SEARCH Class Goes To LinkedIn January 12, 2017 On January 12, 2017, a group of 7th and 8th grade Miller Middle School students set forth to visit one of the most recognizable companies of Silicon Valley…LinkedIn. The field trip was the culminating event of a science elective class that sent these students through the process of creating their own startup companies. After being selected as the winning teams, the students spent the day going on tour and presenting their projects in front of LinkedIn employees. It was the ultimate example of how community involvement can create a positive impact supporting the development of the next generation of innovative thinkers. The saying, “It takes a village,” played out beautifully as innovators at LinkedIn mentored my students. The following is my reflection of the day and its potential to creating innovative pathways for our young. Upon arrival, SEARCH students were warmly welcomed, complete with a sign and name cards, and students were thrilled to be allowed to take pictures in the Lobby next to the iconic “In” symbol. From there, we headed to one of many employee lounges that provided students a glimpse at the cool perks associated with the large Silicon Valley companies today. Students played pool, foosball, and some were even able take a ride on a motorcycle video game. I had the pleasure of being served a frothy cup of mocha made fresh from the talented hands of a barista. Next, we were taken to a work area that LinkedIn employees occupy. The walls of the cubicles are easily transgressed just by standing up and physically lifting the entire work desk. Students learned a little bit of the history of LinkedIn and asked questions about how to become a LinkedIn engineer. Afterwards, students were treated to a magnificent buffet lunch served by some of the nicest people to work in a kitchen who interacted effortlessly with my students. Everyone felt welcomed and well taken care of. It was only after lunch, however, that we experienced the best part of the day. Finding ways to impart wisdom from one generation to another has an important impact to the development of nascent entrepreneurs. It has an impact on adult entrepreneurs seeking the guidance of mentors and advisors, after all. Even more importantly, students who witness models of innovative thinkers willing to take time out of their day to provide feedback imparts a karmic flow of pay it forward. These students will remember this day and someday, they will be compelled to sit in on a student presentation, volunteer for a school or class, or be an active member of their communities. They will care more because they have personally experienced that care themselves. Giving time, feedback, encouragement, and support to a young person will not be in vain. LinkedIn was the perfect setting for students to learn this point. As we returned onto the bus, I realized that this day represented something very special. In the last two decades as a science teacher, I have worked hard to design innovative curricula that drive students toward a deep understanding of the world around them. Yet, this was always done within the vacuum of space that is my classroom. Although field trips offer students a glimpse of the real world and its occupants, it often lacks an interactive component where students must exchange communication and therefore, ideas. Sure, students formulate opinions and occasionally an inspiration might take form when visiting exhibits or shows. But, a direct exchange of ideas is typically lacking with the entity for which the students encounter. Any field trip certainly yields some level of benefit in the form of developing empathy and understanding. I will never say, “No,” to a trip to a museum or a theatrical play. These activities are good for students. But, at LinkedIn, something else happened. Students became full participants to their communities. Their projects came out of the bubble of their school and not the other way around. These students became emissaries for what the next generation is up to, so that the adult world…the real world…can better appreciate them. There is nothing more validating than that for a young person eager to do make a difference in the world. THANK YOU, LinkedIn for having SEARCH class over. It was a wonderful experience! ---Terry Chou
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On January 12, 2017, I went to LinkedIn on a SEARCH field trip during the day and then, I went to the NBC studio in San Jose to film a 5 minute segment on the talk show called Asian Pacific America with Robert Handa. Suffice it to say...that was a great day! The blog post on LinkedIn is coming soon.
