Feel free to play!!! Most of the images I use are taken with my phone and edited in an app called Pixlr. Upload to Twitter and/or Instagram with the hashtag #whitmanwednesday.
Use the project in your classroom to show your students how to connect words and images in meaningful ways. Talk about why the images they choose work with the words they’ve selected. Talk about color and line and vision. There is always room for art in English Language Arts (or any other subject, for that matter).
Learning at home has been part of education since the beginning of civilization. As far back as ancient Greece, only the elite went to schools while most children received instruction to some extent at home. Ancient Romans valued literacy, and even the poor learned to read and write so that they could participate in the economy. The Jewish people of the Middle East of the first century established schools for all children to age 13, after which only the brightest were able to study under a master teacher.
By the Middle Ages, education became something only for the very wealthy or the clergy. The Renaissance brought about new interest in formal education, and the Reformation brought about the first hints of a universal and public education for children of all income levels. A decline in the 17th and 18th century was followed by a resurgence of philosophy and epistemology that began with Johann Comenius, progressed through John Locke and Jacques Rousseau, and expanded with Benjamin Franklin and Noah Webster in the New World.
The cycle of education trends continued through the illiteracy of child laborers during the Industrial Revolution that preceded the advent of the first Kindergarten by Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi. Harbart developed and idea of teacher/curriculum centrality of education, while Montessori followed with more child-centered pedagogies.
As the cycles commenced, there was always a segment of the population that considered itself independently taught. Whether this was the surreptitious education of girls or the secret teaching to slaves, home school has been part of education, either underground or in public.
One of the major criticisms of the home school movement has been the isolation of the students. Perhaps this was legitimate concern at one time, but that is no longer the norm. There are, and probably always will be, families who choose homeschooling in order to prevent their children from interacting with the world beyond the home, but today, the resources available to home school families ensure interaction with other students of multiple ages in multiple venues. Museums, farms, galleries, aquariums and other attraction offer group rates for home school groups, and many offer special programs designed for students who have special interests in specific topics.
This prima ballerina chose homeschool – hybrid education in order to pursue dance.
Some parents choose to home school because their children excel in sport or dance or competitive ventures that preclude attendance in a traditional school setting. These students are far from isolated; in fact many of them have connections with their peers in multiple geographic locations and from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds.
Studying granite. Home schooled sisters explore a large monolith without time constraints.
For those home schooled students who are at risk for isolation because of location, health, or other inhibiting factors, the internet offers a way to connect without leaving home. There are massive open online courses and a multitude of derivatives that allow teens to connect with one another on line and form friendships. Short term events like #walkmyworld and #digiwrimo allow parents and students to participate in national and international forums without lengthy commitments. Sites like Youth Voices and KQED Do Now allow students to write about important issues from politics to social justice and interact and collaborate with other students without regard to location, school schedules, or test materials. This interaction allows students to engage in meaningful collaboration which is sometimes missing in the traditional classroom.
In addition to the asynchronous opportunities, there are a number of accredited hybrid schools that allow students to meet in a traditional setting one or two days a week and work independently the other days. This affords the synchronous learning opportunities to supplement the at home learning. Students are able to collaborate face to face, participate in class discussions, and connect with each other as well as with a teacher who can come alongside parents. In many cases these students are fully independent; their parents support, but do not instruct.
Hybrid school students collaborate on a project in two spaces: the classroom and online.
These schools also allow for online collaboration. Projects can be worked on both online and in the classroom, mimicking the pattern of projects in the business world. This benefits students as they learn the essentials of communicating in multiple modes.
I have taught in multiple venues and I see the affordances and constraints of both the traditional classroom, the hybrid school, and homeschooling. The most important element is keeping the needs of the students at the forefront, no matter what the educational model may be.
My gratitude to Robert Guisepe at http://history-world.org/history_of_education.htm for the background information!
This image has been sitting in this draft for months, so long that I don’t remember the original purpose. I think it had to do with a #clmooc challenge over the summer, but I can’t be sure. Still, it is a powerful image that I can’t bring myself to delete, so it must be something to explore.
