Introduction to Genius Hour: Purolator "One-Hour Delivery" Project

We are starting a novel study next week on the book Shattered. I am planning to also try out the Genius Hour concept with a baby step.

On Saturday, I spent 3-hours learning about Genius Hour with Elementary and Secondary School colleagues.  We watched Daniel Pink's TedTalk about Motivation and explored a multitude of resources available on-line and off that support teachers' who want to incorporate Genius Hour into their learning environment. Several colleagues shared their early experiences with Genius Hour in their classrooms.  They shared some of their students' projects and definitely expressed enthusiasm.

I also heard about the ROWE business model (Results-Only Work Environment) and Fed-Ex Days (give people 24 hours to work on whatever they want — so long as it’s not part of their regular jobs and provided that they show what they’ve created to their colleagues when the 24 hours elapse).

I loved the ideas in theory, in principle. But I doubted their efficacy with most of my high school students.

My students are honest.

Me: If you had time to learn about anything, what would you do with it?
Student 1: Sleep.
Me: What are you interested in?
Student 1: Nothing.
Me: Anyone else?
Student 2: ...

So I try to assign meaningful work hoping to engage all students and excite them about learning.

I think I am a coward. I am afraid to relinquish control... I am afraid that it will fail... that it will be a huge waste of learning time... that students will do nothing... that I won't be able to keep up... that it will be disappointing... that Genius Hour is just another fad.

So this week I want to confront my fear and try a baby-step.  I want my students to build their background knowledge before beginning the novel Shattered. Last semester, I gave the students a chart of topics related to the novel and asked them to find out something about each of them.  We then presented these and students added to their own charts.

This week, I am going to give them a book, have some computers and tablets available, and challenge students to build their background in preparation for reading the novel. Students will be allowed to choose their time, task, team, and techniques. They can use anything to show their learning (i.e. chart paper, whiteboards, paper, video, photos, etc.), but they only have an hour to "deliver."

I have no idea about what the outcome will be. I expect my students will take longer to get on task because they are not used to the autonomy, but when they do eventually find their way, they will learn more.

Baby Steps for all of us...

"Mechanical Pencils": Finding Balance between Basics and Forward Thinking

Our school is launching an Ad Hoc Committee to plan our school's technology needs.   Jokingly or not, someone responded, "Mechanical pencils!" A few chortled at the response, and then we moved on. But the question remains.

When parents, community members, and business leaders express their woes about education, the back to basics concept is held up as a holy grail: Arithmetic, Reading, Writing, and perhaps Vocabulary, Spelling, Manners, Life Skills, and Penmanship.  I am not even sure I disagree with them,  Of course I want my children and students to be able to multiply in their heads and print legibly.  There must be room in 14 years of schooling (from JK to Grade 12) to ensure some degree of competence in such basic skills without compromising the rich, meaningful, personalized learning that has become the ideal in today's education.

I believe that we could find agreement among stakeholders about what basic skills are non-negotiable in the learning process.  In fact, many schools are developing exactly that: a "Non-negotiable" curriculum for each grade (Common Core in the US and Non-Negotiables in the UK). An infographic that captures such trends was compiled from a survey by Education Week. The danger of course is that a "back to basics" approach will fall into a "drill and kill" pattern, with some children falling short of mastery.  What about the value of student-centred exploration, project-based learning, interdisciplinary connections, differentiation, choice, and personalization?

Excerpt, "Teaching Well-being in Schools" from pioneer in Positive Psychology, Dr. Martin E. P. Seligman, full article can be read here.

First, a quiz: 

Question one: in one or two words, what do you most want for your children?If you are like the thousands of parents I’ve polled you responded, “Happiness,” “Confidence,” “Contentment,” “Fulfillment,” “Balance,” “Good stuff,” “Kindness,” “Health,” “Satisfaction,” “Love,” “Being civilized,” “Meaning,” and the like. In short, well-being is your topmost priority for your children. 

Question two: in one or two words, what do schools teach?If you are like other parents, you responded, “Achievement,” “Thinking skills,” “Success,” “Conformity,” “Literacy,” “Math,” “Work,” “Test taking,” “Discipline,” and the like. In short, what schools teach is how to succeed in the workplace.

Notice that there is almost no overlap between the two lists.

Yet parent would not want the so-called academic skills abandoned and often do not trust approaches to teaching that differ from the way they were taught.

The pendulum swings back and forth, and we need to find a balance.  Parents want their kids to come home excited about what they are learning.  Students who want to learn are more apt as pupils.  As long as we work from a belief that all kids can learn functional skills (barring neurological impairments) , the expertise of the teacher and school should be harnessed to recognize and facilitate students' personal learning readiness, providing an environment where all can thrive.

So, it is not a balance between back-to-basics (i.e. mechanical pencils) and innovative methodology (i.e. student blogs) that we need.   It is immersion in both, where each provides fuel for the other.