Mr. Bower, I can't do my project anymore

I sometimes think about a conversation I had with one of my grade 8 students while we were learning about World War II and The Holocaust. It went something like this:

Reagan came up to me in the middle of class and said, "Mr. Bower, I can't do my project anymore."

I was a little taken aback. Reagan had been so eager to start her research on Dr. Mengele and initiated a majority of her project. At first glance such a pronouncement from a student might easily be labelled as defiant, but I was pretty sure there was something else going on here. So I asked, "Really, Reagan? Why's that? What's up?"

"At first I thought I wanted to learn more about what happened during The Holocaust, and then I started researching Dr. Mengele in that book you suggested, The Holocaust Chronicle. But now I'm just saddened by it all. It makes me so sad to read about the awful things that these people did to others. I just don't think I want to do this anymore. I don't want to be sad."

"That's fair. I know that sometimes I have a hard time reading books about The Holocaust. Sometimes it's hard to spend a lot of time focusing on such an uncomfortable topic." 

"Yeah. Totally."

"Before you quit your project, Reagan, I have a question for you. Would it be worse if some people like you and me got a little sad from spending time learning about The Holocaust or would it be worse if we avoided being sad and just forgot about The Holocaust?"

Reagan stood there looking at me.

She didn't say a word.

I knew she was thinking.

In short order she went from looking perplexed to certain. She said, "It would be way worse if we forgot."

"Why is that?"

"Because if we forget, we might avoid being sad, but we would risk allowing it to happen again. And we can't do that." She turned and went back to her project. 

I was proud of Reagan.

***

A couple thoughts:

• Can you see how asking Reagan about what was up was more productive than just assuming she was being lazy or defiant? People like it when you seek to understand them before you seek to be understood -- and children are people, too.

• Can you see how lecturing Reagan about why we need to learn about The Holocaust would have missed the point? Can you see how asking provocative questions that inspire thought are the real work of teachers? 

• Can you see how a text-book, computer software or app can't do this? Reagan needed "just-in-time" feedback and guidance that only a real life teacher that she has a relationship with could provide.

• Can you see how this conversation with Reagan would be very difficult to quantify or symbolize on the report card and yet witnessing her new-found realization is what might matter most? The most important things that happen in school may be difficult, if not impossible, to measure but they can always be observed and described -- this is why assessment is not a spreadsheet, it's a conversation. And when we try to reduce learning to a number, we always conceal far more than we ever reveal.

Is curiosity important?

Is curiosity important?

Or is curiosity just some fuzzy idea that granola eating hippies like to talk about while doing yoga, hugging trees and reading about Karl Marx?

Susan Engel wrote a remarkable piece on The Case for Curiosity:

What might explain the gap between the intense curiosity of young children and the apparent lack of curiosity among older children? I think many adults implicitly believe that children naturally get less curious over time. This belief isn't totally unreasonable. Data do suggest that curiosity becomes less robust over time (Coie, 1974). And if curiosity is, as psychologists say, the urge to explain the unexpected, then as more of everyday life becomes familiar, a child might encounter fewer unexpected objects and events. Perhaps the reduced curiosity of the 7-year-old is simply a by-product of that child's increased knowledge. 

However, adult influence may also be a factor. When researchers invite children into a room containing a novel object, they find that children are very attuned to the feedback of adults. When the experimenter makes encouraging faces or comments, children are more likely to explore the interesting object. Experiments I've done show that children show much more interest in materials when an adult visibly shows how curious he or she is about the materials. In other words, children's curiosity can be fostered or squelched by the people they spend time with. 

Although it's hard to discourage the investigations of a 2-year-old, it's all too easy to discourage those of 7-, 11-, or 15-year-olds. In one classroom I observed, a 9th grader raised her hand to ask if there were any places in the world where no one made art. The teacher stopped her midsentence with, "Zoe, no questions now, please; it's time for learning." 

Often the ways in which teachers unwittingly discourage curiosity are much subtler. By the same token, teachers can also encourage curiosity in subtle ways. One teacher I've observed often begins sentences to her students with the phrase, "Let's see what happens." She's showing them the value of finding things out.

Any questions?

As I wrapped up my keynote talk in Minnesota, I concluded by asking the audience if they had any questions. Due to time limitations, there wasn't enough time to allow the audience to think of a question and then find the courage to ask it, so I received my round of applause without any real response from the audience. I was a little disappointed because I really do enjoy receiving a response from the audience.

