free write: “What will the future be? Fifty, five-hundred, five-million years from now?” The responses served as the starting place for the unit and allowed Ali to understand where each of her students was coming from. Some responses were purely scientific and others really fantastical, but all posed questions about what the future will be like. For example: “One hundred fifty years from now, humans have banned the use of gasoline because of air pollution and cars are now powered by electricity and a fan. The fan gathers the electricity.” The responses reflected the individual interest of each child and from these, Ali was able to further individualize instruction. After the free writing activity, Ali had a discussion with the students in order to generate questions and objectives for the unit. Students discussed what they wanted to learn about and what they already thought the future would be like. The result of the discussion added to Ali’s initial plans and helped shape the coming 10 weeks. The second time I was in the room, the students had moved into planning and designing what the community of the future would look like. There were 16 kids in the class that day, as well as the two teachers and two volunteer parents. As Ali gave the directions, two kids lounged on the couch, four leaned against it, nine kids sat on the floor, and one stood leaning against a stool. When the directions were done, Ali reminded the students of the things they had already decided upon. For instance, they had researched and decided they wanted a socialist government. 36

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Upon questioning them, the students told me that this meant they would pay much higher taxes, but they thought this was the best form of government for a future world since it was fair. They were able to convey that each type of government system has positive and negative attributes. The self-selected groups were divided into transportation, defense, economy, infrastructure (homes and roads), and government. This particular day, I shadowed the government group. This group comprised four boys. They decided that they would go to the atrium outside of the classroom to work. They appeared very independent and at ease with small group work. Each boy grabbed a chair and we formed a small circle out in the open space. A student got up to get an apple out of his bag while the others explained to the parent volunteer how much research they had already completed. They mentioned that money would be a microchip implanted in the body and then scanned, but they worried that this might lead to health problems. This natural recognition of unintended consequences made it apparent that this group had spent time grappling with some difficult concepts. The volunteer mother began to ask them questions, “How will you resolve conflict? Will you have a judicial system?” The kids answered that they needed laws because otherwise people would go crazy. “And we need to know right from wrong.” This led to a discussion on a jail system and how they could have laser lights to keep the prisoners inside. Any chance they got to discuss and research the possible technological advances was jumped upon. After spending time with the government group, I wandered around to observe each of the other groups. Each group had an opportunity to focus in on what really interested them. And each final project clearly demonstrated the particular interests of the group. For example, the government group was able to create a list of laws and the punishments for infractions. At no point in my observations did I observe students complaining about what they were working on. All students demonstrated an ownership in the learning and appeared excited to keep learning more about the particular task they were working on. During a third, the students were instructed to turn their “school of the future” blueprints into actual structures made out of materials in the room. Ali moved around the room with the grace of a dancer—fluttering from group to group, checking in with each of them. As she moved, she posed more serious questions and asked for their responses. In her own understated manner, she pushed them to come up with more than they would have on their own. The first group that began turning the blueprints into buildings started experimenting with different materials. One student dropped a metal piece and liked the bell sound that it made. He got the attention of his group and shared his discovery with them: “Look! This will be our school bell.” He then convinced them to include it into their school plan. The three boys continued working together to determine at what height the bell needed to be dropped from in order for it to ring. Soon, all of the students were working in different areas of the room making their buildings. At this point, the project had been going on for a little over an hour and was twenty minutes past the scheduled activity change. Ali did not appear concerned that the schedule was not being followed and the kids continued working 37

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uninterrupted. The focus was on the students and their learning experience; time and sticking to a schedule seemed the least of the concerns. In the end, the boys decided that a school of the future did not need a traditional bell because it would have more modern technology; however, the time to experiment and creatively problem-solve the building designs was clearly enjoyed. Another time when visiting the classroom, I started listening to the discussion of two boys designing the energy system of their future school. They began discussing hydropower and the Hoover Dam. This led them to list possible types of energy for their community. The list included solar, wind, and steam. This brainstorm turned to a question of how they should power their houses. They decided that they would use steam to power cold water and heat the water with solar power. Listening in, Ali pushed them further by asking them how they would create their steam. This forced the group to go beyond their initial thoughts and the two boys continued brainstorming environmentally friendly ways to make it work. One idea was that they would use sunlight to heat the water and then the steam would circulate in the houses for heat. Each time in the classroom, I observed students engaged in the activity and actively seeking new information. It soon became clear that this classroom structure was supportive of optimal engagement, and therefore, learning. During my observations, there was rarely any need for discipline; for the most part, all of the students were actively involved. I was frequently amazed at how long these first and second graders stayed focused on a particular activity. ENHANCING CREATIVITY

Tying this classroom back to the research, the four ways to encourage creativity that Torrance (1977) stated were found in all aspects of the classroom. First, a teacher must provide opportunity for creative behavior. In all the times I was in Ali’s room, I never saw the children working on a worksheet. Everything that they did was based on working toward an end project that somehow pushed the creativity and imagination of each student. As mentioned, the schedule was a starting place, but the overall feeling was one of freedom and flexibility. The second thing that must be provided to enhance creativity is the development of skills for creative learning. Ali appeared to naturally plan activities that would allow students to work together to come up with unique solutions. As she appeared to effortlessly dance around the room, she modeled that creativity takes work and thoughtfulness. When discussing ideas with students, you could see her imagination take flight. She modeled excitement and passion for learning that allowed the students to develop the same pleasure. Torrance states that the third necessary component is for teachers to reward creative achievements. Students need to feel that their hard work is recognized and the extra effort is worth it. Ali displayed student work throughout the room and hallway surrounding her classroom. This allowed for the students to see their work highlighted. When talking about the projects that her students completed, it was evident that Ali was incredibly proud of her students. For instance, as mentioned, 38

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when she talked about the fall walk art project that the girl completed for homework, Ali was beaming. It was clear that the children worked hard to please Ali and craved her praise. As Ali conferenced with individuals and groups, it was clear that she was intentionally rewarding behavior that exhibited creativity. Her comments were meaningful and encouraged everyone in the classroom to push themselves. The final element, Torrance believes is that teachers need to create creative relationships with their students. Again, having the students for two years made this last element easier than it is in some other settings. With that being said, Ali had a special knack for understanding each individual. She was able to push their imaginations and thought processes. She made each student feel loved and supported, and it was clear that they felt comfortable enough to try out new ideas. One thing that really stood out in this classroom was the meaningful and highquality work that the students produced. I had to frequently remind myself that six and seven year olds created the work. The depth of understanding, creative problemsolving, and unique solutions exhibited a profundity that is often missing, even in much older students. LESSONS LEARNED

While each classroom is unique, there are elements of Ali’s classroom that other teachers can use to enhance their students’ experiences. The first is the passion that Ali exhibited. It was clear from the minute I walked into the classroom that Ali loved teaching and learning. Her exuberance toward the lessons was felt and emulated by the children. Her passion spread and encouraged the students to also be passionate. Ali demonstrated deep understanding of the students. She had a personal relationship with each child in her classroom and made each student feel like they were cared for. Another element of Ali’s classroom was the students’ interests that drove the creation of the unit. The Futures unit was clearly designed with student curiosity in mind. Ali created an environment that enhanced the creativity of her students. She created a room in which creativity was a main focus, both for herself and her students. Watching this performance unfold, I couldn’t help but wonder what the future would look like if our schools focused on the student interests and passions. Would our future be different if teachers focused on finding their own dance? Would all classrooms be this engaging if creativity was used to inspire the class? If this classroom is any example, one thing is certain—creativity encourages kids to be passionate about their learning. In my opinion, the future of education would look a lot more exciting if more classrooms resembled the performance that Ali has created in her classroom. REFERENCES Burnard, P., & Younker, B. A. (2004). Problem-solving and creativity: Insights from students’ individual composing pathways. International Journal of Music Education, 22(1), 59–76. Ricks Center for Gifted Students. (2007). The curriculum. Retrieved July 18, 2007, from http://www. du.edu/ricks/ 39

BUNN Still, T. (2007). What does business want from the schools? Some answers may be surprising. Retrieved June 13, 2007, from http://wistechnology.com/article.php?id=3827 Torrance, E. P. (1977). Creativity in the classroom: What research says to the teacher. Washington, DC: National Education Association.

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KEVIN CLONINGER

4. LESSONS FROM A BARN IN HAMPSHIRE Care, Art, and Wonder

INTRODUCTION AND RATIONALE

There is a treasure hidden in the Hampshire countryside near Winchester, England. I’m not speaking of the grave of Jane Austen, who was buried there and whose novels describe the beauty and decorum of this region. No, the treasure I speak of is nothing more than a modest barn. It is not full of cows, hay, or horses. It’s not that kind of barn; it’s an “art barn,” a barn where students study art. In and of itself, the place has a certain intrigue, but the nature of the classroom and the intentions of its steward are far more captivating than the novelty of the environment. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me first tell you why I am writing this essay. This essay and this book are about possibilities. The realities that teachers face in England are somewhat different from our experiences in the United States. That said, many of the possibilities that we will see in this barn could be applied anywhere, even in a more traditional environment. In fact, the classroom we will visit together may appear unusual, but the pressures and challenges facing teachers in this school in England resemble those we face in our ever more rigid K-12 public schools. My hope is that a teacher reading this essay will be struck by how the creative teaching we explore together is not always “way out there.” On the contrary, creativity in teaching sometimes involves doing the same things we all do as teachers with a different awareness of their potential (Cloninger, 2008a; Cloninger and Mengert, 2010). I would go so far as to say that excellent teaching always involves more than recipes or techniques; it requires passion, care, vision, dedication, and many other things that standards are neither intended, nor are able, to prescribe. In his book on creativity and education, Robinson (2001) speaks to this point: I am not arguing against academic standards in themselves nor would I celebrate a decline in them. My concern is with the preoccupation with these standards to the exclusion of everything else. I am not arguing against formal instruction. I am not appealing for a wider use of so-called progressive teaching methods. Both have an important place in teaching. Some of these methods do put a strong emphasis on creativity; some do not. Some of this work is excellent some is not. A common failing is the tendency to misunderstand the nature of creative activity not only in education but more generally. Too often what passes for creativity has been an undisciplined and undemanding process (p. 200, italics added ). P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 41–53. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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In the classroom I will be describing, readers will hopefully find examples of a good balance between standards, accountability, and creativity and take those lessons with them into their own classrooms. Although we may wish they existed, there are no magic bullets or shortcuts for hard work (if such things are even desirable). The burden lies on you as a teacher to reflect on your own practice and to see what lessons can be learned from this classroom (Schön, 1991). I have simply endeavored to identify some principles that transcend the particularities of this English barn and to share them with you in narrative form. In short, this is an essay on the role of care, wonder, and relationship in the classroom. METHODS

Thirty years ago, Elliot Eisner argued that there is an intimate relationship between the assumptions and procedures employed to assess the effectiveness of a school and its programs (Eisner, 1977). Eisner proposed a new method, not as an “alternative” to scientific evaluation (which he deemed to be both valuable and necessary), but to help broaden and supplement the existing scientific evaluation methods (Eisner, 1977, 1998, 2005). He termed this new method educational connoisseurship and criticism (from here forward educational criticism). Since that time, educational criticism has been used in a variety of circumstances in curriculum studies and other fields (Moroye, 2007; Uhrmacher and Matthews, 2005). As Eisner explains succinctly, the aim of educational criticism is “to lift the veils that keep the eyes from seeing by providing the bridge needed by others to experience the qualities and relationships within some arena of activity” (Eisner, 1977, p. 50). While a connoisseur may never express the enjoyment that she derives from an experience, it is the job of the critic to disclose this experience by allowing another person to have a sense of what it is like to see the world through her eyes. I use narrative descriptions to try to do just that; to give the reader a sense of what it was like to be in the classroom I observed. The research was conducted as a part of a doctoral dissertation on well-being and Krishnamurti Education (Cloninger, 2008b). Krishnamurti was one of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century (Blau, 1995).1 He spent the better part of his life trying to find a means to engender real transformation in individuals and society. He worked tirelessly in word and deed to convince people of the importance of inquiry, self-understanding, non-violence, freedom, and truth. Krishnamurti felt that schools, and education more broadly, were key to helping individuals, and hence the world, change radically in the face of our uncertain times and unprecedented threats (e.g. the ecological crisis, nuclear armament). He created an entire educational movement, probably one of the first forward-thinking alternative school movements in the world (Krishnamurti, 1953, 2006). His schools were each founded as a means of helping individuals reach their full potential and grow in selfawareness. Presently, there is only one Krishnamurti school in the United States, which helps explain the relative obscurity of the movement in American research journals; still, his ideas have been very influential in a number of different areas of research, including theoretical physics and humanistic psychology. All told, there 42

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are presently nine schools worldwide—one in England, one in California, and seven in India. This essay draws on two weeks of intensive observations I conducted in the “art barn” at Brockwood Park School in Hampshire, England. While there, I interviewed the teacher and her students in order to learn about their perspectives on the classroom. The students in this educational criticism were all high school students (ages 14 to 18). In telling the story of this classroom I rely heavily on the teacher’s voice, which I balance out with my own observations and analyses. With all of this in mind, I would like to invite the reader to take a walk with me through this barn and have a look around. RESULTS

The Barn The barn was built in the traditional manner with large oak beams fastened by joints and dowels. The odd pitch of the roof, the gorgeous flowering bushes, the old wood construction: nothing about the place feels modern. The barn is actually two stories, with students working on both levels. The upstairs is used more for quiet work and the downstairs for normal class periods. Entering the main room, you are immediately struck by the natural light penetrating through the many windows of the barn. One half of the room goes up all the way to the roof, while the balcony that forms the floor above stops the other. The room doesn’t feel much like a classroom when you first enter it. It’s more like an artist’s studio in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. The barn is part of a unique boarding school called Brockwood Park School. The school, whose philosophy and approach I will speak more of later, has a curriculum similar to that of public schools in the United States. While most of their work is ungraded, students may elect to follow “exam classes” in order to gain entrance into colleges in England or abroad. The art barn offers electives and exam classes for high school age students who come from all over the world. Maria is the “artist in residence,” although she would brush off the term. She insists, I don’t think of myself as an artist … Sometimes I think I’m a little girl playing teacher-teacher. [She laughs] It used to happen more of the time than it does now, but quite often I’d stand up in front of a class. I don’t like to stand up in front of a class generally, but when I have, I’ve caught myself thinking, “oh my god, what am I doing? These kids are listening to me and they’re making notes about what I say, this is mad! Who am I to tell them what they should know? (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) Such modesty is quite characteristic of Maria and her approach in the classroom. Maria creates a welcoming atmosphere that feels much less like a formal class than like a workshop or studio where artists come to work on their own projects. The students know right from the start, however, that it is not a place where they just sit around. The room is covered in artwork. There is almost no place on the floor or walls that doesn’t have a painting, collage, or photograph on it. It is almost 43

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chaos … creative chaos. Actually I love it. I do love when things are organized and it’s nice to be able to find what you’re looking for in a place where it’s meant to be, but the truth is, I can’t deny that the art barn says a lot about me, just like their desks say a lot about them, or their cubby-holes do, or their … [She pauses and collects her thoughts] I’m kind of cluttered and intense … I love it when they work all over the show, you know, because for me that feels very much—it’s a judgment on my part—it just feels very creative. It feels like there’s stuff happening with energy being generated … Really, it would be nice if I could keep it a bit more orderly, but I feel it’s very expressive of me and of what’s happening in there. It feels productive (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008). As Maria notes, the art barn is brimming with artistic work. I can barely do it justice in words—the paint, the paper, the skeletons, the lab coats, and the paintings, the rows of collages, the shelves full of pottery with fabric laying on top, the plastered models of tea cups, tea bags, spoons, and forks. There is even a mannequin with its head twisted backwards, wearing a colorful blouse and a sign around its neck, which states “Please be GENTLE with me. I’m sensitive (and I’d like to stay that way!). Thank you.” The room is truly “creative chaos.” Rows of halogen lights and daylight fluorescents add even more light of varied qualities to the room. There are sketches and paintings taped on wood boards, chairs strewn across the room, large pieces of cloth and felt draped over bulletin boards and room dividers, easels, lamps, desks, shelving, closets, and much, much more. Maria comes from South Africa. She is fairly tall, and Caucasian, but with a darker complexion, and beautiful, curly, black hair that is so thick it fluffs up and defies taming. She dresses casually and comfortably, usually wearing sandals, jeans, and a blouse of some kind. Maria was teaching while she still lived in South Africa, but if you ask her she’ll tell you that she just “fell into it.” She came to abhor the conditions of teaching in South Africa. Having grown up there she felt limited by the lack of resources, not to mention the lack of “personal freedom or safety to be able to leave the grounds and go for a walk.” It was palpably different when she came to live and work in Brockwood Park. The more I was here; the more I felt that this place is just a huge resource and just a huge opportunity. It’s wide open … And everything I felt, and I still feel, everything is very open, and if you have initiative, and if you have ideas and you want to do things, you can do them, and you can do them with support as well ... I think that’s the thing I love most about what I do here is that I feel I can do anything. Any ideas that I have, you can make it possible. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) Teaching at Brockwood At Brockwood Park, teachers are valued as autonomous professionals who have the freedom (if they want it) to create their own curriculum and teach in whatever way they see fit. The school website explains, 44

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With around 60 students, aged 14 and over, [the school] has the feeling of a large multi-cultural family rather than a boarding school. There is an atmosphere of friendly equality and, as in any family, young people and adults help with the day-to-day decision-making and care of the grounds and buildings. Working together in this way nurtures a spirit of responsibility, co-operation and affection.2 The goal is to work on the “flowering” of the children—to help them discover their own talents, become more self-aware, and deepen their own understanding of the significance of life. This endeavor does not preclude passing the examinations for entry into college or working on the training they need to enter into the vocation of their choice. The school’s mission is concisely stated on its website: At Brockwood Park School we are committed to educating young people to meet life as a whole. Academic excellence is absolutely necessary, but equal importance is given to an ongoing inquiry into the way we live our daily lives. Many of the difficulties in today’s world are the outcome of attitudes and beliefs that education for our times needs to examine. In the secure and friendly surroundings of Brockwood Park, students are encouraged to reflect on their own thoughts, feelings and actions and on those of others. Brockwood offers a setting where students and staff can learn to live and work together harmoniously and intelligently. This process is liberating, for with growth in awareness and understanding of our behaviour, we can discover the immense potential of life and our possibility of living it to the fullest.3 Maria is a firm believer in the philosophy of the school, as well as the freedom she has teaching and living there. Working at Brockwood is more than a job; it is a lifestyle. Maria’s Intentions Maria told me that the previous teacher had a very open approach to art teaching, “which means that the students would come and she would let them do whatever they wanted to do.” It was an open class for all of them. Some of the students “really liked that and some of them didn’t really like that. It was a total mix.” Maria was uncomfortable with the loose style of the former teacher and decided that she wanted to change things. For her, art had “always been a serious subject.” She took it as seriously as any of her other subjects. Maria explains, It’s not just about raw talent. It’s something that you can actually learn and improve. Of course some people are naturally very gifted and they just have a total gift, but others aren’t, but they can learn. So it’s those I felt I really wanted to be able to encourage, because the ones that are naturally gifted are always going to do it anyways and they’re always going to be great at it. That said, they could get better as well. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) 45

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It is very important for Maria that the students feel that they are encouraged to take art seriously and that they are learning, not simply figuring out whether or not they have an artistic gift. In her words, “I wanted to try and break down some of these notions of what it is to be good and also to make everyone feel like they could do something.” To achieve this goal she needed to restructure the whole format of the art classes at Brockwood. In fact, she added much more structure. At least in the beginning, I found that 90% of the students prefer that I start out all of the classes with very structured periods, technique, practice, and projects set. I start guided and have everyone working on the same thing for a while and then I open it up more after that. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) According to Maria, the students are far more productive this way. If it is too loose in the beginning they do not produce much artwork. But, as was evident from the abundant amount of artwork I found in the art barn, this approach paid dividends. “They had projects that they had to do and they could see from there that actually they’re doing a lot more.” Maria also decided to start with teaching them the most basic elements and then showing them how to improve their work in each area. During the year I observed the classroom, she had also increased the number of art periods for most of the classes, which increased the amount of work and preparation she had to do, but “which has also meant that they’ve been much more focused, they take it much more seriously. And I just try and keep it going for them every week, talk to them, make sure they do homework, and work independently.” Among the various classes that Maria teaches, she has one general interest class and two exam-classes where students are required to take a national examination, either “A-level” or “AS-level.” The A-level, short for Advanced Level, is a General Certificate of Education qualification in England, Northern Ireland, and Wales, usually taken by students during the optional, final two years of secondary school. Students usually take these examinations when they are age 16–18 in years 12 or 13 of the UK’s educational system. Each of the students taking the exam classes has a personal desk to themselves in the art barn. As I mentioned earlier, with the exception of these examinations, there are no grades at Brockwood Park. The classes are designed to be non-competitive and ungraded. Rather than rely on what the school considers methods of “reward or punishment, they seek other means to motivate the students to learn.” Even the examinations, though graded, are optional. Maria focuses her students on finishing projects that she develops throughout the course of the year. The project work in the exam classes can be likened to tiles on a roof, each project overlapping with the previous projects and allowing the students to work on several things at once. Another essential intention Maria has for her classroom is to show the students that they can enjoy themselves and be totally absorbed in art. This also allows the students to work on self-awareness and personal maturity. In her view, art is highly therapeutic. She thinks that “you get very involved in what you’re doing and everything else sort of falls away, and you can put a lot of time, energy, passion, and 46

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thought into it, so that can really encourage your creativity in all kinds of ways.” In her estimation art is not only good for coordination, but also encourages confidence and helps people move beyond competition and into self-directed work. Relationship in the Classroom One of the features of Maria’s class that so thoroughly impressed me was the relationship between Maria and her students. She takes the time to speak with each student in every class period. She guides them individually and asks them to think for themselves about the projects that she assigns them. This alone would garner attention in the overcrowded and under funded public schools today, but the nature of the relationships in the art barn goes much deeper. Reflecting on this, Maria says, You get to know them all so well, and through art it’s the easiest. I think art is the best subject to teach because you see what they make, what they do, and it tells you something immediately about them. And you start to see patterns. It’s so much about personality, the way they work, the way they clean the table, the way they clean their brushes, it tells you so much, because you get that insight, you talk to them about it, you get to know them better, it’s really great in that way. I do love that. I guess it’s like with all classes here, you really get to know the students well, so it just immediately means that because you know them, and you really like them or care about them, everything is just so much smoother, you know, and they give you a hard time and they drive you mad, but that is the nature of relationship (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008). At times, listening to the conversations, I would almost forget that we were in a classroom or that they were engaged in a formal class environment. The day I recorded the passage cited above, for example, we were sitting in the barn and Maria was talking with Mary and Betsy. I noted the following: Betsy bristles, looks at Maria and Mary, and says, “I hate my hair. It is just impossible. I can’t deal with it anymore. I’m going to cut it off.” Mary, her cool eyes a bit sunken, strokes her thin, dishwater blond hair, touches Betsy’s hair and says, “I’d never cut it if I had it.” Her body language screams the dissatisfaction she has with her hair. “I don’t know, I like having thick hair,” Maria says, looking at both of her little ones. “Sometimes it drives me crazy, but your hair is beautiful.” She caresses Betsy on the shoulder and looks at her with care in her eyes. Betsy perks up, as does Mary, and they continue to work on their projects. “You know we could play baseball with this.” Maria grabs the huge plaster replica of a spoon that Betsy has been working on and grips it in her hands. Assuming the stance of a professional baseball player, her arms held in tension, the fierce look of determination in her eyes, she keeps her eyes solidly on the imaginary ball and swings. The crowd goes wild! The students cheer her on and laugh. 47

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As we sit, students work on their artwork. Occasionally some traditional Chinese music comes on and blares out of the speakers, then dies off at almost random moments. The girls explain that the music is meant to be used during massages. Mary’s mother uses it for her practice in Wales. After a few rounds of chant, Betsy says in a sarcastic tone, “This song reminds me of winter.” “It’s because we listened to it all winter.” Maria says. “That’s all we had for three months. [she laughs] We listened to it over and over again.” (Field notes, April 2008) It was really touching to watch students and teacher relate this way—almost like sisters or a mother with her children. Regarding her relationship to her students, Maria expressed, With the exam class, I think I’m very much myself, and I let them know all my insecurities and everything about me. So I don’t hold the line of being a teacher … but with the other classes, it’s different. I do a bit of acting, not acting, but I feel like I’m the role. I’m the teacher and I’m holding the line really … [With the exam class] I’m just with them so much and dealing with them so much, they just know and see. They can see when I don’t know what to do and they can see when I do. And also because … They’re self motivated learners, they’ll be there despite whether I’m there or not. Sometimes they’ll tease me and say it doesn’t matter if you come. You know, I guess it’s because they already feel like I’m just more of a facilitator, an ideas generator, a supporter, an encourager, someone to give them guidelines rather than someone to actually teach them something … I guess it’s a bit motherly. I push them. “I know you don’t want to do it, I know you hate doing it, but you’re going to do it, and you’re going to do it well. There’s no point in getting it into your head that you don’t want to do it now.” Yeah, I push them. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) In this supportive and trusting environment, the kids are free to express themselves. They’re in the nest and they are held and encouraged. They try out their wings and take little excursions away on their own all the time, knowing that they can come back when they want. This type of relationship empowers the students to explore themselves. They are encouraged to be themselves, act like themselves, and investigate their “self ” through art. The community and the examiners who come to evaluate the students each year praise the artwork at Brockwood for its expressive and personal quality. As Maria explains, Each person’s work is so individual, and so much a part of who they are and have been themselves, even that in itself is sacred. And is valuable and worthwhile. People’s ideas come from their experience, come from their emotions, their thoughts, and their memories. That’s very important as well, so there are no bad ideas. I try to encourage them to express themselves and you know, anything that they gain through that is worthwhile. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) 48

