Category Archives: innovation

Uncertainty

Posted on by

I quickly learned after arriving at the University of Iowa for my undergrad that taking religious studies courses was a popular thing to do. One professor in particular, Jay Holstein, blazed a trail at Iowa that included religious studies courses having 500 students in them and being classes that students would sneak into in their free time. A documentary was filmed in 2008 focusing on his work and a short clip from the film can be viewed below to understand the type of educator that he was day in and day out.

This fall marked his 50th year anniversary of teaching at the University of Iowa and they celebrated him with a live streamed event including former students, his family, and his Golden Lecture. To hear him lecture again was an absolute gift. One quote he said stood out to me the most and that was:

“Education leads to uncertainty. Things that were simple are now complicated… Don’t be afraid of uncertainty. Be suspicious of certainty.”

Through innovation, social emotional learning, growth mindset, and effective teaching, we are introducing our students to the complicated and the uncertain and we are teaching them to not be afraid. That curiosity and that confidence in questioning anything and everything will be valuable to our students forever.

Discovering the Value of Teaming

Posted on by

I have to admit, the concept of teaming kind of goes against my nature. While I do truly enjoy people, I am an introvert who feels totally comfortable running alone for hours in the mountains. I once spent three weeks backpacking the John Muir Trail through the Sierra by myself. I even drove across country by myself once, perfectly content with just music and the road. Every time I reread Into the Wild (the junior summer reading book, which happened to be my recommendation), I feel a kinship with Chris McCandless as he travels alone from place to place, learning about life on his own terms. 

Whenever I was forced to do group work in school, I would quietly resist. When I first came to Carondelet and our PD days inevitably required groups of teachers to create and perform skits, I felt a muted dread. Maybe it was the nature of these assignments, or never explicitly being taught how to work with others, but I generally believed that I could complete most tasks better and more efficiently on my own. So when Sarah and Rachel from Teaming by Design came last year to present their work, I was an unlikely candidate to subscribe to their ideas. But something clicked for me that day, and I began to see teaming in a totally different light.
I have made it one of my main goals this year to learn more about teaming, and how to implement teaming into my classes. Over the summer, I read Amy Edmondson’s Teaming to Innovate, and became more aware of the overall purpose and effectiveness of working in teams. When done well, teaming promotes experimentation, embraces failure, and encourages diversity. When I imagine the future working world that our students will enter into, I believe that collaboration will be a skill that is just as valuable as reading or writing. Earlier this year I talked to a friend of mine who works for a major tech company about the role teaming plays in his work life. He said that just about everything is done collaboratively, and that when he hires people, problem solving skills, creativity and interpersonal skills are the most important qualities he’s looking for.
I have always tried to mix in some group work assignments into my teaching, but mostly with the intention of breaking up the monotony and giving students a chance to socialize. The point of my group work was never to teach students how to work together. I did always quietly hope that my group activities would inspire students to collaborate equitably and tap into each other’s strengths to produce a quality piece of work. But what would often happen was the student who cared most about the grade for the assignment would do the majority of the work, and the other group members would stay out of her way and let her proceed. 
Something important I have learned this year is that there is a difference between group work and teaming. Teams determines their own goals for a project, and determine their own process for meeting those goals. Teaming is not a matter of giving students an assignment and explaining the steps or assigning roles; teaming happens when students have the opportunity to create the terms of the project themselves then determine the process that will work best for them.
While I mostly consider my Podcasting and Storytelling class a writing class in disguise, it has also evolved into a teaming class. About six weeks into the semester, I begin transitioning from a whole class environment to one that is entirely team-oriented. Before my students choose the two people they will be making a podcast with, I take a week to mix the students up in as many different teams as possible and have them complete mini-teaming activities. One activity requires the team to build a structure using only the contents of their backpacks, and the highest structure wins candy; another asks them to develop the best possible podcast idea in ten minutes then pitch it to the class. It’s like speed dating for podcast partners, and I want them to see the possibilities for who they might collaborate best with.
During the fall semester, I let my students have free choice for who they would work with, and despite all the teaming activities and discussions about how heterogeneous groups often work best, many still chose to work with their friends. But I decided that if I was going to learn about teaming dynamics, I would have to set my micro-managing tendencies aside and just watch as the different groups went about the very complex task of creating a podcast. 
As the weeks went by, it was like I was watching a social experiment unravel, and I gathered as much qualitative data as I could. A handful of teams worked unexpectedly well together, agreeing on a topic that they were all interested in and taking personal responsibility for completing their share of the work. Some went through ups and downs, struggling for a few weeks, then making comebacks and bursts of progress. And some absolutely crashed and burned – a few friendships fell apart and one team turned in each of their parts of the podcast individually because things had turned toxic.
Here are a few of the reflections I got throughout the semester:
“I am a bit of a micro-manager and control freak. It was easy for me to be this role because I am a total type A personality. I think my micromanagement worked well overall for our team because I made sure everyone was finished in time. I really hope they weren’t annoyed with me being up in their business, but we did get our work done and that is what matters.”
“They kept asking throughout the research what our topic is for the podcast. It was somewhat frustrating because I kept having to repeat myself. I felt like I made it clear what our topic was, but they showed otherwise. In the first place, I should’ve forced (teammate) to speak about a topic she’s interested in.”
“At times, it was easy for me to freak out on my teammates, but I remembered that this project is a team effort and that my teammates are there for me. Collaborating with them taught me to think outside the box, try unfamiliar editing ideas, and not be afraid to speak up. After this project, I feel very confident about my communication skills with others.”
One of my biggest takeaways so far is a reminder of how absolutely complex human beings are, especially when they come together to collaborate. Also there is no formula for teaming – the point is for students to get into that messy interpersonal space and learn something about themselves and how they interact with others. Like most everything in my teaching, this is a work in progress.
If anyone is interested in meeting up to continue the conversation on teaming, there is a small group of teachers that meets in my room every few weeks to talk blended classes, teaming and other new things that we’re trying in our classes. Just let me know and I’ll add you to the email list. Or come observe my podcasting class sometime – I’d love to get more feedback.
One of the best teams ever!