Fig.1 Drawing by Belgian artist Yslaire
I titled this post Wasteland when I put the image in place; perhaps it is the title of the piece, perhaps just my impression, but when I look at it my mind goes to the cruellest month underscored by the organ and guitars of Baba O’Riley. The image, I am certain, refers to neither of these, but in my mind they are inexorably connected.
Wasteland is a place beyond hope. A place where there is no escape from monotony and tedium. In this image, the television screen acts as hypnotist, so mesmerizing the viewer that he forgets he is a winged creature, made to soar.
| And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief, | |
| And the dry stone no sound of water. Only | |
| There is shadow under this red rock, |
http://www.bartleby.com/201/1.html
We too often allow life to put blinders on us. Even if we resist the allure of the screen (be it television, computer, or smart phone), we manage to stay in the parched shadow of the red rock, afraid to venture out into the unfamiliar until we, too, forget we have wings to fly on the fresh winds of the exodus from the wasteland to the promised land.
For several weeks I have been immersed in a digital world. Coming back into a face-to-face reality has given me pause to reflect on the contrast between what is “virtual” and what is “real.”
It’s really Simon Ensor’s fault. In a Google Hangout during a conference, Simon asked someone to define “virtual buddy.” He asked the question again on Twitter. He followed that with a blog post. And then he wrote a poem about belonging. And so I started thinking.
The Hangout that began the process was a “between” space during the annual conference for the Association for Learning Technology, this year in Manchester, England. A number of presenters were from a virtually connected associates discussing a project called #Rhizo14. I had followed along with #Rhizo15 in connection while actively participating in #clmooc (another virtually connected community focused on learning), so I had an interest in the conference, even though I could not attend. I was introduced to the “between” Hangouts during yet another conference about hybrid pedagogy (#digped) when I was invited to participate by colleagues I met on Twitter through #clmooc. *
These “between” spaces were supposed to be a sort of “third space” for collaborative discussion about the keynote speakers at the conference. As they evolved they became a sort of debriefing for participants while the online participants (from all over the world) became sort of eavesdroppers who gleaned whatever information came through the on site players. It made me feel both connected and disconnected at the same time. When the on site players shared a single computer their conversation was often between themselves as they developed tactile relationships while the rest of us watched. When they returned to conference activities, those of us left in the Hangout tried to make sense of the information and even found ways to create our own “mini-sessions” of informal collaboration. While I had connected with many of the participants (both on site and online) before this conference, Simon’s question made me consider the reality of those relationships beyond the words shared on the screen.
In a reflective post about Rhizo15, Dave Cormier discusses the challenges of creating a structured community in an unstructured idea (rhizomatic learning is by nature without formal structure). How can individuals belong to a community without creating a division between “we” and “them”; in this case those who had been around since the first experiment (Rhizo14) and the newbies who were just figuring out the concept? Dave writes far more eloquently than I about the conflict between Instructivism and Constructivism, but it all goes back to Simon’s original query: What exactly is a virtual buddy?
I have playing on the digital playground long enough that I no longer consciously differentiate between local acquaintances and those whom I have only met online. In many ways, I often feel MORE connected to those virtual friends because we have to make an effort to connect across time zones, geography, and cultural barriers. Underneath that, however is a common interest in how to harness the power of the internet to make education both accessible and relevant to as many people as want it. Along the way we discover other common interests: knitting, photography, Doctor Who, and other facets of life that have nothing whatever to do with education.
So are these friends “real”? And if they are, why is there a disconnect when some of them are together in a place while others of us connect from our own individual spaces? This whole new world of digital relationships and collaborations is messy. But then, new things are often messy. And not always “right”, especially at the beginning.
This idea of messy newness is a reflection of something Sherwood Anderson said to William Faulkner in June, 1953:
…America ain’t cemented and plastered yet. They’re still building it. That’s why a man with ink in his veins not only still can but sometimes has still got to keep on moving around in it, keeping moving around and listening and looking and learning. That’s why ignorant unschooled fellows like you and me not only have a chance to write, they must write…it won’t ever be quite right, but there is always next time; there’s always more ink and paper and something else to try to understand and tell. And that probably wont be exactly right either, but then there is a next time to that one , too. Because tomorrow’s America is going to be something different, something more and new to watch and listen to and try to understand; and, even if you can’t understand, believe.
