If you’ve read this blog before you know that I’ve had more than a few stories about bullying, bystander behavior, acts of violence and agression toward a particular person or group.  It seems, though, that there is no dearth of news about this at its core, and I feel that advisory should be a place to discuss many of these issues.  It has the power to provide a safe space from this kind of behavior.

A couple of weeks ago, bullying led to a suicide.  Phoebe Prince, a 14 year old high school student new to the school, committed the crime of being new, different, and threatening to social life of an older girl.  She was chased in the hall and called and “Irish Slut”; phone messages, texts, and Facebook pages haunted her.  (Even after she died, bullies posted terrible messages on her page). It is another chance to learn something, to change what is sadly a common response to fear and jealousy.

Activities: With any of these activities, you will probably want to have students understand what happened in South Hadley to Phoebe (using the articles below and the news piece), and allow them to ask questions to learn more about it.

1. Read the poem: “What do we do with a Variation?”
   1. What are the different ways that poet James Berry says that we (humans) deal with difference?
   2. Which seems to have been in place for the bullies at South Hadley High School?  Why?
   3. What is your favorite metaphor in the poem? Why?
   4. Berry shows us the range of responses we have – some of us have all these responses in different settings – what response to dealing with difference represents how you respond most often? Give a couple examples.
2. Read the editorial by Kevin Cullen “The Untouchable Mean Girls“.
   1. Talk with students about what an editorial is and how the rules of journalistic objectivity do not apply.  This might be a good time to review fact vs. opinion with them.  (You can use a T-Chart graphic organizer to have them write words and phrases that are facts from the stories and then opinions he derives from those facts). Have students discuss what the tone of his editorial is. How can you tell?  Do you find his editorial persuasive?  Why?
3. Discuss as a group, based on what you know, where does the responsibility of this type of death lie?  (I would only do this activity if you have built a group with strong norms to listen and respect one another and the topic.  This could be trivialized in an immature setting. We do not have all the information and it would be irresponsible to dole out blame in this case.  Encourage them to think more abstractly.)  Have students discuss where the responsibility lies in these cases.  (One way to frame this could be – if we were going to make changes so this didn’t happen in the future, where would we have to spend most of the energy).  Have them in small groups discuss:
   1. What is the responsibility of the School?
   2. What is the responsibility of the (the bullies’) Parents?
   3. What is the responsibility of the bullies?
   4. What is the responsibility of the bullied?
   5. Other: ______________
   6. The using the Pie Chart graphic organizer have each student dole out the responsibility for this event to any or all of the four groups/people above – it must add up to 100%.  On the back or in the margins explain the “why” you have given the percent of responsibility (not blame) to.  If you have time, have each group member present to the small group and, if possible, come to some agreement on a group pie chart. After looking at it, discuss, what does this assignment of responsibility suggest about how we should move forward to impact the future?
4. Have students respond in quiet journaling: Does learning about these stories cause you to think differently about acting with others?  What did you learn from Phoebe’s situation and her choice? What is it that can and should be done about these incidents? Why?

Resources:

• Boston Globe Article
• “The Untouchable Mean Girls”
• News Story- Television Clip
• Gazzettnet.com Story
• Video: three other girls choose to leave South Hadley HS Because of Bullying
• “What do we do with a Variation?” by Wendell Berry

• Update; February 5: Press Release of South Hadley Public Schools
• Updated February 15th: Story Picked Up in People
• Updated February 15th: Family of a Girl Falsely Accused of Bullying Prince has to Leave Home.

• Updated: 3.29: Town Awaits DA Speech + Bullying bill headed to the Governor
• Updated 3.30: 9 Teens charged with bullying.

Extensions:

• Research the increasing incidents and any current thinking about how to combat Cyber Bullying.  How is it different from bullying in person?  Is it more pervasive or less?  How do bullies experience this?
• Is there a difference between when and how boys bully and when and how girls bully?  Look into research to see if gender plays a role in this.
• You might choose to have students create an ad, write a persuasive essay, or creatively express their feelings on and solutions to this chronic bullying.