Odyssey of the Mind is this Saturday, March 2nd!

Posted on by

Did you know that this year, for the first time ever (I think?), Carondelet has an Odyssey of the Mind team?  From their website:

Odyssey of the Mind is an international creative problem-solving program that engages students in their learning by allowing their knowledge and ideas to come to life in an exciting, productive environment. Participants build self-confidence, develop life skills, create new friendships, and are able to recognize and explore their true potential. OotM proves that students can have fun while they learn.


Odyssey problems have challenged students to design mechanical dinosaurs, invent new factory machinery, build working vehicles, write a new chapter to Moby Dick, put a twist on classic artworks, turn Pandora’s Box into a video game, and so much more.
Since 1978, OotM problems have challenged students to go beyond conventional thinking and incorporate creative problem solving in learning. Creative Problem Solving is a skill that needs to be nurtured and developed. While a conventional education is important, learning to solve problems creatively and confidently gives them an important edge in their education and career goals. There is creativity inside each of us and OotM teaches how to tap into it so it can be applied to real-world problems.


Our team is made up of five amazing students:  Juniors Mykenzie Clark, Liana Huerta, Dani Baur, Olivia Pinto and Freshman Lauren Roach.  They’ve been working hard since December, meeting every afternoon x-block past 4pm and many weekends to complete their task.  Their problem was to design a structure made out of only balsa wood and glue that weighs less than 15 g but that can withstand the weight of 40 lbs or more (and they earn points the more weight their structure can hold).  They also have to toss their structure with a goal of getting maximum height and distance (and ensuring their structure won’t break).  And they have to present all of this within an 8 minute creative skit.  They’ve come up with an amazing Medieval story that has at its core the power of women and feminism.  





If you are free, they will be competing at Concord High School on Saturday March 2nd at 2:50 pm.  They’d love to have your support.  Please let me know if you plan to attend and I can help you navigate to their performance location.  


Go Cougars!

Sometimes Things Go Better Than I Had Planned…

Posted on by
My Spanish 3 Honors students can conjugate 21 tenses in any given form on command. They can analyze and discuss the similarities and differences between Jorge Luis Borges’ short story and Salvador Dali’s surrealist paintings through the theme of duality of being and metafiction. My Spanish 3 Honors students can discuss the benefits and moral disadvantages of stem-cell research and technology in the medical field. They can recite the Beatitudes, discuss genocide in Guatemala, all in Spanish…HOWEVER: 
Many of them do it in an inauthentic accent that makes me weep bitterly at night…(okay that’s not true, but the accents definitely need some work…)
I have struggled for YEARS to find techniques to keep my brilliant students accountable for having an authentic accent. Their accent must match their genius minds. When I correct them in class, and they repeat after me, they are able to sound authentic and within a few minutes, they revert back to overcompensating with an “Americanized” accent (Imagine Dr. Phil speaking Spanish…)
You’re welcome.
While I understand that speaking Spanish with an authentic accent isn’t imperative to understanding the general gist of what a person is saying, and I also recognize and appreciate the fact that not everyone is capable of sounding like they jumped out of a Spanish telenovela, I do find it to be important to at least make an attempt to the best of one’s ability to produce a sound that is as similar as possible to the target language (in this case, Spanish). To make this blog not such a long read, I’ll get to the point…

