A Walk with Blended Learning: Community Service

This morning I ran almost seven miles in Sand Run Metropark.  It was beautiful, hilly, and fast.

This morning I saw eight deer.

I'm not going to write about those experiences.

This morning I joined some of my students to participate in the Medina Walk out of the Darkness Suicide Awareness Event.  A large crowd showed up at 9 am on a chilly but sunny morning to walk 4.5 miles.  That crowd raised over nine thousand dollars, and my students were a part of it.

Part of the philosophy that I embrace about Blended Learning is that it facilitates community involvement.  I want my students to strive to be good citizens of their school, their community, their state, their country, and their world.  Students in my Blended Rhetoric and Composition class chose to fight back against suicide, a heart-breakingly relevent issue in our community.  What I had originally imagined to be a quick project in making videos turned into a large-scale community outreach complete with publicity, fund-raising, donations, interviews, research, and lots of writing.  Click here to see the video my students created to Stomp out Suicide.

Our walk today was a way for us to process everything the students have accomplished this year and to reflect on their involvement in the community and their year in Blended Learning.  I try not to always lead the class; I want them to lead themselves, each other, and me.  It was in this spirit that I encouraged my students to lead the way on the walk.  As they talked, I listened.

The students talked and laughed about Prom.  They poked fun at each other and at me.  Then, as often happens on walks or runs, they got serious.  One student told me why she was glad that she took my course.  She told me that she learned how to be more independent and responsible.  She said she learned to enjoy literature.  Another told me that she felt that our class had bonded more than any of her other classes at the school.

Every one of those students told me that they were so glad to get up and walk together in the sunshine at nine in the morning.



It was perfect.

 

 

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Blended Learning and Service Learning

Today I am exhausted and humbled.  Yesterday, I was exhausted and nervous as hell.

Yesterday my Blended Learning Rhetoric and Composition students organized a community event to record a video for the Medina County Stomp out Suicide Project.  They have been planning this particular scene for at least a month.  This means that I haven't had any sleep for at least a month.  Let me backtrack a bit. . .

 

One day my students and I were discussing possible research projects when I came upon an online flyer for the Stomp out Suicide Video Project.  "Hey, do you want to make a video for this contest?" I asked.  "You could win a thousand bucks."  The students jumped all over it, but in the way that seventeen year olds think about how cool it would be to make a video without doing any of the work to make a video.  We downloaded the information and the students half-heartedly discussed ideas.

That day the unthinkable happened:  our school lost one of our own to suicide.  That evening, one of my students emailed me.  "This just got very real for all of us, " she wrote.  "We need to get serious and do something to make a difference."  And so they did.

The students created storyboards, recruited two videographers, and started shooting.  They researched statistics.  They assigned responsibilities.  One idea they all agreed on was that they needed a community crowd scene.  "Our theme is 'You are not alone,'" they said, "so we need to show that nobody is alone.  We need the community."  They created a Twitter hashtag (#MedinaStrong).  They created waivers and flyers.

 



 

 

I watched with pride (and honestly, a whole lot of angst) while my students made appointments with administrators, safety forces, business owners, students, and community members.  "Beth," a student who had always been a bit shy and quiet, volunteered to meet with our school's administrators and book the high school stadium and the gymnasium, in case of inclement weather.  "John," another student who previously hadn't been much of a go-getter, managed to secure free pizzas, pop, and all the napkins and cups we needed for a large crowd.  He also volunteered to plug our video on the school's morning video announcements.  My students wrote invitations to school board members and our communications director.  They papered our hallways with posters.

What was my role?  I tried to stay the hell out of their way.  I bit my tongue. . . a lot.  I showed them how to log their "business meetings" and all the documentation for the video into a wiki on Blackboard.  I retweeted them.  I took pictures. . .and I held my breath.

Yesterday, I watched my students organize a crowd of ninety students, EMT's, police officers, and community members into a meaningful event.  They presented an opening ceremony, they directed all of those people, and they sent them away feeling that they contributed to something important in the community.  Oh, and they collected money through wristband sales to donate to the Battered Women's Shelter of Medina.  Here are two newspaper articles describing that day:

"Video: Teens, think twice about suicide" from the Medina County Gazette

 

"Medina High School students create suicide prevention video" from Cleveland.com

 

In my last post, I described my job as a shepherd dog.  In this particular case, I learned how a blended learning class is really supposed to work.  My students were inquisitive, and they were willing to do the work.  I was lucky enough to point a finger and gently nudge them from time to time.  When I can take a moment to exhale (we aren't finished with the editing process of the video), I will be able to reflect on how this project helped the students ( and me) to learn and grow.  More importantly, I will allow the students to reflect on their learning.  I want them to tell me what they learned, not just for the sake of the Common Core Standards, but to give them the opportunity to realize what a fabulous moment they shared.  This is something I will remember forever, and I certainly believe they will, too.