Enciendalo! Please People, Light that Spark!

Well you might have heard the ruckus all the way from France, but a live French TV show (“The Game of Death”) just used the basis of the Milgram experiment for a reality show.  They asked members of the audience to flip switches to pulse electricity through a man who needed to be “punished” until the actor (though no one knew this) appeared dead.  This has started a hot debate – are humans programed to listen to “experts” and act out on others or do they understand the artifice of the tv context and they are playing out fantasies because they must know it can’t be real?

• NPR Story
• Time Story
• UK Telegraph Story

Activity:

1. Ask students to read one of the articles (and or listen to the NPR story) and after reviewing the comprehension around the story, have them do a four corner exercise (put a label at each of the four corners of the room – in this case “Strongly agree” “agree” “disagree” and “strongly disagree” – and present a question to them such as “How would you rate your reaction to the statement – I believe that this television show confirms that human beings are morally flawed.” After the class divides up and comes back together (I would tally it on the board) and then begin a conversation/debate defending their positions.  (I might also have students write the “why” their position before entering into the debate.

Resources:

The WonderYou Blog Overview of the Milgram Experiment

Enciendalo!

Ok, so I hate to be too postmodern – a blog about blogs, but I found two resources that would be good subscriptions for advisors who are looking to help students expand their critical thinking skills. These resources are for you – the adult – to keep creative and focusing on interesing

The Opinionat0r – Steve Strogatz

The “Opinionator” Blog at the New York times provides a lot of interesting info an mathematical thinking.  He writes about interesting and challenging topics – and just reading a few has helped me connect ideas for investigations for student projects (when I can follow it).

The Math Mom

The Math Mom has a great way of framing experience through the lens of math.  Her site is filled with reflections and activities from looking at the world daily as a quantitative mind.

There are also activities to use that are framed around daily life experience. They are divided into “easy”, “medium”, and “hard”.  Give them a try and sign up for the newsletter.

Enciendalo! (x2)

• Pi shows the relationship between diameter and circumference of a circle.
• Pi is a constant – no matter what size the circle, as a ratio, its value remains the same.
• Pi is known mostly as 3.14, but it has been calculated out to over a trillion digits.
• Pi has a long history: it comes from the Greek letters and the Egyptians used the equivalent of Pi/2 for their proportions of the pyramids – this seems to have been a good choice, if longevity plays into architecture….
• It is central in equations for area of a circle and volume of a cylinder (central to those of us who like curling and cans of soup).
• Is Pi a normal number?
• Are people who wear a Pi t-shirt normal?  Lots to think about.
• Are there any other constants that have (or should have) a day?

Resources:

1. Pi Day Website – Learn about Pi
2. Wikipedia explanation with cool animation that actually makes the concept understandable! (This would be a great experiment to recreate.  Give students four or five circles (lids, etc) of different diameters.  Measure the diameter of each, mark a spot on the circle and roll it out, then measure the circumference (or use measuring tape).  Is the circumference 3.14 x the diameter?  Have them record their findings on a chart.

Enciendalo!

“A thousand forests had been crushed under the rain and grown up a thousand times to be crushed again.  And this was the way life was forever on the planet Venus, and this was the schoolroom of the children of the rocket men and women who had come to a raining world to set up civilization and live out their lives.”

“All Summer in a Day” is one of my favorite short stories that I had a chance to teach recently.  It is short (less than four pages), has 9 years olds as the central characters, creates vivid characters and a poignant scene, and a deals with issues of group membership, how groups deal with difference, prejudice, and bullying. The characters, setting and theme create an safe topic for conversations of behaviors that may be common to students.

Activities:

• Have students do a quickwrite activity framed in the discussion you want to explore: (This one is to look at how groups treat difference.) “Have you ever been in the company of a group of which you were clearly not a member?  What was the circumstance?  How did you act?  How were you treated?”  Pair share, then report out.
• Read aloud with students – check for understanding and have students pick out words they are not familiar with.
• There are many activities to do with this story (and a few guiding sheets in the resources section).  One interesting discussion might be to have students discuss who should be held responsible for Margot’s treatment and then discuss what those people might have chosen to do which would have led to a positive outcome.

