Eduholic

Oops, I did it again. This time, instead of Huns learning to meditate, my class room was chockablock with toga-clad gods workshopping a science paper.

Looking for some pre-winter break levity that didn’t involve sugar and opportunistically weaving together the two main strands of our curriculum right now—reading the Odyssey and developing original experiments on water quality-- I asked students to come to class dressed as a favorite figure from classical mythology on the day we were workshopping a section of our wiki-built science papers.

You’ll recall that I am currently reporting on two online group writing assignments as they unfold in my classes. This one involves sixty five freshmen divided into 17 groups to conduct year long experiments that are the centerpiece of “IBET”, our high tech high’s signature 9th grade program integrating biology, English and technology. Together, teachers in 3 subjects guide kids through all phases of scientific research from designing an experiment to collecting and analyzing data, and ultimately, presenting it to the world.

We’re now at the point, after a quarter’s worth of learning about databases and dissolved oxygen tests, where kids are ready to begin their own experiments on local creeks. We teachers recently met as a panel to approve their proposals. Now every group has an idea and is writing up a survey of scientific articles about its topic to create the “literature reviews” that will establish their credibility as experts.

The wikis have proved to be excellent tools to facilitate group work, particularly given the ongoing and complex nature of the project. I maintain a “class wiki” as a template and ask each group to format theirs like mine. Every time we arrive at a new stage of the IBET project, more pages go up on the wiki.

For example, at the conclusion of this workshop I asked each group to set up a page linked to their home page titled “Comments for revision of ‘Findings’ section of literature review.” Each student will post three comments from their workshop group based on categories provided in a revision guide. The group as a whole benefits from the collective feedback of a dozen peer readers.

In the unlikely event that you want to conduct your own Workshop of the Gods, below please find: Revision guide for Findings section of literature review; Preparation for Workshop of the Gods; Procedure for Workshop of the Gods; Categories for “WOG” Bingo.

Revision guide for Findings section of literature review

CONTENT
Clarity of analysis
Appropriateness of sources
Strikes a balance between range and depth
Presented in a logical order with signposting to guide the reader

USE OF RESEARCH
10 or more sources are cited
In-text citations are effective to identify the source and establish its credibility
Parenthetical citations in the right format and the right spots

WRITING
Continuity and flow of ideas; connections clearly drawn in transition between sources
Stylistic unity: doesn’t feel choppy, has a uniform voice
MUGS (mechanics, usage, grammar and spelling)

Preparation for Workshop of the Gods
1. Research your selected god/goddess/character. Go deeper than Disney!
2. Use 3 or more sources. Take notes in your writers notebook. Information should include key attributes and interesting stories, with particular emphasis on any connection to the Odyssey.
3. Come to class Thursday in costume and prepared to workshop like a god. Costumes can be interpretive, but must have three or more distinct elements which relate to your research.
4. There may be IBET fashion show with various Olympian games and prizes.

Procedure for Workshop of the Gods
1. WOG fashion show: introduce your costume and share opinions about The Odyssey but DON’T reveal your identity.
2. Conduct workshops in groups of 3 (no one from the same experiment group should workshop together).
3. Workshop members can make comments on any aspect, but particular attention should be given to the categories from the revision guide.
4. Each student make notes on this sheet, and for homework post 3 comment to a new wiki page called “Comments for revision of Findings.”
5. WOG Bingo.

Categories for “WOG” Bingo
Student name
Dressed up as
Deeper than Disney “didjaknow”…
Connection to or point of view on the Odyssey…
Costume elements and what they mean
Other god-like behaviors in the workshop

Posted by Emmet Rosenfeld at 4:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Last post I talked about two current group writing assignments, each using a different online writing tool. In brief, tenth graders are creating research papers using google docs, and ninth graders are writing literature reviews using a wiki-builder on our district’s online learning system.

This post is about the sophomores. First some context on the assignment, and then we’ll talk tech turkey.

Forty six students are in the thick of a unit called “Changing the World” designed with Jen the history teacher, my partner in a team-taught Humanities class. Our destination is a research paper on a key historical figure, but we’re taking an alternate route in the hopes of avoiding the typical competent but uninspired recitations that TJ kids can so effortlessly produce.