 

[caption id="attachment_282" align="alignnone" width="300"] You are not alone. Photo: Sydney Campbell[/caption]

 

 

Stephani Itibrout

Want to read more about Blended Learning?  Follow me on Twitter @itibrout

 

The Relevance of A Teacher

The Keynote Speaker for the last day of Blackboard World 2013 was Dr. Sugata Mitra, inventor of "The Hole in the Wall" project, an experiment which places a computer in a wall in a very public area of an Indian slum (among other locations later) in order to prove that children can teach themselves through natural curiosity and reliable access to technology.

 

[caption id="attachment_189" align="alignnone" width="300"] Dr. Mitra's credentials[/caption]

 

 

 

[caption id="attachment_191" align="alignnone" width="300"] Children can access computers placed in an Indian slum.[/caption]

 

He also invented "The Granny Cloud," based on the idea that children can better learn with an encouraging, non-judgmental adult (like a grandparent) watching and praising their progress but not actually guiding it.  For more information about Dr. Mitra's projects, check out his Ted Talks.

 

[caption id="attachment_190" align="alignnone" width="300"] Children have real-time access to retired British schoolteachers, who encourage them in their language acquisition skills.[/caption]

 

Dr. Mitra's presentation blew me away.  How could a teacher not love a man who wants to tap into children's natural desire to learn?  How could I not appreciate a man who wants to bring education to children who may have no access to technology or education without him?  When talking about the problems with education today, Dr. Mitra said that we need to release teachers and students from excessive testing, and that's where I burst into applause.

When I got back to Ohio after BbWorld 13, I started thinking, and as many of you know, that is where the problems begin.  Dr. Mitra's theory is that given access to technology in a very public way, and given the proper amount of encouragement (but not guidance), students will learn more quickly than in a traditional environment.  I can see where this is a fabulous idea for areas of the world where children do not have regular access to technology or good education, but now Dr. Mitra is using some public schools in England for his experiment.  This leads me to think that he believes those students don't need a teacher, just a computer.  Here is where it gets weirder for me:  Dr. Mitra says that the roles of his "grannies" in his "cloud" are only to observe and praise, but he specifically chose retired teachers to do this, and the video he showed us featured a granny instructing children (not just observing them) in reading in English.  Doesn't this contradict his original theory?  Now I'm wondering if this is another push to get rid of face-to-face instruction in favor of online instruction because it will always be cheaper to stick kids in front of computers than in front of live teachers.

One thing I've learned from pioneering a Blended Rhetoric and Composition class is that I am essential to the equation when it comes to student learning.  I teach students to learn; I point them in directions where they can find the rest of their way, and yes, I am like the "granny" who tells them, "That's amazing!  I could never have done that when I was your age!  How did you do that?"

Does Dr. Mitra think that my students would be better off without me?

Stephani Itibrout

Blended Learning Rhetoric and Composition

Follow me on Twitter: @itibrout

 

True Grit: What My Blended Learning Students Taught Me

Nancy (not her real name) was a star student in my Blended Rhetoric and Composition class.  She did EVERYTHING I told her to do, she made as many attempts as necessary to achieve mastery on every assignment,  and she tested into Honors English at her college of choice.  This story is not about her.

This story is about Sam (not HIS real name either) because through him, and other students like him, I found my focus in this blended class.

Initially, I thought I was going to teach students how to analyze rhetoric and persuasion so they could see the forces that manipulate them in their lives.  I thought I would inspire them with a comparison between modern and “old school” literary and informative text.  I thought I would help them to see that reflection, especially in written form,  is one of the most valuable tools in learning.  I did accomplish these goals (to some extent), but Sam helped me to see that the most important lessons my Blended Learning classroom could teach were “grit” and independence.

My passive-aggressive boxing match with Sam started very early in the school year.

Am I Homer Simpson or Bugs Bunny in this fight?

I say passive-aggressive because most of our conflict was through email, posts to the class discussion board, or his mother.  He was a shy boy, and he was used to flying under the radar.  He was also used to his mother solving his problems for him.  After reading several lengthy explanations from Sam’s mom about his inability to submit his work on time or at all, I decided to have it out with him.

