Category Archives: Reading Response

Using Popular Texts in the Classroom

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Emily Skinner’s text explores using popular magazines and movies as ‘mentor texts’ through which students could practice numerous skills.  Skinner explains that students can be encouraged to critically consume popular texts and to use these texts to examine various social issues and aspects of there personal lives on a deeper level.  Using popular texts not only can easily motivate normally reluctant students but can also allow students to enjoy learning something which I believe has been lost in many school systems.  The ability to instill genuine intellectual curiosity and a desire to learn and improve can be accomplished in several ways, one of these ways being through using popular texts and images in the classroom.  Basing writing exercises on popular materials encourages critical examination both of texts and of the writing and planning process in general.  Although the use of these texts in the classroom would seem to be a wholly positive experience for students, their use would definitely need to be carefully monitored in order to keep students on task.

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Katie Wood Ray’s article, “Exploring Inquiry as a Teaching Stance in the Writing Workshop,” gave insight into a pedagogy that seeks to construct knowledge alongside students. As she demonstrated, this is the ideal way to teach writing as a craft—as grounded as any practice, with concrete materials—rather than as a formula. Even more remarkable is that, by examining the mechanics of more established writers and writing alongside them, I think that students might see themselves as a part of a community of writers. Often, creativity gets mixed up with the need to be “unique,” but this mentality can often be an intimidating hindrance and an obstacle to learning. At a time when writing is so important, yet so archaically taught, I found this stance to be a useful guide.

Using the online audience to motivate students

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In “Unleashing Potential with Emerging Technologies,” Sara Kajder recounts her experience of creating a reader’s guide wikibook with her 11th grade English students. Upon realizing that the book The Stranger had an infamous reputation among her students, Sara decided to challenge her class to create their own guide to understanding the book. As a class, they compiled and posted pictures, charts, summaries, explanatory notes, and character lists alongside an online copy of the book. Not only did the 11th graders enjoy the fast-paced yet casual nature of wikibook, but they were also very motivated by the knowledge that others outside of their class were frequently viewing their work. Kajder noticed a remarkable upsurge in participation and online activity after she told her class about an English class is Seattle that was using the site to aid their own reading of The Stranger. “Within three days,” she writes, “content was explodingon the site. Students had added videos that offered enactments of scenes. Some were podcasting their literature group discussions. Others were linking to every bit of relevant content that they could find.” (223) Students were motivated by the knowledge that other people were following and appreciating their work. This seemed to give the project added value, as if the wikibook was a community service rather than a regular class project. I think this observation speaks to the effects of responsibility. When students realize that their work is helping others, it suddenly becomes more important. They invest time and energy into their work in order to make the project as legitimate as possible. Online technology is an easy and effective way for teachers to provide an audience for students. Perhaps giving students an audience that depends upon and benefits from the students’ work is one strategy for instigating motivation in classroom activities and projects.

Video Games, Education, and Playing Portal

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The Gee article was very interesting to me because it presented ideas that seemed like they should be obvious through an unexpected, but very relatable, template. Normally, most people don’t connect video games and education. Video games are more likely to be viewed as a hinderance to education than a model. Students sitting in front a screen day after day, not doing work, frustrates and concerns many. However, it also proves the point that, to a lot of people, video games are driving, even addictive. Since most teachers would probably love it if students found their classes driving and addictive, why not examine the principles that make video games this way?

What I find interesting is that these principles–interactiveness, understanding, customization, and so on–seem so basic, so self-explanatory. Of course we should be making lessons with these considerations. Reading them, I think back to one of the first things I read for an education class, an essay in which Freire condemns the “Banking System” in schools. Gee points out that video games–where the user is actively participating and making decisions, not just taking in the directions and information the game has to offer. I’m not making an argument that everything in schools should become virtual, by any means. I just think that he makes a very good point about what we could take from the way games are designed. I remember in elementary school and middle school, we did these sort of historical role-play units where we’d have to go down the Oregon Trail or come on a ship to Plymouth or something. I don’t think we really learned a lot with these because most of the game actions were based on luck (a die roll, for instance), and most of the “assignments” involved drawing pictures, but the idea behind them, of a game acted out in real life, was good, and we all loved them. If they could be redesigned to actually feel relative to students and teach important concepts, I think they’d be a really interesting tool and embody the ideas Gee proposes.

