Unbelievably, one student showed up today – as they were making final preparations for graduation – to take the final, that I had to talk him through in order for him to pass. Now this particular young man showed up every day and sat quietly in the back, seemingly participating – but flunked just about every quiz. I remember thinking if he had some personal attention, he would do much better. But I never gave him personal attention. I was focused on managing the class – which with this group, took some effort. I was told by another young man that it was unbelievable that I actually got this group to do anything because they had been totally out of control earlier in the year. Another young man told me that the teacher who was facilitating the class just before me had more or les gotten things under control but they were required to do guided reading packets and watch Forensic Files on Fridays while filling out question and answer sheets. I remember saying and thinking that that is a fine approach because it is organized and really helps those who are low level readers. I did not like the approach however because it did not challenge the students to take upon themselves to discern what information is relevant and pertinent and did not encourage discourse. I restructured the class by demanding that they complete 5 fill-ins for warm-ups in which they had to engage me in conversation to fill in the answers and then a brief lecture – around 15 minutes with power point – along with a Discussion sheet that was developed around a weekly quiz to be given on Friday. I set up a place for the old Warm-ups so that everyone was held accountable for making them up. And set up a designated place for old discussion sheets – which were also mandatory. Quizzes had to be made up as well. In this 2nd period class this approach was initially a disaster. Actually it was a disaster up until the last few weeks when it became quite clear that I was not going to back down and would indeed give those who would not comply, an F – preventing these seniors from graduating if necessary. Now, true accountability would mean that I would not permit students to make up all of the work they missed in the last few weeks of the marking period and would not permit them to copy from each others papers at the end of each week when everything was due. I relented on these things. I came in too late in the year and the battle was truly lost. Because of all of the changes in instructors and issues – they would most likely be permitted to pass and graduate regardless of what I did and did not do. However, I somehow made them believe that I could hold them accountable and accomplished some level of buy-in from even the most difficult of students by the end. I keep coming back to the same idea of the need for a tremendous amount of structure to create a safe space. Along with the need for constant changing activities to encourage motivation. They seem to need super-structured chaos. They should all be cosmologists!
This idea has been labeled as differentiated instruction and project based learning and all kinds of cool buzz names and ideas. Of course the big draw-back is the refusal to read or do anything much outside of class and the abundance of behavioral problems that must be managed. One of my colleagues thinks that to ask them to think deeply about some of the concepts I find fascinating and enjoyable to discuss is really asking too much for their age and maturity level. I really disagree. I think the culture – meaning the academic culture – does not support the kinds of thinking and talking that need to take place during some of these labs and discussions. So framing and positioning are everything. If you want buy in for something like gel electrophoresis or ELISA, you have to frame it within the culture. And you don’t have to use a bunch of slang and bad grammar to do it. It just has to be connected to something that is familiar and clearly identifiable for the students. Gosh, that is an incredible amount of work. I am thinking of my lecture about Internet Forensics. They were quiet and listening to me – fairly intently in the 7th period which was disgustingly awful. I would like to listen to that recording. But I remember how I related to everyday things like social injustices that we all face – and my dad and the identity theft debacle. I painted hackers in a different light and they seemed to be interested, if just for a moment. It framed the discussion within the context of every day life of every day people and positioned the students and their families and friends as hard-working members of society who should be concerned about this topic. It also posed a humanitarian look at the “bad guys”. That was also the highest scoring quiz for my students. Not because of lecture necessarily – they were just familiar with the terminology because they use the internet and computer so much. Making the unfamiliar into the familiar. That is an art. Then there is the tremendous cultural divide.
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