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A quick look at the artwork that hangs around the classroom revealed this approach to me. Students had been working on portfolios of their work that term. One female student from New Zealand had done an entire study of windows in sketches, paintings, and photographs. The photographs were mostly of places she had visited or wished to visit. The captions from her portfolio related to her life and her own experiences with painting. One caption was written at a 45-degree angle on one corner of the page; it read, Here I took a photo of myself in a similar stance to Ana Maria in Dali’s Person at a Window! I painted in oil, using the same media, and kept in mind the textures used by Dali. The view I am looking out towards is very special to me, although this is our library window it is also the view from my bedroom last year. It has been the victim of many a daydreamer, including myself. Maria told me that her students have said that the way they receive the visual world has changed. They see the world in terms of art works now. They go on vacation and take photos for Maria of people and places that have struck them in one way or another. As Maria said, “It’s changed the way they’re actually looking, just receiving the world.” Their work is very personal because it is a way for them to explore themselves, which is encouraged by the relationships they form at the school and the ethos of the community. The students are encouraged and expected to develop a language to explain what they’re doing, and in learning to explain what they’re doing they are “actually understanding more about why they’re making the choices that they are making and why they’re wanting to do things.” Another student, Claire, was preparing for her exam, and Maria explained how it worked: “They give them some words, really some ideas, and they have to choose one. So the word Claire chose was ‘peel.’ The idea of the painting is peeling truth.” Claire smiled with satisfaction. Maria continues: So she began by painting this portrait of a crying baby and then she painted this beach. So the inside will be the baby and the outside will be the beach. So, she is going to paint the beach and then peel it back and underneath will be the crying baby—so paradise versus the reality. It’s very deep. Claire looked at me with a wide smile. Her friend across the table said, “You are very deep.” Claire responded, “Yeah, I am very deep, and I like it.” The Feasibility of this Approach in Traditional Schools One could argue that this approach is impractical in a public school environment. Some believe that the emphasis in schools needs to be rigorously4 academic. In the vernacular of current educational discourse, teachers must be held accountable to standards. Focusing the majority of our attention on the relationships between the 49

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students and the staff would undoubtedly be regarded as too soft or fluffy. Let us not forget, however, that the class described above was an exam class. The students were taking national exams where they were expected to be proficient on a host of art standards. Maria, however, didn’t allow the exam to dominate her instructional practices and her classroom environment. Like other teachers at Brockwood Park, her goal was to satisfy the needs of the state mandated programs while retaining independence for herself and her students. Your heart has to be in it if you want to do it, you know. An art exam is a difficult thing to do because you have to swallow it. You have to say, “Okay, I’ll do what these people want me to do, I’ll take their values as truth,” and it’s quite hard to do that, because it’s something that you’re making. It’s not like math or science or history where you are giving answers, it’s actually of you. You put yourself into it so you feel like you’re serving yourself up, your heart on a platter to be marked. That’s hard. They give you four objectives for each project and within each objective are five plans, or marks. There’s specific wording, very subtle. Confident. Accurate. You know—(Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008). After Maria grades the exams, two external examiners come and moderate the marks that she makes on student’s work. Students display all their work for the examiners. Maria explains the process They’ve got all our marks. They go through everything. They spend a day here and they moderate it, and they take us up or down or agree. And it breaks my heart that they all won’t get A’s, because the amount of effort and enthusiasm that they put into it deserves that and I told them that. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) Maria also expressed to me her frustration with the exam format on several occasions. If she tells her students that “their work is ‘amazing and wonderful,’ they just take it as an opinion, whereas the marks they receive they take as fact or truth.” By taking the students to museums and having them look through examples of famous art, she educates her students to understand the limitation of the testing system. I point out to them, for example, this is an incredibly famous work of art. This artist is very famous, made a fortune of money and is world loved. Would this pass the A-level art exam? They look at it, whatever it is, and they say, “Oh, clearly not.” Eventually they can see that value doesn’t come from a grade, but ultimately that’s what they value, you know. And they can say that they don’t care, but I think it takes a lot to just get whatever you get and say I don’t care, I put my heart and soul into it. (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008) The pros and cons of such a system are apparent in the passages above, but Maria finds ways to help the students gain some perspective on their exams, and, for herself, she avoids simply teaching to the test. She pushes the students to take the exams seriously and to make an activity out of pushing themselves to perform well on it. No doubt the examiner’s pen will deal a few crushing blows to the 50

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self-esteem of the students in this class, but all in all, such experiences are important for the students. They need to learn how to deal with the evaluation systems that will judge them once they leave the protective walls of Brockwood. LESSONS FROM THE BARN

After spending some time in the art barn, it is interesting to step back and reflect on the practices and approaches Maria relies on. Please allow me to illustrate some of the lessons I learned from this unusual farmhouse. Freedom and Order A structured and ordered classroom is not an enemy of the student’s freedom, and freedom does not mean a lack of structure and order. Maria’s shift to a more ordered curriculum helps her students gain confidence in their work and become more productive. Inevitably, this leads the students to become freer to tackle projects in their own style or according to their own tastes because they feel free to explore. The large amount of freedom students have in this classroom does not mean that “anything goes” or that a student can do whatever he or she wants. Safety, Security, and Care The safe and secure environment that Maria cultivates in the art barn is crucial to fostering freedom and growth. The informality of the environment makes it feel more welcoming and homey. Students feel comfortable to be themselves, to be honest with their teacher, and to explore themselves in their work. Consequently, the students are more engaged and focused on what they are learning and also able to engage in higher-order thinking, not just how to sketch a picture from a book or a magazine. Such an environment develops trust, self-esteem, and self-confidence, all of which are extremely important for learning. Maria shared her student’s evaluations with me. In general, the students wrote that they “really appreciated and valued the space that they have to express and be themselves.” They are able to do what they want to do but also feel like they’re learning at the same time. Maria went further in stating, I help them to feel quite inspired and enthusiastic about what they’re doing because that came across strongly as well in the evaluation forms. I get so excited about their projects; quite often more than they do, and I guess it rubs off (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008). Students want to go to this class because they feel cared for and loved. They feel they can be themselves. Helping Students Discover the Joy of Learning The art barn also helps the students discover the joy of learning. Students dance and sing, work passionately and push their personal limits, talk to and care for one another, and, generally speaking, enjoy themselves. Taken as a whole, Maria and 51

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her art barn help the kids develop both their minds and their hearts. The art barn addresses many different aspects of the child, not just the subject matter or mental development. It focuses on the whole person and on developing a global view. This is not just a luxury of a private school; it is due to the teacher’s awareness, which educators in any environment can develop. It is an essential feature for ensuring that real learning is taking place—the kind of learning that isn’t forgotten after the test or the examination is taken. We are talking about shifting the way we view the world and ourselves, questioning the significance of life and trying to live intelligently. This is something that all teachers can learn about from the classes held in the art barn, or, perhaps better said, the relationships that are formed there. The Role of Wonder in the Classroom I asked Maria at the end of my stay if she had any advice she would give teachers in a more traditional school setting. What she shared with me helped explain the culture she has established in her barn: Approaching each student with curiosity. Approaching each project with a sense of, “I wonder what they’re going to do with this?” or “I wonder how they’re going to deal with it?” rather than “I want them to do this.” I think that’s hard, but that it’s important. When you look at books or websites for art project ideas, they always show you samples. I just think that that’s totally the wrong approach. Just to start off like that and show them examples, “this is what it’s going to look like when you’re done.” And it’s not just for art, it’s also for just dealing with people. When you do this, you bring your judgments, opinions, thoughts, and ideas to everyone you meet, but if you can, just think of it with a sense of wonder or curiosity. I find that to be really exciting because I’m blown away by what they can do and what they come up with rather than being held by what I think they should be doing. Otherwise you’ll just be disappointed. You’re just disappointed if you have a fixed idea of what they want, unless they really happen to do it better than you did it (Maria, personal communication, May 24, 2008). Her insight explains how she has helped her students be so productive and produce work of such high quality. She captivates and inspires her students, makes them feel cared for, understood, and free to explore things for themselves. By approaching our students with wonder and reverence, they will amaze us and at the same time we may inspire them to wonder. What more could we hope for in a class dedicated to the artistic spirit but to help students wonder about themselves and the world in which they live? The artistic spirit has always been revolutionary, because it can help us see things in ways that we haven’t before. Our old patterns of thoughts, our expectations of what things “ought to” be, hold us back from truly creative intelligence. In this way, when we as teachers forget to “wonder about our students,” we encourage them to follow our lead and, in so doing, trap them in our own perceptions of the world. Perhaps now more than ever, with all the violence in our world, we must have the courage to move beyond the patterns we ourselves are 52

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stuck in and dare to look with great freshness towards life, our students, and the future of limitless possibilities. I, for one, wouldn’t have expected to discover such things in a simple barn in Jane Austen’s Hampshire. Then again, why did I bother expecting when I could have been wondering? NOTES 1

2 3 4

In 1984 he was awarded a peace medal from the UN. Furthermore, many prominent intellectuals, philosophers, scientists, and psychologists have commented on the impact Krishnamurti’s philosophy had on them: Iris Murdoch, Aldous Huxley, Jonas Salk, Joseph Campbell, Charlie Chaplin, Kahlil Gibran, Leopold Stokowski, David Bohm, Henry Miller, Rollo May, George Bernard Shaw, the Dalai Llama, even Van Morrison, Bruce Lee, Deepak Chopra, and many others (Blau, 1995). Brockwood Park School. (2008). Retrieved June 30, 2008, from http://www.brockwood.org.uk/Ibid. Ib The word rigor is a curious one to employ in the context of education. Bill Schubert recently commented at the annual conference of the American Association of Teaching and Curriculum that the term, though highly lauded, also means “severity and strictness.”

REFERENCES Blau, E. (1995). Krishnamurti: 100 Years. New York: Stewart, Tabori & Chang. Cloninger, K. (2008a). Giving beyond care: An exploration of love in the classroom. Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue, 10(1 & 2), 193–211. Cloninger, K. (2008b). Transcending curriculum ideologies: Educating human beings well. Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, University of Denver, Denver. Cloninger, K., & Mengert, C. (2009). In pursuit of joy: Creativity, pedagogy, and the science of wellbeing. In C. J. Craig & L. F. Deretchin (Eds.), Cultivating curious and creative minds: The role of teachers and teacher educators, part I teacher education yearbook XVIII. Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield Education and the Association of Teacher Educators. Eisner, E. (1977). On the uses of educational connoisseurship and criticism for evaluating classroom life. Teachers College Record, 78(3), 345–358. Eisner, E. (1998). The enlightened eye: Qualitative inquiry and the enhancement of educational practice. New Jersey, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Eisner, E. (2005). Reimagining schools: The selected works of Elliot W. Eisner. New York: Rutledge. Krishnamurti, J. (1953). Education and the significance of life. New York: HarperCollins. Krishnamurti, J. (2006). The whole movement of life is learning: J Krishnamurti’s letters to his schools. Bramdean, England: Krishnamurti Foundation Trust. Moroye, C. (2007). Greening our future: The practices of ecologically minded teachers. Unpublished Dissertation, University of Denver, Denver. Robinson, K. (2001). Out of our minds: Learning to be creative. West Sussex, England: Capstone Publishing Limited (A Wiley Company). Schön, D. A. (1991). The reflective turn: Case studies in and on educational practice. New York: Teachers College Press. Uhrmacher, P. B., & Matthews, J. (Eds.). (2005). Intricate palette: Working the ideas of Elliot Eisner. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

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5. THE JOURNEY FROM SCHOOL TO ONE-ROOM SCHOOLHOUSE Using Art and Drama to Address the Creative Void

A “textbook case” of the major urban transitions underway in the U.S. is how one local principal aptly described Hawthorne Middle School and its surrounding community. Over the past two decades, Hawthorne has shifted from a White dominant population to a Black dominant population to a Hispanic dominant population. Once a golf course community sporting a “Blue Ribbon” high school, the neighborhood surrounding the school is now jam-packed with low-income apartment complexes, several of which are condemned and others, which have blue tarps on their roofs signalling hurricane damage yet to be repaired. Some Hawthorne students, according to the city newspaper, walk on “the most dangerous street in America” to attend classes. But, in spite of this challenging backdrop, the teachers and students at Hawthorne Middle School work hard to “offset the less-than-positive influences of community,” as Doug Mack, the Creative Drama teacher, delicately worded it. The bleak urban milieu outside of Hawthorne’s school walls is not reflective of what is going on in classrooms inside. While it is true that one must pass through a metal detector and have one’s bags inspected upon entering Hawthorne, it is also true that one immediately encounters one of the campus’s two art galleries, a creative space that presents a vibrant, if not dizzying, mix of culture, texture, and sound. It is a collection that celebrates Hawthorne’s recent authorization as a Middle Years International Baccalaureate (IB) World School, a global network of specially selected campuses that take an international perspective and share common concepts and similar approaches to curriculum, instruction, and assessment. This honor was partially brought about by a local reform movement that provided funding for the integration of arts-based activities throughout the school’s mandated curriculum, something the Hawthorne educators found sadly lacking in the state with national pressure to increase high stakes accountability scores in tested subject areas. How Hawthorne Middle School used the resources available and the ingenuity of its teachers to enhance its program offerings and to cultivate a one-room schoolhouse milieu in which students’ creative energies were tapped forms the topic of this chapter. REFORM BACKGROUND

When Hawthorne initially applied for the reform grant, it sought funding for student field trips to theaters, art galleries, science presentations, and museums in and around Houston, the fourth largest urban center in America. The grant also proposed P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 55–61. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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that Hawthorne’s faculty—administrators, teachers, and paraprofessionals alike— would participate in a rigorous, four-stage Learning Through the Arts program offered by the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, a professional development experience that Rita Giles, Hawthorne’s principal, particularly favored. Also, funds would support special experiences at the school and a small amount would be dedicated to “campus beautification”—as Nancy Ibera, the school’s IB Coordinator, described it. What came next was the clincher. In exchange, Hawthorne Middle School would pledge that Hawthorne’s teachers in their future classroom instruction would sustain the changes that took place as a result of the reform funding. The following sections capture what transpired as the promise moved from institutional rhetoric to lived classroom practice—a journey that was anything but smooth. BEGINNING

When Hawthorne’s teachers and principal received the grant, they were bursting with pride that the great honor had been bestowed on them and enthralled with what it could do to stir students’ “creative juices,” which is how literacy teacher and department head, Lana Hughes, phrased it. However, transforming the accomplishment into enacted practice proved to be a challenge. Hawthorne Middle School’s faculty met face-to-face with “the fundamental puzzle of educational reform” about which Cuban (1988) has so cogently written. That is, it had a plethora of activities occurring at the surface, suggesting a sea of change, but at the ocean’s depths, everything remained the same (Cuban, 1990). In Hawthorne’s case, this translated into what Cuban termed first order change: the presence of sporadic, disconnected activities, particularly one-shot field trips, in the absence of second order change—changes deeply grounded in, and revolving around, a common core. When Doug Mack reflected back on what Hawthorne was doing when the grant period began, he said that typically a lone-wolf teacher would come to him with an isolated field trip proposal, he would approve it, bussing would be arranged, and “the deal would be sealed.” So the reform became a “patchwork quilt” of activity marked by sometimes dubitable and other times “forced” curricular connections that bore little resemblance to what students and teachers in other classrooms were doing, let alone being built on past study in preparation for future work. At the same time, the planning of the IB units of study had started as well. In effect, there was not one, but two disconnected change efforts underway—neither of which was altering Hawthorne’s “basic grammar” (Tyack and Cuban, 1995, p. 83) and how things were characteristically done at the school. To add to the complexity, Hurricane Katrina ravaged the neighboring state of Louisiana and some of that state’s youth were re-located to Hawthorne’s housing projects, making Hawthorne Middle School the campus they would attend—and not of choice. This meant that the 885 students already attending Hawthorne, 85 percent of whom were at risk of school failure and 80 percent of whom were mobile, were joined by an additional 105 high needs students from New Orleans, all having recently lost their homes, possessions, schools, neighbors, and friends. Also, everyday things like eyeglasses and medication were gone, and neither money nor medical doctors were available to attend adequately to these needs. 56

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In a nutshell, a perennial problem of American schooling—poverty—became accentuated by an ephemeral problem (Schwab, 1971), an aberrant weather pattern that produced a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico and what happened in its wake. To further complicate an already complicated situation, Hawthorne’s existing student population and those new to it initially did not get along, according to Principal Rita Giles. The displaced students hailed from the “the big easy,” a city with schools possessing different rhythms and rules, different from those in Houston, which are tightly regulated. Also, Hawthorne’s original student population came to resent the newcomers because the latter’s needs trumped the former’s needs, which were already significant. Needless to say, both the arts-based grant work and IB planning necessarily had to be set aside in order to deal with the student and family crises that arose. But, this raised the ire of the reform agency, which associated Hawthorne’s slow progress not with the hurricane and the grueling after effects with which the teachers were dealing, but with a perceived lackadaisical attitude and an absence of gratitude for the enormous opportunity that had been sent their way. MIDDLE

The reform movement’s admonishment of the Hawthorne faculty was discomforting, to be certain. Yet, however misplaced it might have seemed, it affected the campus in three important ways, as Lana Hughes, among others, noted. First, it returned the teachers to what they originally wanted to do. Second, it reminded them that the arts and creative drama might be a way—perhaps the only way—to “meld the two student populations”—which is how Rita Giles phrased it. Third was a concession that the reform movement made. Hawthorne was granted permission to couple its IB pursuit with its desire to integrate art and creative drama in all of its program offerings. In effect, it was allowed to intensify one grant effort with funds from the other. As a result, the campus’s theory of action (Schön and McDonald, 1998) correspondingly changed from two separate statements of 1) how arts fusion would increase student achievement and 2) how the IB program would advance student learning to a theory of action blending the two. “We believe that if we write curriculum units for the Middle Years Programme (MYP) [Middle Years IB Programme], which would incorporate the arts, student achievement will increase” is the unified theory of action Hoffman adopted. For Lana Hughes, this was a defining moment in the school’s change trajectory. Instead of having the same old “What next?” interactions with representatives of the reform movement and each other, the talk shifted to “So what?” conversations and reflections. For instance, “So what do these art and creative drama activities contribute to the development of essential knowledge, skills, and dispositions, particularly global awareness, in the planning of the IB units of study?” No longer were the arts tacked-on pieces, randomly scattered here and there (as Doug Mack intimated earlier); they were organically related—“connected at the hip” was the metaphorical expression Nancy Ibera used—to how curriculum would be lived at Hawthorne from that point onward. 57

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Principal Rita Giles was acutely aware of the paradigm shift that had taken place, which made Hawthorne a one-room schoolhouse—albeit large—in the enactment of its curriculum. All of a sudden, the classroom she had provided for teacher professional development became a “beehive of activity” and a venue for ongoing creative exchanges among Hawthorne’s teachers. Furthermore, under the direction of Nancy Ibera, huge banners featuring overviews of the units of study were created and displayed in the room. And on these working documents (“works-in progress” was what Nancy dubbed them) and “in red ink, nonetheless” (Lana Hughes added), were the Learning Through the Arts (LTA) activities, along with the specific arts prints, that would be used. Also, the tenor of the conversations with Hawthorne’s arts partners changed. Instead of accepting at face value the generic experiences offered by the different providers, Hawthorne’s teachers invited the arts partners to participate in curriculum making sessions as full-fledged collaborators alongside them in order to strengthen relationships and increase curriculum fit. Soon, the “so what” question became a matter of attending to “the third eye”—that is; the creative or enlightened eye (Eisner, 1998), a term that not only became introduced to teachers’ vocabularies, but also part of students’ vocabularies as well. As both Rita Giles and Nancy Ibera noted, the attention afforded the so what/ creative eye conversation prompted the creation of meaningful student work and reflective analyses that began to line Hawthorne’s previously barren hallways. An equally—perhaps more important—phenomena accompanied these displays: 1) professional conversations among teachers concerning what LTA strategies had been employed in the work samples, 2) rich dialogues between teachers and students about the concepts and generalizations studied, and 3) important exchanges between students who had previously been separated by class, grade, and city of origin (Houston/New Orleans). A new form of programmatic and relational cohesiveness was emerging at Hawthorne, one in which intellectual rigor and international points-of-view helped shape both human and curricular transactions. Doug Mack, for example, centered on the problem of Hawthorne’s faculty and student body being conventionally bifurcated by subject area interests and how that, in his view, set the backdrop for a creative void. He recognized that he personally was a case in point. He only interacted with certain Hawthorne students—those who signed up for his elective course. From his perspective, he was being denied the opportunity of cultivating relationships with other segments of Hawthorne’s student population, and those same students were missing how creative drama could be used to enhance learning through voice and movement, thus increasing one’s sense of embodied knowing (Johnson, 1987). This hard thinking caused Doug to reflect on his university days as a new student on an unknown campus. He recalled how he played a lead role in a one-act play and how that fed his creative energies and eased his transition. In turn, that energy spilled over to his studies in other subject areas and helped him to establish community with his peers, some with whom he continues to interact. Remembering Dr. Charles Pascoe, his professor, and the plays he had developed with international characters, he wondered whether Dr. Pascoe might entertain the possibility of visiting Hawthorne Middle School as a playwright-inresidence, teaching creative drama techniques to all teachers and assisting with 58

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making the two aforementioned plays—in alternate years—available not just to a select group of actors, but to Hawthorne’s entire student body. In Doug’s view, this would provide teachers and students creative “commonplace[s] of experience” (Lane, 1988). When Doug Mack contacted Dr. Pascoe, Dr. Pascoe whole-heartedly agreed to participate for a two-year period. Together they determined that Rodeo Mongolia, the script in which Doug had once been a character, and Backyard Story, another high interest script, would be the most appropriate one-act plays for Hawthorne’s students. Both had global themes, with horses from around the world featured in Rodeo Mongolia and bugs from many continents playing lead roles in Backyard Story. In conversations with other faculty members who were also excited with the idea, it was decided that the plays would be read and interpreted in every literacy class and relevant spin-off activities would be woven into other disciplines. For example, a desert biome would be studied in science to complement Backyard Story, and the history of horses would be taught alongside the history of humankind and the measuring of horses in hands where Rodeo Mongolia was concerned. A welcome by-product of the interdisciplinary approach during regular school hours was that new members joined the Drama Club in after-school hours, and lead actors in the final productions were not limited to Creative Drama majors. Also, Dr. Pascoe, in his face-to-face work with teachers and students, taught word development activities that demonstrated how challenging vocabulary could be learned. One strategy involved the dissection of words into syllables and the creation of body movements to represent constituent parts. In this way, knowledge was taken into the body and enacted through it in a manner that would rarely be forgotten because the movements triggering the syllables/meanings could always be re-enacted. Just when Hawthorne’s faculty and students were as creatively engaged as they had ever been, the unthinkable happened. Hurricane Ike swept through Houston, damaging schools, apartment complexes, and businesses alike. On this occasion, however, the reform movement representatives who themselves had personally experienced the hurricane and its devastating impact did not scold Hawthorne’s faculty. This time around, Hawthorne’s faculty was praised for its innovative lessons laced with Learning Through the Arts and Creative Drama activities, its engaged student body, and the brilliance and foresight of having the scripts, props, and sound effects that would allow students in every classroom to study two plays in alternating years (7th and 8th grade), an approach that would sustain Hawthorne’s reform endeavor in the years to come. END

To bring closure to the school reform endeavor, we turn now to some of the comments Hawthorne’s staff and students offered about the creative learning facilitated by fusing art and creative drama activities in the IB units of study. Principal Rita Giles, for example, homed in on how Hawthorne’s faculty reached beyond its school walls to bring in arts partners—“often at no cost”—into classroom study through piquing student interests and subsequent learning. As for Lana Hughes, she centered 59

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on how the Hawthorne faculty “learned a wealth of information about teaching and reaching our students through changes made to our program… It was just a total eyeopening experience for all of us here at [Hawthorne] in how to enrich our students’ lives.” To this, IB Coordinator Nancy Ibera added, We were able to fully prepare our teachers with the IB philosophy and pedagogy as well as through the partnership with the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston … Having teachers fully prepared, and then have them come in and write curriculum that incorporated both programs was really phenomenal for us because we included art across the curriculum as well as the field trips and performances that enriched the units of the study that we created. Meanwhile, student Toby Arnold discussed how creative drama allowed him to face his fears and learn to live productively with them—with a keen eye focused on his future. Below is what Toby said in his own words: With more art and things like it, we got to speak more. With the interactive theater we had, we got to learn how to go up in front of people and confront our fears about people through starting to interact with them and performing for them… As for Janis Christiana, another Hawthorne student, she spoke of having a world opened up to her that had not previously been possible. The field trip experiences enabled her to transcend the boundaries of her underserved community, and the use of her creative “third eye” awakened her to viewpoints and experiences that have changed her life, how she views it, and the sense she makes of it. She remarked: “I had never gone outside of school, but when I got the opportunity, ‘Oh my gosh, it was so cool.’ So I thought it really opened my eyes to all that...” CONCLUDING STATEMENTS

In this chapter, we charted Hawthorne Middle School’s journey from a school to a one-room schoolhouse, an adventure made possible through integrating Learning Through the Arts and Creative Drama into its IB units of study. Such a one-room schoolhouse approach could happen anywhere—even in urban America as we have shown—when teachers and students commit themselves to meaningful, interactive changes that break through the crust of convention and reap huge benefits for those intimately involved. In this work, we told of how Hawthorne’s faculty and students addressed the creative void resulting from the high stakes achievement testing mania and other associated factors. Most of all, we illuminated how Hawthorne’s faculty and students readied themselves for the future through growing relationships with a range of arts partners, learning creative drama strategies, using art prints, and inviting and involving students more centrally in the curricular mix. According to Rita Giles, “A mindset was created here at Hawthorne. We can’t go back now ... It doesn’t work that way. What we have been up to is not a passing thing.” REFERENCES Cuban, L. (1988). A fundamental puzzle of school reform. Phi Delta Kappan, 69(5), 341–344. Cuban, L. (1990). Reforming again, again, and again. Educational Researcher, 19(1), 3–13. 60

THE JOURNEY FROM SCHOOL Eisner, E. (1998). The enlightened eye: Qualitative inquiry and the enhancement of educational practice. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill. Johnson, M. (1987). The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lane, B. (1988). Landscapes of the sacred: Geography and narrative in American spirituality. New York: Paulist Press. Pascoe, C. (2001). Rodeo Mongolia. [Play]. San Marcos, TX: Texas State Theatre Center. Pascoe, C. (2008). The backyard story. [Play]. San Marcos, TX: Texas State Theatre Center. Schön, D., & McDonald, J. (1998). Doing what you mean to do in school reform: Theory of action in the Annenberg challenge. Providence, RI: Brown University. Schwab, J. (1971/1978). The practical: Arts of the eclectic. In I. Westbury & N. Wilkof (Eds.), Science, curriculum and liberal education: Selected essays (pp. 322–364). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Tyack, D., & Cuban, L. (1995). Tinkering toward utopia: A century of public school reform. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

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CARE AND COMMUNITY

“We should want more from our educational efforts than adequate academic achievement, and we will not achieve even that meager success unless our children believe that they themselves are cared for and learn to care for others.” ~ Nel Noddings, Educator, Philosopher