To fulfill this week’s assignment of playing a video game or doing an interview, I tried playing the game Portal at a friend’s house. Now, video games are a little out of my realm. I loved computer games as a kid, but only the ones that let me creatively design and customize thing–I liked kid pix, and I liked all the “tycoon” games, where you would design and run a zoo, or an amusement park, or something. I didn’t really care about Sims once the virtual people came to life, but I loved choosing their appearance and designing dream houses for them to live in. I think this makes sense, because I always liked creative projects, and the games let me pursue them on a much larger scale than I could in reality, since my mother had no desire to fulfill my dream of painting every wall a different color. So, I wasn’t really expecting to like Portal. But it was actually really interesting. The game is essentially a series of puzzle that you must get through by blasting portals–one to enter, one to exit–into the walls. You go into it knowing nothing, and must retain knowledge about what has worked in the past, and well as basic principles of gravity and physics. The levels become progressively harder–I got through about half of them before deciding it was time to stop replaying a dead-end and do other work. Another interesting component of the game is that throughout it, a female voice on an intercom is giving you false instructions and trying to discourage you, only to praise you when you solve the puzzles anyway. Before you begin, she will say the the puzzle has been proven impossible, they are sorry, and you should give up now. Then, if you succeed, she says that the previous statement was a lie, and well done. I don’t think this is something we should bring into the classroom. However, I do think it is interesting in that it shows how much people want to prove themselves. When confronted with a supposedly impossible task, we want to solve it. So, the idea could be toned down for the classroom–students should not be told they will fail, but they should be given interesting tasks and challenged to find ways to complete them.

Overall, I think this article really made me look at video games in a new way–it helped me see them not just as distractions or stress-busters, but  as successful learning devices. If we can bring the same inventiveness, involvement, and forward momentum to classroom lessons, we could surely achieve our own version of that success.

Nancy Drew Video Games

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The Gee article for this week reminded me of a series of Nancy Drew-themed video games that I used to play on my computer in middle and high school. In each game, you are Nancy Drew and you get to solve a mystery. They have titles like “Nancy Drew and the Haunted Mansion” and “Nancy Drew and the Secret of the Scarlet Hand.” In the games, you control Nancy as she walks around the game world. There was a lot of reading involved because there would inevitably be a creepy library full of books or a bunch of old love letters that Nancy found hidden in a secret box, and some of the clues to solve the mystery were contained in the written text, so literacy was directly involved in the game in that way. Nancy also got to interview lots of suspicious people and talk to them throughout the game, so you had to listen carefully to what they said to pick out clues.

My favorite part of the games was that there would be a lot of puzzles to solve. The puzzles could be anything from organizing  a lot of objects in the right order to reading up on how to play chess and then having to beat another character at chess in order to “win” some vital information for the case. Solving these puzzles applies to many of the points Gee brought up about video games, such as co-design, distributed knowledge, well-ordered problems, system thinking, and skills as strategies. The puzzles also relate to the Frey and Fisher article about motivation. I felt motivated to complete each task because it was a do-able challenge and I could contribute to the outcome.

I always played the Nancy Drew games collaboratively with my younger sister. We would fight about whose turn it was to “be the mouse.” Whoever didn’t get to control the mouse that day was the secretary. We kept meticulous notes on each game and wrote down clues, observations, and numbers we had to remember like lock combinations. Sometimes we would have to identify specific objects, like in one game where we had to know the difference between various types of clouds (stratus, cirrus, cumulus, etc.), so the secretary had to draw pictures of all the different clouds so we could identify them later in the game. Taking notes outside the game helped us keep track of our thoughts so we could better analyze the game. I think this example shows that video games can be much more social than we assume. We often picture “gamers” as nerds with no people skills who sit at home playing video games all day to avoid social contact. However, video games can be a collaborative effort. Sometimes my sister would be better than me at solving a certain puzzle and she could teach me how to do it, so I learned new skills with her help. Three of my (female) cousins also played the Nancy Drew games around the same time that we did, so we had a LOT of discussions and debates about them: which game was the best, which was the scariest, which was the hardest, which had the best characters, etc. Video games can promote thoughtful discussion and engage various literacy skills.

