8 Books That Changed My Work in Education

This school year I have been enjoying the best work of my career.

My job change from high school math teacher to an evolving position of K-12 Instructional Technology Coordinator has been a rewarding time for me. I have been excited to explore more creative opportunities in and out of the classroom, with students and adults. I am more inspired and I get to pass that along to other teachers and students who express gratitude for my work.

In this time of transition I've learned so much from the great educators and others that I have met, but I also gained much from books I have read.  The ones that impacted me the most are not the ones I usually see mentioned by other teachers.

So here's the list of eight books that came along at the perfect time for me. They made a significant difference in how I see education, others or myself. Each link for the title is to a page on Amazon.com for an edition of the book.

Disrupting Class - Though a lot of the points are now easily observed, this book opened my eyes to how technology makes things fit. In particular, it describes how online learning can allow us to reach every learner at the point he or she needs to learn. It gave me a vision and a sense of urgency for what I could accomplish for students. One of the co-authors created Sophia, an online learning portal patterned after the model envisioned in the book.

What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Literacy and Learning - I read this book as one of the final courses in my graduate program. The author fascinated me by expanding my view of literacy. Some of his Learning Principles still influence my work on a regular basis. My final project for the class was praised by my professor and I was greatly encouraged that I was onto something important.

Searching for God Knows What - This book, from Christian author Donald Miller, probably doesn't seem to fit well with the others. Among other things, it deals with our tendency to see life as a competition when it's really about fostering relationships. I read it the summer before I started working in all buildings across my district. I can't imagine a better book for preparing me.for meeting so many new colleagues and having to lead them. If you're not opposed to writing from a distinctly Christian perspective, I strongly recommend this book as Miller's best. It impacted my thinking in ways beyond the scope of this post.

Steal Like an Artist - This is a quick read and I love coming back to it from time to time. Probably the most important lessons for me are presented as well in other books below. Still, this one excited me about art. In relating to the author on a few points, it helped me see myself better as an artist and writer. The premise of writing advice to oneself is also a fascinating idea.

Storyline - Here's another one from Donald Miller. This is a short book based on his Storyline conferences. It is also more of a workbook, guiding the reader through the process of viewing his or her life in terms of a story. It was a painful experience to work through this, in all honesty, but the end result proved to be healing. This, along with the next three books, really opened the door for personal expression and art in my work. As promised, it did clarify my vision and purpose. Here's my post about the book and my plans for classroom activities based on the idea of viewing our lives as stories. I also created this game as an introduction for a class.

The Freedom Writers Diary - I read a lot about Erin Gruell and watched several videos online about her work. I don't remember whether it was really this book that made the difference or if it was just her story. Still, it's a good place to start. It reminded me of the importance of tying the content to the students' lives through personal, reflective writing. I can attest that students do generally enjoy it. Not only does it bring the class content to life, but it helps them find a voice and a place in their world.

Poke the Box - I read this short book in the summer of 2012 and I can't believe how it recharged my enthusiasm. The subtitle asks when was the last time you did something for the first time? I got hooked on trying new things and I'm indebted to Seth Godin for life for the learning experiences.

The Icarus Deception - I won this one (also from Seth Godin) on Jeremy Statton's blog. There were stretches of the book that I found hard to get through and I almost didn't finish it at one point.  I'm glad I did because Godin's big picture definition of art and artists helped me find words for what I was discovering in the classroom.  You can see its influences in my posts about engaging students through meaningful contributions and the opportunities technology and connections bring us now (not just years down the road in a career).

Week Three of the Smart Jams Music Video Project - Music Video Planning Sheet

This was a short week, since we are off for a few days for Thanksgiving. We met with all four classes once. Most groups finished writing their songs and began practicing with basic beats.

As I started last week, I showed more students how to make a beat with Smart Drums on the iPad. Crystal worked with most groups to help them rap or sing the lyrics to the beat. We both knew it would be hard for many of them to feel the rhythm, but in a few cases it has been more of a challenge than I expected! I'm getting better at directing them during recording.

I recorded three groups this week and I'm working on putting their vocal tracks to a full music track over the next few days.

I also gave a few groups this Music Video Planning Sheet. It aids in planning the visuals that will be displayed over three repetitions of their chorus. Even though no one is really ready to start recording video, by having this sheet ready we were able to keep all groups working even though not everyone could be practicing with Crystal or recording with me.