WILLIAM R. VEAL AND ANN WALLACE

6. SCIENCE AND MATH FOR LOGGERHEADS Creating Community in Rural Coastal Schools

It is 9:00 p.m. on a late August evening. School has just started for this small, K-6, rural, coastal school. The local science teacher, Ms. Heron, in collaboration with families and community organizations, has taken her students to the beach to watch for the potential loggerhead hatchlings as they make the dangerous journey from their nests to the ocean. Three students, Taylor (11), her sister, Mia (9), and brother, Tristan (7), attend the local four-room school and are eager to see Ms. Heron after the summer vacation. The three children told Ms. Herron that during the summer they had noticed more and more turtle nests, cordoned off with orange tape and stakes, along the beach. During the first week of school each year, Ms. Heron tells the children in her science classes, combined grades 1–3 and 4–6, that they will be studying the loggerhead turtles. On this warm August evening, the children are excited to be able to relate what they observe on the beach to what they are studying in the classroom. PLACE-BASED EDUCATION

It might seem unusual to hold class at 9:00 p.m., but this rural teacher knows the significance of a learning opportunity within her community and environment. The type of education that often occurs in these rural schools focuses on place-based education (Smith, 2002; Williams, 2003). Place-based education describes teaching and learning that is rooted in the local community and culture (Williams, 2003), with a focus on real-world relevance. Situated learning, locally relevant curricula, place-conscious education, and contextualized instruction are important aspects of place-based education. Additionally, place-based pedagogy utilizes the available strengths of rural life by drawing upon the human and material resources of rural communities (Howley, et al, 2007). According to this pedagogy, grade school students often lose what place-based educators call their “sense of place.” This happens because the curriculum focuses too quickly or on global issues that may have no immediate relevance to school children. PLACE-BASED CURRICULUM

Place-based education is a holistic approach to education, conservation, and community development that uses the local community as an integrating context for learning at all ages. The curriculum that emanates from this approach is focused on and inherently tailored to local realities. Place-based curriculum does not focus on P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 65–72. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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standardized and high-stakes testing of one-size-fits-all knowledge; rather, it immerses students in the local heritage, regional cultures, specific environments and habitats, and the rich diversity of local opportunities. Ms. Heron has always had an interest in the loggerhead turtles because she lives in the beach community and is active in loggerhead conservation efforts. Part of her activism involves educating tourists to not leave lights on in their rented homes that face the beach. Another aspect is acting as a “turtle lady” (a local name given to volunteers) during the summer months. This role includes locating new nests, counting eggs, documenting nest characteristics, and recording turtle emergence. She also gives educational tours once a week at the Edisto Beach State Park. It was after one of these tours that she realized that the questions the families asked were the same as those of her students. She decided to develop an integrated curriculum for science and mathematics that centered on the nesting of loggerhead turtles. Ms. Heron solicited help from her friends at the Edisto Beach State Park, the Interpretive Center,1 and the local shrimping companies. Ms. Heron began to implement her integrated project during the first week of school by playing the Sea Turtle Game with her science students. To play the game, each student acts as a threatened loggerhead turtle trying to survive from incubation to adulthood. The students physically act out the sea turtle life cycle. Each student is given a colored card with a letter on it. At different points along the way, letters and events are called out to indicate the fate of the turtles. To keep track of the progress, students who ‘die’ return to their seats. The purpose of the game is to help the students realize why the normal survival rate is so low for the loggerhead turtle. Mia, in the fourth grade, drew an orange card with the letter N on it. She survived the lengthy, development period in the nest (green cards), and the long crawl to the ocean across the beach (yellow cards). Once she made it to the water, just when she thought she was safe, the Net of a shrimp boat caught her and she drowned. Of the 26 original hatchlings (students), she was the 15th to die. More would not survive by the end of the game. The game allowed Ms. Heron the opportunity to introduce several scientific and mathematic principles into the game that were developmentally appropriate for the students at the different grade levels. For example, her instructional style allowed her to differentiate the science and mathematics content by probing concepts more deeply and using quantitative data with the upper-grade students. For the lower-grade students, Ms. Heron focused on processes and qualitative understanding. Back to the August night, during the second week of school, Ms. Heron arranged for the students to gather one night at the Edisto Beach State Park with other teachers, church members, parents, and community members to take a turtle walk in search of emerging loggerheads. This activity enables community members to participate as well. Everyone is ecstatic. The beachfront park is only a short distance from the rural school. Adults and children all greet one another. Taylor, Mia, and Tristan spot their teacher and run to give her a hug. The crowd gathers and the Edisto State Park staff members prepare to give an overview of what to expect. They begin by highlighting the history of the loggerhead turtle, the dangers it faces for survival, and current local and global conservation efforts. They explain how loggerhead turtles are specifically adapted for life at sea, 66

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but require land to nest. The female returns to the same beach area from which she was born to lay her eggs (called natal imprinting). After nesting, the female returns to the water, never to see her offspring. All the students sit there with confident smiles, realizing that they know some of the same basic knowledge from school. The purpose of the walk is to try to find possible turtle nests that have hatchlings that have burrowed through the sand and started their journey to the ocean. During the previous week in school, Ms. Heron had given the students some data sheets that she had used that summer to collect data on each nest. She explained that the data collection involved two phases. The first was the nesting and the second was the emergence. At the park that night, the State Park staff explains to all present the difference between a “true crawl,” which leads to a nest, and a “false crawl,” which indicates an aborted nesting attempt. They share a graph of Edisto Beach that depicts every nesting attempt from the previous summer. The graph also demonstrates the number and location of all false crawls, true crawls, in situ nests (original location), and relocated nests of the female loggerhead turtles. Tonight, the staff will lead the students and community members on a walk to two nests that are ready to hatch. The large crowd breaks into pre-determined groups; one group will head northeast and the other southwest along the shoreline. Each group is made up of approximately 20 people. Taylor, Mia, and Tristan’s group includes four classmates from different grade levels and their families. They feel very privileged that their teacher is with their group. As they begin their walk, the staff member reminds them of the importance of being quiet and not using flashlights; beach rules state that people should not startle and provoke the turtles so that they crawl in the wrong direction. The staff member allows Taylor and the other students to chime in when they have personal knowledge and experience to share. One student reiterates that they may not see any turtles at all, which does not deter anyone’s enthusiasm. Tristan spots a ghost crab and offers his comment that ghost crabs are predators for turtle hatchlings. Eventually, they come upon a nest that has been incubating for approximately 50 days, which is normal for late summer (early summer nests incubate for approximately 60 days). Mia looks carefully at the sand above the nest and notices indentations and beaks peaking through the sand. With excitement in her voice, she quietly motions and calls everyone’s attention to the nest. Over the period of two hours, 58 three-inch turtles slowly dig out of the nest and swarm the beach in the direction of the ocean. As they disappear into the gentle waves, the children and adults smile. Taylor and Ms. Heron are chosen for the important “nest inventory”; they get to count the turtle eggs in the empty nest by carefully digging down 52 centimeters and removing the white, leathery shells. They do this to determine the number of shells, un-hatched eggs, dead hatchlings, and live hatchlings still in the nest cavity. The other students enter these data into their field notebooks. CONTEXT

The Rural Beach School The Edisto Beach School is located on the Southeast coast of the Atlantic Ocean. It is considered a rural school because it consists of four classrooms, 47 students 67

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ages 4 to 11, and is isolated from the rest of the district by 30 miles. There are four teachers in the school. Each teacher teaches two or three content areas in classes with combined grade levels. Even though there are many definitions of rural, no one single definition can be agreed upon (Coladarci, 2007; Farmer, 1997). One way to define rural is to combine the aspect of physical isolation, size of community, and context of the school (Howley, 1997). The Edisto Beach community is similar to many rural, coastal communities along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, in that they become small communities during the non-tourist seasons. These communities work and support industries during the summer months when the local population swells with tourists up to10–20 times the normal, but exist as regular small towns during the school year when the population shrinks. Rural education and the ideas we can learn from these small communities are important since one in five public school students attends a rural school, and almost 30% of all public schools are located in rural areas (Johnson and Strange, 2005, p. 3). SIGNIFICANCE

National standards in science and mathematics both stress that content and teaching should be inquiry-based, student-centered, hands-on, and problem oriented. In addition, learning should be adapted to meet the interests and experiences of the students, applied to real-world contexts, and involve communication and collaboration. The focus of science reform documents includes the “abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry” (National Research Council, 1996, p. 121). Similarly, the focus in mathematics is on the development of worthwhile tasks that are “intriguing, with a level of challenge that invites speculation and hard work” (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM], 2000, p. 19). Collectively, the reform-based teaching and learning of science and mathematics content involve students demonstrating science and mathematical understanding by explaining and justifying their processes and actions on data and objects, rather than simply following procedural instructions. This can best be achieved through place-based education. One important attribute of reform-based mathematics and science instruction is its application to real-world themes. This approach enables students to apply science and mathematics to their own lives, background experiences, and community situations (Veal, 2007). Other researchers suggest that standards-based curricula should be grounded in local culture as the main catalyst for improving the formal education system of rural schools (Carter, Cohen, Keyes, Kusimo and Lunsford, 2000; Howley, Larson, Andrianaivo, Rhodes and Howley, 2007). The application of real-world themes correlates well with the philosophy of place-based, inquiry, and reformbased education. Contextual Questions These reform-based documents suggest many questions that need to be asked in the context of teaching and learning in rural schools. For example, how does teaching reflect the local community? Community involvement is very important to the Edisto 68

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Beach School. Local business partners provide valuable assistance to the students and families. For example, the local shrimpers allowed the students to visit their boats and see how a turtle-deflecting shrimp-net works. Faculty, parents, students and the community make up their school “family,” with a shared vision to make their school one of excellence. Everyone takes responsibility in raising each other’s children and helping with after-school activities. The Parent and Teacher Association and the School Improvement Council work collaboratively to offer parent and guardian workshops, informational meetings, fundraisers, and volunteer opportunities throughout the learning community. The workshops include computer skills, parenting, Spanish, and GED classes. Strengthening the home-school partnership is an important goal of the Edisto Beach learning community because they share a connection to the sea. A second question focuses on the integration of the local environment with student learning. Why is it especially important in rural contexts to involve students in learning about their environment? Science instruction is a logical extension of the local culture, economy, and environment, but it is too often dictated by standards and assessments, which aren’t applied to the local context. As a result, the science instruction is didactic and lacks many reform-based methods espoused in national science education documents. Blunck, et al. (1995) stated “science education in rural settings may be able to provide the most conclusive and useful examples of successful reforms due to the ability of personal experiences to drive knowledge exploration in real life contexts” (p. 90). Mathematics instruction has suffered the same fate. It is often taught in isolation, with no correlation to how or where it can be found in real-world settings. It is important for students to see mathematics as coherent and connected rather than as a series of disconnected rules and procedures that they must memorize. It makes more sense and it is easier to remember and to apply when students connect new knowledge to existing knowledge in meaningful ways (Schoenfeld, 1998). A valuable way to identify and extend students’ existing knowledge is to make use of problems that are set in real-world contexts familiar to the students (NCTM, 2007). The rural context should provide the natural laboratory for integrating the community environment with the standards-based mathematics and science curriculum. A third question asks for justification of an important instructional philosophy. Why is place-based education important, but rare? National science and mathematics organizations stress the value of contextualizing the content to students’ lives and their local environment. As a result, curriculum integration of science and mathematics has recently developed a surge of activity. Unfortunately, teachers often feel confident teaching one or two content areas while feeling less qualified in others; therefore, they do not know how to incorporate lessons and activities across the different content areas. How can we help teachers learn to integrate multiple content areas, particularly in science and mathematics, in a way that supports the learning of concepts in both disciplines? How can we do this in the rural school setting when real-world applications to local opportunities and examples are missing from much of their instruction? LESSONS LEARNED

Small rural schools are a foundational aspect of a local community because they are intricately tied to the local culture, members, and businesses. When teachers 69

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integrate the local environment and knowledge of community members, the bond between the school and the teachers with the students and the families grows. In rural schools, many teachers have multiple preparations and grade levels to teach at one time or throughout the day. We can learn from these teachers by examining how they integrate subject areas, such as science and mathematics, and combine age groups and grade levels. For example, science and mathematics, using the local content and context of loggerhead turtles, provided this teacher and students with a means to teach science content, the nature of science, how scientists use mathematics, and mathematics content. Place-based education is often hands-on, project-based, and always related to something in the real world. In this case, the use of local resources to support students’ learning would not only lead to greater comprehension of the endangered loggerhead turtle, but also, to understanding more about issues that exist in their own community. Place-based education helps students learn to take care of the world by understanding where they live and solving problems in their own backyards and communities (Smith, 2002). The community problem to be solved is the endangered loggerhead turtle. Hill, Kawagley, and Barnhardt (2000) found that a place-based approach in rural Alaska “continues to produce an increase in student achievement scores, a decrease in the dropout rate, an increase in the number of rural students attending college, and an increase in the number of Native students choosing to pursue studies in fields of science, math and engineering” (p. 13). Creating activities that are embedded within the community and involving many diverse stakeholders can achieve the integration of science and mathematics. The use of a local (and global) theme of the loggerhead turtle to not only teach the local rural pre-K-6 children about their local environment, but also to use the context as a theme with which to teach an abundance of skills and enhance the motivation of the stakeholders. The activities are to help students solve problems relevant to their local community by developing lessons that would weave science and mathematics standards while applying them to the contextual, rural nature of the Edisto Beach School community. The types of activities observed at this rural school and described in this chapter highlight the immense opportunity that the outdoors provides teachers. The Edisto Beach School was fortunate to have a State Park near it and located in its community, but this should not be a deterrent for teachers in the suburbs or cities from exploring the outside. Building a strong school-community relationship will help open doors for curriculum ideas. The replication of these ideas and lessons may not be accomplished in most settings and schools, but the idea of using the local community and its resources should inspire teachers at all grade levels and subject areas to venture out of the classroom in search of applicable and relevant connections to the mandated curriculum standards. NOTES 1

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The Interpretive Center is an 11,000-square-foot “green” building that houses educational displays aimed at engaging visitors to understand the pressures that the modern world places on the intersection

SCIENCE AND MATH FOR LOGGERHEADS of sea and land. It features natural history exhibits and interactive displays, as well as a showcase of the wide range of animal life that can be found throughout the varying habit ranges of the ACE Basin.

REFERENCES Blunck, S., Crandall, B., Dunkel, J., Jeffryes, C., Varrella, G., & Yager, R. E. (1995). Rural science education: Water and waste issues. In P. B. Otto (Ed.), Science education in the rural United States: Implication for the twenty-first century (pp. 79–92). Columbus, OH: ERIC Clearinghouse for Science, Mathematics, and Environmental Education. Campbell, P. F., & Robles, J. (1997). Project IMPACT: Increasing the Mathematical performance of all children and teachers. In S. N. Friel & G. W. Bright (Eds.), Reflecting on our work: NSF teacher enhancement in K-6 Mathematics (pp. 179–186). Lanham, MD: University Press of America. Carter, C. S., Cohen, S., Keyes, M., Kusimo, P. S., & Lunsford, C. (2000). UnCommon knowledge: Projects that help middle-school-age youth discover science and mathematics in everyday life. Volume two: Hands-on math projects. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED439002) Coladarci, T. (2007). Improving the yield of rural education research: An editor’s swan song. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 22(3), 1–9. DeBoer, G. E. (1991). A history of ideas in science education: Implications for practice. New York: Teachers College Press. Farmer, F. L. (1997). Rural, definition of. In G. A. Goreham (Ed.), Encyclopedia of rural America: The land and people (pp. 623–626). Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc. Harmon, H. L., Henderson, S. A., & Royster, W. C. (2003). A research agenda for improving science and mathematics education in rural schools. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 18(1), 52–58. Hill, F., Kawagley, O., & Barnhardt, R. (2000). AKRSI final report: Phase I, 1995–2000. ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED453994 Howley, C. B. (1997). How to make rural education research rural: An essay at practical advice. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 13(2), 131–138. Howley, A., Larson, W., Andrianaivo, S., Rhodes, M., & Howley, M. (2007). Standards-based reform of mathematics education in rural high schools. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 22(2), 1–12. Johnson, J., & Strange, M. (2005). Why rural matters 2005: The facts about rural education in the 50 states. Arlington, VA: Rural School and Community Trust. McDermott, L. C. (1993). How we teach and how students learn —A mismatch? American Journal of Physics, 61(4), 295-298. National Commission on Excellence in Education. (1983). A nation at risk: The imperative for educational reform. Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office. National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century. Before it’s too late: A report to the nation from the national commission on mathematics and science teaching for the 21st century. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, 2000. National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (2007). Mathematics teaching today. Reston, VA: author. National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (2000). Principles and standards for school mathematics. Reston, VA: author. National Research Council. (1996). National science education standards. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. National Research Council. (2000). Inquiry and the national science education standards. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Shoenfeld, A. (1998). Toward a theory of teaching-in-context. Issues in Education, 4(1), 1–94. Smith, G. A. (2002). Place-based education: Learning to be where we are. Phi Delta Kappan, 584–594. Tobin, K., Tippins, D. J., & Gallard, A. J. (1994). Research on instructional strategies for teaching science. In D. White (Ed.), Handbook of research on science teaching and learning (pp. 4–93). New York: Macmillan.

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VEAL AND WALLACE Veal, W. R. (2007). The angle of incidence of progressivism in rural science education. Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue, 9(1 & 2), 201–220. Williams, D. T. (2003). Closing the achievement gap: Rural schools. CSR Connection. Washington, DC: National Clearinghouse for Comprehensive School Reform.

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REGINA WEIR

7. WE ARE ALL PEOPLE Lessons from a Multiage Classroom

INTRODUCTION

“South Elementary” was painted boldly on the entranceway to the school. Entering the school required walking past a modest schoolyard with a concrete play area for recess and a tiny green space with prairie plants of the Midwest. Surrounded by a mix of middle class single-family homes and college rentals, the school was located just south of the town center and near a large mid-western university. Multiage education started in the late 1990’s when the principal spearheaded the push for this unique model of learning. Many of the classrooms in this school slowly became multiage options, usually combining two to three grades together. After a few years of two multiage classrooms, a few teachers and the principal began to explore the possibility of joining those two multiage classrooms together. After testing the joining of the two classrooms for one year, Steven Lewis and Lisa McConnell, former K-3 and 4–5 teachers, merged all grades into one learning community. The following year, the teachers decided to expand and include the 6th grade also. They have co-taught the expanded multiage classroom for the last seven years with approximately 54 students. “How is this possible?” I asked myself when I heard about this classroom. When I entered as a visitor for the first time, I was amazed by the way the classroom functioned so independently of the teachers. It was a surprising mix with 54 students as young as 6 years old learning next to children as old as 12. After many visits, it became the norm to see many children active and free to move around the room, interacting with each other on the task at hand. After my second visit to this classroom, I decided to undertake a study to comprehend how the classroom functioned. I wanted to understand the magic of this unique environment. I observed weekly, a few hours at a time, for one year. After a year of studying this classroom, I realized there were important lessons to share. Ultimately, I decided to look closely at how the students and teachers functioned together as a learning community. The Multiage Teachers The teachers, Lisa and Steve, are open and passionate about their practice. Lisa has 20 years of teaching experience and three grown children. She credits a great deal of her teaching ability to raising her own children. Her manner with the students is inquisitive, honest, and self-reflective, and she uses these qualities to relate to P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 73–81. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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children. Steve is a skillful, passionate educator and musician who came across as quiet and patient. His gentle demeanor enabled him to offer skillful emotional support to students. It was obvious that Steve and Lisa admired each other’s teaching abilities. Both teachers felt they brought different strengths to their collaboration. The teaching bond between them was apparent after their seven years of team-teaching this classroom. Learning from Each Other One element of the classroom that emerged as critical to its functioning was the way students learned from each other despite the disparity in their ages. One day, early in this study, I observed the 2nd and 3rd graders share their journal writing with each other and watched them transition into math. Steve was working in the other room with the kindergarten through first graders on math. The older students (4th–6th) were in art while this instructional time for the younger (K-3rd) students took place with Lisa. For instance, the day before I was there, a first grader named Jay invented “fake money” by tearing strips of notebook paper and writing random large numbers on each piece of paper. David, two grades ahead of Jay, had been sitting across from him and was curious about the fake money. David wanted to know how to say the names of the large numbers on the money. He decided to look in the dictionary to see if he could find the names of the numbers with larger than 18 places. After doing some investigating, David talked to Lisa about his idea for the names; he asked her, “maybe quintillion or pentillion?” Lisa explained that she did not know the names for these large numbers and reminded David that sometimes you need to look up what you don’t know. David was filled with ideas about what those numbers could be and went unprompted back to the dictionary. Bursting with excitement about a discovery, David and Lisa looked at the dictionary together. They did not find “pentillion” in the dictionary and decided it wasn’t a word. David then found pentagon and talked about the Latin root of “pent.” Lisa said to David, “Why does its Latin base mean anything?” David said, “Because it’s five … quintillion is a real number, 18 zeros, but pentillion is not. Pent means five sides and five angles like a pentagon.” Lisa was pleased with David’s work and said, “That was a good investigation.” Later Lisa explained to me, “You don’t always know where things will go.” She said she plans, but she also takes advantage of teachable moments. Later in the math lesson, Lisa took the lesson of Jay’s fake money and expanded it to the whole group showing numbers 1 to 100,000 on the overhead. After this talk about the pretend money, another 4th grader, Dennis, got in front of the class and told them about his discovery of the pattern of whole and squared numbers. Using a long yardstick, he talked while pointing at the handmade number charts that were displayed on the wall. Lisa moved to the rear of the classroom as Dennis took over the class. At one point, many of the students started talking at once and Dennis said to the class, “We can’t all talk at once. Raise your hand.” He addressed the class for about 10 minutes, fielding questions from the students. 74

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Of the 12 students in the room, many of them appeared to be listening to the impromptu conversation that Dennis was leading. Lisa indicated later that students have the choice of listening or not to conversations such as the one Dennis led. This example, along with many others, depicts a central lesson from my observations; the teachers constantly encouraged students to share their learning with each other. This enabled students of all levels to benefit from the diverse ability levels and interests in the class. A common opportunity to share individual or group learning in the class revolved around spontaneous and/or planned presentations. They happened frequently and the younger students and new students are socialized into this process upon entering the class. This was evident one day as I observed Milo, a first grader, give his first presentation. The classroom was packed with all the K-6 students and 20 visitors from the local university. Milo was one of the youngest students in the class; he had a pale complexion, with dark contrasting brown hair and freckles. Milo was nervously sitting at the computer looking at his PowerPoint on owls. He had his back to the audience and everyone was waiting for him to turn around. Lisa and Steve purposely waited in the back of the crowded room as Milo sat, hesitating to begin. Soon Chris, a third grader, jumped up to help Milo (I was positioned just behind Chris and Milo and was able to hear most of their private conversation.) Chris moved next to Milo and said quietly, “Why don’t you turn around and look at everyone and I’ll make sure that the slides change for you.” At first Milo did not respond. Chris stood and waited patiently. Milo did not seem ready to turn around and face the large audience. Several minutes went by as everyone waited. The room was quiet despite all the people in the room. Chris whispered something to Milo again. Milo finally turned around with his arms crossed and his face squinting. Chris sat down at the computer, looking intently at Milo for his cue to forward to the next slide. All the kids in the room were focused on Milo, knowing this was his first presentation. Not being a reader yet, Milo described the pictures of owls on his PowerPoint presentation, along with any facts he had memorized. After he was done, students made comments. Milo looked very happy as he heard comments such as, “I like your pictures.” Someone asked Milo, “Have you ever presented before?” Milo looked confused and said, “What does ‘presentation’ mean?” There were some light chuckles in the room. Then, someone said out loud, “It’s what you are doing now.” Milo smiled and said, “Oh yeah, I think I did one six times.” Then there was loud applause, which made Milo’s smile even larger. Lisa explained later about Milo’s presentation that day: “It means a lot to me that he’s teaching me. Also, he gains so much respect from his peers and everybody in here knows one more thing about Milo.” As was common for this classroom, the social relationship of individual students to the group was equally important and connected to the learning process. The presentations in this class provided an opportunity for individuals to develop their relationship to the group. In addition, it also provided the opportunity to share and contribute to each other’s learning. Chris, without being prompted to help, was important to the learning process by the way he provided support to Milo at a pivital moment. The sense of community that supports each person’s learning is also an important function in how the students manage their behavior in the classroom. 75

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Managing their Own Behavior Although I observed, during my frequent visits, how the teachers in this multiage classroom needed to say little to the students about how to behave, they still provided an educational structure that taught students important lessons about being caring “citizens” in the classroom and perhaps beyond. The students had a strong sense of what they should do and understood the schedule of the day, allowing them to make transitions from activities with little direction. One of the teachers, or sometimes a student whose job it was, would turn off the lights and say, “It’s time for circle.” The kids would begin to clean up and move into the large room for circle time without much direction. One student would help another student put their work away if the student was lagging behind. This cooperation without direction was continually observed. I asked a few kids about the way they managed themselves. Some felt it was because of the long-term relationships. Many could not describe why, but agreed they do manage themselves well. The students in the K-6 multiage classroom could be with each other and the same teachers for up to seven years. There are also students who joined in later grades and usually remained in the same classroom through sixth grade. It was obvious over time that the strong relationships, evident in this classroom, were due to the long-term commitment they have to each other. I asked Jessie, a fourth grader, who has been a student in this class for three years, how everyone gets along. In a demure manner Jessie said, “We just work with each other. It’s because everyone has been here for a while and if we would get really mad at someone you should resolve it quickly. We are with each other for a while so it’s important to make things work well.” Jesse’s commitment to the functioning of the class mirrors that of other students who were interviewed. Lisa was reflective about how her approach to managing a classroom has changed over the years. She said that one of her mentors had pointed out to her the importance talking to students “like friends talk to each other.” She realized, from her mentor, that saying things like, “Are you being respectful?” is not a genuine way for people to talk. Instead, she describes the need to respond to situations by being honest, saying things like, “I’m trying to talk and you’re just talking. Do you not care about what I’m saying?” She indicated that both she and Steve strive to be non-manipulative as much as possible. One example I observed involved Lisa confronting a student who was talking during a whole-class discussion. She said to the student in a matterof-fact tone, “You don’t have to be interested in this. It’s ok to work on something else but it’s not ok to distract us from talking.” Situations like this emphasized personal choice and the need to conduct oneself in a manner that did not interfere with the learning of others. During ongoing visits to this classroom, I was surprised to see how well a class this large could manage itself without the constant presence of a teacher. The age difference and kids being in this environment for many years was very conducive to the successful functioning of the classroom. One spring morning I arrived when the younger students (K-3) were building forts out of bed sheets the teachers provided. The older (4–6) students were at art while the younger students were in the large open room building the forts for reading time. 76

