A Culmination of the Arts and Education

It has only been a week, but Christmas at Luther seems like such a distant memory.

Students had to arrive on campus early from Thanksgiving break to begin rehearsals, and the majority of the week that followed was consumed by mass rehearsals, ensemble rehearsals, set up for this or that, not to mention the cascade of emails with the latest updates and need-to-know information for... you name it. The week of Christmas at Luther was certainly insanely hectic, but it's amazing how quickly we forget of all the other planning and preparation that went into such an event.

Choirs began rehearsing this Christmas music somewhere around the time of Halloween, and I'm sure the behind-the-scenes work had begun some time before that- likely last January or before! Although the finished product of all the work we put into Christmas at Luther is only apparent to those of us participating in it during the week of, it's important to realize everything else that went on.

Students aren't always going to see everything moving around them- and that's the way it's supposed to be. As a future educator, it's going to be my responsibility to see that students are motivated to learn... even though the end goal may be a long way from being in sight. Singing about the joy of Christmas when you're still deciding what Halloween costume to wear doesn't make a whole lot of sense at the time, but when viewers around the country see what we have to present on December 22nd, the work we did will make sense.

World Peace through Education

In our educational psychology class, Dr. Langholz has given us the opportunity to work on an independent project as an alternative to a traditional final exam. We were presented with different options shortly after our midterm exam, and originally I had intended to read 3 additional education-related books, but I realized quickly that time constraint might make this difficult, so I am now preparing a different project. However, I had begun reading "Three Cups of Tea," which turned out to be so fascinating a read in itself that I continued with it in my spare time.
I finished the book on Thanksgiving day, laying on the floor of my grandmother's house, my stomach full from a bounteous traditional Thanksgiving dinner. Certainly a juxtaposition from the lives of the young people Greg Mortenson is trying to help in his book, who have very, very little in the means of worldly possessions.
To summarize, Greg Mortenson was an avid mountain climber who failed an attempted climb of K2 in the early 90's. Weak and seperated from his crew on the way down, Mortenson is nursed back to health by local residents who very little to give, but they still give it all to help this stranger. Touched by their kindness and seeing their desperate need for a building for the young people to learn, Mortenson vows to someday return and build a school. In the years since, Mortenson has gone on to build over 50 schools in some of the most dangerous terrain on earth- Pakistan and Afghanistan, some places where the Taliban grew.
Essentially, Mortenson has seen that through education (notably the education of girls), peace, understanding, and an ability to move forward in the world is a possibility. Mortenson is a curious exception in the realm of mission-work, in that he is not pushing a Christian or western agenda- he simply is promoting education.
Mortenson is inspiring in that his work voices the simple idea that education (even basic) is a very powerful thing. Although I don't recommend that everyone who wants to make a difference in the world go to impoverished foreign countries to teach, I think we can be inspired to make some difference. Making sure every young person in America receives a real, quality education is something we can all work towards, and wanting to make a difference on the other side of the world is a worthy cause as well.
"Three Cups of Tea" is very insightful in realizing that something as simple as education or having tea with those who are seemingly radically different from ourselves can be helpful to see that we have more in common than we think. If Mortenson's work can prevent wars, what logical person would argue otherwise?

Technology in the Classroom: Cohesiveness or Chaos?

Recently, we completed our book review projects by doing a a presentation in class lecture- however, we didn't do this in typical fashion. In Professor Langholz's sections of Ed Psych, we were to implement technology by recording what would be our presentation and posting the video on a media-sharing website, such as YouTube.

Utilizing technology in such a way was quite interesting- it was a both an opportunity for wider artistic freedom and expression, yet it was definitely a challenge (and rather time-consuming) to figure out the technology and how best to use it.