(as cited in Meriwether, 2004, p. 8)
And there is the answer. Online relationships won’t ever feel “quite right”, but we must keep trying new ways to connect and eventually we will see something “different…more and new” that, even if we don’t fully understand, we can believe. In its imperfections, there is still connection. Perhaps the best part of being “virtual buddies” is the journey we are taking together into something unexpected.
*All the acronyms are confusing, but much of the hybrid pedagogy/virtual connections take place on Twitter with extensions to Facebook and/or Google Plus. All of the things in which I participated were forms of MOOCs (massive open online courses) geared toward educators who wanted to explore and promote the idea of open learning. Rhizo is based on the idea of the rhizome plant, one that sends out new growth from its roots so that the visible growth is supported by an underground structure that is interconnected. Dave Cormier is probably the leading expert in the current iteration and his ideas on the purpose of education need more thought that I intend for this particular post. DigPed is attached to the Hybrid Pedagogy journal. The Connected Learning MOOC (#clmooc) was a six-week course for educators organized mostly by professionals connected to Youth Voices. All of the hashtags are still active on Twitter.
References
Meriwether, J. B. ed. (2004), William Faulkner: Essays, speeches, & public letters. New York, NY: Modern Library. Random House, Inc.
The fi
nal project for the Connected Learning MOOC (#clmooc) took us to explore the National Park system as an open public space. Georgia has a plethora of National and State parks along with Heritage sites, Historical sites, National Monuments, and National Recreation Areas. I chose to explore a new-to-me park in Lithonia, Georgia. Arabia Mountain is an exposed granite monadnock still relatively unaltered by humanity. There was once a quarry there, but it is long shut down and the machinery removed. Because it is not heavily promoted and the signage is less than obvious, few people walked the mountain while I was there. (Granted, it was midday in July, and the 95 degree temperature may have had something to do with the solitude.) Still, it was easy to imagine early settlers and Native Americans hunting and living here. It is vast and rugged, but upon inspection, harbors all sorts of microscopic life and plants that manage to thrive without much soil. The views from the summit are beautiful, even on a hot and hazy afternoon. Buildings and roads are invisible, so it feels remote and isolated.
While I enjoyed my trek, I had to consider how I could incorporate this Make into a classroom scenario.
Science and math might be natural fits: micro-biology and ecology are obvious, and geometry students could calculate the pitch of the mountain or determine the weight of granite slabs. Literature requires a little more creative stretch to incorporate. However, upon reflection, I see a number of ways to justify a National Park field trip for an English classroom. There is the historical value of oral storytelling, which was the tradition of the first inhabitants of this land. The area was also home to a community of freed slaves (the area bordered three different plantations) that became a prosperous town through the mid 20th century. NPR did a story about the Flat Rock community in 2008. Blending the Park with this history affords students the opportunity to write a historic retelling of the community or of fictional residents. This allows the students to research life in a specific era, a particular setting, and a historic climate about which little is known. Story is a key element of preservation, although it requires careful study blended with critical and creative thinking. As research, this is far more difficult than the “encyclopedia report” many students do, but the benefits of learning curation from multiple sources ultimately proves practical well beyond the high school years.
Research fulfills a number of standards in the Common Core requirements, but there are opportunities to use a visit to the Parks as impetus for creative writing. Many American authors wrote about nature (Jack London comes immediately to mind), and short stories featuring the land may inspire students to dig a little deeper into their own psyche or philosophies. Poetry may also emerge as a way to capture the vast beauty of the Parks. A haiku or tanka (even a sonnet) poem embedded into a photograph blends creative thinking, art, and a structured form that touches the highest level of Bloom’s taxonomy.
In any education, National Parks are a treasure to consider, and many of them are accessible enough to encourage all students to visit, even if a school field trip is not allowed. Arabia Mountain is off the Path system of DeKalb County, a free to use paved greenway designed for pedestrians and cyclists. The Arabia Mountain website offers a number of ways to see the park.
I love hydrangeas. When I visited Savannah at the beginning of June, I took dozens of pictures from every angle and of every color I could find. It made sense to begin this project, RE(MEDIA)TE, with a personal photo of something I love.