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When I entered the large open room, most of the students were moving around preparing to build. Of the 15 students in this room, 13 were working on the fort building activity. There were a few forts already set up, three tables with sheets thrown over so the cloth touched the floor. The few tables, positioned to one side of the room, were mostly bunched together. Books were on the floor and poking out from under the sheets. I heard one girl yell out to the group, “Can we connect them all together?” A child said, “Sure.” Then someone else, “Can I be in it too?” A friendly voice replied, “Sure.” A boy named Seymour said, “You can take this sheet to make a bigger one.” There was a lot of moving going on. Soon someone said loudly across the room, “Can we connect them all together?” Their voices were getting louder. Lisa entered the room and said, “Let’s talk about this.” They made a circle on the floor quickly without being told how to sit. One of the older girls in this group said, referring to the forts, “I want to make a circle so everyone can see each other.” Another child commented, “There are some of them that want it small and one big.” A third child added, “I think that when you go under you need room for your head.” Lisa replied, “Some people are saying ‘them’ but it’s all our fort.” Lisa’s statement indicated how she wanted to make sure the students understood their common interest. Next a student suggested it should be one big fort. Dan responded quickly, “It will get too crowded.” A student then responded beginning a sentence with “they.” Lisa spoke suddenly in an animated manner, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Why do you think I said, whoa?” Then a student chimed, “Let’s listen to each other.” A few children had their hands up wanting to be called on by Lisa. Lisa responded, “You can talk when there is a space in the conversation but hands are not necessary.” A student then offers an idea about what to do with the books in the fort. Lisa looks at the group and says, “Does anyone have a problem with that?” Everyone seemed accepting of the book idea. Lisa continued, “A wise friend of mine said, ‘We can’t not do things because of a problem. Every day we have something new and we have problems. We have new problems and we have new solutions.’ I just wanted to share my friend’s wisdom … you have 45 minutes of reading left. I think we have solutions.” When a student spoke with concern, “Some people want it this way,” Lisa responded, ‘“Some people say’ and ‘people this’ but we are all people you know.” There was a pause and then, “Do you have some ideas about how to work this out?” She saw some nods and then said, “I’m not going to listen now. Let’s see if you can work this out.” I noted Lisa’s judgment on when to cut off the conversation. Some kids were still trying to make their point to Lisa, but she told them again she was just going to watch. She appeared confident the kids would work this out and shifted the dependency away from her. There was a lot of talking and moving around the room as the students continued to make forts and negotiate their ideas. Lisa stopped the group after a short time and said, “There’s 30 minutes left. Let’s take two minutes to talk about what just happened.” One of the older girls started to talk. At first she began her sentence with, “they,” then stopped and said, “Dan and Garrett didn’t want their fort to be put together so we put those two together.” Dan responded, “Yes, but it worked out ok.” Lisa waited while a few other kids spoke and then she said, “Can you all imagine 77

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where you are going to read?” After this Lisa put the last sheet on one of the incomplete forts so the children could get started with reading time. The kids jumped up, grabbed a book they wanted to read, and ran over to the forts looking for a place to sit underneath the tables and sheets. As this situation depicted, the students handled the freedom and responsibilities this setting provided. Lisa provided a safe structure for the students to explore their social relationships with each other while also facilitating some intentional lessons during the process. For example, she stopped the conversation a few times to make a point about how they were communicating with each other and inserted an insight she learned from a friend about solving problems. It was continually surprising to see how common behavior issues between students, or even with teachers, was not readily apparent. For Lisa and Steve, age diversity is representative of society outside of school and is critically important to the functioning of this classroom. Lisa stated early in the study: Another thing that I just think is powerful is not having too many kids that are the same age and … I was gonna say that seems most important with older kids when it’s so daunting when you get a bunch of 6th graders together and I think that’s true of kindergarten too and you get a bunch of kids that don’t know the structure or can’t tie their shoes and it’s pretty overwhelming. I like so much that there are a few of everybody. One of the rare opportunities to watch a behavior problem manifest in this class occurred when the sixth graders were working alone without the typical multiage groupings. The situation I am about to describe mirrors Lisa’s thoughts about how daunting having the same age level can be. On a fall day during the second semester of the study, I observed the sixth grade students working together on math while Lisa was in the other room working with the fourth and fifth grade students. On this day, a sixth grader named Dylan was having trouble focusing on his work. Steve spent the beginning of the math period providing Dylan with individual attention in math. After this, Steve left the sixth graders to do their work alone and went to the other room. Dylan started humming and making distracting sounds. Several of the students tried to get Dylan to be quiet. At one point, Mitch, a new student this year, jokingly picked up a chair and used it to pretend to run Dylan out of the room. In the process of these disruptions, many of them playful, four of the eight students decided to work in another location. As the class period came to an end, the students put their math away and got ready for music. Lisa found out that Dylan had been disturbing the class and asked him to wait in the empty room while she took the older students to music. She returned with a notebook in hand, taking notes as she and Dylan talked. Lisa sat down at a table with Dylan and initiated the conversation, saying, “You started with a great day.” Dylan responded by saying how he likes to do his work while he talks and hums. Lisa asked Dylan how his actions affected the other students. Dylan replied, “I don’t think they liked it.” Lisa, reflecting on a difficult day herself, said, “I don’t know if you remember me on Friday say I was so crabby. I was so tired and crabby. And one of the things I know if everyone is driving 78

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me crazy I better look at myself. If you’re telling me you were irritating everyone in the room maybe it’s time for you to take a look at what you are doing?” Dylan responded quietly with a soft “yeah” to Lisa. Lisa and Dylan discussed why he was irritating the other students. Lisa pointed out his responsibility to the community and said, “One thing I think too is when we are talking about taking responsibility for yourself and being a part of a community of learners that you have to take charge and understand when you’re stopping other people from doing their work. (Pause) But you stopped other people from doing their work. I would say you stopped them from learning.” Lisa asked Dylan what he thought the consequences would be for him in another classroom. Dylan said, “Maybe lose a privilege. Like maybe not go to a special I like.” Lisa questioned this consequence because it wouldn’t have anything to do with what was going on today and then said, “We need to address what was going on.” She told Dylan she thought a meeting was needed with the other students to think about how to address this issue. Steve, who had been listening, entered into the conversation and expressed his frustration trying to get Dylan to settle down today. He also expressed concern with how Dylan’s friends perceived his actions and wondered whether he was feeling left out by friends who chose to work on math without Dylan. Steve said, “Sometimes when people have hurt feelings it comes out in different ways. I’m trying to understand what was going on … I’ve known people that have had hurt feelings who instead of being sad or feeling sorry for themselves they kind of do the opposite.” Lisa and Steve looked at Dylan who sat without response. Steve spoke saying, “I’m trying to read your body language because I think if it’s true you are not going to admit it and you’re going to act like … (Pause) I know you’re listening, so I’ll just see what happens after this.” Lisa suggested again they have a meeting tomorrow with the students to discuss this situation. Dylan nodded in agreement. This situation with Dylan represented a special communication method these teachers embody. This manner of communication was a vital characteristic in the way relationships were developed between students and teachers. The focus in the conversation with Dylan was on understanding behavior rather than on punishment. Lisa and Steve guided the conversation by being self-reflective about their own feelings and actions. Lisa emphasized the importance of personal responsibility when existing in a community of learners. Lisa and Steve also communicated a social norm in this class, explaining that it is a group responsibility to address problems of this nature. Lisa and Steve used this opportunity with Dylan and his classmates to problem solve as a group the next day, a class ritual the students know well. The group decided that Dylan should work in the small reading room alone so “he can make as much noise as he needs.” The focus was not about Dylan learning to be quiet or what Dylan did wrong yesterday; instead his peers felt he needed the right space to make noise while he worked on his math. Rather than delving out punishment, Dylan and the group were empowered to take responsibility for any possible solutions. 79

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Lessons from a Multiage Classroom Teachers play a critical role in establishing a community of learners. Although recreating a multiage environment may not be possible in all schools, there are lessons to be gleaned from this classroom for teachers to consider. Lesson one: As this classroom reveals, it’s important to empower students to take ownership of their learning and the classroom environment. Lisa and Steve provided a model for how this can be accomplished. The students were empowered to be problem solvers as the Dylan situation and the fort making demonstrated. Lesson two: Taking ownership of one’s learning is dependent on the functioning of the community. The teachers were intentional about creating a culture in the classroom that encouraged students to learn from each other. This happened through cooperative learning activities conducted daily in this classroom, but it also happened by students doing formal or informal presentations. The situation with Milo and Chris modeled this well. Milo was able to share a topic he was passionate about with the classroom community and Chris was able to support Milo during the presentation. A learning community grows when students and teachers understand how their learning is dependent on the community. Lesson three: Jay’s fake money provided an example of how important spontaneity and uncertainty was to the learning process. A classroom such as this required planning along with a receptiveness to allow learning to take new directions. Lisa was not hesitant to admit her uncertainty around the names of the numbers Jay made up. She positioned herself as co-learner in the process of learning with her students. Lesson four: A not-so-surprising lesson from this classroom was how older and younger students learn from each other. Although it’s commonly thought that the benefit of multiage learning is mostly for the youngest, this classroom demonstrated how surprisingly well older students could learn from younger students. Teachers, even in traditional school environments, could create opportunities for younger and older students to interact and learn from each other. This multiage classroom also indicates the importance of long-term relationships in a school environment. School personnel should work to create long-term relationships beyond the typical one-year classrooms. Lesson five: This classroom reveals how effectively a classroom can function without a teacher as the center. The classroom teachers rarely conducted lessons that focused on the teachers’ knowledge but rather used a mixture of methods (inquiry based learning, cooperative learning, project based learning, etc.) to activate the students’ learning. Challenges and issues that arose were given to the community to problem solve, thus placing the emphasis on the community’s function, not the teachers’ control. These teachers facilitated the ingredients necessary for the community to grow, such as effective listening skills, engaging learning experiences, and the classroom structure that promoted a sense of community. There was an enormous amount of trust provided by the teachers to allow students flexible learning opportunities. This trust is critical to a learning community. The lessons above resonate beyond the one classroom and are easy to lose sight of when teaching: the role of education to create a caring citizenry. During the 80

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fort-making activity, the students had the opportunity to practice democracy while making a pretend village. Many education scholars (Meier, 2009; Parker, 2003; Nilhoim, 2006) point out the pivotal role of actual participation in democratic communities from an early age. This classroom provided insights into how two teachers created an environment that fostered a sense of community and potentially impacted the development of caring citizens beyond the one room. Teachers of the future can carry on this classroom’s ultimate lesson: “We are all people.” REFERENCES Meier, D. (2009). Democracy at risk. Educational Leadership, 66(8), 45–48. Nilholm, C. (2006). Special education, inclusion and democracy. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 21(4), 431–445. Parker, W. (2003). Teaching democracy: Unity and diversity in public life. New York: Teachers College Press.

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8. WE ARE FAMILY Providing a Second Chance for Over-Age Students

Interviewer: What would you say to a student who is thinking about applying for the AP [Accelerated Program]? Student: You get a second chance. You’ll have another opportunity to get to the ninth grade. The teachers will actually help you instead of saying that they will. They communicate with you. This student participated in a special program that 36 over-age students entered as seventh graders and 31 (86%) left as rising ninth graders. The program graduated 33 of 35 students (86%) the previous year. What happens in the Accelerated Program (AP) that allows struggling students a chance at success? Their success lies largely in the AP environment that gives over-age students a second chance to develop a sense of accomplishment, belonging, and engagement—all ingredients necessary to school and life success (Finnan, 2009). RETAINING, DROPPING OUT, OR BOTH?

Many students repeat a grade every year. Some do so in kindergarten or first grade, a decision often made by parents concerned that their child is not sufficiently mature. Others are retained in later grades, typically because of poor academic performance and/or behavioral problems. Although grade retention can provide students a chance to mature or to learn what they missed the first time (Gleason, Kwok and Hughes, 2007; Pierson & Connell, 1992; Reynolds, 1992), it often serves as a way to punish disengaged students or as an unimaginative way of addressing student failure. Most studies show that retained students do not learn more than do students with similar academic records who are promoted (Alexander, Entwistle and Dauber, 2003; Hong and Raudenbush, 2005; Nagaoka and Roderick, 2004), and they are far more likely to drop out of school when they are old enough (Rodrick, 1993). Multiple retentions essentially guarantee that students will drop out (Center for Mental Health in Schools, 2006; National Center for Education Statistics, 2006; Comer & Joyner, 2006; Roderick, 1993). Most students are retained or drop out because they are in the process of or have disengaged; they find school work uninspiring, believe they cannot keep up with assignments, and/or feel that no one cares about them (Bridgeland, Dilulio and Morison, 2006). In other words, they believe that they cannot accomplish the P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 83–93. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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tasks expected of them; they do not belong in their school or classroom community, and they struggle to engage in the work of school. Too often we overlook the psychological and social factors that play into students’ academic decline (Connell and Wellborn, 1991; Finn & Owings, 2006) and downplay the importance of creating school and classroom environments that foster accomplishment, belonging, and engagement. THE ACCELERATED PROGRAM

Many programs designed to help struggling students emphasize passing high stakes tests and target skills students lack rather than identifying and building on their strengths. The AP was developed purposefully to 1) reengage students, 2) find and build on their strengths, 3) envelope them in a supportive community, and 4) awaken their curiosity, imagination, and analytic skills. Personnel of the AP, located in four trailers connected to a suburban middle school in Charleston, South Carolina, identified rising seventh graders who were at least one year over-age. Students with serious behavior problems or learning or behavior disorders were eliminated from the pool. Eligible students were invited to apply with the promise that they would complete seventh and eighth grades in one year. The program differed from regular middle schools in several ways: Ninety, rather than 40-minute, course periods provided extended time for English/ language arts and math. Social studies and science were taught in one 90-minute block. Three Accelerated-Program teachers in the AP trailers offered all courses except related arts. No more than 45 students were admitted, keeping class sizes under 15 students. A full-time counselor and program director provided support services for students. Enrichment opportunities (e.g., field trips, service learning) were integrated into the curriculum. The Accelerated Program was part of a Charleston County School District initiative, Middle Grades Accelerated Program (MGAP). It differed from other MGAP sites because of additional resources, earning it the designation of the “Mercedes of MGAPs” (Courrege, 2007). Other MGAP sites did not have a director, full time counselor, or a third teacher. They also did not have the advantage of a partnership with the College of Charleston and funds for enrichment activities. Teachers focused on engaging students, expecting them to find connections, participate in discussions, apply what they were learning, and reach out beyond the classroom walls. The social and emotional support offered in the “first trailer” was a critical ingredient. Through a card system the counselor and director addressed students’ social and behavioral issues. A student who needed “time out” or a break could take a green card, leave the classroom, and go to the first trailer, no questions asked. A teacher who had problems could give the student a yellow card and send him to the first trailer. Red cards, rarely used, were for serious offenses. First-trailer personnel developed initiatives to address issues, organize enrichment activities, and connect with partners such as faculty and students from neighboring College of 84

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Charleston (CofC). For example, they organized Stop the Drama, designed to address conflict among female students, and Ripple and Connect, a yearlong theme designed to show interconnections between actions and cause and effect. They planned environmental awareness and historic preservation field trips and service-learning projects with neighboring elementary schools; they coordinated a storytelling project with a CofC faculty member. Each year a graduation ceremony was held at the CofC so more than 300 family and friends could celebrate with the graduates. AP personnel intentionally established an environment across the program and in each classroom that helped students develop a sense of accomplishment, belonging, and engagement. In the following sections the words of AP students describe these environments and why they are important. Two cohorts of students were interviewed, one cohort twice and the second, three times using semi-structured formats allowing for probes and follow-up questions. CREATING SUPPORTIVE LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

Environment Fostering Accomplishment Students talked about how the AP helped them feel that they were accomplishing important things. They described changes in terms of academic and social/behavioral accomplishments and teacher (including the counselor and director) actions and programmatic features. Academic accomplishments. Students described academic accomplishments as improved grades and tests scores, increased knowledge and skills, being able to learn in one year material that is typically covered in two, and acquiring better work habits and attitudes. Throughout our interviews there were many references to improved grades or scores on standardized tests. For example, when asked how the year had gone, one student said, “Last year I was failing all of my classes: no A, B, C, D. I was failing! At the beginning of this year I got my first quarter report, and I was passing everything. Now [at the end of the year] I’m still passing everything.” Other students talked about learning more this year and generally doing better in school. For example, when asked to define “accomplishment” one student said, “The word accomplishment is knowing something and not knowing something, that’s an accomplishment. Like if somebody asks you a question you don’t know the answer to, then to answer the question, that’s an accomplishment to me because I feel better on the inside. Another accomplishment is setting a goal and reaching it.” Another student said that his goals for high school next year are to “achieve high. Just do my best and don’t let other kids get you in bad stuff.” One student explained why she liked the AP: “It’s just, it really helps me understand stuff, and in the main building [traditional school] I didn’t get much out of stuff. It was really hard for me to understand. … And I’m understanding a lot of stuff and I’m feeling older.” Other students equated academic accomplishment with being able to complete two years in one and to go on to high school a year earlier than they expected. One young man described his goal for the year: “First, to pass! I also hope to see my other friends pass with me and be together again and having a good time.” 85

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Another student described how students at her former middle school viewed AP students: “They looked at us like we are retarded. Like, ‘she has to be, she failed twice.’ They thought we were crazy, but now they see that we are going to high school. I can’t stop talking about it and neither can my mom.” The incentive of entering high school early worked; many students said that they worked harder because they wanted to pass and go on to high school. Social/behavioral accomplishment. The AP also addresses student attitudes and behaviors that stand in the way of learning. The students described how they became more mature and developed leadership skills, got in trouble less frequently, were more calm and happy with themselves, and took responsibility for doing their work. Some discussed the importance of program supports (e.g., Ripple and Connect, goal setting) and teacher expectations; others described becoming more mature in the AP: “At the beginning of the year they said we had to have high school behavior and that helped us to mature more.” “I’m starting to be more mature, make friends, study more, take things more seriously.” “Reflect on what we did wrong and learn from our mistakes.” “Last year, with the same problems I have right now, I wasn’t handling them the right way, and now that I have the help, I’m handling them in a much better way.” Others described developing leadership skills to help them in high school. A young woman said, “This has taught me leadership skills, life skills. It has made me proud and more confident. I know lots of people. I know how to trust.” Many Accelerated Program students had histories of struggling to keep their behavior in control, but now they were proud of newly developed skills and attitudes. A student defined accomplishment as “Like to me, it’s that I went through the year without really getting in trouble, making my mom happy and all that kind of stuff. Coming this far, like getting to another day. In regular school I’d probably been getting in trouble.” Another young man said, “They [teachers] talk to us individually to see how things are going. They do this daily. They boost our confidence. Without them it wouldn’t be the same. People would have been out of control. They keep us in check. I’ve seen a difference in the behavior.” Others talked about how easy it has been to make friends and that helping friends is important. Students described themselves as calm and confident. One young woman said that she would tell incoming students that “you’ll change a lot and you’ll be happy with who you are, the person you’ve become when you leave here.” She added that to her accomplishment means, “making each day go by well and doing the best you can.” She continued, “My days are a lot happier and better, and I’m doing better in school.” Another young woman said, “I’ve accomplished my goals, and one of my goals was getting to know my surroundings. Once I get to know my surroundings, I feel a lot better. I’m more comfortable and not as shy. I’m more confident.” Students were quick to attribute their increased social accomplishments to the teachers and program features. “They [teachers] give really good advice and help you lead it so you don’t make wrong choices.” Strategies such as Ripple and Connect 86

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and other efforts to help students modify behavior and become more organized were commonly described. “At the beginning of the year there was an idea called Ripple and Connect, and I still use it. I think about cause and effect before I take an action. I think about how it affects other people.” Students described doing homework and being more mature and responsible. For example, one young man said, “My behavior has changed a lot this year. I’m much more mature. I come in and talk to people; I talk to teachers about what’s going on at home. I don’t laugh at somebody making mistakes or other people’s problems. I’m paying attention in class, doing my homework; that’s a big change from last year.” A young woman described the change in her attitude when discussing what she would say about the program to other students, “They won’t regret it. This is such a good place for people who fall between the cracks, who get lost. I didn’t have trouble learning, but I was lazy. I got too caught up in friends. In the sixth grade I was in the honors track, but I didn’t do the work. The teachers looked disappointed but they didn’t do anything. They could have made contact with me, helped me plan, called home.” Teacher actions and programmatic features. Students accomplish more in the AP because of teacher actions and the non-academic supports provided in the first trailer. The director and counselor developed and implemented Ripple and Connect and the card system, provided other forms of guidance and advice, and organized many enrichment activities such as field trips and service projects. Students greatly appreciated their efforts. One student said, “Well, you can talk to our guidance counselor. She’s very helpful; she’s very supportive and she is very concerned and helpful. She just gives you confidence, boosts you up and figures out the way to solve your problems and things like that.” Another student said, “Every time we act out she [the director] asks if that is high school behavior. She reminds us that we don’t want a label. She will just look at us and say, ‘maturity level’ and we know. … Without the first trailer people, it would go downhill. It would not be as well structured.” The three classroom teachers worked with students until they understood material and provided easy access to extra help. They demonstrated through their actions that they believed in the students. The following summarizes widely held opinions: “…we were doing something like linear functions, and I was like sitting there trying to get it and I was like, ‘ok, how can I get this?’ and then I was like, ‘wait a minute!’ and all of a sudden that light bulb went off because she like sits there and takes time with you, and we have time to talk about it to where everyone really understands it.” “At my old school if we didn’t learn something that was right you’d raise your hand and ask them to do it over, and they’ll say no because you should have been listening. And now out here, they’ll go over it one-on-one or with the whole class.” “After every subject we pass we do a review game and later on we come back to the subject to make sure that we remember what we were taught in that subject. We have a choice instead of going outside we can come back and make sure we understand what we did in the class period.” 87

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Structurally, the AP differed from typical middle schools, including philosophy, structure, and easy access to non-academic supports. The philosophy is built on a desire to give students a second chance and an expectation that they are capable of accelerating their learning. Students enter as 7th graders but meet 8th-grade standards by the end of the year, requiring teachers and students to believe that they are capable of such a demanding schedule. Students appreciated the opportunity to prove them right. A student said, “I think it’s like getting a second chance at life, so you get to catch up with everybody.” A young man said, “I like the fact that the backbone of the subjects is the eighth-grade standards because then you’re taking two grades in one. I learn more in one year, and it’s very good, but it’s also hard sometimes and you got to stay focused.” According to students, the most important aspects of the program’s structure were small class sizes and longer classes. “We have less [sic] students and smaller classes so we’re able to have more time with the teachers.” The structure helped with behavior according to students, “The environment [helps him pay attention], how there’s not a lot of kids in the class so there’s not a lot going on.” Having fewer than 35 students facilitates individual attention and clear communication, “Because there are not so many kids they [teachers] can make sure all students know. When we have the whole program together we know that everyone has heard. The teachers will get things done.” The students also liked the 90-minute classes: “I like the times. If we had eight periods and had to go from class to class it would be hard. This is getting us ready for next year. They have 90-minute classes in high school. You have more time to connect, talk.” Environments Fostering Belonging Whereas experiencing accomplishment is directly related to improving student achievement, it is unlikely to occur unless students also develop a sense of belonging. To the students, belonging includes learning in a family context, forming connections, and being expected to take responsibility for actions. Teacher actions and programmatic features support this sense of belonging. Students frequently talked about how the AP provided a sense of belonging that many did not realize in their previous school experiences. Family. The AP students characterized belonging as family. To them family entails being there for each other, knowing each other well, feeling safe to argue and disagree. Examples of students’ descriptions of family follow: “I was very unmotivated [last year]. I picked on people that I’m ashamed of now because I see how it hurt. We connected and became one big family. … People come to me for advice; friends come for help.” “We still have our friends from our old schools and everything, but here, we’re not exactly like friends, we’re like family. So we argue with each other a lot most of the time, but because of the things that they taught us here, we handle our differences better and so we aren’t as argumental as we would be if we were in the building [regular school]. 88

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The family environment entailed developing deep connections with each other and feeling a sense of responsibility to the group. Connections. AP students knew each other well, could count on each other, developed a sense of trust and safety, and learned to limit the drama that characterizes life for many middle school students. As one student said, “In other schools we weren’t as connected, but in AP we’re like one big family; we help each other and talk about stuff and stay connected a lot.” Another said, “We all know each other better being that there’s only 11 people in every class, so we know that we can depend on each other, know that we can ask somebody for help with homework, and we won’t be disappointed and stuff like that.” One young woman vividly contrasted the AP with her experience last year: In my other classes I could break down and cry and no one would help. Here, I broke down and several friends came to help. That meant a lot to hear that students care for each other. … At [my former school] I never talked to anyone. I was all bottled up. See my knuckles? I broke three of them hitting a metal post; I was so angry. Here I’ve learned that it’s better to talk it out. I am starting to understand. I’ve matured more this year. No one gave up on me; I thought they would but they didn’t. It took two months for me to start to trust them. Responsibility. Students recognized that to belong in the AP required a level of personal responsibility, something they had not displayed previously. They spoke of increased maturity, managing emotions, setting goals, and helping each other. One young woman reflected on the year and said, “It’s been really good. My grades shot up, and I haven’t been in any drama. My maturity level is way up.” Students talked about how previously they would have gotten into fights, but they felt that they owed it to the program and themselves to work things out without fighting. This change did not happen immediately; it grew as the sense of belonging grew. “At the beginning of the year there was a fight. People were cheering it on. Now there are no fights. I would jump in if someone else fought with one of us, but we don’t fight.” Students learned to take responsibility for themselves, to set goals for their future, and to help each other. One student described how the teachers helped her set goals: “We have meetings; everybody just talks to each other and different stuff. We use the Ripple and Connect stuff. We’ll have a week that we try to accomplish one goal, like everyone will do something good for the next person and by Friday we have a big meeting to be like, ‘tell me one thing that you did good for a person this week.’” Other students talked about helping each other with family and home problems, relationships, and school problems. They kept each other on track, learned to count on each other, earned each other’s trust, and avoided “he said, she said” drama. Teacher actions and programmatic features. The sense of belonging permeating the program grew from concerted efforts of the teachers, especially the director and counselor. Through the card system, Ripple and Connect, and focused interventions 89

