Welcome to Virtual Science

Last year I posted an article here at Media Infusion called “Four Weeks to a Flatter You.” The theme of the post was that the world is indeed becoming smaller as Thomas Friedman suggested in The World is Flat, and I provided a 4-week regimen to help teachers prepare themselves with skills necessary for constructing 21st Century classrooms. This year, I’d like to follow up that article on “Web 2.0 Self-improvement” with tools for “Web 2.0 Us-improvement.” I’ve put together another 4-week course to help us move further along the journey. We’ll examine the idea of how — because of the Internet — culture (and business) is changing through crowdsourcing and how we can take advantage of this phenomenon to transform and democratize our classrooms.

In 2005, Thomas Friedman’s book, The World Is Flat, sent a wake up call to the United States, with a message of particular urgency for educators: We must stop preparing our students for careers that will no longer exist for them in the 21st Century.

Our country no longer occupies a role of dominance in the global economy, with little competition, as it has for the past 50 or so years. The playing field has been “flattened” due to such forces as the Internet, and any job that can be automated or outsourced will be.

We are training our students for an unknown future, having little idea of what jobs will exist when they graduate college. What we do know is that they will have to compete globally and at a higher level than the market calls for now. Any job that can be automated or outsourced will be, and what will remain are those jobs/tasks that need specialization that can’t be found elsewhere or can only be done by a “localized touch,” rather than the long arm of overseas, cheaper labor.

Welcome to the Flat World! Fasten your seatbelts: it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

“C’mon everyone, let’s head back to the lab.” The group of middle school students and their teacher begin a short walk back to their school. Clipboards, data sheets, and water quality instruments are tucked safely in their backpacks. When they return to class, they upload the data that they gathered, including water temperature, pH, and the picture that they took of their study site. All this information is entered onto a web page where students from other schools have shared similar data from their locales. Learning experiences like this connect students to their local environment and to each other through real-world projects. The use of technology helps bring these lessons to life in ways that are relevant to students.

Greetings from IslandWood, a 250-acre residential environmental education center that serves nearly 4,000 students each year. We specialize in environmental education and place-based learning, which we think of as teaching in and about the physical and social space where kids live. A big part of our work at IslandWood is to help classroom teachers find strategies to connect students to their own neighborhood environment and community.

How do you teach Native American history and culture in the context of an American history class? Is the Native American content taught in separate components or woven within the framework of the remainder of the curriculum? As an 8th grade history teacher, I know that unfortunately in many textbooks Native American culture is compartmentalized and taught from an outside perspective. “We Shall Remain,” the new documentary series from American Experience and PBS airing in April and May (check your local listings), is an invaluable resource for teachers who wish to teach Native American culture within the curriculum of United States history courses. The series includes five films, each offering a unique approach, depicting the role of Native Americans within the context of American history. The five episodes include: “After the Mayflower,” “Tecumseh’s Vision,” “Trail of Tears,” “Geronimo” and “Wounded Knee.”

I recently asked my 8th grade American history students what immediately came to mind when I said “Native American.” Several mentioned the help Native Americans provided the Corps of Discovery on their expedition to the West, a topic we recently discussed in class. Many of the responses, however, characterized Native Americans in militaristic terms – focusing on warfare, attacks and battles. Additional common responses included “Thanksgiving,” “teepees,” and “hunting bison.” These responses left me disappointed, in part with the limits of my instruction. The history of Native Americans in North America is much richer and more fascinating than just these highly stereotypical glances.

Nobody ever taught me how to teach Shakespeare until I had been doing it for 18 years. In 1986, I attended the Teaching Shakespeare Institute at the Folger Shakespeare Library and spent four weeks with 40 colleagues in Washington, D.C. I learned how to teach from some wonderful scholars, talented actors, my other colleagues at the Institute, and the director, Peggy O’Brien.

So, while I muddled through Macbeth and Hamlet for the first part of my teaching life, I have felt much more comfortable for the final 15 years. During this second phase of my career I have stayed involved with the Folger both as a participant in the Institutes that created the three volumes of Shakespeare Set Free and as a Master Teacher for many subsequent Institutes. After retiring in 2001, I began to teach pre-service teachers at Stony Brook University, and in 2005 I was hired by the Folger as Senior Consultant on National Education.