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My friend Garrett LOVES video games. I think he could talk about them all day! So he jumped at the chance to share some of his ideas with me. I started by asking him very generally- “What do you like about video games?” He answered my question with a question-“Well what kind of video games, Sarah?” He explained that there are many different genres of games and said that each game has its own “feel” as well as its own set of goals and central features.

I asked him to describe the features that most attract him to his favorite games. He said that he loves science fiction and fantasy books and movies, and that the games he likes take these genres to “another level.”

I think he explained very well: “Instead of reading from a third party perspective, you’re a part of the story. You take on the role of a character and you preform that character’s action. It is a totally different feeling than just reading or watching a story unfold- you can be much more actively involved in it.”

He elaborated further on the different ways that video game players can become engaged in the storyline: “In some games, there is an overarching storyline that your character is following, but you can change the way that story is created and change the way your character achieves their goals. In other games, the emphasis is less on a specific character or story- it’s more about immersing yourself in a new world, almost like a second reality.”

He also noted that video games require practice and willingness to examine your mistakes and create strategies- “When you’re playing video games, you can watch replays, figure out what went wrong, and practice specific strategies to help you get better. It actually reminds me of playing lacrosse, or even of preparing for tests in schools. Really competitive video gamers wake up early in the morning and practice, because if they don’t other people will learn new strategies and they’ll be left behind.”

A lot of what Garrett said echoed the ideas expressed in James Paul Gee’s article “Learning by design: good video games as learning machines.” Gee emphasizes that the interactive element of video games is essential in motivating players and making them feel invested- concepts that can be applied to learning. He writes, “Good learning requires that students feel like active agents (producers) not just passive recipients (consumers)”(p.6). Gee also discusses the important learning skills video games teach- like devising strategies, practicing, examining mistakes, etc. I think video games provide a model of skills and aspects of learning that can be applied to school, especially the idea of making learning enaging and interactive.

 

 

Group Projects – Motivating, Most of the Time

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In Frey and Fisher’s article “Motivating Requires a Meaningful Task” they discuss the importance of productive group work as a classroom tool. I think that their observations about the delicate balance between too many group members (some students do not make an effort because “they know the work will be done by others”) and too few (“students begin to feel overwhelmed and give up on the task”) were right on track. I also liked the idea that the group size should change depending on the members and the class at hand and that the groups should consist of diverse skill levels. My only concern about forming the groups in this way is whether students of different levels would work well together. I remember that when I was in middle school, we were divided into reading groups based on our literacy skills and the students in the separate groups made fun of each other for the content and difficulty level of the books the respective groups were reading. The behavior seems (and was) petty, retrospectively, but I imagine that students today may conduct themselves similarly. On the other hand, when I worked in groups with peers of varying skill levels, usually in classes other than Language Arts, I always found that helping each other was rewarding and enjoyable.  In order for teachers to prevent riffs between students at different levels, I think that they should establish the precedent in their classrooms that all students will be working together regardless of individual achievement.

Another passage from the article that I found interesting was the section on the complexity of a task. Frey and Fisher write, “if students merely divide [a project] up and agree to meet again later to assemble the final product, it’s likely that the task was not challenging” (Frey and Fisher 31).  While that was not how I approached group projects in middle school, in my experience in both high school and college, that is definitely how group work is conducted. However, I don’t think that my group members and I approached a project in this way because the assignment wasn’t difficult, but rather because we had limited time in which we could all work together on the project. I am personally not a huge fan of group projects and regularly find them taxing, so I don’t think that they need to be any more challenging. I just wonder, after reading this article, if part of the reason why I don’t like group projects is that the assignment is not difficult enough to motivate my group members and I to want to collaborate. I will have to consider this point with greater attention when I am designing lessons for my future students and inevitably dividing them into groups.