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such as Stop the Drama, students could use processes to stay connected. Having non-teaching professionals available to stop negativity before it grew cemented the environment of belonging. Primarily, through offering sound advice, encouraging dialogue, establishing clear procedures, and taking time to know students, the teachers demonstrated their care and interest in all students. As students described, the teachers “… know our weaknesses and our advantages” and “give really good advice and help you lead it so you don’t make wrong choices.” Having people in the front trailer allowed students to “talk to them about anything because they won’t go off and tell other teachers what happened. It’s like a personal relationship and you can talk to them about anything. They have action steps and things to make us do better, help us in our situation. And keep us going; without them I wouldn’t make it.” Another student said, “They encourage us. They help after school. In class they give advice. We can come to the first trailer and they will stop what they are doing to help. It is fun and interesting. We do ‘unordinary’ stuff.” Environments Fostering Engagement Not surprisingly, students appreciated learning in environments that they considered fun and engaging. They liked variation, the opportunity to move around, and to learn through field trips and games. Reading and language arts were taught through a rotation from a computer-based program (Read 180), small-group instruction with the teacher, and independent reading. Students liked the rotation because as one said, “I get to read, have free time, get on the computer, and be interactive. I like that instead of sitting there and listening to the teacher and taking down notes.” Another student described the classes: “The teachers never do things boring. They always have us hyper and energized. We can focus more, and there’s always a game to a subject where we’re having a good time and learning at the same time. It’s not like the class is quiet and boring, and we’ve always got the books out. We’re always doing hands-on stuff like that so that’s very nice.” As the description below illustrates, students remembered their lessons because they were actively involved in them: I’m not a textbook learner. We learn more in action. I have always struggled with math. Now I’m learning. For example, with the garden, I didn’t think we would need to know the square foot and the milliliters in a bottle, but working on the garden showed me why this is important. I have to learn in action. [The science teacher] made funny songs. We learned about rocks, volcanoes. We had a model of the water cycle. He put in different colored things like spices. When the water got through the cycle it was a disgusting color. It opened my eyes. He changed lives. I would go on any trip he arranges. He said that we were his favorites. He is crazy but we jumped on it. The AP also enhanced students’ sense of engagement by helping them make sense of their learning. Engagement, like accomplishment, occurs when students can focus and stay with their learning. As one student said, “I can stay focused because there’s less (sic) kids in one class. There’s not a lot of confusion and chaos in class and 90

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I can stay focused. The learning experience is good, and we do a lot of hands-on experiences and stuff like that.” The active learning through field trips and games also helped students make sense of what they learned; they saw connections they may otherwise have missed. LESSONS LEARNED

These students clearly do not speak for all students, but their voices illustrate one overarching critical lesson: adults can learn a lot from listening to children and adolescents, especially those who have experienced both success and failure. These students’ hard-earned wisdom illustrates how our identities are both fragile and enduring (Spindler, 1978). These are young people who, more than likely, entered kindergarten full of optimism and hope—secure in their belief that they would learn, fit in, and enjoy learning. Their experience prior to entering the AP proved otherwise, and they went through the wrenching process of thinking of themselves as failures at learning, in some cases as social misfits, and as people who disconnected from academic and/or social expectations. Fortunately, through the intervention of the AP program, they regained some of that early confidence and ended the program with high expectations about their ability to accomplish academically and socially, with new social skills and experiences of belonging and a renewed interest in engaging in meaningful work. That these students found the AP so exceptional implies that they did not uniformly experience this approach to learning in the past. That so many students continue to disengage and/or fail also illustrates that too few schools encourage development of a sense of accomplishment, belonging, and engagement. In 1900 John Dewey (1900/1990) wrote, “What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must the community want for all of its children.” (p. 7); the same can be said today, the experience enjoyed by the AP students should be the experience enjoyed by all students. As a teacher, what can you do to help students like these AP students? First, be sure that students can experience a sense of accomplishment. Teachers need to stay with students who initially struggle to learn. This may entail breaking up material into smaller units for students, presenting alternate strategies to solve problems, or bringing in other resources (e.g., other teachers, mentors, peer coaches) to help students keep up with lessons. To experience accomplishment, students also need adult help in setting attainable goals. Teachers need to help students set goals and develop steps to meeting the goals. Once these students started to see a pattern of success, they were more willing to set more challenging goals. Teachers need to be both cheerleaders and coaches in this process. They need to cheer students on while also providing constructive feedback to students. These students benefited greatly from adults who provided structures and processes that helped them meet their personal goals and achieve their ultimate goal: entering high school. Second, be sure all students feel a sense of belonging in your classroom. They need to learn in safe and caring environments and believe that they are important, contributing members of the school and classroom community. They look to adults 91

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to model caring behaviors and to expect students to treat each other with care. They also count on adults to provide structure and processes that encourage trust, open communication, and assistance in addressing social and emotional issues that might otherwise prevent them from successfully participating with others. The strategies used in AP, such as Stop the Drama, the card system, and Ripple and Connect helped students who otherwise might have alienated themselves from the rest of the class. For these systems to work effectively, teachers have to be extremely flexible and anticipate problems. For example, Stop the Drama was a quick response to escalating tension among the female students; by addressing the problem quickly and directly the tension ended quickly. Easy access to a highly skilled counselor and program director was a critical element of the AP program’s success. Although all classroom teachers do not have such access, you can better serve your students by developing partnerships with the counselors and school administrators to be proactive in addressing student needs. Third, recognize that most students want to learn, but they often disengage in classes because they either do not understand material or concepts, or because lessons are not stimulating. Students appreciate variety, active involvement in learning, a playful environment, and adults who are willing to work with them as individual learners. One lesson students wanted conveyed to adults was: I’ll stay engaged in learning if you stay engaged with me. Successful implementation of AP practices calls for much introspection on the teachers’ part and a willingness to open up and look at students as individuals looking to accomplish something while trying to make meaning of their everyday school life. We encourage you to start small and make sound incremental changes rather than making sweeping changes that take a great deal of time and effort. For example, just greeting students by name with a smile on your face can make a huge difference for many students. Listening to students’ ideas and concerns also takes little time but results in more trust and provides a window into issues in their lives that interfere with learning. Making students part of the solution to problems gives them ownership into solutions that they may otherwise resist. These suggestions do not require new training, but they illustrate that updating teaching skills is a gradual process that calls for patience and constant renewal. REFERENCES Alexander, K., Entwisle, D. & Dauber, S. (2003). On the success of failure (2nd ed.). New York: Cambridge University Press. Bridgeland, J. M., Dilulio, J. J. & Morison, K. B. (2006). The silent epidemic: Perspectives of high school dropouts. Civic Enterprises. Retrieved July 16, 2007, from http://www.gatesfoundation.org/nr/down loads/ed/thesilentepidemic3-06final.pdf Center for Mental Health in Schools. (2006). Grade retention: What’s the prevailing policy and what needs to be done? Los Angeles: Center for Mental Health in Schools. Comer, J. P., & Joyner, E. T. (2006). Translating theory and research into practice through the Yale Child Study Center school development program. In M. A. Constas & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), Translating theory and research into educational practice: Developments in content domains, large-scale reform, and intellectual capacity (pp. 151–172). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Connell, J. P. & Wellborn, J. G. (1991). Competence, autonomy, and relatedness: A motivational analysis of self-system processes. In M. R. Gunner & L. A. Sroufe (Eds.), Minnesota symposium on child psychology (V.23, pp. 43–77). 92

WE ARE FAMILY Courrege, D. (2007, September 4). “Mercedes of MGAP” gets students on track. The Post and Courier, pp. 1A, 9A. Dewey, J. (1990). The school and society. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (Original work published in 1900). Finn, J. D. & Owings, J. (2006). The adult lives of at-risk students: The roles of attainment and engagement in high school. Statistical Analysis Report. NCES 2006-328. Finnan, C. (2009). The upper elementary years: Ensuring success in grades 3–6. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Gleason, K. A., Kwok, O. & Hughes, J. N. (2007, March). The short-term effect of grade retention on peer relations and academic performance of at-risk first graders. The Elementary School Journal, 107(4), 327–341. Hong, G., & Raudenbush, S. (2005). Effects of Kindergarten retention policy on children’s cognitive growth in reading and mathematics. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 27, 205–224. Nagaoka, J., & Roderick, M. (2004). Ending social promotion: The effects of retention. Chicago: Consortium on Chicago School Research. Retrieved February 21, 2007, from http://ccsr.uchicago.edu/ content/publications.php?pub_id=12 National Center for Educational Statistics. (2006). Grade retention. The Condition of Education 2006. Retrieved March 1, 2007, from http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/2006/pdf/25_2006.pdf Pierson, L. H. & Connell, J. P. (1992). Effect of grade retention on self-system processes, school engagement, and academic performance. Journal of Educational Psychology, 84, 300–307. Reynolds, A. (1992). Grade retention and school adjustment: An explanatory analysis. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 14, 101–121. Roderick, M. (1993). The path to dropping out: Evidence for intervention. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing. Spindler, G. D. (1978). The making of psychological anthropology. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Wasley, P. A., Hampel, R. L., & Clark, R. W. (1997). Kids and school reform. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

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“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” ~ John Muir, writer, naturalist

CHRISTY MOROYE

9. ECOLOGICALLY MINDED TEACHING Authenticity and Care

Does “environmental education” only happen in science class or on field trips to the local nature center? What does ecologically oriented teaching in other subject areas look like? This chapter illustrates the practices of two ecologically minded teachers in traditional secondary English classrooms. In each case, the teachers’ ecological beliefs emerged in their intentions for students, in how they orchestrate their classroom environments, and in a variety of curricular aspects. This chapter highlights key ideas from a larger study on the practices of ecologically minded teachers (see Moroye, 2009 and 2007). From this study of public school teachers, we will see that the teacher’s personal ecological beliefs affected many aspects of their work. In other words, a teacher’s beliefs are not simply “checked at the door,” but influence the broad strokes of the art of teaching. While this orientation has implications for ecological education, suggesting that environmental education is influenced by the teacher’s beliefs, it also has implications for “greening” traditional curricula. Furthermore, we might look at the ways in which other beliefs affect practice. In other words, a teacher’s beliefs about global citizenship or artistic sensibilities or social justice may all affect a variety of aspects of educational practice in unexpected ways. This chapter offers two examples of ecologically minded teachers and then suggests several ways in which educators and others might explore their own beliefs, ecological and otherwise, and how they influence their work and lives. What does it mean to be an “Ecologically Minded” Teacher? “Ecologically minded” refers to those who identify themselves as any or all of the following: expressly concerned about environmental issues (either within or outside of education); attentive to ecological metaphors in the classroom such as connectedness and interdependence; cognizant of the relationships between humans and the natural world and how those relationships function in a system; and/or mindful of the cultural sources of environmental issues (such as unchecked consumerism). I am intentionally not using the term “environmentally” minded teachers in order to avoid labeling the teachers “environmentalists,” a term that connotes bias and can be politically and emotionally charged. The four teachers involved in the larger study hold strong ecological beliefs, but the specifics of those beliefs are not necessarily shared in common. While one teacher, Ms. Avila, has a particular interest in animal rights and global citizenship, another, Mr. Hepner, focuses on spending time outdoors backpacking and backcountry P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 97–114. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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skiing. In this particular chapter, we focus on Mr. Rye, who is primarily concerned with recycling and social justice, and Ms. Snow, who is focused on relationships and her spiritual beliefs. Ecological mindedness does not denote one particular set of values or beliefs, but it does suggest an awareness of the intersection between the natural world and the human one, if indeed a separation can be made. The teachers’ particular ecological beliefs are not necessarily a factor in the findings in this study; the overarching mindset that is cognizant of interconnectedness and interdependence seems to be the salient and important characteristic that influences educational practice. WHAT DO ECOLOGICALLY MINDED TEACHERS DO IN THE CLASSROOM?

Ecological Infusion: The Curricular Dimension As you will see in the vignettes that follow, ecologically minded teachers do not fit a particular mold. Instead, an ecological perspective influences the salient characteristics of their practice. None of the teachers who participated in this study has specific “environmental” curriculum that they must teach. However, four types of ecological curriculum emerged during the study: 1) explicit ecological topics (such as nature writing); 2) complementary ecological curriculum (defined below), which includes themes, language, and examples embedded and often modeled by the teacher; 3) critical thinking with an ecological focus; and 4) ecological care. I will discuss each of these ideas as they relate to two teachers: Mr. Rye and Ms. Snow. Explicit and Complementary Ecological Curriculum Those who study what schools teach often categorize certain kinds of curricula to help in their analysis. For example, the stated curriculum refers to the outwardly expressed goals such as teaching about the causes and effects of the Civil War, or learning and using properly the six major comma rules. Similarly, explicit curriculum includes the tangible, content-related educational goals, which can be found in the chosen texts, handouts, curriculum guidelines, and other materials. The various people and agencies such as the teacher, department teams, the district, or sometimes the textbook companies create the explicit curriculum. As a point of contrast, the hidden curriculum is that which underlies the explicit educational goals (Jackson, 1968), which could include rules students must follow in order to succeed in school, such as raising their hands, asking permission to go to the bathroom, and putting their names in the upper right-hand corner of the paper. Although various other types of curricula can be discerned while studying more subtle attributes that affect a teacher’s practice, it is sometimes useful to attend to the ways in which a teacher’s beliefs affect what happens in a learning situation. I refer to this as the complementary curriculum, or “the embedded and often unconscious expression of a teacher’s beliefs,” (Moroye, 2009). This is of particular importance for studying ecologically minded teachers because their beliefs may not always permeate the explicit or stated curriculum, especially in the humanities. 98

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Let’s look, for example, at the practice of Mr. Daniel Rye, an English teacher at Seneca Lake High School. Mr. Rye, a native of Colorado, has been teaching for 17 years and at the time of my observations, he was teaching three courses: Advanced Placement Language and Composition, a lower level senior seminar course, and a course for “at-risk” students who were not succeeding in school. Mr. Rye is a cordial, professional, and exuberant teacher who smiles widely. In this first vignette, Mr. Rye is preparing his students for the AP Language and Composition exam. He works through a piece by nature writer Mary Oliver, and students explore her complex response to nature and the Great Horned Owl. Using this particular piece of writing is an example of explicit ecological curriculum in the classroom, and he also incorporates critical thinking about the text. Also evident in this vignette are examples of complementary ecological curricula in which Mr. Rye uses words like “organic” to describe an essay’s organization and asks students to return the overheads so he may recycle them. While not an integral part of the curriculum, the incidental language is a type of modeling ecological behavior. A Complex Response Mr. Rye prepares his students for the AP exam with one final prompt before the test. While students begin to stream in during the passing period, the teacher from the last period, a young, blonde woman, stays to chat with Mr. Rye and his students about the AP exam. “You guys will be well prepared! Mr. Rye is excellent!” she says. They smile in agreement. “We know! We love him!” The bell rings and students continue to trickle in. “AWESOME! Rock on!” He shouts as he escorts a group of students to their seats. “Hey! We have two days left until the exam!” Mr. Rye dives into his pep talk (in fact, that is what almost all of his lectures are like—pep talks). “Get in the mode of writing successfully every time you write. You are the best class I have ever had. And tomorrow we will have food, advice, and craziness!” Mr. Rye distributes a released AP Test prompt, which includes a piece about owls by Mary Oliver, a prominent nature writer. Mr. Rye reads the question with them aloud. “Carefully read the following passage from Owls by Mary Oliver (2003). Then write an essay in which you analyze how Oliver’s style conveys the complexity of her response to nature.” Mr. Rye continues, reading the first few lines of the prompt slowly, softly, as if he were telling a secret. “‘When the great horned (owl) is in the trees its razor-tipped toes rasp the limb, flakes of bark fall through the air and land on my shoulders while I look up at it and listen to the heavy, crisp, breathy snapping of its hooked beak … if one of those should touch me, it would be to the center of my life, and I must fall. They are the pure wild hunters of our world. They are swift and merciless upon the backs of rabbits, mice, voles, snakes, even skunks, even cats sitting in dusky yards, thinking peaceful thoughts…for the owl has an insatiable craving for the taste of brains … I know this bird. If it could, it would eat the whole world,’” Mr. Rye finishes with a whisper and wide eyes. 99

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Enrapt, students stare directly at Mr. Rye, silent. He then continues by reviewing how to break down the question. “Read the prompt! Consider the author, her gender. Think about how Oliver’s style conveys the ‘complexity of her response to nature.’ Read with a purpose—what do I notice about her style? How can I characterize it? Then consider—What is her response? Is it sensual? Soulful or spiritual? The writing portion of the AP exam tests your response to literature and how you articulate that response.” Mr. Rye assembles students into groups so that they may tackle the prompt together. He counts students off by fives and tells the numbers where to meet. He then gives each group an overhead and markers. “Be specific. Be brilliant. Break it down. Be focused. Be efficient.” A group of boys near me seems a bit puzzled by Oliver’s words. “I don’t understand this,” one boy snorts. But the group plods through it. “Okay. This is a 1st person narrative,” another boy in the group begins. “The complexity—draw a big tree branch and an owl,” a third suggests. They continue to throw out ideas: “That’s her response to nature—she questions it.” “She doesn’t understand everything about nature.” “Yeah. Questioning it shows she doesn’t understand it.” “Nature’s, like, complex, dude. It’s too complex, dude.” Mr. Rye paces around the room with a sense of urgency, listening to groups discuss their ideas. He pauses at the front, drinks from his Nalgene water bottle, and gazes outside for a moment at the cloudy spring day. After a reminder about time, he asks groups one by one to come to the front of the room to present their thoughts. Group one describes Oliver’s style as tangential and dream-like with contrasting phrases saying that she shows her complex response to nature through contradictions like “immobilizing happiness.” The other groups offer their interpretations, which are similar, but also include words like “questioning” and “complex” to describe her style. Mr. Rye thanks each group and then moves quickly to the center of the room saying, “I will recycle these overheads, so give them back to me at the end of the period.” His brow wrinkled, Mr. Rye has the look of a man searching his soul. “I want you guys to nail this,” he says. And they embark on a class discussion of the prompt. He writes the following, generated from students and teacher, on the chalkboard as he talks: RESPONSE TO NATURE STYLE

Terrified/happy contrasts—owl and flowers Teacher/destroyer comparison/contrast owls: one gentle and wise, the other loves brains; is violent Awe/appreciation passivity to her Excessive, complex syntax—she goes on and on, repeats, lists, verbs “Okay. How does she feel about the owl?” He elicits “powerful” and “she fears it” from the students. 100

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“Yes,” Mr. Rye says. “Nature is predatory, but it is also restful and a place of refuge. Oliver gets that contrasting view and it’s overwhelming. Her writing is also excessive, just as nature is. She separates the world of humans and that of nature— she fears and loves the owl; she shows deep reverence.” Seeming satisfied that the students understand Oliver’s complex response to nature and how to tackle this AP prompt, he concludes the class by assigning the 12 multiple choice questions to “Owls” for homework. Students gather to talk with Mr. Rye, and he listens to each of them and responds with his usual kindness and attentiveness that they have come to expect. As previously discussed, the vignette above is an example of the ways in which both explicit and complementary curriculum intersect. Mr. Rye selected a piece of nature writing, and his “teacher talk” was also infused with ecological references to recycling and an “organic” style of writing. The next vignette switches focus to how his ecological beliefs affect his intentions and desires for his students, not just how his beliefs affect his actions in the classroom. Awareness and Critical Thinking In the following vignette, we see that Mr. Rye not only cares about his students, but he cares that they learn to think critically about the world in which they live. Students gain perspective on their lives by listening to the wisdom of others and reflecting upon its relevance to themselves. It’s a Big Life Out There! In response to the seniors’ waning interest in school as graduation draws near, Mr. Rye developed a writing project in which students explore various aspects of their lives. The first section of the seniors’ writing project consists of students writing about themselves. Suggested content includes their life resume, specific interests, stories important to their lives, etc. These entries were prompted by writing they did in class about food and drink preferences. Section two of the project asks students to be observers and critics, to “describe details about the world around (them),” and then to offer “specific, insightful commentary and analysis based on the details” they describe. Suggested content includes their families, friends, neighborhoods, college, television, current affairs, controversial topics, etc. This combination of sections supports Mr. Rye’s desire for students to connect self awareness with community and even global awareness, to see that we not only live in our neighborhoods, but we also live in a world that affects us and is affected by us. One prompt in particular stands out as fostering the type of critical thinking Mr. Rye is seeking. In conjunction with the writing exercises, Mr. Rye shows the class parts of an interview with Morrie of Tuesdays with Morrie (1997) fame. Mr. Rye passes out part of a poem that Morrie quoted loosely in the interview. It is called “All I Have is a Voice” by W. H. Auden (1939): All I have is a voice To undo the folded lie, 101

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The romantic lie in the brain Of the wealthy man-in-the-street And the lie of Authority Whose buildings grope the sky: There is no such thing as the State And no one exists alone; Life allows no choice To the citizen or the police; We must love or die. The class discusses the poem, and students give responses about the lies in the poem. They point to the authority of powerful people, that it is a lie that owners have it all. They discuss the lie that we tell ourselves that money is everything. They say that the folded lie is the embedded lie—the one that sneaks into our minds and hearts without us noticing because all of society accepts it. “You are so brilliant!” Mr. Rye responds. “I could start you writing by analyzing and explicating the poem. I would ask you to discuss and think about the lies Morrie and Auden think exist. But instead, I am more interested in your ideas. List the lies that you feel are being pushed at you. Maybe it’s the lie about how class rank at SLHS matters. Whatever it is, make a list.” After walking around the room, coaching students quietly, the class shares responses, some of which are more on point than others. The responses include: the War in Iraq, Santa Claus, pharmaceutical companies (“they are drug dealers”), commercials, that beauty is blonde hair and blue eyes, and the “entire fashion industry.” Mr. Rye seems satisfied with their list, so he wraps up the discussion. “It’s a weird world.” Mr. Rye smiles and shakes his head. He then talks about the “Twenty-Five Club,” a group from the 1970’s of 25 people who wrote 25 things they wanted to do or accomplish. By 2000, 24 of them had done all 25. They then pressured and helped the last one to accomplish his. Mr. Rye then explains how he did this at age 19 with his friends, and they meet once a year to check on each other’s progress. Mr. Rye asks students to list the 25 things they want to do in their lives. They work quietly for a while and then giggle and share. “Stay focused—you have a few more minutes. ‘05 should just be a start. It’s a big life out there!” The next day Mr. Rye decides to take students outside to write their next section: a letter to themselves to be read in the future. Students parade down the hall, Mr. Rye talking with several of them at once. He then stands just outside the glass doors beyond which is a large green courtyard with small hills, ponderosa pines, a few benches, and criss-crossing sidewalks. “Here’s your little prompt from me,” he says as he hands out small pieces of paper. “Enjoy, go find a place of your own, and have fun.” Students take a piece of paper and begin to disperse across the courtyard. Just overhead, a Blue Heron silently swoops by. The courtyard, now peppered with students, is silent except for the sounds of chickadees, sparrows, and the occasional finch. Students hunker over papers, bracing the corners from the whispering breeze. Mr. Rye joins his flock in his own space writing his own letter to himself. As outsiders stroll through the expanded classroom, 102

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they seem to understand the sacred space and whisper to their walking companions more quietly than they would in the hallways or any other time on the quad. Mr. Rye then ambles to each student, pens pecking at their papers, checks progress and offers silent support. One student, finished with his letter to himself, decides to conquer a tree. “It’s on my list!” he shouts to Mr. Rye. Mr. Rye throws his head back in his familiar silent laugh. It may be puzzling to draw the connections between the previous vignette and ecological beliefs. What does writing about oneself have to do with ecological mindedness? Mr. Rye explains that one of his primary concerns for students is that they develop a sense of themselves and a sense of what is authentic for them, which he believes leads to personal integrity. “I see such a link between people’s treatment of the natural world, of animals, and their treatment of other people, and I can’t get away from that connection. And if I want these students to live lives that I think are meaningful and fulfilling— radiant—I really believe that their view of nature will also have integrity.” Mr. Rye believes that this authenticity and personal exploration could influence the way students understand their connections to others, both human and nonhuman. This is further exemplified in the ways in which he models and teaches with and about care, and it is also seen in the use of writing in nature—moving the classroom outside for inspiration. Care as Ecological Curriculum Care permeates the actions, beliefs, and practices of Mr. Rye. “As young people learn how to discern and accept care, they can gradually learn also to care for others,” Noddings explains (1992, p. 103). Because Mr. Rye and the other ecologically minded teachers from this study show care so deeply and completely in the classroom, caring actually becomes a part of the ecological curriculum; it is part of what teachers want students to learn and therefore modeled extensively. Students are learning how to “discern and accept care” from their teachers, and several instances show that they are also practicing care for others by offering spare materials to those in need, by supporting each others’ ideas, and by showing care for their teachers. Mr. Rye’s pep talks and encouraging words so much enhance curriculum that they become curriculum—Mr. Rye himself, his words, his constant motivation become a part of what students learn. They are learning through his modeling what it means to be a caring, intellectual, and ecologically and socially aware person who is alive and awake in the world. He lives the radiant life he wants for his students, and his beliefs and who he is become a part of his modeling care for himself and for the world. This is evident in this final vignette for Mr. Rye in which he introduces the last novel for the school year, The Alchemist, to his AP Language and Composition students. He emphasizes that students should care about themselves and the choices they make for their own personal journey. “The price for following your dreams is never more than the price for not following them.” Preparing for any AP exam requires certain adherence to the national curriculum. Now that the test is over, Mr. Rye grasps the freedom that he has and selects a novel 103

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that he hopes will speak to students and help them understand their own life journeys. He spends the day after the AP exam prepping students to read The Alchemist by Paulo Coehelo. “Getting ready for the test is part of why you take AP,” he tells students. “I am so proud of what you’ve done. But I’ve waited so long to just be a little freer. We’ve talked about the passage and the prompt, but what prompts YOU? What are you going to be? What are you going to do? This class can be so cool now because you are so interesting. I love ideas, I love individuality. This is why I teach.” Mr. Rye says this book, The Alchemist, will help them explore their own lives. He gives background information on Paulo Coehelo and talks excitedly with the book in hand. Coehelo told his parents he wanted to be a writer. They were not happy with him because they wanted him to make more money. “When he insisted on being a writer,” Mr. Rye continues, “his parents sent him to an institution—he stayed there for almost four years. He wouldn’t give in to having a more conventional career, so his parents disowned him.” Then Mr. Rye begins recording notes for students to take. “Take out a piece of paper. I know this seems hokey, but I want you to write this down.” “What I love about this story is that this guy went through so much. They did everything to keep him from becoming a writer—they even broke his hands in the mental institution. But he knew he wanted to be a writer and he did—very successfully.” Mr. Rye puts on the overhead: Paulo Coehelo, “his truths”: 1. You must pay a price for following your dreams, but it is never more than the price you must pay for not following your dreams a. What might this price be for you? Relationship, hopes, risk, time, money? b. What is the price for not following your dreams? (Students respond: regret, unhappiness) 2. Coehelo says that people in the US are more willing than any other country to pay the price for NOT following their dreams. He thought the US should be the target audience for this book, especially teenagers 3. Following your dreams is usually strange and unpredictable 4. You must leave the things you are used to in order to discover who you are and what you really want; You’ll never see the truth where you are. For example, Plato’s allegory of the cave—go into the world, then come back and liberate others in the cave 5. Two things lead you away from your dreams: a. Worrying b. Trying to be perfect “You might not buy this Paulo ‘Crapo,’ but some of you might.” Mr. Rye talks about college as his choice to follow his dreams. “What will it be for you? You just have to make your life better. Paulo says that he can’t get over how people worry in the US. They worry about worrying!” Mr. Rye adds his own example of traveling 104