Why hydrangeas? I think it is because they can change with the acidity (or aluminum) in the soil. High pH leads to pink blossoms, while a lower pH produces blue blooms. The whole range of color, from rich red to deep purple is all dependent on the acid in the soil. The plant adapts to the changes in the soil, and a plant that is naturally pink can be made blue by manipulating the circumstances of the growing environment.
People have a harder time adapting to change. Many shrivel up when things get hard, while others refuse to bloom at all unless conditions are just right. What if we, as educators, can teach our students how to “remediate” their responses to the challenges they face in life, whether or not it is academic. Certainly no one can predict how the future will unfold, and it is rare to live very long without some unexpected change. What if we can use our classrooms as adaptive spaces, where students can find their identities and understand that flexibility will keep them moving forward when the hard times come? In fact, it is the challenges that make us more beautiful, even though the outcome is nothing we could have anticipated. Like hydrangeas, the acid/alkaline balance of life’s circumstantial soil does change us. If we can anticipate that change, perhaps we can welcome it and appreciate its loveliness. And if we can pass that message to our students, perhaps we reach beyond our content area to real-world learning.
My re(media)tion began with a photo. Good photos require an attention to aperture and shutter speed, light and shadow, as well as composition. As I changed media and took to colored pencils, I had to consider shape and color in different ways. Shapes were something that photography captured for me. The image as colored pencil drawing is not realistic. That is a decision I made as a creator, based largely on my skill set.
There are other artists whose techniques create drawings that rival photography in detail and accuracy. Neither is better than the other; it’s a decision each artist makes in order to capture the image in his/her mind. Or it is a decision based on constraints of technical ability or available tools.
Once I was satisfied with my drawing, I scanned it in order to re(media)ate to a form I am comfortable with and that I enjoy tremendously. I find digital art such a freeing form. I am a pretty good photographer and a mediocre sketch artist, but Photoshop Elements lets my imagination run free without the hindrances of a lack of ability or training.
This is an important consideration for our students. Some will be gifted writers. Other will excel in various art forms or physical accomplishments. When we consider re(media)tion, we must consider that each student will come with his own set of abilities and challenges. When we meet students at their comfort levels first, we are then able to guide them to new ideas, new experiences, and walk them through the art of becoming. They may only identify as athletes or an artists or a mathematicians, but we can teach them to embrace new ways of expression and in the process, help them develop a new skill.
I used a variety of digital techniques to manipulate my original image. I started by scanning the colored pencil drawing so I could pull it into Photoshop Elements (PSE). Someday I’d like to move up to the whole Creative Suite, but for now, PSE does everything I need. And what it doesn’t do, I can usually figure out a way around it. That’s another good life lesson for our students. Sometimes the way you think you’re going to accomplish something requires a change of plans and some creative rigging. Back to techniques. I used several art filters: high pass, watercolor, darken image, and a few others. I changed blending modes and ended up with a nice foundation. Then I added some textures, mostly my own creations, but one from a company call Design Cuts that has some really fun effects, textures, and overlays.
That was artistic enough, but fantasy/imagination is an important part of remix. I have a former student who is a ballerina and my favorite model. I had wanted to do a fairy themed set of digital art pieces, and I knew she would be game to play along. We ended up doing a whole series of photos that I am currently turning into Elemental Sprites: Air, Fire, Water, and Earth. It’s great fun for me, and she loves the end result.
I remembered one of the photos from the shoot taken in an outdoor location that allowed me to easily extract her. I added some wings from Deviant Art (once I changed the colors to work with my theme.) Then it was a matter of placing her in a place that made sense. And isn’t that also true of life? If we are haphazard with where we place our trust or our skills, we may find ourselves in precarious places. We must think through life’s decisions, and the sooner we can help our students see that, the better prepared they will be for a world where they are in control of all their decisions.
I finally added a quote to finish the piece. I looked for the source, but couldn’t find it. Still, it fit the scheme of the artwork, so different from the original photo, yet still totally me. I think that’s one message of re(media)tion: freedom in creation expands the mind and allows the self to continue on a journey of becoming.
Along the lines of the #clmooc “untroduction”, KQED posited a unique way for students to self-identify through a #donow project. Not only does it deal with identity, but it can also introduce the ideas of imagery, metaphor, and symbolism.