To get to interesting, students are developing and workshopping their papers in chunks— context, biography, effects-- while simultaneously preparing for debates which will occur next week (the papers themselves aren’t due until after winter break).

Charles DeGaulle vs Karl Marx, Mandela vs Gandhi… which team will be able to convince a jury of their peers that their chosen figure had a greater impact on a slice of history? Through a Sweet 16 of debates, we hope kids will arrive at more argumentative and rhetorically convincing essays than if they’d just sat down to tousle with thesis statements and notes from the library.

For example, today teams were anticipating arguments that their opponent might use against them, and preparing talking points to attack the other guy. I predict these counterarguments will make it into the papers’ final drafts.

Now, how does the online writing piece fit into this?

First, here’s a paragraph for beginners. Google docs is part of the increasingly wonderful world of google, which some people still just use for a search engine. Open a browser and find documents under “more” at the top of the screen. (Register for a free gmail account to use these tools).

The interface is a no-frills word processor, like a stripped down version of word. To use it, start typing. The program is pretty smart; it saves your work every few seconds, so you no longer have to worry about losing stuff or even carrying around a memory stick. And, if you want to, you can look back at or revert to any draft along the way.

Google docs is good for group writing because someone using it can “invite” other people to the document. The guest receives an email with a clickable link to join the writing party. If both host and guest(s) are on line at the same time, they can literally write together. Or, if the document is visited at different times, each writer just adds in turn. Collaboration can occur in real-time or asynchronously.

With this flexibility, there are hiccoughs. When a whole class is on google docs at the same time in a computer lab at school, it goes slowly, although one kid gave us directions to create a “secure server” and that seems to speed things up.

A more fundamental problem is that writing, by definition, is a solitary endeavor. As I sit and type these lines, for example, there is a fairly constant process of pausing, moving text, lurching forward a couple lines and then back. If an unseen hand were also moving lines around, my head might explode like a grape.

Asking students to meld minds, then, is the basic challenge inherent in group writing. Stop by next week to see if home-made web pages are a better tool for the job.

Posted by Emmet Rosenfeld at 5:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

"We're No. One" wrote my editor on the Teacher homepage last week, in the little blurb designed to drive hordes of readers to my blog. If you ignore the period, he serendipitously transcribed the actual title ("We're #1") into a reminder that it's not all about the test scores, stupid.

Sure, some guy who likes to talk turkey got irate on the comment board, but the general response to last week's post about TJ's shiny prize was underwhelming. As it should have been, to be honest. Any educator worth his salt is true to his school, recognizing that the alchemy of faculty and students in their own building on any given day has its own inestimable value, not to be determined by external yardsticks (dismount soapbox).

Anthony and I didn't set out to create an ironic headline-- okay, he doesn't even know I'm writing this and he corrected the typo when I pointed it out-- but it goes to show that in writing, interesting things can happen when more than one set of fingers is clacking away at the keyboard. I am exploring that potential a little more intentionally in my class these days by asking students to put their heads together on a couple group writing assignments using two different collaborative writing tools.

Tenth graders are authoring research papers on influential figures from one of four historic time periods in groups of two-three kids using google docs, a web-based word-processing program similar to the ubiquitous MS Word but with useful additions like saving your work automatically every few seconds and allowing up to ten people at time to write together on the same screen.

Ninth graders are reviewing scientific literature for water quality projects in groups of four kids using a wiki-builder on blackboard, an online learning system used by our district and many others that allows teachers to post assignments, host chat, and conduct other activities to extend the class beyond school walls in a secure environment.

Whether or not you'll keep reading at this point may depend on where you fall on the curve between old school and 21st century. Pen and paper troglodytes, don't run away-- take this as a fellow idiot's guide, or at least water wings, with which to wade into the digital world in which our kids swim. Those who already teach by avatar may find value in my cavewall scribblings insofar as the impromptu experiment offers a chance to talk about the virtual teaching of writing.

Still here? Great. Wish I was, too. But as I write this post (on google docs, by the way, without my thumb drive), I'm in New York city for the weekend and haven't yet read enough of the work my students have posted on either google docs or blackboard to tell you how it's going. Actually, this is the perfect chance to test things out: I'm far from home but the kids' writing is just a mouse click away. Unfortunately, despite its amazingness, this internet still doesn't put more hours in the day.