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to New Zealand the previous summer. He talks about how laid back and easy going they are there, and how he tries to take that attitude in his own life. “This gets dismissed in the US as fluff. Ya know—what is your teacher trying to sell you? Some of you will read this and dismiss it as a fairy tale, and that is your choice. Okay, time to go. You can take a book now or tomorrow. You don’t have to worry!” Class ends and most students take a book from Mr. Rye. Remembering Mr. Rye’s intentions for his students, we know that he believes that care for the environment stems from care for other human beings, and care for other human beings comes from caring about ourselves. While it may seem that Mr. Rye is not teaching ecological education, his motives are compatible with an ecological ethic; he is focused on empathy, connectedness, and care. We might say that Mr. Rye is planting the seed in students now to become ecologically, socially, and culturally aware by providing them opportunities and prompts for self exploration and for critical thinking. Final Thoughts on Mr. Rye Mr. Rye’s practice is much like the jazz music with which he surrounds himself— spontaneous, gurgling, often erupting into frenzied tangents then mellowing to soulful silence. Underneath the ebb and flow beats the uncompromising undercurrent of compassion, authenticity, and love. He is, at times, like a solo musician on a dark stage alone, tickling one note at a time on a shiny keyboard. These are the times he is reading text—every word is as important as every other, and each changes the texture of the work. At other times, he is like the entire orchestra playing together— leaping, hooting, laughing, all at the same time and in one single motion, at once in tune with the audience while simultaneously transcending them. Ms. Snow: A Space of Caring Like Mr. Rye described above, Ms. Katherine Snow is an experienced English teacher. The school in which Ms. Snow teaches, Highline High School, is an ethnically and socio-economically diverse public high school in Colorado. She also taught for several years at a suburban middle school in the same district. In 2005, Ms. Snow received the district’s Exemplary Award for curriculum she developed on the Middle East after a trip to Egypt with a Fulbright scholarship program. Ms. Snow, a tall, graceful woman, also has a degree in counseling and is a Lakota minister. When I observed Ms. Snow she was teaching a senior Humanities seminar, Advanced Placement Literature and Composition, and English 10 Essentials, a class teamed with a special education teacher. An Expectation of Decency I slip into the quiet room, students bent over their notebooks, Ms. Snow moving among them. Paper hands hang from the ceiling suspended by string and paperclips. One is a rich brown hue with a small blue and white human icon in its palm; another 105

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has spirals of different colors on each finger. On the North wall hang three largerthan-life, black-and-white photographs of women in Egypt, a memory of Ms. Snow’s Fulbright trip. A lone plant spreads across Ms. Snow’s desk, which is set diagonally near the east window. A coffee mug, a few stacks of papers, and writing utensils complete the desk’s landscape. Big, clean blackboards upon which Ms. Snow occasionally scratches a few notes for students flank the East and South walls. The West wall is reserved for student work, and a large bulletin board is covered with projects. A freestanding cabinet covers the window that overlooks the back of the school. Desks are arranged in three sections for a sort of amphitheatre feel, which is appropriate for the many student performances and readings Ms. Snow’s students do. The “stage” up front is used by students as often as it is by her, and students, assuming a variety of roles, often read drama or dialogues. I asked Ms. Snow to describe the environment she created in her classroom: There are lots of things on the wall from my trip to Egypt. There are things hanging from the ceiling, art projects by the kids. There is a board where I have kids’ work displayed. I actually try to have some sort of publishing of kids’ work in some way or another. We have a plant and I bring music in from time to time. It feels kind of spacious in that room, too, because the windows are so big. In terms of physical, emotional? I would hope it would be a space of caring, nurturing, fun, exploration, creativity, acknowledgement, encouragement. But, also high expectations. An expectation of decency in behavior and also in stretching yourself and growing actively. Ms. Snow works to create that environment of caring and nurturing through her interactions with students and the interactions she expects among them. One of the ways she does this is with her classroom management style. Similar to Mr. Rye, Ms. Snow seems to always assume the best intentions in her students before concluding that they have misbehaved or done something disrespectful. Again, as with Mr. Rye, I witnessed very little, if any poor behavior, with the exception of some side talking in her “essentials” tenth grade class, and occasionally, students were late to class, as illustrated in the following vignette. I never saw Ms. Snow punish or scold a student. I only saw her guide and redirect questionable behavior, and she often praised and rewarded good behavior. Ms. Snow’s classroom management style is characterized by deep care, and her role as caregiver is certain. Her care is, at times, so penetrating, so intense, that you can’t help but be compelled to care about yourself. In fact, as I observed the genuine love she has for individual students, I found myself seeing their wonderful qualities I might have otherwise missed. Students understand and soak up this love, and they respond in a way that seems they understand that disappointing Ms. Snow would be like disappointing virtue itself. The following two vignettes, Charting Virtues and Watching them Rise illustrate the ways in which Ms. Snow cares for her students by assuming their best intentions and by playing her role as caregiver, which also serves as a striking model for care. 106

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Charting Virtues “Stickers! We need stickers!” Ms. Snow announces as she walks around to each student handing out all varieties of stickers. Students are making a book of virtues for themselves, each containing a grid for charting their virtues day by day. Students reward themselves with stickers if they successfully act upon one of their chosen virtues. There is a low rumble as students share stickers, and the senior Humanities class seems as enamored with them as a third grader would be. “Did you get a chance to do your stickers, hon?” Ms. Snow asks a quiet student in the back. With sticker time over, students take out their Socrates’ text and discuss the night’s reading. Ms. Snow reminds them to record notes and to use highlighters for key phrases. “Highlighting decreases your work. It is such an important skill. Otherwise, you have to go back through the whole text. This is such a dense text! I think we’ll have a little quiz tomorrow—there’s not a lot of highlighting going on. Oh! Bravo!” she says to one student who has just begun highlighting. “Bravo!” to another. “Highlighting helps move your eye. And then if you write in the margins, that’s even more helpful.” Ms. Snow walks to the board and writes, “Socrates’ preferred form of government is _________.” She turns to the class, and they don’t seem to have the answer. “I will give you a sticker if you can answer this!” “Aristocracy!” one student shouts. “Yes!” Ms. Snow says, and fills in the blank with aristocracy. “Let’s come back to the large group. I think when our minds are melded together we answer these questions better.” A tall male student walks in wearing a tuxedo. “Ohh! This is nice!” Ms. Snow says, commenting on his attire and ignoring the fact that he is 10 minutes late. “It’s Matchmaker this weekend!” He reminds them that the school play is coming up, and then he quietly finds his seat and takes out his notes. “What is aristocracy?” Ms. Snow asks of the class, redirecting their attention to the subject at hand. “The landed have power,” a student says. Ms. Snow talks about how the elite group of people would rule. “What about women?” Ms. Snow asks. She turns to write on the board: Democracy: Landowners = Men Non Landowners = Women, Slaves & Poor Men Several students raise their hands. “I’m going to start with you and then I am going to move to more quiet people.” “Does Socrates talk about the philosopher king?” a student asks. “I don’t know but would love for you to find out.” Another student in the class offers his explanation of the philosopher king, and Ms. Snow thanks him. “Let’s start on The Crito right now. We are going to set this up as a dialogue.” Ms. Snow pulls two desks to the front of the classroom. “I need a Socrates and a Crito and we are going to be an invisible audience.” She waits, but no boys volunteer. 107

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“If the gentlemen won’t stand for it, certainly the ladies will!” Again, no volunteers, but many smile. They all choose numbers between one and thirty, and two boys win the honor of reading the dialogue aloud in front of the class. All students follow in the text, and Ms. Snow sits at a student desk with her mug of tea, reading silently along, not interrupting. Ms. Snow’s patience and humor help move the reluctant learners into a discussion of a dense and challenging text. She engages the class as a community and, although patient, does not accept apathy or non-participation. She simply finds ways to get students to participate, not by insulting them or confronting them with frustration, but by joking with them and creating structures (such as assigning numbers to volunteers) that elicit the participation she seeks. Watching them Rise Ms. Snow’s curricular focus, as she stated in her intentions for her students, is to provide opportunities for them to explore new ideas in order to come to understandings about themselves and about the world. To do that, she offers provocative texts supported by penetrating questions. She says: What I absolutely love about teaching is creating curriculum in a way that it is palatable, but more than palatable. Tantalizing. And then figuring out how to deliver that, and to watch them respond to it. It is so utterly fascinating to see when they become engaged in the questions. Legitimately engaged, not just as an onerous task. It’s thrilling to me. It’s like throwing out bait and watching them rise. What an honor it is to be able to do that. I never witnessed explicit ecological curriculum dealing with issues directly related to the Earth. Ms. Snow’s ecological beliefs involve knowing the self, the type of ecological curriculum she offers (like Mr. Rye) focuses on knowing the self. Ms. Snow describes how her ecological beliefs appear in the classroom: I feel that I can talk about my “ecological beliefs” in a way that is very professional and acceptable to other people’s belief systems, and I think I bring a body of knowledge that is also related to my counseling degree that couches it all in terms of what we are studying at the time. So, it’s sort of like a sea urchin, where you have this core, and then you have all these little prongs coming in, so you begin your discussion with the core, but then you have all of these pathways to enter into and out of that core, into other ways of thinking. In the following two vignettes, Embracing Light and Dark and Mystical Illumination, we see how Ms. Snow’s beliefs guide the questioning in her classroom, and we also see that the questioning guides students to evaluate their own experiences. Furthermore, in Mystical Illumination, we see that not only does Ms. Snow model care for her students, but also that students reciprocate that care in their concern for her forthcoming foot surgery. 108

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Embracing Light and Dark As students read silently “To the Parents of the Prodigal Son,” Ms. Snow helps individual students. “You can infer what some of those words mean on your own,” Ms. Snow tells a student who has questions about word definitions. “So we should start inferring!” the student smiles. “Yes, you may start inferring!” They smile at each other and Ms. Snow moves on to other students who need her. A student walks in about five minutes late and Ms. Snow greets him. “Ian, hi!” rather than giving him the school required tardy referral. Ms. Snow later told me that he was regularly late because he had to drive across town to get to school. Rather than punishing or scolding him for his regular tardiness, she understood his situation and embraced his choice to attend Highline from another school’s attendance area. Today they are starting Demian. Ms. Snow asks students to tell the story of Cain and Abel. “Good. Now someone take off from there,” to prompt more details of the story, and others do. Ms. Snow previews the text by asking students for examples in their lives of seeing or being involved in what we might consider darkness or the dark side. An African American male immediately offers a personal example. “I saw someone get shot. The detectives kept calling me. I saw a guy walk up to another dude and shoot him in the head. I was traumatized. I never talked to the detective. I am sorry I didn’t, if I could have helped. It was crazy.” “Yes, and crazy making, I bet,” Ms. Snow responds sympathetically. Ms. Snow moves students into an explanation of their final project in which students will teach the class about a rebel from history. “I want to encourage you to be as creative as possible. I have seen some amazing presentations and some not so amazing. If you follow this outline, it will be so easy for you to be successful with this project.” She reviews the two-page document with them, and tells them that her good friend Mike, a former English teacher, created the project. “That’s the way you want to set it up. It is very clear, isn’t it? This is your final exam, this and another creative piece you will do.” She then gives students a list of rebels, and tomorrow, students will choose groups and begin working together. “Questions at all? Does this look like fun?” Students respond with excitement and energy about the project, and some begin talking about rebels they want to choose. “Can I tell you something funny?” She tells them about a group of boys who did Van Gogh, and they created a beautiful PowerPoint presentation with his artwork and details about his rebellious nature. “But the last slide was of a person mooning us with a sign: Thanks, Josh, for nothing! They were sincere in their aggravation about this group member not doing anything. So the moral of the story is to be sure to contribute to your group because you never know what they might do to you!” Students get her point and laugh at poor Josh. “Ok! Demian! What should we talk about first? How Chapter One was for you? What are the two realms?” Ms. Snow then guides them through a discussion of the first chapter of Demian. “What place does Emil feel safe in?” A student correctly 109

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responds that he feels safe in his house. Ms. Snow continues with comprehension kinds of questions like, “What propels him from the light to the dark?” She affirms their answers and then moves to another question. “That’s right. And what is the story about?” After it is clear that all students have read and understood chapter one, she goes to the board. “When you are in college, your professors will talk and write on the board. You should have your notebooks out.” She writes: “Edenic Symbolism Allegory-story-characteristics about human nature” A student pipes up. “I was going to ask you about similarities or little things that are allusions.” “Yes! What allusions did you see?” “I saw apples and stealing.” “I saw light for abundance and innocence,” another student says. “Ohh! I saw darkness and shame,” adds another. Ms. Snow records their ideas on the board and continues discussing the chapter. A student questions one of Ms. Snow’s details. “Are you sure he asks to meet with his sister in this chapter? I don’t remember that.” “Oops!” Ms. Snow smiles. “That is the peril of reading ahead! Now you have a hint of what’s to come in Chapter Two!” Ms. Snow calls upon a student who has not yet participated. “I am going to give you a chance to redeem yourself from yesterday. What allusions did you see, and what do you think they mean?” The student provides a thorough and insightful response. “I know you were tired yesterday. Nice job today.” Ms. Snow proceeds with a discussion of the voice inside Demian that is guiding him. “Some people call it the guardian angel inside. Some call it our conscience. He can’t ignore the voice inside.” They then talk about ‘the shadow,’ so named by Carl Jung, and Ms. Snow asks students to read the definition. “Is there anyone in your life who aggravates you? Whom you don’t understand?” Students offer several examples. “If there’s a trait in someone else that bugs us, Jung says we also have that trait and we haven’t acknowledged it in ourselves yet. What do you think about that?” “Yes,” says a girl in the center of the room. “That’s awfully easy,” Ms. Snow says. “We are supposed to disagree—remember?” another student reminds her. “I don’t think Jung is right because just because someone bothers us doesn’t mean we don’t like something about ourselves. And even so we aren’t perfect.” “Do you mean to say we need to embrace both light and darkness in our lives, even if it’s not comfortable?” Ms. Snow prompts. “Yes.” “You’re right. It’s hard, isn’t it? Emil has to be exposed to the light and dark so he can grow.” Ms. Snow’s deep caring for her students is exemplified by the ways in which she draws students’ lives not just into the classroom, but into the subject matter. She draws upon their own creative endeavors, such as creating works of art and drama, and helps students connect with the text through these meaningful intersections of 110

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life and story. This helps facilitate the kinds of real caring that are offered by Ms. Snow and reciprocated by her students, as seen below. Mystical Illumination Outside it is five degrees above zero, the high for the day. Students are bundled and many are missing or late due to icy roads, perhaps. The room is chilly and Ms. Snow stands wrapped in a lavender shawl over a nubby gray sweater. Her Ugg boots are lined with warm white fleece, pant legs haphazardly bunched at the tops. “How many of you remember your dreams?” Ms. Snow hands out paper with “men dream about Mars, women about Venus” and “What College Students Dream” written on them. A few of them share their dreams, and then they write about the dreams in Demian. Ms. Snow reviews upcoming due dates for reading Demian and the rebel project. Students complain about the deadlines because the school Talent Show is Wednesday night. Ms. Snow tells students that she has to leave Thursday for an operation. “No! Why! What’s wrong with you?” one girl asks, surprised and concerned. “I have to have my foot worked on.” “What’s wrong with it?” “I have arthritis there.” “You talk about it like it’s not a part of your body.” “Well, it feels like it’s not right now. My dear friend Ms. Lincoln will be here for me.” “Is she nice?” “She is wonderful. But that’s why I need you to stick to these deadlines, so I can have your work before I have to be gone.” Students stop complaining about deadlines and wish her well. The class moves into a discussion of symbolism in dreams. It is clear that all students have read the chapters, and they come with questions about the meaning of Demian’s dreams and the painting of the dream face of his beloved, Beatrice. Ms. Snow draws upon students’ experiences and intuition and connects them to the novel. “Karena, as an artist, do you ever let your subconscious choose for you?” “Yeah. In my art class we have to do little practice and I don’t like that. I like to just go—just let whatever happens happen.” “How about you, Darcy? You are an actress on the stage. Do you ever let your instincts guide you?” “It comes naturally to me. You just know who you are supposed to be.” “That’s how Demian begins,” Ms. Snow says. “He pins the painting to wall and goes to sleep ‘gazing’ at it. He lets it soak into his subconscious. Then the painting becomes Demian.” Ms. Snow sheds her purple shawl and picks up a purple overhead marker. She talks through a few notes on a transparency. “Demian is dreaming himself—he is transforming himself. ‘Mystical illumination’—can somebody explain what this is?” “When we’ve been trying to find something—it is that A-ha moment when things make sense,” a student explains. 111

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“Yes. Does this make sense? Any questions, yeah-buts?” Ms. Snow says as the class closes. Students leave quietly, pensively, and a few remain to talk with Ms. Snow about her surgery. FINAL THOUGHTS ON MS. SNOW

If we were to imagine Wise Mother Earth, she might very well resemble Ms. Snow. She has long wavy gray hair that bounces softly as she moves around the room, and her clothing flows around her like a halo. She often wears purple or gray, which enhance the soothing presence she offers to her students. She is at once like a warm blanket and calm waters, encouraging, prompting, and caring for them relentlessly. There is no mistake that her primary role in the classroom is that of caregiver. Ms. Snow retired after that school year, and she reflected on this at the end of our first interview. This is the best year I have ever had in teaching … it’s almost like a blessing … I have such a gift of kids this year who are open and receptive and warm and fun and loving and, my goodness, God has given me so much this year. I feel like, even though I know that I’m coming to the end, I feel like it’s the best possible way for me to leave, because I’m going to be able to have such positive memories. I’m in awe, actual awe of the kids I have this year. Every Friday I go home and I grieve. I do. I have to talk about the things that they’ve done and how astounding they are. I think what will I do when I don’t have that anymore? And I know what I’m going to do, but, you know, I have doubted being in this profession so many times, and this year, I know why I am here, and it’s a great way to go out, having something that has been affirmed in such a positive way. So What Can You Do? When I first began my research, many people asked me what I would do if I found out that ecological beliefs had no influence on teachers’ practices. Certainly this was a possibility, which is why we conduct research in the first place—to understand what is yet a mystery. But my instincts told me that I would find ecological beliefs to be a rich source of influence on the practice of teaching; this instinct probably came from my own life experience as an ecologically minded teacher. Many colleagues have asked me how to enhance the ecological focus of their work if they don’t teach environmental science. I offer the examples above, and I also suggest several ways in which to understand and, if desired, enrich educational practices toward an ecological orientation. Likewise, if you are a globally minded person or one who believes in social justice, you could engage in the following process for those beliefs, as well. Begin by Understanding Your Own Beliefs Good teachers naturally reflect upon their practice, but we often forget to reflect on our personally held beliefs. Before trying to understand and enhance your ecological perspectives in your work, seek to know how they show up in your life. For example, 112

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Mr. Rye is a self-described “crazy active recycler” who is known in his neighborhood for finding new ways to use “trash”. Ms. Snow is a Lakota minister and counselor, and she engages in a variety of community activities that reinforce her connection with wilderness and natural places. Perhaps you are the kind of person who likes to engage in community action, or you may be the type to spend time outdoors enrapt in natural beauty. Think about your own ecological identity. Continue by “Observing” your Own Practice Once you have a better understanding of your own ecological beliefs, you can begin to see the ways in which those beliefs emerge in your life and work. For example, because recycling was such an integral part of Mr. Rye’s home life, he sought to recycle everything from overheads to scraps of paper, to old notebooks and pencils. Ms. Snow, a minister and counselor, actively engaged in similar roles as a teacher. A great place to begin the observations of your own work is by looking at the physical surroundings you have created. Whether in your classroom or your office, take notice of how you have orchestrated your environment: Do you have plants? Natural light? Photos of ecologically inspired people and places? Think about the structure of your room or office: Is it open to communication and engagement? Have you organized the furniture to allow for a variety of voices? Certainly because ecological beliefs vary and emerge in different ways, there is no “right” way to organize or structure your physical space. But it is a good place to begin to see how your beliefs surface. Next, you might look at your curriculum to see where ecological ideas materialize. 1. Identify and act upon ecological opportunities. Once you have deepened your understanding of your own ecological beliefs and how they currently emerge in your work and life, you are likely to begin to see new places to insert or include ecological perspectives. For example, Mr. Rye had a choice about which AP prompts to use to prepare his students for the test. He chose the Mary Oliver piece on owls, which provided students not only an opportunity to analyze an excellent piece of writing, but also the chance to think about the complexity of nature. 2. Connect with colleagues who are like-minded. Find out who sponsors the Recycling Club (if it isn’t you) or who spends time outdoors or participating actively in community events. Talk with that person about your ideas and share the work you have done to unearth the ways in which your ecological beliefs emerge in your work. If you are a teacher, I highly recommend engaging in reciprocal observations of each other’s teaching. Try to identify where beliefs already emerge and places where, given attention, they might. The more you can expand your network of ecologically minded folks, the more opportunities will arise. When ready, you might engage like-minded students or others who are interested in exploring these ideas. 3. Be honest about the benefits and drawbacks of how ecological mindedness influences your practice. 113

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But isn’t ecological mindedness too political for teaching? I have often been asked whether or not it is appropriate to try to expand the existence of personal beliefs in teaching. I can’t answer this question for everyone, but I can say that my research has shown positive outcomes of ecological beliefs: teachers develop a culture of care; students are provided opportunities for critical and creative thinking; students’ lives are connected with curriculum. While these are not predetermined outcomes for everyone who is ecologically minded, the point is that ecological mindedness does not have to be politically oriented, nor should teachers insist that their views are correct or better than others. However, if ecologically minded teachers (or lawyers or doctors or business owners) are forced to artificially separate who they are from what they do, then I don’t believe that leads to authentic practices like honest reflection and building effective relationships that enhance the teaching and learning process. That is why reflection must be, I believe, an integral part to understanding and expanding ecologically oriented practices in education. This honest reflection is enhanced when paired with other like-minded educators and explored in the context of improving practice. REFERENCES Albom, M. (1997). Tuesdays with Morrie: An old man, a young man, and life’s greatest lesson. New York: Random House. Auden, W. H. (1939, September 1). Retrieved February 15, 2010, from http://www.poets.org/view media.php/prmMID/15545 Jackson, P. (1968). Life in classrooms. New York: Teachers College Press. Moroye, C. M. (2009). Complementary curriculum: The work of ecologically minded teachers. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 41(6). Moroye, C. M. (2007). Greening our future: The practices of ecologically minded teachers. Unpublished Dissertation, University of Denver. Noddings, N. (1992). The challenge to care in schools: An alternative approach to education. New York: Teachers College Press. Oliver, M. (2003). Owls and other fantasies: Poems and essays. Boston: Beacon Press.