Resources:

• Text to the Story “All Summer in a Day”
• Resources to go with the story including: a Do Now writing prompt, sketch and important scene with quote, create a pie chart of responsibility, identify setting and figurative language, identify the characterization techniques of the protagonist, Margot.
• You Tube Video Version of the Story
• Bradbury’s Illustrated Man
• “What Do We Do with a Variation” – James Berry Poem.  A great text for students to use to think about the different ways people deal with difference.

Enciendalo!

GradNation

In a speech about education policy today President Barak Obama talked about what he would like to see in educational practice – and mentioned the Met school in Providence specifically! (See the link to the video and the speech below).  He says,

That’s why we’ll follow the example of places like the Met Center in Rhode Island that give students that individual attention, while also preparing them through real-world, hands-on training the possibility of succeeding in a career…That’s how we can curb dropout rates and boost graduating rates. I have to point out, in the 21st century, high schools shouldn’t just make sure students graduate — they should make sure students graduate ready for college, ready for a career, and ready for life. And that’s why we’ll foster what are called early college high schools that allow students to earn a high school diploma and an associate’s degree or college credit at the same time. We want to learn from successful charter schools where students can take advanced and college-level courses…So government has a responsibility. Government can help educate students to succeed in college and a career. Government can help provide the resources to engage dropouts and those at risk of dropping out. And when necessary, government has to be critically involved in turning around lowest performing schools.

One of the battles he is proposing to fight is help stem the tide of high school drop outs.  He has worked with Colin Powell’s group, America’s promise who has created an initiative called GRADNation.

Some statistics from the America’s Promis Website:

• Every 26 seconds, another student drops out of school in America – more than 1.3 million students per year.
• Today, more than one in three students fails to graduate from high school.  As a result, we lose an entire graduating class every three years.
• Among minority students, less than 50 percent of Native American and a little more than half of African American and Hispanic students completing high school on time.
• Young people who drop out are twice as likely as likely as graduates to be unemployed; three times as likely to live in poverty; eight times more likely to wind up in prison; and twice as likely to become the parent of a child who drops out.
• Of those who do graduate, only about one-third have the skills they need to succeed in college and the 21^stcentury workforce.

Activity:

1. Watch the video and or read selections from the text.  What are Obama’s main points?  do you agree or disagree?
2. If you are in a Big Picture School, what does it mean to you to have the President to praise your type of school?  What do you know about the Big Picture network.
3. Write a journal entry about your own journey in school. What keeps you dedicated to finish?  Why do you persevere?
4. What do the stats about mean to you?
5. Do a little QR – based on these stats, how many people drop out each quarter?  From each state? (How many from your state)?

Resources:

• Big Picture Learning Website
• Text of Obama’s Speech
• America’s Promise Website

Enciendalo!

Activity:

Choose a photo or bring in a photo for the students to choose from to write. Give guidelines (how long they have, how long the writing should be.  you have done this before, think about the writing skills, styles or techniques that you might want to highlight or practice. You could have students write in dialogue, or use metaphor, or create a compare and contrast descriptions, or try to persuade the reader about something having to do with the picture. It could be a free write where you ask them to make a list of what they see, describe what might be happening, just happened, or will happen based on what they see, tell a story about the place or characters, or just describe in detail everything you see.

You might have students look up a compelling photo on one of these sites (below) and choose one to write further about or one that they could swap with another student.

You can also vary with historical photographs, landscapes, portraits, etc.

Resources:

• National Geographic Photography
• Life Searchable Photo Archive
• Photo.net
• Ansel Adams – Japanese Internment Photographs
• Golden Age of Jazz

Enciendalo!