I began to study King Lear in depth that first summer in D.C., and I even got to play the old King in a scene on the stage at the Folger Theater. I was the Mafia King Lear (aka, Don CorLEARone) and I was dividing up my organization among three female high school teachers. It wasn’t fabulous, but we had fun rehearsing it. In 1987, I became even more immersed in the play while participating in Jay Halio’s NEH Seminar at the University of Delaware and in England. That summer I saw a live production of Lear at Stratford-upon-Avon and did an in-depth study of the play at the Shakespeare Institute. But I never appreciated the play fully until I taught it to my high school class several years later. It was only then, in the voices of my high school students, that I heard the beauty of the language, the power of the words, and the brilliance of the imagery. It quickly became my favorite Shakespeare play and remains so today.

As a first grade teacher, the majority of my day was spent teaching reading. While some of my students flourished by receiving instruction in reading groups, literacy centers, and journal writing, it was clear that others did not. It was a challenge to figure out methods that would interest and engage my students who needed more than books and practice through traditional teaching methods.

Teaching students to read can be challenging, but providing opportunities for them to hone their skills can be even more difficult. The traditional methods of teaching reading and providing opportunities to practice skills are only effective for a select portion of the population. Today, more teachers are relying on interactive websites because they appeal to the multimedia generation.

Like so many other Americans, my early perception of world history was focused through American and European lenses. The civilizations that shaped the West were considered to be more deserving of our attention than those that had fallen under the boot heels of European imperialists in the 18th and 19th centuries. This attitude was certainly a reflection of the times. Throughout the 20th century, Western civilization dominated world affairs, caused the bloodiest conflicts in human history, and pushed forward some of the most innovative technological advancements ever seen.

But, as we know, the world is changing. Today, the ancient civilizations of India and China are experiencing resurgences in economic strength that are reminiscent of the power held in those regions long before Vasco da Gama made his way around the Cape of Good Hope and into the Indian Ocean. The implications of this new shift in global power, both historic and modern, change everything.

In recent years, the volume and quality of video and online visualizations available to teachers has virtually exploded. Series like the BBC’s Planet Earth and PBS’s Nature provide visually engaging, content-rich experiences that draw and hold students’ attention. Many times, my earth science students have told me about a show they’ve recently seen that related directly to content we were covering in class, and I’ve purchased a number of DVD’s from various providers with the intention of sharing at least part of them with my classes. Sharing this video content in the classroom helps connect your curriculum to the “real world,” providing examples and illustrations that you simply cannot create in your classroom. And when students see that the content they’re studying in the classroom is also the subject of a broadcast TV program, the importance and value of what they are learning is reinforced.

Learning to read can be scary – for both kids and parents. Kids have to contend with letters, sounds, and words, while their parents are handed terms like “phonemic awareness” and “alliteration.” It isn’t easy for anyone to make sense of all the new information.

But reading doesn’t – and shouldn’t – have to be an intimidating process that turns off all but the most gifted students. With online games, kids are introduced to new skills in a light-hearted, silly way, allowing them to learn at their own speed and stay engaged. Everything from the alphabet to phonemes can be fun. Really. We promise.

October is Month of the Young Adolescent (MOYA), a time to celebrate the skills and accomplishments of 10 to 15-year-olds while focusing on the unique needs of this age group. During these years when young bodies and minds are changing rapidly, educators must be mindful of providing academically rigorous learning while supporting the developmental and social needs of the middle level student.

This We Believe: Successful Schools for Young Adolescents, the foundational position paper of National Middle School Association (NMSA), describes the characteristics that such schools must exhibit. Among the recommendations are that learning must be relevant, challenging, integrative, exploratory, collaborative, and active. Students must be able to see how subjects are connected and how learning is connected to their lives. They must be led to use critical and higher order thinking skills and experience a variety of teaching methods. I can think of no better way to address these needs than through the use of technology and media!