I wanted to find a fun, out of the box tool that would help my Honors students become cognizant of their accents and to hold them accountable for trying to sound as authentic as possible. I wanted to provide them with a tool that they could use to practice at home. I introduce you to:
It’s a game where people try to pronounce certain words with a plastic barrier in their mouths. (Apparently it’s hilarious, I’ve never played…) Anyway, I came up with this idea because many English vowels require the speaker to close their mouths to pronounce. For example: “oh” or “u” (you). If you just tried saying these vowels, you find that your lips close together. My students are saying words like “dos” and “ocho” like “dose” and “ohchoh”. In Spanish, the mouth stays open. It’s hard to explain in writing, but the plastic tool prevents students from closing their mouths, thus forcing them to pronounce the vowels in a more authentic way. Here are some videos, first in English, then Spanish:

I asked my students what they thought about this new technique to help them with their accents, some said that they liked it and they could feel that the plastic piece was helping them be aware of the positioning of their lips when they spoke. Others said that it didn’t really help. Perhaps they won’t go home and practice with their own tools that I provided to them, but there was an even more valuable lesson that came up with using this ridiculous piece of plastic. It was ridiculous. I have found over the years that in order to be successful at speaking a language, one must take risks. The mental filter that tells you that you sound dumb, or are going to sound ridiculous impedes many language learners from actually attempting to speak. The biggest lesson for my students was to eliminate the filter, to both look and feel ridiculous, and attempt to speak anyway. Did this piece of plastic help them improve their accents dramatically? Perhaps not, but it certainly made them more cognizant of their accent, and it was a physical reminder to let go of the filter and just try to sound the best that they can. This is not what I had planned to happen with this activity. I was more focused on getting my students to sound more authentic, but an even better result came from the class: My students were having fun, they lost their obtrusive filters, and began to let go of the fear of speaking (and singing). 

I’d say that’s a win!

Algebra – Initial Thoughts

Posted on by

Now that we have survived the first 5 weeks of our new Algebra program, I thought it would be helpful to write down some initial thoughts on how things are going.  It has been really exciting to see something that was just a crazy idea last year morph into a real program that we are already really proud of now.  There have been some adjustments already and there are some things we are still trying to figure out but overall the feedback from our students and the teachers involved has been positive.  

Here’s what has worked well:
  • We spent the first two and a half weeks establishing a group culture of the class.  We discussed growth mindset and had all of our students take the “How to Learn Math for Students” course.  We spent time discussing the messages from this course with our students. 
  • There are a lot of moving parts to this course (online learning through Carnegie Learning, collaborative activities, how Schoology is organized, GoFormative exit tickets, topic guides, etc.) which can be overwhelming if everything was explained at once.  Instead we used the first two and a half weeks to chunk things out and explain each one separately before putting it all together. 
  • We had all of our students take the Mathematic Diagnostic Testing Project High School Readiness test.  We will also test them again when they complete the Algebra program.  This will be one way we measure the success of this program.  
  • Students are truly moving at their own pace.  Those who are familiar with the concepts in the first topic have moved quickly through it and already taken their first assessment.  We also have some students who need the extra time to really master the content and are moving at the right pace for them.  This wouldn’t happen in a traditional classroom.  
  • The four teachers who are implementing this program (shout out to Mary Beth Dittrich, Kristina Levesque, and Christy Marin!) work well together.  We communicate often with one another.  We are all flexible with what we need to do each class period (even when it’s decided 10 minutes before class).  We do not always agree with one another but we are comfortable speaking our thoughts.  We are able to discuss things openly and honestly to come to a solution that is best for our students.  
  • Carnegie Learning is a good tool for our online component of the program.  The problems are rich and require students to be engaged.  The reporting section allows us as teachers to determine where they are struggling and what the students need extra support with.  Students are also able to go back into the program in review mode without losing their saved data which is a huge plus. 
  • The new furniture is amazing.  This program would not be what it is now with the old desks.  The new furniture allows students to work well in groups, using their smaller white boards when needed.  The individual desks work well for the online learning or assessments.  Plus the colors of the chairs brighten up the room and change the learning environment.  
This is just a short list of what has worked well.  There are so many more including hearing students comment that they really understood something or watching them work well with their groups on collaborative activities.  
We do have some challenges:
  • We have 4 teachers for over 94 students in period 3.  Sometimes we need an additional teacher (or two!) in the classroom to work with students, particularly those who are struggling.  In the past these students would have had 2 periods of math in a smaller class setting.  One requirement we’ve established in our program is that a teacher signs off on the collaborative activities.  When doing so we ask each student in the group to explain to us what they have just learned.  This is a great way for us to gauge student understanding and to see that everyone is responsible for their own learning.  However at times multiple groups need to be signed off and we just don’t have enough teachers to get around to everyone.  
  • Space is an issue.  The new furniture is great but having separate classrooms isn’t as ideal.  As teachers sometimes we are in one classroom but can’t necessarily see what is going on in other classrooms.  We try and pop in and out of the classrooms during the period but it’s not always possible.  If we had a larger, open space we would be able to  spread ourselves out to help the students more.  
  • The 45 minute class periods are tough.  It’s not quite enough time for students to transition to more than one activity once you account for taking attendance in the beginning, explaining which classrooms are for each activity, and ending a few minutes early for the exit ticket. The block periods work better for this program.  
  • As teachers we need to find more time to meet to discuss how things are working and what adjustments we need to make.  It’s hard finding that time even with a common 7th period prep.  Teachers have other classes they are teaching and need to use this prep for those classes at times.  We also have so much to discuss that even if we used every 7th period, there’s still always more to talk about.  This collaboration is so important though.  Yesterday we graded our first topic assessment together and this was necessary to make sure we are all grading the same way.  But it takes time which has become a precious commodity.  
Despite the challenges I am so excited for what we are doing.  I am loving watching our students engage in mathematics in a totally different way.  I’m inspired by the dedication and commitment from my colleagues.  I know that we will continue to reflect on what we are doing and revise it to continuously improve as we strive to meet the needs of all of our students.  
We would love you to come visit the organized chaos of our Algebra program.  We meet periods 3 and 4 in rooms 2, 5, 6, and MacLab.  Come by anytime as we would love to hear your feedback on what you observe and any ideas you may have to improve on this program.  