So, instead of virtual workshopping, in a little while I'll head downtown with the boys for playtime in the park and then on to a Chanukkah party at my twin bro's in Chelsea. Y'all come back for the next few posts, in which I promise to report on how the group online writing assignments are going.

Also, for the record, I want to examine how certain "documented accomplishments" I wrote about in my ill-fated Entry 4 have in fact propelled me rather directly into exploring these online writing tools. With any luck, I can connect the dots between those accomplishments and whatever writing actually emerges at the other end to find clear and convincing evidence of student achievement. (Extra credit to any readers who can identify five or more National Board buzzwords in this paragraph.)

Posted by Emmet Rosenfeld at 9:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In case you missed it, Newsweek’s role as the arbiter of the best high schools in the nation has just been challenged by U.S. News & World Report, which released its own tally today. Turns out TJ, where I teach, is tops.

I last wrote about this over a year ago in Education Week, (Ranking America’s High Schools: A Few Quibbles on What Constitutes 'Best', June 14, 2006) when Newsweek’s list came out and we weren’t on it. TJ and other selective public high schools were not ranked but instead relegated to a sidebar for being, well, selective. My comments led to a dialogue in “Certifiable?” (We Interrupt This Blog ... July 5, 2006) and beyond with Jay Mathews, the Washington Post education writer who created the formula used by Newsweek (and a mentor in my own journalism career, such as it is).

I challenged the Challenge Index in part because it only measured the number of tests taken, but not the results. Andrew Rothertham, pithy edu-brain and an author of the new rating scale, has taken that into account with a formula that gives 25% of the credit for just taking hard tests, but 75% for doing well on them.

Our principal announced the news to staff in an email that took a measured tone. While he acknowledged the significance of the recognition he also noted that we were ranked not for “the uniqueness of our curriculum and the rigor and creativity of our student projects … nor as a result of our commitment to innovation [or] interdisciplinary connections,” and went on to add, “In my ideal world, [rankings] should reflect the degree to which [schools] prepare students to develop original ideas and influence progress in society.”

Like Dr. Glazer, I have mixed feelings about the accolade. On one hand, US News got it right. The achievement of our kids is ridiculously high, due both to their remarkable innate abilities, and also to the great job we do with them once they walk in the door. Simply put, I have never been at a school that addresses its mission with such robust integrity, day in and day out.

But I also go back to some of Jay’s thinking, about which I’m Voltairish: not agreeing with his results but defending to the death his right to focus our collective attention on the issue of what makes a great school… particularly in light of his oft-repeated assertion that ranking schools by test scores is akin to ranking them by the socio-economic status of the parents. It’s hard to ignore that US News’ top ten includes a healthy dose of magnet schools or ones from good zip codes, most with relatively low figures under “minority enrollment” and “disadvantaged student enrollment.”

To put a face on TJ achievement, take Vishaka, one of my tenth graders and a typical TJ kid. She led the group of meditating girls mentioned last post, hosts a cable TV show in her spare time, and in general displays the kind of wonderfulness that allowed me to write about her without a blush in a recent letter of recommendation that she “embodies the qualities of pageantry.”

Sure enough, over the recent Thanksgiving break while most of us were lolling in tryptophan stupors on our couches at home, she went down to Florida and won a Miss America contest. She came back to school with her crown and sash in a little glass box etched with stars, and couldn’t resist wearing them in the library when she told me about her whirlwind week. After her story, she slipped off the tiara and went back to her computer to continue a research project.

A few kids nearby raised their eyebrows, but most just smiled and turned back to their computer screens, continuing work on their own research projects. Miss America contests aren’t everyone’s thing, but they are Vishaka’s. And she’s incredibly good at them. But she didn’t get that way without a lot of determination and sacrifice. Qualifying as the runner-up in Northern Virginia, Vishaka worked twice as hard as the other girls to look calm and collected while talking about world poverty in an evening gown.

Like Vishaka, TJ will bask briefly in the glow of its newest award and gracefully ignore the haters. Before you know it, the tiara will be back in its box as we continue the work we do every day in pursuit of excellence. More than test scores, demographics, or one particular mathematical formula versus another, that’s what makes us #1.

Posted by Emmet Rosenfeld at 3:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)