Activities:

For this advisory activity, collect colored pencils, charcoal, or crayons for the students to use. You might also have some old magazines around for students to use as inspiration or to use as material for this project.  This is an opportunity for the students to visualize and be creative.  You might introduce this as an activity in

Give students a shape, like  a square, and tell them they can use this as part of whatever drawing they like.  You can use a form with a square already drawn on it.  (Like this one) if you like. They should incorportate the original shape in whatever picture they would like. Give them a set amount of time (20 – 30 minutes) and encourage them to be detailed and spend time creating the look they would like.

You might think about having them write a few sentences on the back detailing what they drew and why they chose this as the object. (If there is time, have people share as a large group).  This  is not a square, it is a…._________________.

Depending on your advisory culture, you could have soft music on in the background to set the mood.

You can use this with many objects glued to a piece of paper (popsicle sticks, straws, coins, buttons, etc) or shapes drawn on the Paper.

Enciendalo!

There is something clean and simple and wonderful about a graph.  Add humor, and you’ve got a great advisory activity.

Activity:

1. Have students work together in pairs to choose one of the graphs above and discuss what does this graph say and how it says it. You might encourage students to look at the title, the x and y axis or the segments from the bar graph or the categories on a pie graph.  What is being compared?  Is the picture a story over time? What do the amounts on the charts represent? Does it show amounts in relation to one another?
2. As  a whole group, brainstorm some topics for a graph of your own. What experiences have you seen that would be fun to show in a graph.  How would you represent it – a pie chart? A line graph?  A Bar graph?  Why?  Choose one of these, brainstorm numbers and percentages and draw the graph.
3. Allow students to think about a graph they might create. (Their top 5 procrastination techniques, Ways their parents respond to a request for money, snack foods in a week…etc). and have them each do one that represents what is important/funny to them.  Use good graphing techniques.

Resources:

• GraphJam
  

Enciendalo!

Thanks Kari for the idea!

It is hard to see ourselves the way we are, often times.  Its a blind spot of the human experience.  We can, however, easily judge things outside our cultural comfort zone.  Last week, the NYTimes ran a story that will challenge us to remain objective and reason like a social scientist.  In the Phillipines, where karaoke is a favorite past time, men have been killing each other over different songs, but singing Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” is a ticket to gun play.

Activity:

• Ask students an introductory question to focus the students and connect to prior experience.  You might have them think about what are the most important past times in the United States and what does this say about us?  What do people take pride in – in the various countries or cultures you’ve visited?
• Read the article with students.
• Review the basics of the story:  Who is the article about? Where does it take place? Why is it important?
  • What questions do you have about this? (What would you ask to understand it more deeply?)
  • What do you think contributes to these actions?
• What happens in your community or our country that might be seen by others, outside our culture, as strange or unthinkable?

Resources:

• New York Times Story
• “My Way” Song and Lyrics
• Big Picture Learning Social Reasoning Goals

Enciendalo! (Your Way)

“What is Love?” – questions from the not so questioning…

So I’ve been thinking about questions lately, and love, since Valentine’s day is coming up and, well here’s an activity where two great tastes that taste great together, love and inquiry.

Activity:

• Tell students that you are going to have an activity to generate questions, to stimulate inquiry.
• Have students generate any questions they have with Love.  What do they really want to know about it?  What do the know that they would want to learn more about?  Encourage them to think from the learning goals and think expansively. You may want them to each write at least one on a post-it (one per post-it) and bring it to the front of the room to share.
• Categorize these for them -(group them).  You can use any framework about questioning that you are comfortable with: open ended vs. closed ended questions, five basic types (factual, convergent, divergent, evaluative, combination), lower order and higher order, and Bloom’s Taxonomy. All of these show different levels of questioning and can help in a conversation with students to ask questions from different levels and develop their skills at more critical thinking.
• Have students review  the Blooms Taxonomy Sentence starters (or any other inquiry framework) or this Blooms Question Sampler.  You may choose to have the group focus on one level of or questioning or divide into small groups.
• Once they have looked this over, have students generate 3-5 more questions each with various levels.  (You may want to put the levels on the board and have them write or post their new questions in the correct category).
• You might ask them to choose the one question that interests them the most – journal on this and why it is intriguing to them.  Have students keep the list of types of questions so you can begin reinforcing that with other activities.

