Author Archives: boadams1

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About boadams1

Learner. Husband. Dad. Mountaineer. Head of School at Mackintosh Academy - Boulder, in Boulder, Colorado. Have worked in transformation design, educational innovation, and school leadership for 30+ years.

PROCESS POST: Exploring Metaphors – Schools as Natural Habitats

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Author’s note: I’ve thought on this blog post for about a month, but I have nervously avoided writing or publishing it. I think it runs a risk of really offending people. Of course, I do not mean to offend anyone. Rather, I find that exploring metaphors about school and education helps to stretch and enhance my knowledge and understanding of school and education. Comparisons reveal. Yet no metaphor is perfect – some traits translate, and others don’t. But many people seem to get hung up on an idea that a metaphor must translate each and every element of the comparison. In my opinion, to try to make a perfect 1:1 comparison is misusing a metaphor. If two things were perfectly alike, there would be no need for a metaphor or comparison. It is because two things are not perfectly alike that a metaphor and comparison proves interesting and helpful – to explore the similarities and differences. I’m sorry if this exploration offends. But… here it goes.

In 1907, the German entrepreneur Carl Hagenbeck founded the Tierpark Hagenbeck in Stellingen, now a quarter of Hamburg. It is known for being the first zoo to use open enclosures surrounded by moats, rather than barred cages, to better approximate animals’ natural environments.[14]

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoo

How might schools be like zoos? In particular, how might schools be like zoos transforming from cage-based systems to more natural-habitat systems? In other words, how might schools provide more natural habitats for learners?

For some time between seven and ten years, I have been researching a primary question: “If schools are to prepare students for real life, then why don’t schools look more like real life?” As a corollary to the question, I like to consider how we might make schools more like real life. For students and teachers, in fact, school IS real life.

Lately, I am getting more challenges from people about what I mean by real life. That’s a fair and good question, and I am learning so much from these challenges – from these requests to define what I mean by “real life.”

Most recently, I’ve begun my responses something like this –

Well, in watching my own children grow and learn, I am struck by what searchers, explorers, and discoverers they are. So are other people’s children. Children seem to learn best through experimentation, immersion, and play. I don’t see many pre-school (not preschool) kids choosing to sit in desks most of the day to be taught to.

As I think about my life since formal schooling, I am also struck by how much my own learning – after school – involves messy searching, exploring, and discovering. Most of our lives as learners seems to be more constructivist, more integrated, more project-based, more inquiry-driven, more self-initiated. As an adult, I rarely sit for 180 days studying silo-ed subject matter (and I know that is a gross generalization).

Structurally, though, in many ways, formal schooling – in its traditional form – seems to be an interruption from our more natural, human ways of learning. The habitat of “school” doesn’t seem terribly natural.

So, for me, making school more life like means making school learning environments more like our natural habitats as human learners. In many ways, the PBL (project-based learning, passion-based learning, problem-based learning, place-based learning, etc.) movement is working to make school more like our real lives. In our real lives … We mostly work in projects. We pursue our passions. We find and attempt to solve problems. So, making school more like real life has involved more PBL. When student choice and curation of projects is baked into the work, I believe the work is even more natural habitat-ish. When students have authentic audiences – community members beyond the teachers – I believe the work is even more natural habitat-ish. When failure is a more process-embedded waypoint on the path to success, instead of a product-defining finality that marks a cell in a grade book, I believe the work is even more natural habitat-ish.

The technology integration movement seems another attempt at natural-habitat learning. Instead of understanding that kids live tech-filled lives outside of school and expecting them to check their digital devices at the door, many schools have worked to make technology part of the schooling experience in the most recent years. In the real world, kids can be producers in a Web 2.0 environment, not just consumers. So, adaptations to school have followed suit – students have more opportunities it seems to be producers of content, not just consumers of content.