114

ELIZABETH OZAR

10. ECOHELPING EDUCATORS

The county of Los Angeles sprawls coarsely throughout Southern California, spreading its fingers like a dying brown moss across the lower half of the state. At its most western point, the county spans miles upon miles of magnificent coastline. Fabled to have the most beautiful beaches in the world, Malibu’s sands stretch along the southern spine of California for 21 of these glorious miles. Appropriately, the city’s name is derived from the local Native American Chumash who called it “Humaliwo,” which roughly translates to “the surf sounds loudly.” Smugly basking in the sun and glowing from its notorious stars, the city of Malibu is a jewel in the rough that is the county of Los Angeles. Rough would be an adequate, if not appropriate, descriptor for inner city life in the City of Angels. In the mountains and canyons to the east of Malibu and Ventura County beaches lies the Santa Monica National Recreation Area. It is a federal park specifically designated for Angelinos’ recreational pleasure, run by the National Park Service (a branch of the U.S. Government’s Department of the Interior). The park itself is loosely conjoined into segments divided by spotted plots of private property running throughout. The Santa Monica National Recreation Area, or SaMo, as its patrons more affectionately refer to it, procured enough money through grants from the California Coastal Commission and Cooperative Conservation Initiative to start a program called Ecohelpers. The purpose of the Ecohelpers’ program is to reach out to inner city high school pupils. These students, often of a lower socio-economic status, are taught about the ecology of the park and the effects that animals and plants have on the environment. The program’s goal is to foster an increased sensitivity and awareness for the environment around them, while showing them the beauty of a place so close to home (but yet, so foreign to most). This is a learning experience that cannot be absorbed through the pages of a book, but must be physically felt with wondering eyes and curious hands. As a bonus, the program has the long-term effect of drawing students in as volunteers (a mutually beneficial situation for both park and pupil), which adds up to be an incredible source of manpower to help improve and restore the park. As an Ecohelpers coordinator, I was a jack-of-all-trades. I helped plan students’ trips, taught them about the environment, talked with their teachers, created curriculum, designed posters, and participated in the physical restoration of the park. Restoration included planting native plants and removing non-native plants to restore the native habitat of the park. While I was a coordinator, the majority of the restoration took place at Zuma Canyon (derived from the Chumash word for “abundance”), right across the Pacific Coast Highway from the renowned and ever-popular Zuma Beach. P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 115–120. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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There are numerous reasons why teachers sign their classes up for Ecohelpers year after year. When every program is nearing its end, the head teacher is given a program evaluation to complete before leaving to assess the program’s effectiveness and the reasons for the teacher’s participation. The questions asked include: What were your expectations of the Ecohelpers program? Were they met? What worked most and least in the program? Do you think that the program increased your students’ appreciation of national parks and plant diversity? How could we improve the Ecohelpers program? Did you receive our “Ecohelpers Teacher’s Manual” in the mail, or access it online? Which sections were useful/not useful and why? Were you able to do any of the pre-trip activities? Why or why not? For materials used, please give a numerical value of usefulness from 1–5, with 1 being least useful and 5 being most useful to your student’s learning experience. ____ Teacher’s Manual ____ Lesson Plans ____ Worksheets ____ Curriculum One of the main reasons teachers state for coming to Ecohelpers is to give their students, who are largely underprivileged, the opportunity to experience the ecology of the local area hands-on, instead of gaining knowledge solely through a book. Ecohelpers gives many students who have never been in a national park before their first experience. A quote from a recent teacher evaluation states that the program simply gave them a chance “to be out in nature and make a difference in the environment.” On a more practical level, a Park Ranger at SaMo who has been with the Ecohelpers program for many years explains that “Many teachers come to us when they see free bus, curriculum-based, and service learning. With tight school funding, but knowing the value of field trips, it’s an opportunity for real-life education supported by the school administration.” Not only does Ecohelpers provide the high-level take-aways that teachers like to provide for their students, but it also helps in a practical way. Providing financial incentives helps teachers fit the program into their schedule and budgets. For Ecohelpers’ staff (including myself ), a typical day consists of early morning preparation. We gather supplies, which consist of handouts, maps, and communication equipment. When supplies are collected, we leave SaMo headquarters, in Thousand Oaks, in our government trucks driving through the canyons towards the sea. Once we arrive at Zuma Canyon we open our tool shed and start taking out our other supplies. Hoes, gloves, shovels, rakes, trash barrels, posters, and an easel are staged for the different portions of the program. Since the parking lot is not paved, cones are set up to guarantee the school bus room to park. Portable bathrooms are checked for cleanliness and stocked with toilet paper. On days when classes are not scheduled to come to Zuma Canyon, we work preparing for the incoming students. For instance, holes are dug with a gas-powered auger to ease students’ efforts at planting. Areas are weed-whacked to enable 116

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students to see what they were doing while planting. Often we walk trails to make sure they are suitable for walking. We also frequently check for new examples of wildlife habitats and plants to show off. However, on the days in which buses of rowdy teenagers come to visit SaMo, we have our work cut out for us. The first thing we do (much to their dismay) is to climb onto the bus once it stops before letting them out. We introduce ourselves, and then we talk about park safety. Part of the short and to-the-point speech is about respecting the park, plants, and animals that live there, and leaving it the way they find it, (i.e., not bringing things home with them or defacing the park). We also discuss specifics about safety. In particular, we talk about our twitchy rattlesnakes and itchy poison oak populations. After the speech is over, the excitement (and now, slight trepidation from some students) often comes to a boiling point, bubbling over and out of the bus into the park. The first crucial stop is the bathrooms. Once that is out of the way, the students trickle into the picnic area and crowd onto brown benches. Usually, this is done while laughing and chatting. Once everyone is seated, the teacher often helps calm the crowd and we wait for their full attention. Luckily, cell phone reception is non-existent in the park, which with teenagers works in our favor. We start off by talking about how Southern California is a Mediterranean ecosystem. We explain how everything in the ecosystem relies on all other things and is interrelated—from the lowest thing in the chain to the top of the ecosystem, the mountain lion. The mountain lion is always a huge source of interest and curiosity. The park’s mountain lions are tracked and studied in depth by SaMo scientists since there are not many of them in the park. Typical questions include how many there are, if they have ever attacked humans, and how often they are seen on trails. After we show actual pictures of animals that are native to the park and high on the food chain, we pass around shed rattlesnake skin and pieces of birds’ nests. We use this tactile experience to segue into talking about native birds and hawks. We then show pictures of parrots and ask if the class thinks they are native or not. We often get mixed answers so we then explain that the flock of parrots is not native to the area, but had been abandoned as pets and managed to survive because the climate of Southern California is not dissimilar from that of their homeland. Finally, we discuss how the wild parrots have an impact on the native birds. The crux of our conversation moves from that point on. We talk about nonnative plants and invasive species versus native plants and animals. We discuss the ways in which the ecosystem has been destroyed or altered, for what purpose this destruction has occurred, and the consequences of these actions. We talk about how invasive species have encroached upon the land, how the re-vegetation work the park is doing would help restore the disturbed native habitat and why this is so crucial. The example we use is an avocado grove that was hidden away in part of the park that was once used for agricultural purposes. There was debate as to whether the grove should be removed because it was not native. Should the park root out all new arrivals, regardless of whether they were detrimental to native species or not? Lying at the heart of the issue was the fact that the avocados were unobtrusive guests. 117

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Even though they were not native to our Mediterranean ecosystem, they were not reproducing out of control nor negatively affecting the environment. In contrast, invasive species, commonly seen as weeds in the park, take hold of an area that we refer to as disturbed (meaning the soil had been disturbed and native plants uprooted) and reproduce uncontrollably with no natural predators to keep them in check. Often these plants are harmful to the native plants and animals. After sharing all of this, we then talk about SaMo’s efforts to restore the park’s original habitat to avoid the harmful effects of these invasive species. After answering questions, we split the class into a few groups depending on the size of the troop at large. Each Ecohelper’s coordinator or volunteer takes a group on a short hike, planting session, or weed-pulling exercise. Once each activity is finished in the allotted amount of time, the groups rotate to the next exercise. The weed-pulling group travels to an area of the park that has been overgrown with invasive weeds. We give the students gloves and demonstrate the place on the plant to grab and the proper way to pull weeds without getting hurt. The students usually really take to this task. By the end, there is often a stack of weeds piled exorbitantly high. The hiking group goes on a short hike on the trail into Zuma Canyon, making frequent stops along the way. This is a journey through time, a hike through the land as the Chumash had walked it. We pause at the native wood rat’s home and show how it has learned to use native tree twigs to build a home for its family. We pass out the seeds of a native plant the Chumash had eaten on hikes to maintain their stamina. As students savor the seeds, we ask them what flavors it reminds them of (the answer is usually watermelon). Along the way, we talk about the Chumash and their traditions, and make it a point to discuss the ways that the Chumash would use certain plants and why. We cross over a small creek and talk about watershed ecology—what watersheds are (the area that drains to a common waterway, such as a stream or the ocean), what they are composed of, and why they are important (because our individual actions can directly affect them). Students who stare out their windows onto concrete courtyards during biology class, unable to mentally grasp examples, can finally see a watershed in action. The experience is a direct connection to what they are studying in their textbooks and their actual physical world. Lastly, the planting group journeys to a section of land in the park that we have already prepared with the auger and have cleared of weeds. This method, we have found, increased the chances that the newly planted shrub growing without being choked by weeds. One of our park rangers who specializes in land restoration and invasive plants has already conducted the research on what the proper mix of native plants was to be for the area. So we load our trucks with plants from the SaMo nursery and put them in the designated holes the day before a field trip. Previous rows have been planted by us or other classes and are consistently watered until they can fend for themselves. We point out these rows and plants so they will not get trampled (sometimes in vain). When the group has gathered in front of the staging area, we begin our planting demonstration. 118

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One has to keep in mind that many of the kids have never set foot into a national park before. They have never participated in any capacity in gardening, and the instruments of planting and tending a garden are often foreign to them. Therefore, we start out with the very basics. We explain the names and proper uses of a hoe, rake, and shovel. They are usually so entertained by the fact that one of the tools was called a “hoe” that we often have to pause the demonstration for the laughter to subside. We teach them safety procedures with the tools, which include not hitting other students with them and to be mindful of where they are swinging them. We show them how to use the hoe to clear out the last of stubborn weeds surrounding their holes. We then demonstrate how to use the shovel to get the dirt out of the hole. After that, we explain how to gently take the plant out of its plastic pot without hurting it. Finally, we explain that they must keep the plant level with the ground— not above or below it—or else it would most likely not survive. During the planting, we split the kids into pairs so they have a partner to consult with, and then we send them off to try their hands at planting. We walk around answering questions and helping the groups with their newly named plants. Usually, at the end of the day, we fix a handful of plants that were not planted correctly. Yet, with 80 or so plants on average, we experience a fantastic success rate. When the program is over, if students want to see more of the park we take them on an extra hike. Following they often come back to the picnic area to gossip, tease each other, and eat their lunches. After properly disposing of their trash and cleaning up their picnic, through some cajoling and threats from their teachers, the students begrudgingly head back to their buses. With some smiles and some shouts of “Thank you!” they climb back onto their big yellow submarines, starting the long journey back into the city. For many, this is their first foray into a national park, and for some, it might be their last. But it will likely not be forgotten. The days at Zuma Canyon give them concrete examples and experiences to better understand what was going on in the environmental units that they had been studying in their biology books. Ecohelpers provides an invaluable experience for both students and teachers, shown by responses given in teacher evaluations. In 2008 and 2009 some evaluation responses stated, “students were able to connect the ideas they learned in class to the actual outside environment,” and that it “expanded their conceptions of national parks.” Teachers, more often than not, came back year after year with their classes, delighted at the opportunity to give their students the chance to interact with their surroundings. Students gain a better and deeper grasp of the material than they would by looking solely at a textbook. Being able to smell, touch, and taste plants made their learning more real. Seeing animals and an actual watershed made the experience more meaningful. It makes tangible the negative impacts of invasive species and damage to the environment. The Ecohelpers’ program is unique because it enables illustration of higher-level concepts in ecology by showing real life examples. Through its hands-on approach, it challenges students to apply the knowledge they acquired in the classroom to the outside world. As Richard Louv (2008) discusses in his article in the Journal of 119

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the Wilderness Education Association, the time that kids spend outdoors with nature is diminishing. While they may be aware of the current global threats to the environment, their own time and intimacy with nature is lessening. Louv and others argue the huge importance of this contact, not only for physical health reasons, but for child development and connection to the world. In other research (Cachelin, Paisley and Blanchard, 2009), quantitative responses suggested that field-based participants “demonstrated greater cognitive understanding” than classroom-based participants. One of the evident, immediate benefits of Ecohelpers is that it makes the students excited and involved. Instead of just listening to a class lecture, they enjoy the experience firsthand and felt the impact on the environment themselves. The Ecohelpers program affords students who might never have the chance to experience an outdoor natural space a wonderful opportunity to appreciate the complexity and fragility of nature and ecosystems. Research shows that student participation in nature is important. (O’Brien, 2009). There are many ways in which you may accomplish integrating outdoors with indoors education. Start by checking out where your local national, state, county, and city parks are, enquire if they have educational programs and if so, what benefits they offer and what topics they focus on. If there are no pre-existing programs for the topic you are teaching, many parks’ educational programs, will work with you to design something to fit your needs. Making that first contact is crucial. Also, check with private and non-profit outdoors organizations—many offer educational programs. Check with other teachers in your area to see if there are hands-on outdoor programs in existence already. If you are unable to find programs, create your own. Check with other locales that already have programs and preparations made, and you can use the previous successes of others to get your program off the ground. REFERENCES Cachelin, A., Paisley, K., & Blanchard, A. (2009). Using the significant life experience framework to inform program evaluation: The nature conservancy’s wings & water wetlands education program. Journal of Environmental Education, 40(2), 2–14. Louv, R. (2008). National Conference on Outdoor Leadership. 2008 Keynote Address. Journal of the Wilderness Education Association, 20(1), 4–6. O’Brien, L. (2009). Learning outdoors: The forest school approach. Education, 3–13, 37(1), 45F–60F.

120

CAITLIN LINDQUIST

11. SNAPSHOTS OF HISTORY Engaging Students in Critical Thought

INTRODUCTION

His classroom is academically action-packed and full of surprises. To watch Mr. Stoddard teach is to witness an intricate interplay between student and teacher. Students ask probing questions and begin discussions that push the class into unexpected spaces. Student appetites are whetted, resulting in a dance of pushing and pulling, statement and explanation, opinion and rejoinder. His work is like that of a photojournalist, taking snapshots of history with which students can interact. His lens encompasses United States History and Geography, and he adjusts his camera’s settings for certain environmental variables including student interest and current events. Mr. Stoddard’s intuition informs his choice of what content to include and teach and how to display it for his students. His students see the results of his work and are able to interact with his artful approach to teaching by critique and discussion. There are four things Mr. Stoddard does really well in his American History course at Green Hill High School. First, his pedagogy creates space for and fosters critical thought. Fisher and Scriven (1997) define critical thinking as “Skilled, active, interpretation and evaluation of observations, communications, information, and argumentation.” In thinking critically, one considers all evidence and uses criteria to form a judgment about the problem at hand. Mr. Stoddard’s classroom environment is set up so that students engage in reflective judgment as they are confronted with opportunities to consider history and current events in ways that require them to formulate their own opinions. For instance, the bulletin board headed “Political Satire” is filled with cartoons that require the reader to understand historical context so that they grasp the critique presented in the illustration. Students are required to discern what the cartoon is saying by using background knowledge and by applying new knowledge to the political context. Learners then formulate their own opinions of the situation being described after engaging with it critically. The atmosphere of critical inquiry is not solely apparent in the physical environment of the classroom, but also included in the tone of class lectures. The classroom environment will be further described in detail later in this essay. Secondly, Mr. Stoddard pushes students to the edge of their comfort zones in an evocative way by engaging students in the class in cognitive dissonance, or the ability to hold two conflicting viewpoints simultaneously. Mr. Stoddard believes he is doing his job well if attitudes, beliefs and behaviors are called into question. P.B. Uhrmacher and K.E. Bunn, Beyond the One Room School, 121–134. © 2011 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.

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Mr. Stoddard intentionally prods his students to question their beliefs and to consider different perspectives on a daily basis. His hope is that students will learn to be independent thinkers able to justify their beliefs based on what they have learned in his courses. He strives to have his students understand their roles in the world and how people throughout time have made a social impact on the world. In order to get there, though, it becomes necessary for students to come into a state of dissonance or contradiction of beliefs before they can be reconciled to a state of consonance. Third, Mr. Stoddard presents American History from a variety of perspectives, human and non-human. For instance, when he teaches about the bison and westward expansion he presents the Native American perspective by delving into the symbiotic Native American relationship with the bison. In the discussion of westward expansion, the savannah and the bison are presented in first person narrative, each with their own voices and stories to tell. A video on the tall grass prairie presents the prairie as being alive and anthropomorphized to explain, first hand, how the ecology of the area functions. He makes connections between areas of content to show the interdependence of man upon animal, on animal upon biome. The incorporation of multiple lenses into the curriculum and how they interact is very intentional. The syllabus states that the course intends to cover the history of the United States from social, cultural, political, economic, intellectual and military perspectives, which are all forces in the shaping of the United States. “All of America’s people and their contributions to American culture are included: Native American, Hispanic, African-American, Anglo-American, women and men. The course will examine all viewpoints of history ...” The syllabus continues to explain that controversial topics will be addressed regularly as they are a foundational part of American history and forewarns that students ought to be prepared to have their historical beliefs questioned. “This course will teach students to identify bias in all forms, to read between the lines … History is studied not to indoctrinate a population, but rather to enable it to better understand the past in order to create a more democratic society for the future.” Critical thinking, cognitive dissonance, and the use of multiple perspectives and how they interface are all intentional pieces of his U.S. History curriculum. Fourth, Mr. Stoddard provides multiple entry points for students to connect with the subject matter. Not only does he discuss the interdependence of man and animal, but he also hooks students using the classroom environment to provoke thinking, using questioning to make contextual connections to content, and he teaches difficult subjects (such as lynching) to make emotional connections to the subject at hand. Making learning relevant and bringing emotion into the classroom ensure memorable lessons for his students. Not only do students learn to relate to subject matter by connecting it to their own lives, but they are also asked to put themselves in someone else’s shoes. They are asked to feel how another may have felt with respect to their own historical circumstance. CLASSROOM VIGNETTE

Today he takes his place at the podium in the center of the front of the room, which seems oddly formal for a teacher of his relaxed personality. Three columns of desks 122

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expand out in front of him, some angled inward. He is well-dressed and maintains a professional attitude even while students tease him about the fluorescent light reflecting off of his bald head. I rise to introduce myself, although students seem largely unfazed by my presence. He reiterates to students that I am here as a researcher from a local university. After clarification regarding my role as researcher, I am seated at the back of the room at a table in the corner. Beside me is a large floor-to-ceiling window reflecting the sun as it works up the strength to rise; shadows against the white blinds are ever-changing as time progresses. The teacher’s metal desk is impressively clean and organized, as is the rest of the room. Students are listening to expectations for their upcoming research projects, and the teacher reorients the class to the syllabus. At the front of the room are two white boards surrounded by newspaper cartoons under the heading “Political Satire.” Beside one of the boards hangs the American flag. Other walls are lined by a series of prominent quotes that relate to the content below them. “How smooth must be the language of the whites to make right look wrong and wrong look right,” stated by Chief Black Hawk, headlines a board full of images. Photographs of Native American Chiefs including Red Cloud, along with color photographs of the American landscape, are displayed below Black Hawk’s quote. The images and quotation serve to demonstrate the interconnection between the white man, Native Americans and the land. A colorful world map that is surrounded by black-and-white photos of National Parks including Yosemite, Denali, and the formidable California Redwoods swallows the wall behind me. Portraits of inspirational people intermingle, Einstein, Gandhi, and John Lennon included. Looking around the room, photographs of Amelia Earhart, Rosie the Riveter, and Malcolm X are found as well as a large black paper cut out of the profile of the African continent. The images and articles selectively placed on the walls reveal Mr. Stoddard’s political leanings and biases. However, in his classroom he is careful to balance pushing both liberal and conservative thought and provides his students the chance to see events through a variety of political lenses. He is careful to present multiple perspectives and their gradations to his classes, with the expectation that students will be able to interpret and evaluate historical and current events on their own. In fact, that is very much the intention of the course—to make it so that students are able to make competent evaluations of situations; to see a variety of focal points through different lenses before depressing the shutter to capture the final image. The physical environment is arranged so that no visitor can escape without having her ideas and beliefs called into question. Posters, sayings, news articles, photographs, and paper homages cover the walls in an inescapable fashion; the second one enters the room she is inundated and stimulated both visually and intellectually. Engaging in the classroom’s surroundings pushes me into a space of critical thought. Am I a “tree with no roots?” Or do I pass the test of knowing the history of my people? How do I connect to the images and articles in front of me? What is my lens, and are my images in focus or are they distorted? This is how he uses the classroom environment to provoke thinking and connecting. 123

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Mr. Stoddard begins the class with the statement “music shapes and reflects society.” He then asks if any students know what music the Columbine shooters were listening to before they went on their rampage, making the connection between recent events and what will become his lesson on protest music. His evocative question also serves to engage students emotionally by referencing a tragic event that happened so close to home. He continues, stating that after the shootings people were looking for their violent inspiration, for somewhere to point their finger. Mr. Stoddard tells the class “They weren’t listening to anything, they were bowling.” He continues: “Why are we discussing bowling?” Because if music shapes and reflects society, surely there is a melodic nemesis out there that could be partially responsible for inspiring the Columbine shooters. However, because the students were not listening to music prior to the shootings, and because that nemesis was essentially nonexistent, Mr. Stoddard asks if it would be appropriate to ban bowling. The intentional discussion is centered on students finding flawed logic in arguments. In this case, it is the fact that music alone cannot be responsible for social ills and wrongdoings. Music is powerful in that it encapsulates and reflects society while simultaneously influencing how society sees itself. It is a powerful communicator of feelings and experience as well as a sociopolitical gauge of sorts that keeps a cultural pulse. However, it alone cannot be the reason that all societal ills take place. This opening segues into the main lecture on protest music and its role in the history of the United States. The 1920s are the era of focus; more specifically the struggles African Americans faced during that time. The African American experience, the fight for survival and gut-wrenching racism that arose during an era of lynching, are the focus for today’s lecture. Mr. Stoddard intentionally plans his lecture with a variety of entry points for students to connect to the content. Not only does he draw connections between protest music and social unrest of the time, but he also offers opportunities for students to grapple with the content, to explore their own discomforts, to feel the music. CRITICAL THOUGHT

Between the end of the Civil War and the Civil Rights movement, there were fewer than 5,000 lynchings in the United States. “What constitutes lynching?” Mr. Stoddard asks. He then answers his own question, stating that lynching is “murdering someone outside of the justice system; vigilante rule.” Something so heinous was not difficult to justify in the 1920s. Any action that was considered an infraction at the time could be used to rationalize lynching, including the rape of white women, African Americans owning land in the “wrong” geographic area, or an African American attempting to cast a ballot at the ballot box. The lecture then dives into Strange Fruit, the song that will be focused on today as sung by Billie Holiday. As the song plays, it’s nearly impossible to not recognize that its content is disturbing; the lyrics are nauseating, its era haunting. Mr. Stoddard introduces Strange Fruit by explaining that it was written in 1938 under the pseudonym Lewis Allan to conceal the songwriter’s Jewish heritage in hopes of increasing the song’s popularity. The Jewish school teacher from the Bronx was inspired by a photograph of a lynching and created a poem and the 124

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subsequent song as a form of protest to bring lynching into the public eye. The 1920s saw jazz emerge as a sociopolitical force, which would prove to be the opportune time and genre for Allan’s lyrics to be given life. The overhead is on, lights are off, and the sun slowly sheds light against the dense gray carpet. Students are now asked to connect their own music listening habits to the lesson by considering how many hours a week they spend listening to recorded music versus live music. Why would Mr. Stoddard care about listening to recorded music versus listening to live music? Students chime in with responses about feeling energized at concerts, the inspiration that they have experienced seeing live performances, and what it is like to experience live music with other people versus listening to a recording alone. They are drawn into the content by making contextual connections. Further questions are presented: What technologies are used to make the music you listen to? What recording artists to you like and listen to the most? Have any of these artists made you aware of a problem or an issue in our society? If the students answered “no” to the last question, Mr. Stoddard asks them to see him at lunchtime. What problems has music brought to your attention? How does the song or music make you feel about the issue? This is how he uses questioning to make contextual and emotional connections to content. Content is made relevant to learners as they are asked to tap into their own musical listening habits to contemporary society and to historically significant songs, including Strange Fruit. COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

8:13 a.m. “What role do the lyrics play in how it makes you feel? What role does the music itself play in how it makes you feel?” The last questions are clearly intended to provoke students into separating melody from lyric, as evidenced by Mr. Stoddard’s next example. “Imagine Rage Against the Machine set to a South American flautist. Not the same, is it?” He delves into the superficiality of current pop music and reveals apparent concerns that music not assuming the social responsibility it once carried so ardently, especially during times of unrest. “Give me two years of voice training, a packet of lyrics and a recording booth, and I’ll be the next Jessica Simpson,” he quips. The lyrics for Strange Fruit are projected on the overhead. Students are expected to follow along and to take notes for follow up questions, which will be turned in. He probes students to consider the lyrics, the music, and why Billie Holiday was chosen to sing the song versus someone else. The room is chilly; a draft flows across the room and goose bumps take up residence on my arms. Jackets are put on for comfort as Mr. Stoddard retreats to the back of the room, giving the music and lyrics the limelight. “Southern trees bear strange fruit/Blood in the leaves and blood at the root/ Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze/Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees 125

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Pastoral scene of the gallant South/The bulging eyes and twisted mouth/The scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh/Then the sudden smell of burning flesh Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck/For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck/ For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop/Here is a strange and bitter crop.” Romanticized images of agrarian life on a plantation, the large magnolia blossoms, the South as a paradise based on what is noble, virtuous, and chivalrous are contrasted with the bulging eyes and twisted mouth of the murdered dead. Students are asked to answer the follow-up questions that they will keep private as the song is played again. Billie Holiday’s pacifying and gentle voice creates beauty out of atrocity while students answer the question of how the song makes them feel. This is the space of cognitive dissonance, where students are asked to hold two opposing viewpoints at once. On the one hand is the pastoral South, presented as casual, polite, and pastoral, while beneath the landscape is a society entrenched in racism and hatred. How is it that in such a romanticized setting African-American people are struggling to survive in a society that hates them and hangs them from the boughs of trees? How is it that these conflicting ideas are reconciled? How do students cope with the discomfort inherent in such disturbing and important content? Mr. Stoddard delves deeper into content to allow students more space to think critically about the situation they are studying so that they can create their own answers and draw their own conclusions. 8:34 a.m. Mr. Stoddard slowly migrates to the front of the room. “Why were most lynching victims hung from trees? How do we know the song is about lynching? What is the proof? How do we know Mr. Stoddard didn’t come to this conclusion by himself ? The track is on its fifth revolution. He prefaces the next question, stating it is most likely the most difficult to answer. “What contrast is made between the gallant South and the South that bears strange fruit? What is ironic about this contrast?” Spin number six on the CD; Mr. Stoddard takes his place sitting on a student desk, biting into a muffin and swinging his left leg below him. He rises and adjusts the overhead in preparation for the revelation of the next question to be projected on the front wall. The song ends again, and is played again. 8:42 a.m. Do you think this song is more powerful because the topic of lynching is implied instead of stated? Why? He expounds: “What if the song were called ‘Lynching Must Stop’? Would that have been a better idea?” Mr. Stoddard then connects the lesson to present-day and asks if there are modern-day lynchings. Students are asked to delve into the content on a literal and metaphorical basis at this point. Students raise the issue of nooses that have sprung up across the United States recently that carry intentions of the threat of lynching; the noose is a reminder of confederacy. Mr. Stoddard adds that students who hung nooses in Louisiana were 126

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defended by the school district as having played a prank. “How did the school administration come to that conclusion?” he asks. The only conclusion reached is that perhaps the situation was downplayed to mitigate fear, albeit entirely inappropriately. Mr. Stoddard relates the story of James Byrd from Jasper, Texas who was a mentally compromised man of color on his way home from a bar. A group of whites offered him a ride in their pickup truck, which he refused. The whites kidnapped him, tied a rope around his neck, and dragged his body for miles down a winding dirt road. The centrifugal force from rounding a curve slammed James’ body into a pole, decapitating him. His head was left on the doorstep of a black church with a note pinned on it. Mr. Stoddard does not offer what the note said. VARIETY OF PERSPECTIVES

The next questions are posed as a string of related questions that are all incredibly complex on their own. “Can historians gauge the effects of a song on the public? If so, how? For example, does Hip Hop reflect an American culture of misogyny, or does it perpetuate it? Why is Rap more controversial than starting a war illegally? Should crimes motivated by hate (for example, the murder of James Byrd) be treated separately from crimes motivated by envy or greed?” With only a few minutes left, optional extra credit activities are presented to the kids. Students are given the opportunity to express their learning using multiple forms of representation. Mr. Stoddard invites them to write a song or paint an issue of concern to them. The lights flicker back on—glaring, headachy and a harsh awakening to the mundane after an intense and disturbing discussion of U.S. History. 8:59 a.m. Students rise and place their papers in the in-box beside where I am sitting. Crowded around, they wait for the stapler, chatting and discussing the extra credit options. The end of class signals for the students to get organized and ready to move on to their next class. Students start talking and the chaotic transition between classes ensues as the students pack up and leave for next period. A week later, Mr. Stoddard and I met to discuss his pedagogy. He is in his eighth year of teaching high school at Green Hill, and needless to say derives his inspiration from feeling responsible to educate students about social justice issues. He has always felt a magnetic connection to global issues. The profundity of his concern regarding sociopolitical issues was greatly influenced by teachers who taught him about genocide, colonialism, and anthropology. During his adolescence, Mr. Stoddard felt a strong connection to the Transcendentalist movement and to powerful individual figures such as Gandhi and Thoreau. He began to question everything about paradigms and institutions after his grandmother’s passing. The questioning resulted in the eventual exploration of Rastafarianism. He was quick to realize that Reggae music addressed the issues at the forefront for him, including poverty and colonialism. These are the issues he prefers to discuss all day, regardless of who he is with. 127