Resources:

1. Bloom’s Taxonomy; Blooms Question Sampler
2. Five Basic Types of Questions
3. Lower order vs. Higher order
4. Blooms Sentence Starters (PDF)
5. What is Love – Haddaway Video; SNL Spoof Compilation

Extensions:

• So what IS love?  Write a journal entry, poem, paint a picture, write a song, choreograph a dance, make a photo essay, etc that presents your definition.

Enciendalo!

Two Truths and a Lie:

Step 1: The facilitator writes three statements on the board. Two statements are true, and one is a lie. Example:

I have been running 5 days a week for 7 years.
I have a pet fish called, “Abe Vagoda.”
I lived in Italy for a year.

Step 2: Encourage students to ask “lie detector” questions to get further information, in order to determine which statement is false.

• Training – Where have you run? What is the most important advice for a new runner?  How do you prepare?  What races have you run? How long do you go each day? What year did you start?
• Pet – How old is Abe Vagoda? What does it eat? How long have you had it?  Is it male?
• Italy – Where did you live in Italy? What dialect of Italian is spoken there?  What is the local delicacy?

Step 3: Advisory votes on which statement is a lie. The facilitator reveals which are truths and which are lies.

Place participants in small groups (3 or 4 works well). Small groups repeat steps 1 – 3. Have participants introduce each other to the large group.  Remember, as a leader, don’t be afraid to be goofy (if you won’t,  no one else will).

Resources:

• Other Icebreakers and Energizers

Extensions:

• Variation: Two Truths and a Dream Wish. As an interesting variation to the classic Two Truths and a Lie icebreaker, people may also play a version called Two Truths and a Dream Wish. Instead of stating a lie, a person says something that is not true — yet something that they wish to be true. For example, someone that has never been to Hawaii might say: “I have visited Hawaii when I was young.” This interesting spin often leads to unexpected, fascinating results, as people often share touching wishes about their lives.
• Politifact - Go to this site to check the Truth-o-meter on current political discourse.

Enciendalo!

“Burnin’ and a Lootin’ tonight…” Bob Marley.

Some of the most powerful images from the  Rodney King Riots in LA in 1992 were of the rampant looting of stores as the area burned.  The boundaries of civic responsibility were smashed and broadcast on tv for days.  This behavior startled the country, it tips an inherent  fear of chaos and disorder.  In the last week, new outlets in the US and England began reporting that there was looting in Haiti.  There were reports of mobs attacking suspected looters and other reports countering that these were highly exaggerated.  Regardless of the degree, it raises the question, what is looting?  How is it different than stealing? or Finding? How does the context of the situation help to define this?

Activity:

• This activity surrounds reading and responding to a text – a portion of an editorial by Rebecca Solnit.  I would recommend running a text-based activity on this short reading (consider Text Based Seminar Protocol or the NSRF Text Rendering Protocol.)
• According to the protocols, give students time to review the short text and review with each other the basic facts related in the piece.
• Run the protocol so that students get an opportunity to probe the meaning of this editorial. Allow people to explore the ideas related in the piece.
• Keep a chart on the board to write out characteristics and build a definition of looting.’
• Finally, consider running a Barometer at the end of the class with reference to one framing question (such as In this case, did the media misrepresent the actions in Haiti as looting?)

In “The Nation“, Rebecca Solnit wrote this week:

“There’s something grotesque about using the word “looting” to describe what’s happening in Haiti. Following that island nation’s devastating earthquake, dozens of survivors have been filmed or photographed digging through the rubble for food, water, medicine, and other necessities. In virtually every case, the media has identified these people as “looters.’’

But are they, really? To loot is to pillage and plunder for selfish gain. That’s not what wretched Haitians are doing when they grab a box of powdered milk from a collapsed store. They’re merely trying to “salvage the means of sustaining life from the ruins of their world.”

