Group Tasks

I had a super-great learning experience in class this week.  My group and I had felt our data story poster was near completion two weeks ago, but upon seeing it again yesterday with only a data table and no graphs, we decided graphing would help others understand the data and our story better.  It took some hard thinking and discussion to decide how we wanted to show phone subscriptions over time to GDP of different countries over time, but finally decided for a reason we couldn’t really put a finger on, that two graphs would work well: one showing phone subscriptions to time and the other showing GDP of the three countries we chose over time. 

Our brains warmed-up nicely as we traveled the room of posters, discussing our questions and thoughts of the data stories as we went.  At one point we reached a poster that was challenging to understand at first, comparing U.S. military and education expenditures to each other.  After looking and discussing further we did understand, and again, didn’t really put our finger on exactly why the graph had been tricky to understand.  Finally, back at our own poster, we saw a post-it question from another group asking why didn’t we put our two graphs together as one.  That’s when I really got it, that we didn’t put them together because if that meant comparing phone subscriptions to GDP, it might imply that one determined the other.  We didn’t necessarily conclude that GDP determined phone subscriptions, we just wanted to show the trends of each GDP and phone subscriptions over time.  We wanted both to be compared to time (as our x-axis) and would have had trouble combining GDP and phones for the y-axis in a meaningful way. 

This group task of the entire process of creating the data story, representing it in a poster, discussing other posters for understanding, and finally considering where others thought our poster could share understanding better, made me really understand an aspect of graphing quite consciously.  It was more meaningful for me to experience why my group and I felt more comfortable sharing our data in a certain way, considering other ways other groups shared theirs, and then thinking about ours again together that my understanding deepened. 

Now, not only do I have a deeper understanding of graphing, but I also have a deeper, more meaningful understanding of the value of group tasks in the learning process.  I will definitely take this awareness of the value of group tasks for understanding with me into classrooms.  I guess I am just left wondering when does the teacher need to step in if understanding is not coming through the group tasks?  How patient with the process should the teacher be?

The Beauty of Sheer Effort

Life is only right now, what happened before now and what will happen after only exist in my head.  That is why I loved when Lamott (Bird by Bird, 1994), described something she was going to write after a meaningful experience for her at the Special Olympics.  She said, "And I could see that it was about tragedy transformed over the years into joy.  it was about the beauty of sheer effort" (p. 42).

I was reading the first three chapters of Routman's Writing Essentials (2005) a little ahead of the Lamott reading, and I couldn't help but be struck with the feeling that so much of what Routman was describing as what teachers should do to encourage their students, by being writers and readers ourselves, by writing all the time, but starting with truly rough drafts, etc., is what Lamott was modeling through her book.  As if Routman told Lamott how to encourage writing in her classroom of students, or, that Routman modeled her ideas for teaching writing after what Lamott actually does.  Through my own effort of assimilating these books into my own understandings I made-up this connection between Lamott and Routman, and even if it is a connection that doesn't make sense to other people or zillions of others made the connection before me, I think it is great because  I did it.  And, I didn't even realize how good I felt about making this connection until it spilled out in my writing right here.  The good feeling made through thinking and using writing to notice the world is something that wouldn't surprise either Routman or Lamott.  Maybe it is joy.

Joy is something Routman emphasizes a lot in her book, and I feel it emphasized in Literacy class as well.  It was bothering me quite a bit as I read Lamott that however much it seemed to demonstrate almost exactly what I understood Routman to be saying about writing, I thought it was lacking the most important part, the joy.  Lamott seemed to spend a lot of time describing a lot of unhappiness connected to writing however much she also included things like "one short assignment" just like Routman's "snapshots", both really short, quickly written pieces of writing that writers can start with.  It wasn't until the chapter "Polaroids" that Lamott brought in the element of joy in writing.  That tragedy and joy can coexist in the present world and in writing seems affirming.

"Joy" I equated to "beauty" from "The beauty of sheer effort", and "effort" I feel fell in line with Lamott's "polaroid' idea and Routman's "snapshot", that they are what is happening right now, to just do something short right now because right now is short and who knows where it's leading but it could be very interesting.  maybe it doesn't even have to lead anywhere, maybe it is very interesting anyway.  And this is great, the present is great and writing is a strong way to conscious of it, that both the effort of writing and the effort of living are amazing.

Finally, on p. 47 Routman writes, "Just as important, such overplanning creates unnecessary work for the teacher.  Use that time instead to enrich your life - visit a friend, take a walk, read a book, cook a favorite dish.  These activities will leave you with more energy and enthusiasm for the hard work of teaching".  Too often I am an overplanner, and like the "perfectionism" Lamott describes in her Perfectionism chapter, it does inhibit me from the joy/beauty of the effort.  I need to be conscious of that for myself and students.