Select an everyday object or material as your personal symbol. What object or material did you choose, and what might it signify about you?
I had to give this some thought. I am not easily classified (which I like). Many objects have a singular purpose, so that character trait eliminates a fair number of objects. So I thought, “What one thing best summarizes my multiple interests and abilities?” Because I’m always on the go in a multitude of directions, I settled on the wheel as the object that best serves as a personal symbol.
Why the wheel? It is always in motion, often productive, useful in multiple situations, and able to cover vast distances, revealing new vistas at every turn.
I admit it. I get bored easily. I like new adventures and new challenges. What more evidence is needed when I join #clmooc when I should be enjoying a short respite from school between M.Ed. completion and Ph.D commencement? Learning new things keeps my mind busy and gives me new ideas for being even more unorthodox in my pedagogy than I was a year or five or ten years ago. That keeps me fresh and relevant and frankly, effective. No stale lesson plans for me; every corner I turn reveals new ideas to test and tweak.
Always spinning, always thinking, always looking for the next adventure. What better personal symbol than the wheel?
“To sleep, perchance to dream…” (Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1)
When I dream
How do dreams reflect identity? How does the unconscious mind become the conscious decisions of daily life or long term plans? Who am I in my dreams and can that become reality if I so desire?
This week’s learning event afforded an opportunity to consider the power of dreams, but also reflect on which dreams are worthy of pursuit.
Dreams release us from all limitations, but also bring our fears to life. Patrick Ness’ book, A Monster Calls, brings to life an old yew tree in the dreams of a boy who must find a way to cope with his dying mother. The fear of monsters parallels the fear of the disease and how it has and will continue to affect his life. As the protagonist faces the dual monsters (the tree and the cancer), he finds himself able to do things he never imagined.
Of course, it is a work of fiction, but in many ways, dreams can help us discern new ways to manage life’s stress because in dreams we are not limited to what is practical. As a teacher, some of the best lessons I’ve ever written have come either in dreams or in that twilight between waking and sleeping. Once the idea is discovered, the analytical daytime mind can begin to work out the logistics of overcoming the limitations of practicality.
Some dreams can take on a real life, as Ryan Neil demonstrates as an American Shokunin. His artistic dreams manifest in Bonsai, where he has learned to balance life and design to create living sculptures that will live for hundreds of years. This is the beauty of art, no matter what the medium. I have some skills with photography and digital manipulation, and if I were to describe an impossible dream, it would include being discovered as an artist and making a living with this kind of creativity. My logical mind, however, sees the limitations (including my inability in sales and marketing), and puts my art into the category of hobbyist.
Relax and dream
Still, the creativity of my dreams does find its way into the classroom. I never teach the same lesson twice–even on the same day. Every class has its own personality and requires a unique approach, a certain kind of humor, and a personal touch. I use the analysis to create goals and objectives and outlines, but once class begins, I shape my lessons in much the same way Neil shapes his Bonsai art.
One element of pursuing dreams is the freedom to do so. The arts offer that kind of freedom. Today’s educational system does not. The current obsession with standardized tests, single stream learning, and strict analysis places nearly insurmountable limits on teachers. The standards themselves are not the issue, for the most part. The application of those standards, however, puts many teachers in a bureaucratic maze with only one escape route. This devalues the creative passions of the teacher as well as minimizes the students’ ability to innovate, create, and think beyond multiple choice. What will happen to the dreamers and the visionaries if they are forced to conform to a false norm? Is there a place for the Einsteins and Edisons in our elementary schools today?
Nightmare
Teachers must dream bigger than ever in this day of sameness. We must find new ways to talk about literature and culture and society. We must create new ways to connect content with life in relevant ways all while ensuring our students are able to perform on state test day. It is a challenge that for me has inspired a new dream. While I once dreamed of leaving a legacy in the world of visual art, I now dream of leaving a legacy in adults who, having walked into my world classroom, are not afraid to push back, who value creative problem solving, and who are able to meet ridiculous regulations with style, panache, and enough humor to know that in the long run, life is a better teacher than textbooks anyway.
Part One
Unorthodox but Effective 