MOOCs, badge-ification, maker spaces, and DIYs also seem related to the transformation of schools to more natural-habitat-oriented environments. Service learning, STEM, STEAM, STREAM, independent study, apprenticeships and internships, research partnerships – these all seem great examples of efforts to make school more like our natural habitats for human learning.

But what “cages” remain? A few possibilities come to mind:

  • traditional grading systems, especially those that utilize mean averaging, zeros, and non-narrative feedback
  • standardized testing, as it is used in the systems-measurement sense
  • silo-ed, non-integrated subject areas and departments
  • homework in its typical, traditional uses
  • organization of classes by strict age-grouping
  • single, isolated teachers instead of co-teachers and partnered facilitators
  • 45-55 minutes as the typical blocks of time for math, English, history, etc.
  • rows and columns of desks that preserve order over involvement

With the zoo comparison, I do NOT mean to imply that students are animals or wild creatures being held against their will. And I do not view teachers as zoo keepers. I am simply questioning if the traditional structure of school approximates our natural habitats as human learners. When we filter school transformation through a lens of “Does this change make school more like the natural habitats of human learning?” then I think we stand a better chance of making school naturally motivating, relevant, exciting, and intriguing. Additionally, when school is modeled on natural habitats, the environments and experiences come closer to preparing learners for the ongoing, lifelong learning that they will encounter for the majority of their lives after formal schooling.

Does any of this make sense?

Postscript: Despite thinking about this idea for weeks, I decided to write the piece as a process post. So, I gave myself 15 minutes to capture a rough draft of my thinking. For me, the thoughts are significantly incomplete, and I have much more to explore and discover about this metaphor – in both its strengths and weaknesses. But, as writing is thinking, I decided it was time for me to get more serious about my thinking on this metaphor.

How will I know what I think until I see what I have written?

E.M. Forster (roughly quoted)

Sacrifices in the name of U.S. History #DogGoneIt

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Did you know that the U.S. military trained suicide bombers in World War II? The living instruments of warfare were dogs. That’s right – dogs. In fact, tens of thousands of people enlisted their family pets to serve in WWII in a program called Dogs for Defense – part of the Canine Corps. The dogs were trained for a number of tasks – to carry ammunition, to attack shooters’ trigger hands across battlefields, and to bust bunkers.

I had heard of Victory Gardens and scrap metal donations in the early 1940s, but I had never learned of the animal sacrifices made during WWII. Until this morning. While walking Lucy today, I listened to This American Life – Episode 480: Animal Sacrifice. In Act 1,

Susan Orlean tells us about the moment America asked untrained household canines to make the ultimate sacrifice: to serve in World War II. Susan talks to Gina Snyder, who remembers being a teenager when her dog Tommy joined the service. And Susan digs into the national archives to learn the fate of other dogs that fought on the front lines. A version of this story appears in Susan’s book Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend. (20 minutes)

After watching Hachi (briefing on Wikipedia) last night with the family, and because I was listening while walking my faithful companion Lucy, I’m sure the Dogs for Defense story resonated more poignantly with me. But despite my emotional priming, I found the WWII story compelling and interesting in its own right.

Of course, I wondered why I had never heard or learned of Dogs for Defense or the Canine Corps before now. I used to teach seventh graders the subject of U.S. History, and I had never even encountered a hint or a glimpse of this fascinating military effort and civilian sacrifice. I thought the story would make an ideal artifact for the typical middle school history course. I’m feeling a bit of regret that Dogs for Defense was never before in my teacher’s toolbox. From another perspective, though, I am thankful that I found the story in my learner’s toolbox.

It’s fascinating to me what we curate into the curriculum, and it’s equally fascinating to me – maybe more so – what we intentionally and unintentionally curate out of the curriculum. In a content area like history, time is our greatest enemy, I guess. In historical survey courses, many are driven to cover as much history as possible (at a particular altitude), so we skim a surface for as many years as possible. Therefore, a certain degree of depth and a luxury of search-and-discover is sacrificed. What if we let the student learners do more of the curating?