BUT....here is the episode that aired on TV on January 15, 2017. The entire talk show was about the Cupertino Union School District. I have included all four segments below. SEARCH class was featured on Segment 2. Segment 1: Superintendent Wendy Gudalewicz talks about why the Cupertino Union School District is a destination district for families across the nation. http://www.nbcbayarea.com/on-air/as-seen-on/Cupertino-Union-School-District-on-Asian-Pacific-America-with-Robert-Handa_Bay-Area-410976485.html Segment 2: The Science Enrichment and Research (SEARCH) class gives students the opportunity to experience real world application of scientific inquiry. http://www.nbcbayarea.com/on-air/as-seen-on/Miller-Middle-School-on-Asian-Pacific-America-with-Robert-Handa_Bay-Area-410977555.html Segment 3: Montclaire Elementary School Teachers incorporate "SeeSaw" into the classroom. http://www.nbcbayarea.com/on-air/about-us/Montclaire-Elementary-School-Teachers-Incorporate-_SeeSaw_-into-the-Classroom_Bay-Area-410978605.html Segment 4: Students from the advanced group of the Cupertino Middle School Woodwind Quintet perform "Andante Grazioso" by August Klughardt, edited by H. Voxman. http://www.nbcbayarea.com/on-air/as-seen-on/Cupertino-Middle-School-Woodwind-Quintet-on-Asian-Pacific-America-with-Robert-Handa_Bay-Area-410979105.html In order to stay current with the times, I need to begin this blog with something related to the election results that came in last Tuesday night. Although I was saving this blog topic for a later date, I think it might just be apropos right now.
With an incoming Trump presidency, the promotion of education about global warming, mass extinction events, and human interaction with the environment becomes even more necessary for all science educators to teach to their students. The idea that the United States will relinquish some, if not all, leadership on the global efforts to scale back the damage being done to the planet is equally frightening as any of the other ideas put forth during the Trump campaign. So, what am I going to do as an educator? I need my students to understand:
The curriculum I will highlight today is my Coral Reef Project, which we are about to embark in Life Science. I came up with this project many years ago and am quite proud of this piece of curriculum. This is the kind of project-based, phenomenon learning that exemplifies a new approach to science education within a traditional science classroom. Set-Up: My students are finishing up the Classification and Evolution unit next week. Students are learning about the Permian Extinction event today in class, in fact. They are learning about how climate change seems to be a universal factor in all five of the last mass extinction events and that we need to understand those changes in order to survive. This will set us up to begin studying our next unit on Ecology. The Coral Reef Project is the culminating activity to that unit. There is no test for the Ecology unit, just the project results. Introduction: This project allows students to bridge science with policy making and it enforces the idea that science is applicable to the real world. Coral reefs are an important ecosystem and biome of the world. Humans depend on healthy coral reefs for their economic, social, and biological value. This is the stage in which a congressional-style hearing or debate on its management takes place. Students incorporate role play and debate in a jigsaw structure that ultimately provides the scaffold necessary to come to the understanding of how politics, economics, and biology are inherently connected to society. Student Roles (The Jigsaw):
Outcomes For This 80 Point Project: All students write a research paper on their topic. It is worth 30 points. All students give a short and collaborative speech before the Politicians. Students are told that the more the group comes up front as a team, the more sway it has with the Politicians. That effort is worth 20 points of participation. All students are to submit the index cards that collected their research data. These cards must be cataloged and are restricted to only 12 words per card of information. No copying entire paragraphs and a minimum of 25 cards are needed for an A. The index cards are worth 10 points. So, that leaves the last 20 points entirely dependent on the budget set forth by the Politicians. Of course, there is no way for all four groups to earn an A on this portion of the project and the Politicians typically feel the weight of that impact to their friends very heavily. After the class presents their unified speeches, it goes into debate mode. We spend one and a half class periods for the debate. Politicians kick start it by asking the first questions. The groups are given the opportunity to ask questions of their own to the other teams. I allow only a response, a rebuttal, and a close before moving onto another question. Politicians are allowed to interject questions at any time. I remove the Politicians from class to deliberate on the budget and this is usually to the many groans of students who want to continue the debates. The Politicians give me the budget the next day. They, too, have to write a research paper summarizing all of the interest groups’ pros and cons, efforts and outcomes. They have to turn in their index cards. They give a speech to the class by reading aloud the decided budget. And then, the class decides if they would like to re-elect the Politicians or not. The re-election is based on the ability of the Politicians to raise $200 for it. Re-election is able to be funded by a special amount of money each interest group has stored away for this purpose. The Commercial Fishermen have $70 allotted. The Coastal Developers can fully fund a re-election campaign with $200. The Tourism Industry can fund up to $100 and the Ecologists can fund only $30. I felt that those figures represented the real world fairly accurately. So, during the entire process, the Politicians and the interest groups engage in real world discussions because they are getting a dose of reality. If the Politicians cannot raise $200 for their