Me:  Sam, why is your mom emailing me and calling me?  Why aren’t you talking to me?

Sam: I don’t know.  I thought you wanted to know why I couldn’t do the assignment on time.  

Me:  We are going to establish some guidelines right now:  First, you are seventeen.  You are almost an adult.  Next year in college your mom will NOT be permitted to talk to your professors about your work, so we are going to break both of you of this habit right now.  When you have a problem, I want you to contact me in any way you want--email, discussion board, phone, video--but YOU have to do it.  Only you can be responsible for your work.  

Second, I don’t care about deadlines.  I care about mastery.  I want you to do EVERY assignment, and I want you to really learn from every assignment, and it doesn’t matter how many tries you attempt or when you get it done, but you will get it done, and you will know you are finished when you hit the mastery column in the rubric.

This is me when I'm laying down the law in class. Word.

Ok, this part about deadlines was quite a departure from the way I usually operate.  I often stress deadlines, telling students that they are an important part of the “real world,” and I penalize students for not meeting my deadlines.  My frustration with Sam led me to change this policy for the whole class.  It was as if the Standards-gods had smacked me upside the head, and I finally saw the light.  Why should I penalize a student for wanting to re-do a blog five times?  Don’t I teach students that writing is recursive, and we are never truly finished with a project?  Don’t I want my students to WANT to achieve mastery, even if it means more work for all of us?  Why should anyone accept only achieving about 70% of a standard if the student can do better?  Maybe I can train the students to WANT to do better if I could eliminate the constraint of time.

I have been listening to interviews on NPR in which “experts” are saying that the most important determinant in a child’s future success is not testing or grades, but “grit,” that is, determination, drive, and the will to do whatever hard work it takes to accomplish a goal.  I have always followed this philosophy (instilled in me by my own “expert,” my father), and I started to see that by emphasizing mastery outside of deadlines, I was teaching my students grit.

 I'll be reading this book very soon.

For the students’ final exam, I gave them an article about “grit,” called “Mastery is  Pain,” and I asked them to respond to it by defining grit and pinpointing where they might have shown grit this year.  This was Sam’s response:

The term “grit” means perseverance and passion for long term goals. Everyone has goals in their life, but sometimes people have the hardest times achieving those goals. Whenever people have a bump in the road, they throw in the towel and give up. I have to admit sometimes this was the case for me, but sometimes I’ve had grit, and achieved my goals.

School hasn’t always been the simplest thing for me, and has created some stress over the years.Yet this Rhetoric and Composition class has really taught me some skills that will later help me in my life. The way this class was set up really forced us to be an individual and responsible for our actions.Time-management was a skill that I really learned to value through the process of this class. With everything going on outside of class, it made it really hard to meet the deadlines when the papers were due.

I know that in college time management will probably be an even bigger issue, and this class has taught me how to focus in and use all the hours in the day to complete a paper.

Other students had similar responses:

Since we did not have to come to class every day, this required us to get things done on our own time, without that constant push from a teacher. At first I found this extremely difficult and struggled a lot. Nearing the end of the year, I started managing my time better and getting things done when they needed to be done and on time without the midnight deadline rush. I also have learned organization during this course. We practiced this through various projects that had to be organized on our own with different types of media, and saved successfully where we would be responsible for it.

Lastly, this came from a student like Sam, who struggled all year with deadlines and mastery:

Over the course of this year this class has given me many skills not just academically but also outside of school and the classroom. Building projects online that the whole world can see like the video and our blogs has given me confidence in myself to not be scared of what people think. This class has given me the confidence to go out and talk and not be worried about what I am saying, I am no longer worried about sharing my opinion whether it be what everyone else thinks or whether it might offend others, this class has given me that confidence. However this class has also taught me that there is something I need a lot of work at, and that is time management, throughout the year I had struggled with this aspect, and I know if I do not get that in check it is really going to bite me in the butt next year.

In conclusion, this class is still a work-in-progress, but isn’t every class?  My students helped me to realize that sometimes I have to let go of something (timelines) in order to get something better (mastery, grit).

This is me when I'm trying to let go of deadlines.

I intend to use this lesson to my benefit and keep working on my goals for my students, no matter how many attempts it takes, until I can achieve mastery.



Stephani Itibrout

Rhetoric and Composition

@itibrout