It would be interesting to me to see what middle schoolers would find – through search and discovery – if they were guided to more self-discovery in subjects like U.S. History. I may be admonishing only myself, but I regret not being a more creative facilitator of learning when I was a part of a formalized learning space for U.S. History. I now wish I had served fewer completed meals, and I wish I had allowed more for students finding their own ingredients and recipes. I don’t doubt that we would not have covered as many years of history, but I bet we would have all learned – and retained – so much more.

If I had to do it all over again, I’d make my own sacrifice – giving up my traditional march through the chronological years in order to catalyze more searching, discovering, story finding, and connecting. To do so might even be responding to a higher calling of service to my country … and to the future learners’ world.

#MustRead Shares (weekly)

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Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Tis the season – wondering about the Christmas and Holiday time in schools

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I am 42 years old. And this Christmas was my first (maybe since I was 4?) that I did not spend as a direct member of a school community – either as a student or a faculty member. Of course, I was a parent for my two boys – in their holiday season at school – but that doesn’t seem quite the same.

For the past five years, at least, I have perceived more and more comments like, “We’re just trying to survive the crazy Christmas season” coming from school people. Maybe because of my recent career move – I still work in education, but not at one particular school – I was more aware of the commentary this year. As I spoke to numerous school-based educators this season, many of them remarked, “Bo, you remember what it’s like this time of year in school. We’re just trying to get through the days to break.”

By no means did everyone make such a comment. Of course not. But the ratio was about four to one, if I had to guess. About four out of five school-based people commented on the hectic nature of the Christmas season in schools.

Just to be clear – I do not mean to be at all critical here. It’s really just an observation. But it has made me think a lot (more) about school change.

If so many amazing school-based educators see the Christmas season in schools as hectic – as something to be “survived” until we get to vacation – then why don’t we do more to resolve and rectify the “craziness?” Why don’t we adjust the schedule, change the tenor, and remedy the stressors?

Someone wise once told me, “Bo, God did not create the school schedule. We created it. So…we can change it. It’s in our power to do so, and I don’t think God would mind. In fact, God might rather appreciate the modifications, especially if they were meant in a spirit of Christmas-full-ness.”

To be fair, a number of school-based people also remarked to me about the wonders and specialness of the Christmas season in schools and asked if I was missing it. Those people were just outnumbered by those talking about the speed and stress of their season.

This time next year, I wonder if any brave school folks will have resolved in the new year to address what they deemed the “craziness of the season,” or if anyone will have adjusted the daily and weekly routines of December in order to instill more balance and joyfulness at a time of year that is meant to be such at its core. Will a few school-based change agents help their communities move from “survival” to “peaceful?”

It could be a great exercise in change and progress. It could be a way to transform observational commentary into purposeful improvement. It’s only just a thought.

The Best — of 2012 Lists. Is anyone writing My Best Learnings of 2012?

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The “Best of 2012” lists are everywhere. As I read my blog feeds each morning, as I scan the news headlines, and as I listen to live radio and recorded podcasts, I feel a bit inundated with these Best of… in 2012 collections.

In all of my scanning and searching, though, I have not come across a “Best of What I Learned in 2012” list from any students/learners sharing on a digital portfolio. I wonder why.

Are teachers assigning such reflection prompts but the resulting writing or podcasting is kept private? Or does such an assignment not happen, really? Are any learners choosing – unprompted – to create a collection of Best Learnings in 2012? Why haven’t I thought to do so myself?

It seems to me that such a learning reflection might be something of an ideal endeavor for learners young and old not so young. Do you know of such a list or school-based assignment? If so, will you share a link in the comments? Again, I am curious if any teachers have assigned a student reflection akin to “What are your top (10) learnings from the past year?” Or “What things have you learned in 2012 that seem indispensable to you – the things that have been most meaningful or that seem like they will be the most useful and enduring?”

I’m thinking about my list of Best Learnings in 2012. I’d love it if you would share yours. Or if you’d put me onto such lists that already exist.