Skip to main content

Less Physics Mo Problems

Why am I writing this personal entry? Well, it is not an attempt to gain any sympathy. It attempts to show what is possible if a clear intention and goal serve the learner's needs.  In May of 2022 just near the end of another fantastic school year, I do not remember what happened. But, I was unable to finish the school year and was unable to teach the following year.  Why? On May 21st, 2022, I fell down a flight of 16 stairs (luckily carpeted) from the 2nd to 1st story of our home.  I was found at the bottom of the stairs. I was found foaming at the mouth. This would lead to a 2-month hospital stay which included an induced coma because my seizures would not stop, several rounds of lumbar punctures, and relearning basic physical movements like something as simple as being able to roll in the hospital bed. Simply put, when I was admitted to the hospital, I was diagnosed as being “critically ill.” Please take a moment and read those words: critically ill. They are not terms...

Do Your Students Take the Red Pill?

Is the devil you know better than the devil you don't?



I want to thank my friend and colleague Andelee Espinosa for providing me with the topic and inspiration for this blog post.   



As outlined by Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, the hero begins her story as an individual who may feel out of place in the ordinary world.  A spiritual aid will come to the hero and give her a call to adventure or quest that is usually initially refused, leading to disaster.  After this disaster, the hero has no choice but to embark on the adventure.  It is the spiritual aid who gives our hero the tools to complete the quest, but the hero must finish it on her own. Through the journey our hero faces a series of tests and at the end she reaches the Supreme Ordeal, or the ultimate test.


The film The Matrix follows the hero's journey to a tee. In the film, Thomas Anderson, a.k.a. Neo, is living in a world that appears to be normal, but he keeps questioning if there is something more that explains why he does not fit in.  He is given a choice by his spiritual aid.  Someone who is above the laws of nature.  This character is embodied by Morpheus.  Morpheus gives Neo the choice to accept his world as it is and take the blue pill or take the red pill and dare to see the world he inhabits for the construct it is.  






In the film, Mr. Anderson takes the pill and awakens the true hero that lies inside of him, Neo.  He finds that the world he thought was real was an artifice designed to make humanity more docile.  The Matrix is a complex film with a plethora of different lines of social commentary, including education, which I would love to explore. But the film has been mined to its core by some of the greatest philosophical minds on the planet via books, articles, and even audio commentaries. So, I'll leave it there.


The other day, Andelee and I spoke with a student about summative assessments. This student is not a strong performer on tests. Traditional testing does not accurately represent her mastery of the course objectives. But when asked whether she would like to be assessed on a traditional test or a project that covers the same objectives if given the choice, she said she would choose the test.  When asked why, the student didn't have an answer.


A project is one form of alternative summative assessment that can be part of a classroom.  Projects take a variety of different forms.  They can be the written word, the spoken word, visual images, a physical artifact, or a combination of these elements.  There are no limits to what an alternative assessment could look like other than the teacher's willingness to see how it aligns to the course objectives.


Why would a student choose a performance measure that they know does not accurately represent her content knowledge? That is the question we as educators need to face. Why do students take the blue pill if they know the current state doesn't serve them best? How can teachers help students make the choices that are best for them? How can teachers get them to take that red pill?


Teachers are our students' spiritual aid.  It is the teacher's job to help students accept the call to adventure.  How do we do that? The first job is to make the path clear. The main reason students won't embark on an alternative for of assessment is because it is new and different. It is the unknown. Students know what a traditional test looks like.  They vary from teacher to teacher, but few go out of the bounds of the norm.  So although content may vary, the format is relatively the same.  


So, the teacher needs to model for our students what an alternative assessment looks like.  By the time students get to high school, they have had almost a decade of traditional testing.  As a spiritual guide, teachers must light the path with a clear rubric of what content must be covered.  Also, the rubric must be clear about what skills will be evaluated.  For example, if an alternative assessment is a presentation, will the rubric just assess content or will it also assess the style of the presentation?


