Worksheet Zombies - Can Curiosity Kill the Cat(atonic)?

Zombies Wander Among Us

So Halloween has come and gone, but as the ghosts and goblins put their costumes away for another year, I am reminded of a personal nightmare.  I write curriculum for high school students in a manufacturing apprenticeship program.  The work is all cross-content and activity-based.  At a recent staff meeting, I had a teacher ask if we could just go back to worksheets.  “That is what the students really want!” she pleaded.  Worksheet zombies.  I shudder at the thought.  Our schools are pushing out students who want to fill in little bubbles instead of think and create.  What kind of monsters have we created?

Obsolete, Not Broken

In his 2013 TED Talk “The Future of Learning”, educational researcher Sugata Mitra assured those listening that our schools aren’t broken, they are just obsolete.  Our schools, Mitra asserted were created to meet needs of a different time.  Those needs have changed and so now our schools must also change.

Guide on the Side

Mitra suggested a new role for teachers:

“The teacher stands back and watches in awe as learning happens.”

Mitra filled his TED Talk with anecdotal evidence from his research where he provided resources and gave minor prompting to young children.  Mitra shared the unexpected results - children learned as a result of exploration, not instruction.  In Mitra’s research,  the only time an instructor performed as a “sage on the stage” was when practice and skill refinement proved necessary.  Mitra challenged his audience with the idea that “knowing” is an obsolete skill.  In a monologue on the state of learning, he alluded to the idea that curiosity is now king.

Will Curiosity Kill the Cat(atonic)?

In a suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, embedded in the Kettle Moraine High School - a public high school - exists not one, but two competency-based, project-driven charter schools.  The class sizes aren’t smaller.  The student to teacher ratio isn’t lower.  The school day isn’t shorter.  The students also aren’t doing worksheets.

With a list of competencies, multi-disciplinary teachers, open space and computers, students in KM Global and KM Perform let curiosity guide them through experiences only limited by their creativity.  

Kettle Moraine High School Routinely hosts visitors eager to learn about the magic.  The school is routinely honored as one of the greatest in the nation.  All the while, in the same halls as these cutting edge charter schools, teachers and students from traditional classes taught with traditional methods respond to bells and clocks, open and close their textbooks for traditional classes, and march the march of the last century of education.  I’ll stop short of calling the students of KM worksheet zombies - the school is just too progressive, but I will point out that the reason this traditional environment remains is that school leadership acknowledged that there are students who aren’t comfortable learning outside of “the system”.

So is curiosity the sword to remove the zombie’s head?  Worksheet Zombies are a cultural paradigm.  No one swipe of sword will secure our future.  But time, willingness to change and educational leaders - like Pat Deklotz, Superintendent of Kettle Moraine march us one step closer to Mitra’s vision of learning as a by-product of curiosity.

Blended, Flipped or Personalized

The world of education is awash in cutting-edge practices designed to amplify student engagement and learning. From methods that are technology driven - like “Blended” learning and “Flipped” classrooms to ideologies that describe how to best meet a student’s needs - like “Personalized” learning and “Individualized” learning; teachers are bombarded with “best practices”.   How is a teacher to know which direction to move for his/her classroom?

For what my 15 years of experience in education, youth development, and curriculum and instructional design might be worth, I would tell teachers that methodologies and ideologies are like tools in a toolbelt.  You aren’t limited to the choice of one, but you will be most effective if you choose the tool best designed for your goal.

Quick Aside: In my last post, I encouraged educators to explore the possibilities of ed tech tools; to experiment bravely in order to better know the tool.  For those who may feel that the previous paragraph contradicts bravely experimenting, please know that I would consider experimentation to be a prerequisite of the ability to “choose the tool best designed…”.

Blended

Blended learning offers students the opportunity to engage with educational technology.  The technology tools can be used to assess, practice, explore and expand understanding of concepts.  Teachers may want to consider using this tool if they have students who learn best independently, have a large class and could use help reducing the size of a group receiving instruction, and/or if they have limited access to manipulatives/hands-on activities to reinforce learning.  Clearly, blended learning can be a challenge for teachers with limited access to computers and/or the Internet.

Flipped

Flipped learning opens the door for classroom time to be used for activity and practice instead of direct instruction.  Flipped learning environments typically require students to watch videos of instructional material.  This content is then reinforced and further explored through hands-on activities in the classroom.  Teachers who wish to have more class time for interaction, practice, and observation of student performance would do well to flip their classroom.  Teachers of students who struggle to regularly attend school and/or who have little support at home with homework may also find that the flipped classroom better supports their students.  However, teachers need to be prepared for the student unable to access the video due to inaccessibility of computers/phones and/or the Internet.

Personalized

Personalized learning refers to curriculum and instructional design that allows for student choice of time, place, path and pace.  It is a methodology that allows for students to learn, practice and demonstrate understanding through avenues that meet personal interests and learning styles/needs.  Teachers looking to add student input to assignments, who wish to amplify student creativity, and who want students to take responsibility for their learning could find happiness with personalized learning.  Teachers looking for a quick fix to student engagement may feel disappointed with personalized learning as creating a personalized learning environment is a journey, not a final destination.  Adding elements of personalized learning will take time, experimentation, and piece-meal implementation.

Tools in a Toolbelt

Just as a house isn’t built with only a hammer, increasing student learning and engagement will likely require more than one tool and methodology.  In looking at Personalization, Blended learning, and Flipped classrooms as tools, you might decide to use elements of all three.  Consider adding student choice (Personalization) to how a skill is practiced by offering online learning material that a student can use as evidence of learning.  If you open a center in your classroom where they can do this, that is technically Blended learning.  If you create or use curated videos to explain the skill in question, then you could offer student choice (Personalization) for whether they practice at home and get direct instruction at school or they could watch the video at home (Flipped)  and practice online in the classroom (Blended).

“But where do I start?”

The idea that one tool and/or one methodology isn’t a panacea, may leave teachers panicked about how to get started.  I would suggest that the first step is to start with a method or idea that resonates.  Find one small way to adjust instructional practices based on this learning.  Keep what works.  Drop what doesn’t.  Then keep learning and experimenting in order to fill the toolbelt.  Every journey, whether a walk in the park or a mountain trek, is completed one step at a time.

Recommended Resources:

1. Able, Natalie (February 17, 2016). What is Personalized Learning [Blog Post]. Retrieved from: https://www.inacol.org/news/what-is-personalized-learning/
2. Blended Learning: Blended Learning (2017). Retrieved from: https://www.edutopia.org/blogs/tag/blended-learning
3. Flipped Classroom (2017). Retrieved from: https://www.edutopia.org/blogs/tag/flipped-classroom