Hopefully I'll have some sample audio recordings to show off soon!

My favorite things to assign students (that they enjoyed too)

I've been working on a book for a few months now. While finishing a chapter tonight, I was thinking of some things I have assigned over the years that students really enjoyed and that I also had fun making up, talking about or grading.

In no particular order, here's my list:

• Self-reflection journals - I love to have students think about what they have learned or can learn from their own lives. Sometimes we delve into memories and sometimes we plan the future. The idea is to make school more purposeful by tying the content from the lesson to their lives. I believe all truly important learning has to start with a sense of purpose.
• Reading interviews with artists - I like to have them look up the person behind their favorite entertainment and read an interview with the person. I am inspired by how my favorite artists think and I want the students to see that they do in fact think.
• Similarly, quote assignments - Students love to find quotes they can relate to. I have them add the quote to pictures or incorporate them in their presentations in some way. You can also have students try to write their own "quote worthy" statements. We did one with six-word memoirs.
• Writing scripts for videos - I don't recall anyone ever asking me what they were getting for a grade when they were writing a script or otherwise planning a video. It is an engaging activity.  When assigned properly, it simply cannot be done well without deeply thinking about the subject matter. Here are my recent video assignments for high school students.
• Writing songs - These assignments can be difficult for students, but they are rewarding for all involved when the work is completed. Be sure to check those final submissions for plagiarism! See this page for my work in this area.
• Puzzles - It is getting harder and harder to make a good assignment out of these if the internet is within reach. If you make your own it's still possible to get students thinking about a good challenge, though. My favorite creations involved:
• A long list of directions that took them throughout pages in their math books.  Each step had them look up something that was used in the next step. 
• A triple puzzle I created that had scrambled words (usually content area words, but some teacher names or other school related things thrown in) that were also hidden in a word search. The third part of the puzzle was usually a quote or advice that was formed by entering circled letters from the scrambled word part.  I made these with PuzzleMaker.com.
• Visual puns like these.
• What advice would you give...? - I ask students to make comics or other creative works that could provide success tips to younger students. This makes it meaningful for them. I used to also give high school seniors a much loved assignment where they had to write letters filled with advice addressed to their past selves when they were freshmen. It is a good activity for teachers too!

Week Two of the Smart Jams Project

Crystal and I finished up the second week of our Smart Jams music video project for 5th grade.  I was really encouraged by the students' work!

For the third session with the students I gave them a worksheet that required them to work together on a few problems in their assigned topic.  After completing those, Crystal and I checked their work and talked to them about the process or information.

Having these conversations about math while in music class was one of the highlights of the week.  More than anything else, that is the value of this project.

The worksheet then asked them to:

• Summarize what a student needs to know or do to complete a similar problem.
• List any math terms that should end up in the song.
• List any common mistakes a student might make when doing such a problem.

For the last step, the students were supposed to begin writing the song.

Here's the worksheet I gave them for the topic of rounding to the tens and hundreds.

The groups all ran out of time in the 45-minute session before they could get far on their songs.  Crystal and I evaluated what they wrote and what we learned from talking with them.  Two things were clear:

• Some of the topics were going to be hard for them.  I misunderstood how far the students had gone in fractions by this time in 5th grade, so adding with unlike denominators, simplifying and dividing fractions was too much to ask.  Before the next session I adjusted the difficulty in these cases.
• They were not natural songwriters!  That should be a given, but I needed to try this just to see.

I wasn't discouraged by the fact that the songs were not coming along well.  I just accpted that would be one of the biggest hurdles.  (I previously thought it would be fitting their words to a beat, but we'll see how that goes next week.)

We decided they needed a lot more direction on going from the concepts to an original chorus.

Then, as an artist and musician, I was most excited about how the second session of the week went.

For this session I wrote what I called "math words" that explained the steps or vital information for the different topics.  The students had already done this on their worksheets, but to be sure there was no confusion, I built upon what they had written or what we talked about in the groups.

I made a sample list of math words that described how to add two digit numbers when regrouping was necessary.  I displayed this slide for the class:

It's important to note for the videos that we will probably have an animation of their math problem being worked out while they perform the chorus.  That way the chorus doesn't have to stand alone, explaining every detail of what's going on.