¡Conduzcamos por la Ciudad!

Posted on by
I have been taking a course at UC Berkeley for six Saturdays since September, and I finally finished my last course this past Saturday. During these courses, I have begun to move even more away from simply memorizing vocabulary and grammar and truly incorporating the material into real-world applications. 

In Spanish 2, which is a combined Sophomore and Freshman class, students are learning about city vocabulary: streets, signs, turn, go straight, keep going, and also store names: fish market, fruit stand, park, supermarket, bakery, bank etc. I have also heard several of my students chatting about getting their licenses, or taking their permit tests…or failing their license tests.. 🙁 
AND THEN I HAD AN EPIPHANY:
I wanted to make city vocabulary as real as possible for my students.
 In groups of 3-5, I had my students open Google Earth and investigate a city in Latin America that they had heard of, or that they were interested in. They basically virtually traveled through all of Latin America, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Spain and were able to see street names and people’s houses, and a lot of trees. They also got side tracked and searched for their own houses and Carondelet as well…but back to the assignment. 

Once students became excited about looking at cities through Google Earth, I had them pick a city and try to replicate it in the most basic from onto butcher paper. Some students drew Cartagena in Colombia, others drew cities in Mexico and Puerto Rico. 
They drew streets, and labeled the street names and round abouts etc.
Next, they researched common shops based on the vocabulary that they could find in or around the city. They were able to make cultural comparisons and realize that there is a CROCS store here in the US, but also in Colombia,  and the students were surprised to see this. They labeled their stores with the Spanish word, for example: pescadería for fish market, and they labeled the name of the market. 
Next students, learned the “nosotros” commands “Let’s drive” “Let’s go” and they also practiced their informal commands as well. Once they were relatively comfortable with their commands, students finished coloring their maps.
When the maps were complete, each group received a “Hot Wheels” car that I had gone out and purchased. They got to pick their cars: the truck, the garbage truck, the race car, and they were excited to drive their cars.
Students took turns filming each other giving one another directions using commands and listening and “driving” their cars according to the directions their peer was giving them to get from one place to another. Students had a blast doing this activity and they were able to integrate culture, grammar, and vocabulary into a fun, innovative, creative project in a group.
What surprised me the most, is that students went completely off script and started to spontaneously incorporate vocabulary from earlier chapters. They decided to make their cars have accidents and they needed to go to the hospital because the driver had an injury. Hospital and injury vocabulary happened way back in chapter 1, however students were still able to recollect the information and use it in an unrehearsed in a spontaneous way to make a story with their maps. This is what pleased me the most. As a language teacher, my goal is to have my students produce the language as spontaneously and unscripted as possible, and they became excited to create their own individual scenarios spontaneously.
Overall, I enjoyed this assignment, and so did my students. I got a lot of great feedback that they were able to use real-world applications in class. 1 week later, I quickly quizzed students on the vocabulary and the commands, and they were all able to produce accurate answers without having studied before.
Here is a sample video:

Alternative Assessment

Posted on by

Chapter 7 in our Algebra 1 textbooks is all about exponents and exponent rules.  It is super dry (lots of rote memorization), but critical to their success in future math chapters and classes.  So I decided to try something a little different because I wanted my students to be able to fully understand and explain these exponent rules, not just regurgitate them on a typical test.  As I often do in class, I referenced my favorite Einstein quote, “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough,” and decided to ask the students to explain the rules to me–via video.  The expectation was that they would explain why the exponent rules work, not just show me that they work.

Not quite sure the best way to do this, I attended Joan’s lunch demo of screencasting (such perfect timing!) and she really helped me get the ball rolling.  We found a great app (ShowMe) to record videos with, but when the time came to submit these videos, there were quite a few issues.  The biggest being that most of these videos are 5-10 minutes long and few platforms have the capacity to store that amount of content.  We are still working through this part of it.

I haven’t made it through all of the submissions yet, but so far they have been amazing.  Allowing the students to prove their understanding in a creative way really helped me see them in a different light … and we don’t even need to get into the brain science that supports using both “sides” of your brain in a math classroom.  The creativity of this one in particular blew me away:

Chapter 7 Alternative Assessment Student Sample
*It is over 7 minutes long so you obviously do not need to watch all of it, but the creativity comes across right away.

Even after all of the logistical snafus, the feedback from the students was very positive:

Almost 70% said that this type of assessment helped them understand these concepts more than if they had taken a traditional test.

Creating Innovators–Let’s Play!

Posted on by
Over the
break I finished the book Creating
Innovators by Tony Wagner.  The
author interviewed many people considered to be “innovators” as well as their
parents, teachers and/or mentors in order to identify trends that help to create
innovative people.
Throughout
the book, the most common trend that developed was the fact that these
innovative people were given time to “play”(by parents or teachers or mentors)
and through that play they developed a passion and through that passion blossomed
into a purpose for their careers and other life goals.  That’s when I realized that we don’t take
enough time to play in a math classroom so I made it my 2nd semester
goal to incorporate more “play” into my classes.  I am trying to do this in three ways:

1.     Number talks
with my algebra classes.  The basic idea is that I put a problem on the
board (i.e. 18 x 5) and the students have to figure it out without any
calculator or paper/pencil.  Once they
think they have the answer they put a “thumbs up” in front of their chest.  When everyone is showing a “thumbs up” I
invite volunteers to explain their thinking while I transcribe it on the board.  For example, one student did 5 x 10 then
added it to 5 x 8.  Another student did
20 x 5 then took away 10 (2 groups of 5). 
We had about 6 different strategies up on the board after this
problem.  The purpose is to show students
that there are many different ways to think of one problem—not just one.  I am very transparent with them, explaining
that my goal is for them to “play” with these numbers and start to see the
flexibility and creativity in math.

2.     Creating
time in my schedule for non-curricular math.  Students need to see how
math (and mathematical thinking/strategies) apply outside of the
classroom.  If I believe this, I need to
prioritize it and create time for it—so that’s what I did.  In planning for this semester, I set aside
nearly every Friday for this purpose.  To
start out we will be working through Khan Academy and Pixar’s collaboration Pixar in a Box, which provides students with
videos and practice activities to see how math, science and technology come
together to create a Pixar movie.  Last
week we learned how Hooke’s Law (physics) was used to animate Merida’s hair in Brave. 
I’m not grading this.  We are just
playing.




3.     Would You Rather?
(Math)  With my financial algebra students I am
trying to incorporate more opportunities for them to defend their thinking with
mathematics.  I am using this to start
class (similar to the number talks with algebra).  Again, I am emphasizing the fact that there
is no one correct way to think about these questions, but they do need to
support their decision with math.  For
example, in the picture below, students cannot just say “I would pick the beach
one because I like the beach better.” Most students select the beach based on
the basic multiplication (they can use calculators for this exercise) but then
some students argue that they would pick the city location because it is more
likely to be full throughout the year).


So my
question is, do you incorporate any aspect of “play” into you classes?  How?  I
need more ideas.  Also, if you are
interested, the best chapters were the ones about “social innovation” and “innovating
learning”.  You do not have to read the
entire book to get value from those chapters.