re-election campaign, they all automatically get 14 out of 20 points…a C- grade. Anyone actually keeping track of the points will notice something. If a student, Politician or otherwise, gets full credit on the research paper, the index cards, and participates in the speech and debate, that they would get an A overall on this project, even if they were given a C- grade by a Politician or the class. When I created this project, I knew that all students needed to feel some level of power and influence in order to get full buy-in. But, I definitely didn’t want retaliation for any of the outcomes. Therefore, the lowest grade a student can give another is a 14 out of 20 points for this project. I only reveal this fact at the very end of the project to upkeep the appearance of power. Wrap-up: Students get a taste of reality and learn to empathize with many differing viewpoints on this project. They come away realizing that to conserve a coral reef, the local politics and economics must be accounted for along with current scientific understanding. It is the only way that effective conservation efforts can be done. It was heart wrenching to hear Kate McKinnon sing ‘Hallelujah’ on Saturday Night Live. It makes me feel that now one door has closed, educators need to be searching for all windows of opportunity in discourse and action. Without doubt, we need to ensure students have a chance to open their minds and think about the enormous task at hand to save the world. I have just done my first podcast! The audio is a little off, so I will be using a headset next time I record a podcast interview with Doris Korda. You can download our conversation at http://doschoolbetter.com.
As I begin to write a proposal to the Miller Community Education Foundation (MCEF) for money to purchase equipment for The Playground, I think an important exercise will be to define what Maker Education is to me and how I find ways of its incorporation to what I do in the classroom.
This is what I want for my students:
As a Life Science teacher, I have standards to abide by and timelines to meet. I am held accountable to ensuring that we cover ground on foundational concepts so that my students can be successful in successive coursework at the higher levels. I read of a metaphor once that really stuck with me about this issue of needing to teach to the standards. It goes something like this… Teachers are like architects. The standards are the building codes that must be enforced and followed. But, what kind of architect would you rather be? One that is only capable of building a typical house that will just do. Or, would you rather be Frank Lloyd Wright and create houses that are still structurally code abiding buildings, but simply have something recognizably magnificent emanating from it? Of course, I want to be the Frank Lloyd Wright of curriculum designers. But, I’ll take this metaphor even further. I want to build a magnificent curriculum to which my students can come to occupy themselves in for the year or semester and within that time, I want to provide them the opportunity to make this house their home. To customize some of the internal aspects and asethetics. To provide them the means for which they can imprint themselves onto its grandeur. So how do I accomplish such lofty desires? First, I learn about my subject matter deeply and I build my curriculum on the themes that persist as the cohesive string tying all concepts together. In Life Science, those themes are the characteristics of living organisms. Everything learned by students stem from that list and validates the reasons for why we learn the concepts that we cover in class. Next, I create or collect only the labs, activities, and projects that serve the above goals. That is how I vet all value that is added to my curriculum. How does Maker Education fit into all of this? To me, Maker Education is more than just having students build stuff using technology. Maker Education is the philosophy I take to ensure that my students have the opportunity to create their own homes within the houses that I provide. My students engage in activities to create, to recreate, or to design key aspects of their learning experience. The timing of those actions don’t have to be constant to be effective. It is ok to have students make, tinker, and develop their own designs sporadically throughout the course. The key is to deliberately incorporate some of this perspective with enough frequency that it is relevantly instilled into students as something they value. Additionally, the student-created designs should not be free of form in a Life Science class. When my students create their own dichotomous keys for sharks, they are creating their designs in a structured format. I want a dichotomous key, after all, as the product of their efforts. This key is equivalent to a computer program with binary choices. In having students create their own dichotomous keys, as opposed to simply reading the key to identify a shark, students engage in computational language development as they make and tinker with their designs. Students bring their personally constructed keys to be peer edited as a final cap to this activity. This is when they discover how important clarity in language and usage of evidence is so important to science. I consider this exercise a form of making. High tech machines are not always required to do such work. After students create their own dichotomous keys, they appreciate far more deeply the work involved in classifying life on Earth. Teachers of any subject matter can develop a student-centered learning experience where students make in order to demonstrate learning. I wonder how many teachers employ this approach to their teaching? Please share your stories with me and let me know. Terry Chou I just presented at Stanford University’s FabLearn Conference 2016. It was an amazing experience and truly inspiring as I learned how teachers around the world are advancing the Maker Education movement. These educators are putting in countless hours designing and implementing curriculum that takes student-centered learning to a whole new level.