Bringing prior knowledge to the table

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For me, one of the most compelling points in Spector and Jones article about Anne Frank and critical literacy was the idea that teachers should unpack what students already know (or think they know) before diving into a lesson. I think this is especially important when teaching about historical events or characters that fall under the realm of “common knowledge.” Spector and Jones suggest that teachers “ask students to discuss their knowledge of Anne Frank – and how they came to that knowledge” and to create posters depicting their idea of Anne Frank’s story. I think similar activities could be created for almost any historical event or character that students would have prior knowledge about. Inviting students to share what they know is important because it allows teachers to better understand what they need to teach, but also because it gives students the opportunity to think about the sources of information that shape their ideas about history.

While reading this article and thinking about student knowledge, I was reminded of a story that my friend told me. She is student teaching in New York City this year, and is currently working in a middle school social studies classroom. She’s been teaching lessons about Colonial America, and one day a student made a comment about Native Americans being “less civilized or less advanced” and that they needed the colonists to help them create a real society. She asked the student where he had come up with that idea, and he said “I don’t know I just heard it”(similar to the students studying Anne Frank!) When my friend asked the rest of the class what they thought, a great majority said they thought that too, they had heard that version of history as well. Knowing that many of her students were approaching the study of Colonial American from that perspective changed the way she thought about teaching them.

Emphasizing the fictional part of historical fiction

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In “Constructing Anne Frank” Spector and Jones argue that historical fiction, while engaging, threatens to distort students’ perception of real events. As an alternative, they suggest that teachers supplement interpretive works like the Goodrich and Hackett play, with primary sources and real life accounts of the historical events, so that students can recognize the optimistic slant of the play. I agree with the authors’ teaching tips, and think it’s a great way to teach students to critically analyze any movie, play, or book that claims to be “based on true events.” Rather than choosing to exclude these works of historical fiction, teachers should allow their students to confront these interpretations and learn to view them as inherently biased and one-sided. From Freedom Writers to Pearl Harbor, there is so much in the popular media that claims to depict real life events. If viewers are not taught to critically analyze the films as a works of art, they fall into the trap of forgetting that the work is an interpretation rather than a primary source.
As I was reading this piece, I was thinking that it might be interesting to ask students to write their own short plays that take on a particular slant and interpret the historical events in a way that promotes a narrow understanding. When students take on the roll playwright, they will discover the creative freedom that an artist has in creating a work of historical fiction. Because a play is technically artwork, there is no pressure to depict events exactly according to fact. I think such an assignment would help students view images, films, and plays in the popular media as interpretative works of art rather than historically accurate sources.

Learning as Empowerment

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The readings for this week redefine what it means to learn something. Many teachers believe their job is to teach the students some kind of truth or lesson that conveys information. For example, the purpose of a lesson about the Diary of Anne Frank might be to convey the prepackaged idea that Anne is a symbol of optimism within a bad situation. However, the authors of both readings want to challenge the idea that the teacher’s role is to tell their students universal truths. Instead, teaching is about giving students the tools they need to analyze the world around them. Learning should not just be listening to a lecture where the teacher tells the students everything they need to know about Anne Frank. Learning should be encouraging the students to figure out information by themselves using different sources that might contradict each other. It is more useful for the students to be able to analyze these sources for their validity and their significance, rather than simply telling the students what is important. I loved the examples in both readings because the students were actively engaged in their learning. The authors value the students’ input and don’t just see students as empty vessels that need to be filled with information.

The readings reminded me that learning should be an empowering experience. As a student, I feel empowered when I am challenged to creatively analyze the course content in my own way. Teachers should be aware of how they view their students and how their assignments might be either empowering or disempowering to students. The readings for this week are also similar to the education as social justice readings we did before break because the students in these classrooms were expected to understand social inequity. I liked how Larry Steele ended his article by explaining that he doesn’t care what jobs his students will have in the future, but he hopes that they bring knowledge about social justice to whatever job they might work at. Teaching students to think analytically about social justice does not necessarily mean they will all end up working for non-profits or other like-minded organizations; it means that they will be prepared to consider social and environmental costs at any career they choose. They will be empowered to promote change in whatever area becomes their passion.