I really built it up that the left column was me as an old, tired math teacher.  Their job was to write a fun version that brought my words to life.  

Crystal did a great job of showing how the "song words" could be rapped or sung.  She played a simple beat on her keyboard and improvised over it.  I used those song words to show that maybe every line won't rhyme.  I also used the words in parentheses to show how the group might shout those words or echo them.  Again, we demonstrated that with Crystal's improvisation.  

Being a part of any original music creation in school is a gift to me.  It is good to see the passion that comes from it, even if the words are about math!

So we handed back their papers from the first session and gave each group my set of math words.  They really did a good job!  Again, I was able to go from group to group and have good conversations with the students.  They were taking it seriously and their excitement for creating something new was a great encouragement to me.

Most haven't complete their chorus yet, but some were ready to start working on the performance.  I showed them Smart Drums in GarageBand and they practiced with that until the end of the session.

Next week we expect to record a few groups' work.

6 Reasons your students need to see your mediocre art

New for 2014: Follow the continuing Teaching Like an Artist series on TeachingLikeanArtist.com.

I've been trying to teach like an artist more lately and I'm learning a lot from the approach. I can hardly walk through the hall at the middle school now without a student asking when we can work on their next creative project. They are inspired to create music and videos. It's been an exciting year so far.

One thing I'm seeing is the value, I'd even say the blessing, of just being OK at the art I share. I've been frustrated at the mediocrity of most songs, games and other creative works I've made in my life. Now I'm opening my eyes to the gift as I see it helps me encourage others. 

Here are some thoughts...

• I have learned the value of hard work over a long time when it comes to following a dream. Great talent might make it tempting to amaze the average person with something that was easy. For me, the desire to make a great song or popular game has been beyond my reach, but I got closer by keeping at it longer than most people I know.  Students need to hear of that as they learn to follow dreams.
• Similarly, I've learned what it's like to push through the fear of failure. I know I'm not a great musician or graphic artist, but I've taken the plunge a few times and put my best effort out there. Every young artist has to deal with that possibility of rejection. Being barely acceptable myself, even after years of effort, provides me with tips as well as examples of failures that I lived through. I can to draw on those to encourage students. 
• My mediocre creations seem attainable to students. They are willing to try. If my sketched cartoons were amazing maybe they'd never imagine they could do it too. Instead, I've seen many students take a shot at similar sketches when they see me draw simple figures.  
• I can speak to the joy that comes from sharing an idea. Many artists talk about the pleasure of blessing others with their work.  I believe them, but doesn't it seem easy for them to say that when they make a comfortable living from it at the same time?  I can say with certainty that seeing my creations as a gift for others is a great reward. Sometimes I wouldn't make time for creating art for any other reason. 
• Being just OK at many things gives me the chance to help more people as they pursue their interests. I think if I had been more disciplined 25 years ago I might have excelled in one area. Instead I spread myself thin. Now that helps a lot in my job where I have to help in every class from Digital Photography to Creative Writing to Choir.  I would never suggest to young artists that they so divide their time, but if you also find yourself average at many things, start doing each of them a little more often in class. 
• Being OK with sharing OK art is helping me be better.  This is huge. Getting a taste of the joy of self-expression will inspire you keep at it and you'll get better. Probably more importantly, though, it gives you a chance to show your students what a learning, growing adult looks like. They will be inspired to do the same in their areas of interest.

Lest it sound like I'm lowering the standard, I do make sure the students know I'm not a great artist.  Even if the low number of hits on my YouTube videos don't clue them in, I regularly remind them I won't be feeding my family with my game designs or my songwriting.  In fact, half the reason I'm mediocre at most of my hobbies is because I didn't put in the work when I was younger.  When I see they've got a talent for something, I encourage them to do the necessary work to be great.  I also direct them to examples of professionals in the field.

Just remember that overall the students love it when they see you make barely acceptable art. Who cares if the one kid tells you his grandma draws better than you?  Most will find it entertaining. I finally get some compliments on my guitar playing and even my games seem like great fun in what is often an environment void of creativity.

So I encourage you to take plunge this week and share something new you made, even if (or maybe even because) it is just OK.