A good alternative assessment rubric, should not limit students to only one format. The rubric should allow any student to present mastery of objectives.  This doesn't mean that the rubric can't include skills, such as creativity and collaboration, but these must be explicit course objectives.  If they are not, the teacher has no right to add it to a student's course grade. This assessment also allows a student to meet the objectives in the format that presents no barriers between what she can demonstrate on the assessment and is able to demonstrate outside of the assessment.  


So what happens to students that refuse the call?  Those students that don't see the value in an alternative assessment may fail the traditional assessment.  It is then the teacher's duty to discuss with the student why she did not take the alternative assessment and give her the opportunity to do so.


When the hero enters the unknown, she is crossing the threshold  as it is termed by Campbell) of the alternative assessment. When any student chooses to take a chance on the unknown, it is important that she feel safe.  So when designing alternative assessments be sure not to leave your students hanging out to dry.  Daily check-ins with appropriate feedback are a must. The student must meet success on these daily trials which help determine progress towards the goal.  When students fail to make progress, the teacher must guide but not lead the them through the issue.  When students have effective collaborative groups, these peers serve as helpers (Campbell's term) in the process.


In the end, the choice to take a chance on an alternative assessment is the student's.  Teachers need to serve as mentors for our students as they decide what pill to take. Give them a true choice.  Your students know what a traditional test looks like, but probably have no idea what an alternative assessment looks like or entails.  Without knowledge, there can be no real choice. If a student fails, it is the teacher's job to help them learn why and send the student back on that journey to mastery.  When I explained to the student Andelee and I sat down with that a project would allow her to show what she learned in the way that best fit her strengths. There was no question,she said that she would do the project.


And for those teachers out there who are not giving students alternative ways to demonstrate mastery, don't ask why should you be doing it. Ask why am you are not doing it.  Your students will never become heroes unless they are truly tested by more than a Scantron.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Twitter Cards for Blogger

So, I’ve been seeing people with beautiful Twitter Cards in my Twitter Stream. They make it clear that there is a web page to visit and give a quick preview of what would be found. Something like the one below: I’ve been wondering how to get one of the cards to appear when I tweet out a link to my latest blog post.  Since I use Blogger, there is not a simple button to click to turn this on.  I had to find a way to paste new code into the HTML code of my blog.  It took some searching from multiple sites to get a completely functional.   This site though was quite helpful.  But, I’d like to walk you through my process and hopefully it helps a few out. There are a few types of Twitter Cards.  Two that at most frequently see are the basic summary card and the summary card with large image.  Below you can see the layout of each, but realize that they both have the same content pieces. This is going to look like a lot ...

Personalized Learning Tasks and Roles

Yesterday, I read a great post by Jim Rickabaugh dealing with the roles of learner and teacher in a personalized learning environment by looking at tasks . The roles were set up on a continuum. This article timed perfectly with a reflection on part of Students at the Center by Allison Zmuda and Bena Kallick on idea generation and task development I had in mind. These two works are the focus of my reflection here. I think a key misunderstand teachers have when it comes to digging into personalizing learning is that for planning purposes, we no longer begin with standards but with student desires.  I believe like all good instruction, we need to start with the standards.  Think about it, standards are what we want all learners to know and be able to do as a result of passing through our educational system. That is why it is essential that we make sure that standards are representative of what we believe is important for learners to be informed and productive in th...

Pear Deck 101 + Q&A

  Last week, I presented as a part of Pear Deck’s Pear Fair 2020. My presentation was Pear Deck 101 for Google Slides. During the presentation, there was a live chat. Many people said it went too fast for a 101 Session. Luckily, it was recorded so it can be rewatched.  Also, many said that they wanted to know how to build a Pear Deck first. I structured the presentation to show what Pear Deck was before showing how to make one. Perhaps that wasn’t the best structure. But, I’m going to stick with my philosophy of showing what something is before showing how to make it. The presentation, which can be watched below, was structured in several different sections What is Pear Deck? Providing an overview of the experience from the Teacher and Student perspectives. How do you build a Pear Deck in Google Slides? How do you start a Pear Deck presentation? How do you end a Pear Deck presentation? Here is the Slideshow I shared during the session bit.ly/pearfair101 Time really flew in...