Group projects (which in themselves can be rather time-consuming and difficult when individuals don't easily agree) are only complicated when technology comes into the picture. All the planning for the presentation, topped with how to work the camera, the logistics of who is doing what when, and how, make for quite the challenge. The largest chunk of our time was consumed by editing and putting together our final "film." We used i-Movie on a Mac, which is supposed to be a very easy-to-learn and easy-to-use film editing software program. It wasn't extremely complicated, yet it still took a while to learn- I can only imagine the horror of trying to master and use a more complicated technology in a short amount of time.

In the end, our project did come together, but only really at the end! Technology can be a valuable asset in the classroom, yet because of it's ever-changing nature, it is a force to be reckoned with.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1p3GeMEFuIk
Check out our finished project, our "First Lecure" (it had to be divided into two parts to be uploaded onto YouTube- the technology again!)

Chalk

I regularly look forward to someday being a teacher.
I also regularly look forward to Thursday nights, as they generally come with a new episode of NBC's mockumentary comedy, "The Office."

Our Ed-Psych class was fortunate to recently get the opportunity to watch a comedic yet very informative movie entitled, "Chalk." "Chalk" essentially takes on the same documentary-type format as that of "The Office," but in this feature-length film, the camera crew follows around a group of teachers (and an administrator) in a public school setting. Funny moments and irony abound as the year unfolds for this ragtag bunch.

Character list includes:
the female PE teacher, who has to learn to stop being so pushy
the music-teacher-turned administrator, who never has a minute of spare time in her life
the likable yet overly ambitious 3rd year history teacher, hell-bent on winning teacher of the year
and the first-year history teacher who can't quite find his footing (or his confidence)

This isn't the overly-inspirational success story that is typical of movies about teachers. I feel that "Chalk" is a more realistic (if not simply comically exaggerated) portrayal of the average teacher. Each individual working at the school has their own issues and their own obstacles to overcome, and it's not an easy thing to do, especially when feelings of being alone in thankless job set in.

Simply put, "Chalk" is a very reasonable (and entertaining) insight into the world of real-life teachers. I recommend for all teachers, future teachers, parents, and anyone else who is looking for a good laugh.

Students > Numbers

Our final guest lecture series hosted parents of students in the Decorah School District.

It's amazing how a well-presented argument can really modify one's outlook or opinion on a certain subject. These parents got me to re-think my stance on No Child Left Behind.... AGAIN.

Originally, from all that I had gathered in high school, reading about the matter, and talking with teachers I knew, my opinion of "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) was not a good one. I understood it to be a poorly thought-out, bloated, sagging bureaucratic way of addressing the shortcomings in the American education system. All the emphasis was placed on ever-higher test scores, the tests that were used to gauge student achievement were not accurate, were biased against students not of the majority WASP background, and ridiculous amounts of teachers' time was wasted on the presentation of the test results.

A few weeks ago, in our Ed-Psych lecture nonetheless, administrators spoke to our class about the successes of NCLB and how putting an increased focus on teaching strategies that yielded positive results was a major benefit of NCLB. Although some older teachers would argue that "this is the lesson [they've] been teaching for 25 years," and why change it, administrators give the voice of reason is that it's not working. Some might say this is a bit heartless, but our goal in education is to have students learn, not simply for teachers to teach.

So I began to see a real value in NCLB (as evidenced by some of my previous posts). Yes, the test results might not be a perfect representation of true student achievement, but as science would suggest, no data ever really is. Now that these administrators had gotten NCLB and myself seeing eye-to-eye, the parents came along and tipped the balance again.

The parents in our class understood the purpose and supported the positives of NCLB. Yet they each had small criticisms that someone who hasn't been a parent yet, might not really have thought of. These parents pointed out the ridiculous expectations the tests held for students with exceptional learning handicaps or disabilities. The actions taken as a result of these test scores seemed to make the learning gap larger. "My child is more than just a number."

So after a few weeks of reflection, it is still hard to clearly see what exactly my own stance on NCLB is. I'm sure that as I further progress down the path of education, I'll slowly clear the shroud in my mind, only to have something make me think in a different direction. NCLB is something I will be constantly maneuvering around in my mind for a long time to come.