Imagine, for a moment, that your city or town was destroyed by some natural disaster, and you and your family hadn’t eaten in days. You’d be justifiably irate at the notion that “grabbing a box of PowerBars and a few gallons of water” from a shattered storefront made you a criminal. Yet we have no trouble smugly applying that description to those in similar circumstances if they are poor and foreign—and, yes, black.”

Resources:

• Barometer: Taking a stand on a controversial issue
• Text Based Seminar Protocol
• NSRF Text Rendering Protocol
• A UK Times report that highlights “Looting” in Haiti
• Mother Jones article questioning western media perspective on the “looting” story at all.

Extensions:

• Have students research historical examples of looting, based on the definition created in class today.  When did they happen?  Who was involved? What triggered the action? What effect did this this have on the nation or the community after the event?
• Write a journal entry about how stealing is different from looting.  In what ways are these things the same? How are they different?  Under what situations could they see themselves stealing?

Enciendalo!

What does it mean when we say something is “human nature”?  I love these broad questions – are we basically good (thanks Locke) or evil (shout out Hobbes)?  Do we have the capacity for altruism?  Who are we at our worst moments?  Stanley Milgram, a social scientist in the 60′s, pushed the limits of experimentation about one area of human nature – our obedient responses to authority.  Milgram was filled with questions that sprouted initially from Nazis in WWII.  How could a baker or college professor become a guard at a Nazi death camp? Didn’t they feel a sense of responsibility?  Why didn’t they stand up?  His research came up with one answer, an answer that also comments about our nature.

Activities:

1. Prior knowledge – ask students to write or talk in pairs about the response to the following, “Think about a time that you did something you that you were uncomfortable about because a person you perceived as an authority told you to. Describe the situation, the people involved, and the outcome. What happened? Who was the authority? Why? Why were you uncomfortable?”  Help students share responses and tell them they will learn about an experiment that probes how humans react to the authority.
2. Depending on your access – either read the NYTimes article or watch one of the video’s below (each is about 8 minutes) that reviews the Milgram experiment. (Ideally – watch the video in advisory and discuss and use the short article for homework).
3. Encourage students to take notes on the basics:
   1. Who are the participants?
   2. Which of these people are actors?
   3. What is the machine that the “teacher” is using?
   4. What is the experiment testing?
   5. What “Pressures” were put on the teacher when they began to feel uncomfortable? (list quotes if you can).
   6. What are the results of the experiment?
   7. What do you think from these events?
4. Discuss the Milgram Experiment and the dark side of authority and obedience (and shedding responsibility).
5. Why do you think they use roles like “teacher”, “experimenter”, and “student” instead of names?  What do you think this means?
6. Does authority have to be a “guy in a white coat”.  What are other ways we might think about authority? How have you seen people respond to this?

Resources:

1. The original 1960′s experiment (10 Min Video) (You can fast forward to get the basics).
2. The a recreation of the experiment
3. NY Times Article “Decades Later I would Pull the Switch”
   1. Related Discussion Questions
4. Wikipedia Overview of the Experiment

Update: (3.28): Well you might have heard the ruckus all the way from France, but a live French TV show (“The Game of Death”) just used the basis of the Milgram experiment for a reality show.  They asked members of the audience to flip switches to pulse electricity through a man who needed to be “punished” until the actor (though no one knew this) appeared dead.  This has started a hot debate – are humans programed to listen to “experts” and act out on others or do they understand the artifice of the tv context and they are playing out fantasies because they must know it can’t be real?

• NPR Story
• Time Story

Extensions:

• This experiment has obvious relations to the behavior of Nazis in World War II.  Many asked, how could a whole country, usually common working people become part of a discriminatory murder machine?  Consider reviewing Facing History and Ourselves materials on Obedience and Conformity specifically in the context of the Holocaust.
• As a reflection from this experiment – assuming this is true, what safeguards do we need to put in place to make sure that people don’t shed their responsibility and act (in some cases) barbarically?

Enciendalo!