There were four salient points that I learned in that weekend.
This is what I intend to do to ACT on these insights. Without action, much of these nice thoughts will fade and be put to the back burner. So, I’ve decided to act. Point One: How to bring in more Exploratory Play opportunities to my middle school site. I will be pitching an idea of a technology playground to the Miller Community Education Foundation and my administration today. I don’t want to call this space a Maker-anything. Makerspaces have the explicit intention of making a product and in today's climate, this space always carries an expectation of innovation or invention. Instead, I want the purpose of this space to be for exploratory play. Therefore, I propose calling this space "The Playground". The intent of this playground is to play, not invent nor innovate. Low tech material and any high-tech tools that reside inside will be geared towards all possibilities of play, which might express itself as innovation and invention. Maybe it is a fine distinction, but I think it will be a necessary one, especially to get the staff on board with it. My message will be that our students have an opportunity to play using technology...both low tech and high tech. That there is value in play, whether it be as a solo exploration or a collaboration. Finally, that students have access to a variety of avenues of self-expression. Point Two: How to get the staff on board with not only The Playground, but to innovate their curricula towards a Maker-style classroom. This one will be especially difficult. I’ve already engaged in various conversations with my colleagues who acknowledge that a Maker-style space like The Playground would be great to have on campus, but there are legitimate questions to its sustainability. Most teachers will need substantial support to help them incorporate an activity that would have their students utilize this space. There is also the issue of supervising and/or maintaining this space in a manner that involves majority of staff members, as opposed to just a few and committed handful. So, this will be my game plan. Just focus on my own classes and bring The Playground to fruition. I will take a “Build it and they will come” mentality. I don't know how much can be done, but I know what I can do. Lead by inspiration. Be the voice of innovative teaching at my school site. Do what I can to help my community evolve. Point Three: Helping Other Educators (worldwide) Tailor Their Programs I am on a Facebook group called DoSchoolBetter.com. Educators from around the world are coming together for support and asking questions to specific problems of their programs. There are definitely common issues that all educators have to deal with from group grading issues to incorporating an entrepreneurship perspective. I am trying to be as active on that site as I can. It makes me feel like I can be helpful to someone else trying to innovate in their classrooms. It also allows me to witness the wonderful programs out there and brings me hope, as well as inspiration, for what is possible. Point Four: Stay in AWE of all the innovation that is happening worldwide. If I can surround myself with stories of educators striving to innovate, I know I can do so, too. This will keep me motivated to continue my journey as an innovative educator. Please let me know about your programs, too. I am eager to connect with educators who are doing great things at their sites! Education is truly a remarkable profession to be in right now. I hope that by blogging about my thoughts, my classes, and my journey that it brings me closer to a wider community of educators seeking to elevate the state of education worldwide. I know that this is what I need to do. Terry Chou |
AuthorTerry Chou is a science teacher at Joaquin Miller Middle School in San Jose, CA. Three years ago, she fell in love with the idea of teaching innovation as a way to bring a unique research experience to her students and SEARCH class was born. This further developed her keen dedication to the advancing of science education. Archives
January 2017
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