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Day Two First thing in the morning, students saunter in and take their seats. Before I know it, every classroom chair is full. The class is directed to pick up three handouts from the back table. Mr. Stoddard reminds students, “We’ve been looking at westward expansion from various perspectives.” The American History class has been studying westward expansion through the eyes of robber barons and rebels, corporations and capitalism. Today in class, students will look at westward expansion from an environmental perspective. Primary sources are used to shed light on historical context surrounding the extermination of the bison. The points of view presented in class are not relegated to human perspectives. Rather, the points of view expressed in the class include those of various animal and environmental perspectives. Mr. Stoddard gives the class response questions that they are assigned for homework, including one that asks for a description of the process of westward expansion from the perspective of wolves or bison. When asked, one student offers that no one has ever asked her to think from a different perspective before and she becomes visibly excited about answering the question. In order to answer the response questions, students are expected to wade through a myriad of materials that present information helpful for their responses. It goes without saying that Mr. Stoddard expects more than canned answers from his students. In providing primary and secondary sources to his students, he expects them to engage critically with the material and to make sense of it for themselves. The material students learn is integrated across the year; interdependence between ecological and political systems is woven into his American History and Geography courses. While students are asked to ruminate on the response questions, Mr. Stoddard broaches the topics of European livestock and disease, and the complications associated with each are addressed. CONNECTIONS

The breadth of the material presented to the classroom is vast, as though captured through a wide-angle lens. The relationship between the bison and Native Americans is explored by reading diverse texts from the Buffalo Bill of Rights to an article by an environmental historian who argues that the Native American and bison relationship is exaggerated. The impact of gender on bison extermination and how women became instrumental in the creation of sought-after bison robes for the European market is also explored. Despite the role that Native American tribes played in the extermination of the bison, it was the European presence that had the greatest impact on the bison’s extinction. A film is shown about the Great Plains region, its ecology and climate and the relationship of the Lakota to the plains. The railroad, the expansion of the United States, and the impact of fencing property all contributed to the end of freedom for the Lakota. Natural migration of bison and therefore Native Americans was inhibited; encroachment reduced their territories and contributed to their demise. 128

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The interconnected web of the Lakota, the plains, and the reduction of natural migration is presented and discussed. Another film on the tall grass prairie is used to show the relationships between prairies, grasses, bison, fire, and native people. “My music is the sound of thunder” opens the film, hooves beating in the dust. “I have a story to tell,” says the tall grass prairie, as the ecological theme continues to be woven in with content. It seems challenging to make history as appealing to high school students as Mr. Stoddard does, much less relevant to them personally. The use of multimedia aids in the presentation of varying perspectives while simultaneously allowing for students to remain engaged with the course content. How is it that Mr. Stoddard has made otherwise potentially inaccessible content relevant to students? How is it that he keeps them engaged? Mr. Stoddard incorporates relevant topics into the curriculum, in this case ecology. He teaches about the symbiotic relationship between the Great Plains, buffalo, fire, wolves, and Native Americans. The prairie and its climate were imperative to the Lakota and their relationship with the plains. Their relationship to the buffalo included that the fact that buffalo provided sinew for thread, stomach for bottles, hooves for glue, hides for teepees, clothing and shoes, meat for food and bones for tools. On their own, the Native Americans were doing well and had established a healthy, symbiotic relationship with the land. However, that all changed with settlement. Once settlers arrived after the Civil War, multiple versions of how the land ought to be used developed. For instance, Colonel Harrington decided the Bozeman Trail ought to be used for gold prospecting, while Chief Red Cloud wanted to maintain the plains Indians’ relationship with the land. This disagreement led Red Cloud to attack the soldiers. The eventual encroachment of the white man on Indian territory permanently altered the natural migration of the bison and therefore of Native Americans—yet another demonstration of the interconnected content Mr. Stoddard teaches. Tribes that once had (and needed) hundreds of square miles to survive saw their territory become encroached upon and reduced. Where bison once cut grass, tilled the soil, and fertilized the plains, they became game for tourist entertainment. The human desire to conquer nature reared its head and the buffalo’s numbers declined drastically. Here Mr. Stoddard underscores the Native American’s perspective on the extermination of the bison. Students are asked to consider what it would be like to live in those conditions, with one’s environment rapidly deteriorating while being implored to submit to intruders—the white man. What must it have felt like to have your home and resources whittled away, making it impossible to survive? What if your once healthful relationship to the land came under attack and was rendered unacceptable? Here Mr. Stoddard creates an emotional entry point for learners to connect to content by asking students to put themselves in someone else’s position. The next day is a discussion of Sand Creek and wolves, including film clips and an in-class project. An excerpt from Predatory Bureaucracy: The Extermination of Wolves and the Transformation of The West is handed out to students. Relationships between institutions and government and the creation of environmental precedent are discussed. These relationships, Mr. Stoddard contends, are at the center of the 129

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environmental crisis. This is in stark contrast to the Native American relationship with nature, which emphasizes unity and interdependence among all living things. Again, multiple perspectives on the subject are introduced, as is the notion of interdependence. Students are asked to hold contradictory viewpoints in their heads and to resolve them with critical thinking. Primary sources are used as tools to allow students to draw their own conclusions. His lecture on A North American Holocaust revolves around the extermination of wolves. The importance of historical context is discussed while Manifest Destiny is contrasted to the lives of the plains Indians. Where Manifest Destiny was about private property, fences, and ownership, the plains Indians’ relationship with the land was founded on respect for open plains and the wilderness. The battle between the European American and Native American societies began over the American dream. Europeans began to rid their homesteads of whatever they saw as obstacles, including people, animals, and predators that were threats to livestock. Stoddard connects this to the current issue of mountain lions in urban areas and questions who is in whose territory. From the perspective of the mountain lion, humans are the invaders. He wonders why it is that we don’t consider the perspective of the animal in question more frequently. RISK

Mr. Stoddard always knew that because of his desire to cover controversial topics, his course was a potential professional risk. The second page of the course syllabus is a waiver for parents and students to sign, which outlines four classroom rules intended to facilitate the smooth operation of the course and to protect Chris from any ensuing controversy his course might inspire. Although the classroom rules are brief, they are important and emphasize tolerance for differences, respect for all individuals, turning in assignments on time and coming to class prepared. The paragraph following the four bulleted rules reads, “The main objective of my class is to help students to think for themselves, and to become independent, responsible, upright young adults. This entails showing respect, consideration, and tolerance to all people and ideas in an academic context.” Mr. Stoddard encourages teachers to take risks, to do something different, which he considers best practice. He believes that teachers need to instruct students on how to think by teaching the whole student so they can succeed in any area. He advises to not allow education to devolve into a lockstep state that indoctrinates students. According to Mr. Stoddard, people ought to be well-rounded, literate citizens who not only contribute positively to society but can also cope with pressures of an increasingly complex society. If we don’t have people who can think outside the box, change won’t happen. Mr. Stoddard fears a move toward standardization across the board. Collaboration and team teaching can be highly effective while teachers maintain autonomy. “To me, part of teaching is art … I don’t have a lesson plan book, I’m just me in the classroom. There has to be a little bit of room for creativity and spontaneity. The problem with the creative side is that there can be disasters, too.” 130

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CREATING A SAFE ENVIRONMENT FOR CONTROVERSY

What are the implications for new teachers? First, Mr. Stoddard demonstrates that it is possible—and important—to teach from a variety of perspectives. Theoretically, this means looking at multiple opinions and critically evaluating each one for bias. It can also mean anthropomorphizing animals or the Great Plains, as Mr. Stoddard does. It is this characteristic of his teaching that makes it truly unique, not to mention engaging for students. His use of primary sources bolsters the ability for him to teach a variety of viewpoints as they represent opinions and facts in their original contexts. It is possible for students to then use the original sources to draw their own conclusions and to formulate their own opinions on a variety of history-related subjects. It is also important for new teachers, as Mr. Stoddard mentions, to know their school and classroom climates and their audiences. While the syllabus clearly stated that a component of the class would be cognitive dissonance, and despite the fact that each student signed a waiver, Mr. Stoddard still found himself up against the wall when it came to teaching controversial content. It cannot be emphasized enough that knowing the classroom and school climates is paramount to successful instruction of potentially touchy subjects. Administrative support and a progressive educational climate undergirded Mr. Stoddard’s ability to navigate any sticky situations, and he considers himself fortunate to have had as much support as he has. It is important to share with the administration what the class intentions are if one is to teach in a provocative way. The main implication in this circumstance is that waivers are important. If your content is going to be delivered in a way that might be seen as controversial, it is best to have a good defense. There are lessons to be learned in how Mr. Stoddard has set up his classroom environment as well. The physical space is engaging and thought-provoking. Posters, phrases, maps, and images of icons are present but not so overwhelming that the space is cluttered. However, each piece of paper on the wall has a reason for being there and was intentionally hung as a way to get students and visitors to the room to engage and connect to historical events. He discloses the importance of recognizing and admitting one’s bias, and he intentionally teaches learners how to detect bias in arguments. I asked Mr. Stoddard if it is possible, in his opinion, for teachers to leave bias at the door. He tells me absolutely not, that no knowledge is value-free. Even the scientific method is biased because it assumes hypothetical understanding is paramount, that linear understanding is the way; this discredits multidimensionality. Instead of pretending to not be biased, teachers need to teach to detect and understand bias so students can draw their own conclusions and decide for themselves whether they agree or disagree based on critical thought and evaluation. The implication here is that it is not only important to teach students to be critical thinkers, but it is also important for teachers to model how to think critically themselves. How provocatively should social studies topics be taught? Should social studies merely rely on objective facts, or is public controversy an indicator of a healthy classroom where issues are grappled with? The benefits include teaching critical 131

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thinking. A 2007 survey of 5,400 secondary students found that the following: “Students who regularly take part in classroom discussion are more likely to: – Vote in later life – Support basic democratic values – Take part in political discussions – Follow political news in the media – Be interested in the political process – Have confidence in their ability to influence public policy” (Barton, K. and McCully, A. 2007) Discussion of controversial content in schools allows students to become more active citizens than they would be had they not been exposed to discussion of difficult topics. The Ohio Department of Education published the report The Evidence Base for Social Studies: Controversial Issues1 which discusses how controversy can stimulate citizens to become engaged in public dialogue and broaden perspectives. The report cites Hess (2004) and states that “a positive relationship exists between discussion of complex issues and the development of tolerant attitudes and knowledge of the need for tolerance in democracies.” In order for democracy to grow and thrive, it is therefore important for individuals to express and accept different points of view. The free exchange of ideas is imperative to developing a healthy democratic climate, and one forum in which those exchanges take place is in the school setting. Schools provide the forum where learners discover how to interact with one another and where they can uncover and challenge black-and-white thinking to reveal gradations in between. Discussing controversial content can be an exercise in learning how to become a well-rounded citizen in a democratic society. According to the Ohio report: Hibbing and Theiss-Morse wish to promote a curriculum with hotly debated political issues in order to teach students that controversy is not an unfortunate by product of democracy but one of its core and vital elements. As a result of discussing controversial issues in the classroom, students score higher on measures of political efficacy and show positive correlations with following current events in media and discussing political matters with family and friends (Harwood and Hahn, 1999). The aim in teaching controversial content is to allow students to grow into individuals who can deal with complex issues in a competent manner while analyzing evidence and subsequently drawing their own conclusions. How is one to go about doing this in a healthy and helpful manner? Suzanne Cherrin (2004) developed what is known as “freedom with structure,” which aims for open, respectful dialogue about potentially difficult topics. “‘Freedom with structure’ is a balance of free expression of each student’s opinions and respect for other students and their opinions.” In order for learners to participate in high-level dialogue, they must be trained in ways that meet agreed-upon guidelines. Those guidelines might include reminding students that prejudicial comments might be offensive to classmates, and what the rules of engagement are when students disagree with one another. Issues to be discussed, according to Harwood and Hahn, 132

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ought to be selected based on student interest, maturity level, significance to larger society and relevance to their lives. The following classroom techniques and approaches to content have been demonstrated to be helpful when teaching controversial content: – Establish an open discussion climate where students feel free to disagree without being disagreeable (Harwood and Hahn, 1999) – Express personal perspectives when appropriate without promoting that position to the students (Harwood and Hahn, 1999) – In elementary grades, begin with teacher-centered whole group discussions (Jeong and VanSickle, 2003) – Maintain focus and direction of discussions and model thoughtfulness when listening and responding to others (Harwood and Hahn, 1999) – Be aware of vocabulary when referring to members of disadvantaged groups; ask “Am I presenting the issue in such a way that students will be inspired to explore them further rather than reinforcing biases?” (Cherrin, 2004) – Introduce fewer topics and examine them more thoroughly (Loewen, 1995) – Ask challenging questions and provide challenging tasks which require opportunities for multiple answers and means of presentation (Jeong and VanSickle, 2003) – Provide students the opportunity to delve into historical controversies (Loewen, 1995) – Respond to all student remarks with respect and dignity (does not mean rubber stamping the statement) (Cherrin, 2004) – Identify statements related to cultural myths or fallacies (Cherrin, 2004) – Challenge students to produce valid evidence for their positions (Cherrin, 2004) – Maintain intellectual balance by promoting freedom for expressing alternative points of view (Harwood and Hahn, 1999) – Provide the resources necessary for students to determine the validity of a position or to become aware of weaknesses in a position (Evans et al., 2000) – Encourage students to participate in discussions, school governance, and local/ state/national political action without advocating a particular position or party (“The Civic Mission of Schools,” 2003) – Equip students with decision-making, problem solving skills that enable them to make a difference through open discussions, position papers and debates dealing with current or controversial topics (Osler and Starkey, 2003) Regardless of his political leanings, Mr. Stoddard’ classroom and lessons have embedded in them lessons that we can all learn from. Perhaps at the forefront is the issue of how to teach controversial issues and how its importance ought to be of concern to all teachers regardless of their own political beliefs. While it is understandable that teachers and administrators do not intend to incite conflict, it is not possible to teach students to be effective thinkers if one avoids controversial social studies topics at all costs. The idea of inextricably interlinking content with emotional, contextual, and content-informed connections to create powerful learning experiences is another lesson that can be gleaned from watching Mr. Stoddard’s class. The role of the classroom environment, physically, contextually and emotionally 133

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speaking, is incredibly important to making learning meaningful. It is possible to create a physical space that challenges, a contextual space that connects content to schema, an emotional space that is safe and yet provocative. All of this coalesces to create the opportunity for learners to see an issue from a variety of vantage points. In order for students to be able to create their own snapshots, they must first see the world through a wide-angle lens. NOTES 1

“The Evidence Base for Social Studies: Controversial Issues” (54 KB) Ohio Department of Education website (accessed Oct. 2, 2009). http://www.procon.org/viewresource.asp?resourceID=2016#A

REFERENCES Barton, K., & McCully, A. (2007). Teaching controversial issues...Where controversial issues really matter. Teaching History. Retrieved from http://www.procon.org/viewresource.asp?resourceID=2016 Gibson, C., & Levine, P. (Eds.). (2003). The civic mission of schools. A Report from Carnegie Corporation of New York and CIRCLE: The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement. Retrieved from http://www.civicyouth.org/research/areas/civicmissionofschools.htm Cherrin, S. (2004). Teaching controversial issues. The Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education. Retrieved from http://www.unm.edu/~castl/Castl_Docs/Packet5/ Teaching%20Controver sial%20Issues.html Evans, R., Avery, P., & Pederson, P. (2000). Taboo topics: Cultural restraint on teaching social issues. The Clearinghouse: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 73(5), 295–302. Retrieved from http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a920877827 Fisher, A., & Scriven, M. (1997). Critical thinking: Its definition and assessment. Argumentation, 16(2), 20. Harwood, A., & Hahn, C. “Controversial issues in the classroom.” ERIC Document Reproduction Service ED327453. Hess, D. (2004). Controversies about controversial issues in democratic education. PS Online. Retrieved from http://www.apsanet.org/content_12741.cfm Jeong, C., & Van Sickle, R. (2003). Moral education in the context of globalization and multiculturalism. The International Social Studies Forum, 3(1), 233–242. Loewen, J. (1995). Lies my teacher told me: Everything your American history textbook got wrong. New York: The New Press. Ohio Department of Education. (Year unknown). The evidence base for social studies: Controversial issues. Retrieved from http://www.procon.org/viewresource.asp?resourceID=2016#A Olster, A., & Hugh, S. (2003). Learning for cosmopolitan citizenship: Theoretical debates and young people’s experiences. Educational Review, 55(3), 243–254.

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CONCLUSION

We conclude with a few suggestions and a number of questions that we hope you explore on your own or in groups. Our first suggestion is that the chapters in this book be read and reflected upon in reading groups. At the time of this writing, Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are quite popular as an approach to professional development. Richard DuFour, a leader in PLCs, asks the following guiding questions: What do we want each student to learn? How will we know when each student has learned it? And how will we respond when a student experiences difficulty in learning?1 We would add one more question: what is the most effective way to reach each child? Thus, we have four questions for you to consider: 1) What do we want each student to learn? 2) What is the most effective way to reach each child? 3) How will we know when each student has learned it? 4) How will we respond when a student experiences difficulty in learning? We believe that tying the ideas of this book to these questions is a good starting point for reflection on educational matters. In particular, we focus on question two, what is the most effective way to reach each child? However, we encourage you to consider all four questions in regard to your own classroom. Let’s examine each of our themes, beginning with risk-taking. Risk-Taking There are different levels of risk-taking found in all classrooms. The essays presented in this section of the book exemplify environments that encourage and support high levels of risk. Terry Bramschreiber describes how he models risk in a way that encourages students to also take intellectual risks. Students are willing to share and argue their ideas. Bramschreiber pushes them to challenge their teacher and their own beliefs by delving into ideas that one often takes for granted. Is the Earth really round? How do we know? Bruce Uhrmacher explores risk-taking as a topic and focuses on aesthetic risktaking: “the willingness to participate in actions that deepen the learning experience by acting outside one’s comfort zone, and, therefore, opening oneself up to new and novel ideas, emotions, and ways of being.” Here are some questions for exploration: – In what ways do you believe that modeling plays a role in the creation of a risktaking environment? How could you push yourself to model risks in your own teaching practice? 135

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– What are some controversial topics that you could talk about in your classroom? – Think about Mr. Ruiz who was passionate about opera and brought it to his teaching. What are you passionate about? What would you like to bring to your teaching? – Think of a time when you have been pushed outside of your comfort zone. What was this experience like? Why do you believe it is important to experience the feeling of being outside one’s comfort zone? – Many educators today argue for the importance of teaching through culturally responsive pedagogy. How would risk-taking fit into this model of teaching? Creativity Often when asked, many people will state that they are not creative. Comparing themselves to some of the giants of creativity whom they may find in movies, science, or the music industry, many feel lacking. But we note that every person possesses the ability to be creative in big and small ways. In fact, a lot of people “discover” ideas and products that others have discovered before them. The rediscovery of a creative idea is still a creative idea and we ought to reward such efforts particularly when performed by school-age students. Furthermore, the possibility to be more creative is increased when one practices the act of creativity itself. In Kristen Bunn’s essay the teacher’s own creativity encouraged the students to use their imaginations and create new and wonderful ideas and products. Time seems to stop as the students engross themselves in the projects they explore. Kevin Cloninger shows us the importance of wonder. Students are pushed to experience creativity and in doing so develop a love of learning. Maria is incredibly thoughtful about the environment that she creates. In Cheryl Craig and Sun Hong Hwang’s essay, we are given a snapshot of a school that used creativity and the arts to successfully reform. It shows when teachers and students commit themselves to meaningful, interactive changes they can break through the crust of convention and reap huge benefits for those intimately involved. Consider the following questions: – Is creativity important in learning? If you believe so, why? If you don’t, why not? – Do you see yourself as creative? Why or why not? How do you think that your image of yourself as creative or not impacts your students? – What are some easy ways that you can create a classroom that encourages creativity? – How might safety and order play a role in a creative classroom? – How could you be more cognizant of your classroom environment? In what ways could you arrange the room to encourage creativity? – How might you get your whole school to focus on the topic of creativity? Care and Community When one talks about community, one might think about the school as a whole, the school and its relation to the wider community, or the classroom as a community. 136

CONCLUSION

In this section of the book we focus on each in the context of a caring community. While some communities may be held together by proximity or by an intellectual focus, the communities in this book are held together by a notion of caring. In the William Veal and Ann Wallace essay, the caring community reaches outside the classroom to embrace the local turtles. A passion for stewardship spreads from teacher to students. The students are taught about the community in which they live and how to make it a better place. The learning is hands-on and relevant. Regina Weir’s essay about empowering various aged students to learn from each other describes how a caring community is created in a school and classroom. This type of community is required in order to create a learning environment that supports the range of ages found in this classroom. Finally, Christine Finnan, Kristina Webber, and Carolyn McPartland’s essay is about caring for students who are behind grade level. This unique program provides, for many, a situation in which they are cared for in a school environment for the first time. These students experience success because of the environment that the teacher is able to create. These questions may help in your thinking about creating a caring community: — How can I create a classroom that exemplifies care? In what ways can I ensure that I model care? — What elements in my teaching reflect my own thoughts about care and the community in which we live? — In what ways can I bring the local community into my classroom and in which ways can I take my students out into the community? — How may the physical environment of my classroom help model care and community to my students? — In what ways can my students help in the development of a caring community? How can my students help in the creation of the community norms? Interconnectedness Finally, the theme of interconnectedness has to do with the fact that we live in a global world. We are interconnected environmentally, economically, and politically. Christy Moroye and Elizabeth Ozar’s essays examine environmental interconnections. Caitlin Lindquist’s essay focuses on a teacher who reveals political and economic interconnections. As Christy Moroye notes, the teachers who she researched were ecologically minded and therefore this way of thinking appeared in their classrooms. It becomes clear in her essay that recognizing our own beliefs assists us in understanding how these will impact the students we teach. Elizabeth Ozar describes a mutually beneficial situation in which the park and the students both gain from a partnership. The students fortunate enough to participate in this program leave with a greater sense of responsibility for nature and their role in protecting it. Likewise, the park gains from the volunteer work. 137

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Caitlin Lindquist focuses on a teacher who questions and challenges. It is clear that he feels strongly about the need to introduce students to controversial topics so they can become more aware of the world in which they live. The following questions can help you consider interconnectedness in your own classroom: — Do you believe that your content should be relevant to your students? If so, how do you determine what is relevant? — How do you encourage your students to connect to the lesson to ensure they learn the essential outcomes? — What are your own beliefs about the world? Is environmental stewardship important to you? What about political causes? What else? — Why is it important for students to know about how their actions impact the broader world? — How do advances in technology and communication change the reality of the world in which today’s students will live and work? — Is controversy required in order to raise awareness of world issues? If so, how can you create an environment in which it is safe to discuss these issues? If not, what is required? We now return to our main question of: What is the most effective way to reach each child? In looking at this question, we believe that the four themes presented in this book allow teachers to be effective. They enhance engagement in the classroom, and therefore, increase learning. The educators in the book have created remarkable learning environments that exemplify positive risk-taking, creativity, care and community, and interconnectedness. We believe that the classrooms and settings described are noteworthy environments and we hope that they inspire you in your own school and classroom. NOTES 1

DuFour, R. & Eaker, R. (1998). Professional learning communities at work: Best practices for enhancing student achievement. Solution Tree Press: Bloomington, IN.

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AUTHOR INFORMATION

Terry Bramschreiber taught high school and middle school science for fifteen years. He is currently an administrator at Discovery Canyon Campus in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Terry is a doctoral candidate at the University of Denver. P. Bruce Uhrmacher is professor of education and coordinator of the Curriculum and Instruction program at the Morgridge College of Education, University of Denver. His research interests include aesthetic education, alternatives in formal and informal learning environments, and arts-based research. He is also faculty advisor to the Aesthetic Education Institute of Colorado. Kristen E. Bunn worked as a classroom teacher for seven years in both private and public schools. Kristen is currently working in Colorado for the Eagle County Schools professional development department. She received her doctorate from the University of Denver. Kevin M. Cloninger, Ph.D., is the President of Anthropedia, a non-profit educational foundation dedicated to helping people live healthier and happier lives. His research interests focus on health and well-being and education, which he uses to develop Anthropedia’s educational resources. In addition to his activites with the foundation, Kevin has also lectured and given workshops on well-being and education in the United States and England. Cheryl J. Craig, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, University of Houston, where she coordinates the Teaching and Teacher Education program area. Craig is a regular contributor to such journals as Teaching and Teacher Education, Teachers College Record, and American Educational Research Journal. Sun Hong Hwang is a Post-Doc in the Curriculum and Instruction program at the University of Houston. He has over 5 years of experience in creating multimedia videos in general and digital stories in particular. His research interests include narrative inquiry, storytelling in distance education, educational use of digital storytelling, ePortfolio, and educational fair use in education. William Veal is a science education professor at the College of Charleston in South Carolina. He has worked in public schools teaching science and at different universities teaching science methods, chemistry, and education courses. He received his doctorate from the University of Georgia. His research interests are in the areas of rural science education and pedagogical content knowledge.

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Ann H. Wallace is an associate professor of mathematics education at James Madison University. Her research interests include improving the mathematical content knowledge of elementary and early childhood teachers. Regina Weir is visiting professor of special education at Indiana University Bloomington. Her research interests are inclusion, school reform, and teacher education. Regina is currently writing her research dissertation on teachers as change agents and the role of teacher education. Christine Finnan is a professor at the College of Charleston with a joint appointment in teacher education and anthropology. Her research interests include: examination of influences on the development of a sense of self, issues in upper elementary education, and education of struggling students. Kristina C. Webber, MSW, is currently pursuing a doctorate degree in social work at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is a research assistant with the Elementary School Success Profile research team. Prior to entering the doctoral program, she was a program evaluator for the Charleston County School District in South Carolina. Her research interests include dropout prevention; the influence of stereotypes and identity development on students’ academic motivation and achievement; and the development and evaluation of school-based interventions. Caroline McPartland is currently Sales Coordinator at Ipsos in the greater New York area. When she contributed to this study she served as a graduate assistant for Christine Finnan. She received a BA in History and Communication and a MA in Communication from the College of Charleston. Christy M. Moroye, PhD is an assistant professor at Regis University, School of Education and Counseling in Denver, CO. Her research interests include aesthetic and ecological perspectives of education. Before joining higher education, Dr. Moroye served as Department Coordinator and English Teacher in the Cherry Creek School District in Aurora, CO. Elizabeth Ozar was an honors student at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She went on to obtain her Masters degree in education at Stanford University. Elizabeth currently lives in Denver and continues to study relationships and sexuality. Caitlin Lindquist was an elementary school and outreach teacher for over ten years in Denver, Colorado. She is currently a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Denver Morgridge College of Education in Curriculum and Instruction.

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