Afterward, Penny was kind enough to offer me some pretty cool feedback. She suggested that rather than asking the audience for questions, I should give everyone a minute or two to think about my presentation and than ask a couple people to offer their best response.

I really like this idea. I'm going to use this to conclude my next talk and I'll let you know if it works better than just asking for questions.

Thanks Penny!

How to ask a question

Here's a good one from Peter Wood's How to ask a Question:

Weigh the usual interrogatory words in English: who, what, where, why, when. If you can begin your sentence with one of these you are more than half-way to a good question. “Who gave you that scar, Mr. Potter?” “What is a black hole, Mr. Hawking?” “Where is the Celestial City, Mr. Bunyan?” “Why are you wearing that letter, Ms. Prynne?” “When will our troops come home, Mr. Lincoln?”

The rest of his post is worth the read, especially if you want to avoid the most common mistakes even the most intelligent adults make when asking a question. Here's a post I wrote on how question period in K-12 classrooms go wrong.

Chinooks Edge Professional Development

I had a great day in Olds, Alberta where I gave two presentations at the Chinooks Edge Professional Development Day. For those who were in attendance, here is a follow up post featuring links that I promised that would supplement the discussions we had. Feel free to e-mail me if I neglect to provide a link on a topic you would like more information on.


Making Writing Fun:


Spelling Implications
Writing, Professional Development and Social Networking
How Twitter can connect you with others
Here's why Rubrics are not the savior for writing assessment. Video
Here's how games such as Rock Band can be used in the classroom
Here's how you can turn any game into a strategy guide project.
Here's why teaching writing as an exercise in following the rules can be dangerous
Here's how an alternative to traditional language arts exams.
Here's how I use movies to inspire writing projects. (Coming soon)




Questioning Questions:


Questioning Questions
Questions or Answers
Standardized Testing is Dumbing Down our Schools
Multiple Choice Tests Suck
Grading Effort: Unintended Consequences
Constance Kamii on constructivism
The behaviourism infection
Harmful Effects of Algorithms
Autonomy as the aim of education
What's wrong with this picture?
Covering Curriculum
Negotiated Curriculum

Questioning Questions: Rethinking Classroom Discussions

This session will examine the purpose of asking questions and how teachers need to rethink the role of questions. We will examine who questions are for and how to better use questioning as a form of assessment. We will discuss common pitfalls teachers slip into such as the Radio Effect and Fishing Expeditions. We will rediscover how questioning can be one of the most powerful skills a learner can employ, and how 'traditional' schooling and today's high-stakes testing are so corrosive.

For more on how we need to rethink questioning:

Questioning Questions
Questions or Answers
Standardized Testing is Dumbing Down our Schools
Multiple Choice Tests Suck
Grading Effort: Unintended Consequences
My Prezi: Questioning Questions


For more information about booking Joe Bower for a lecture or workshop, please contact by e-mail: joe.bower.teacher@gmail.com

Questions or Answers

I find that when we engage in real, authentic learning, we tend to have even more questions that when we started.

So why is it in 'traditional' school we sell learning as a fishing expedition for right answers?

Grades, tests and report cards all encourage students to focus obsessively on answers, when the truth is that learning is more about the questions we ask than the answers we discover.

Yes, finding answers to our questions is important, but when we focus so much on the answers, rather than the questions, we place an artificial ceiling on our learning.

The only reason to pursue an answer is so that new questions can be formed. If we want to place any kind of real stock in 'life-long learning' place far more emphasis on questioning and a little less on answers.

Consider the following:

Who asks all the questions on a test? Apparently questions are only for teachers, and you would only ever ask a question that you already know the answer to. Or so it would seem, if you looked at how often we ask students to ask the questions on a test.

What do parents ask their children about when they get home from school? Our words matter, and so when we ask 'What did you learn?' we are doing so because we care, but perhaps it would be just as caring to ask 'What did you wonder about today?' or 'What did you struggle with today?'

If aliens landed today and studied every test that has ever been given by every teacher in the world, they would have to conclude that questions are for teachers and answers are for students. Meaning, you would only ever ask questions if you already know the answer.

We have a strikingly imbalanced take on who gets to ask the questions and who gives the answers.