The Push and New Horizons
What does it mean to "push" students? This concept is touted as a benefit of an independent education or the mark of a "strong" teacher, but the term is applied to such myriad situations as to become hackneyed and jargon. Of course we push students; don't all teachers? We push them to organize, plan, prepare, complete, create, analyze, evaluate, compare- to think. Perhaps it takes a more social emotional twist when teachers push students into realms of moral thought that are uncomfortable (a buzzword from the "parlance of our times") for them. However, simply producing an uncomfortable emotion or a stress is not an achievement; it may be a side-effect of rigor, but it is far from a goal. Pushing students to learn basic skills, to learn to become learners, is laudable, but hardly the meaning thought of when considering what truly pushing a student might entail. The balance and truth of the term "push" is deciding what is gained by the push, what is learned, and what emotions lie on the other side of the the work: confidence, clarity, relief, even perhaps the epiphany of the Dubliners' snow. I have once heard the term "lifting" applied, and though I'm not one for the issuing of words to replace others that are already acceptable (the contradictory new word "irregardless" comes to mind), I do appreciate the more explicative nature of "lift." The implication is obvious, allowing a student to see beyond that which was formerly visible: a greater horizon and the possibilities replete in the discovery. To truly "push" a student, you create situations that require them to work in ways that might seem, at first, beyond their abilities, their comprehension, and their perceived limits. This requires rigor and struggle -which is necessary in all worthwhile endeavors- and, at times, failures. Without the risk of failure, there can be no true push. Instead of lifting, we are carrying, and so teaching the student that risk and struggle are imaginary as there will always be an easier path or a servile Sherpa ready to "short-rope" them up the frozen slope (read Krakauer's Into Thin Air for that reference). It is with this pedagogical concept that I approach my planning for every year to create a specific learning experience in the classroom.
What is Accessibility?
Well, beyond the setting's selection on my phone, accessibility seems to run counter to the idea of the push and the beyond. If it is accessible, then it's at your finger tips, it's an answer from Siri, it's waiting and easy to find. This is a modern reconstruction of the term lensed through technology and the swift flow of information. We think of accessibility as a ramp allowing access, a path made easier on which all can travel. Is Everest accessible (to continue with that earlier reference)? Not for all surely, but for those with abilities that suit the terrain and who are willing to expend the effort, clearly, it is. In deciding how to create the challenges of the year, how accessible should they be? Tasks should definitely vary in intensity. Some are simple ones, creating content or performing tasks on a regular basis to instill the ethic and organization necessary for the larger projects. While others take on a more challenging aspect, building on those rote skills, now well-practiced. And then, when possible, a few mountains are raised up that provide summits from which new worlds are visible. All is accessible, all is reachable, but some require the struggle and the risk and the push. Level of accessibility varies, challenge varies, and so the designing of certain units, lessons, and projects must vary to match. In the second half of this entry, I will examine one such 120 minute project that rises as a small mountain in the hilly terrain.
Downhill: Start with the Summit, then Work Your Way Down
In designing the challenge, I start with the goal. For this short project, the goal is explicating and analyzing a brand new poem, without the guidance of the teacher, and utilizing a text that is advanced and pushes the students beyond their perceived abilities. For this I choose the dense and beautiful verse of T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men. Beyond a fifth grader? Absolutely! Let's be honest, beyond many college students. But the skills learned throughout our poetry unit of recognizing symbol and metaphor, understanding Rhyme and Meter, peeling the union (to repeat an analogy I use in class) to discover new layers hiding beneath the surface will be utilized and their application will demonstrate student knowledge. I want to remove myself from the equation (no carrying), and so instead of lecture, a series of guiding questions that point out areas of focus provides the framework on which they build. They are Socratic in nature, designed to build on past knowledge learned and spur new thinking and the synthesis of the virgin material with prior knowledge and experience. During work, the only answers to questions asked of me are quoted lines and stanzas to redirect them to particular sections of the poem in which the answers may lie. Though studies show that creativity is best achieved in individual work, selecting a group format (3-4 students) in analyzing new text, allowing ideas to bounce and build, hearing even the work of other groups (actually encouraged in this project) allows for deeper understanding and interconnected learning with new material. The true purpose of group work is to unlock the potential of multiple minds in a way that allows the group to achieve together what would be incredibly difficult (if not impossible) alone. In short, if you want students to write original poems, they should work alone. If you want them to analyze something new and incredibly challenging, allow them to combine strengths and cover weaknesses. Finally, force them to be blind. For this particular project, I do not want them to know a thing about Eliot, his time period, his association and response to WWI, the politics or history of the early 20th century, etc. I love History and context, and often give them quite short history lessons when discussing Shakespeare or Hughes. But for this, such a context would initially be too constraining, too limiting. Students will be trying too hard to fit their ideas into a frame, to find the "correct" interpretation instead of their own. No, for this project I save the context for the end.
Some Examples
Enough talk this time, let's look at the project in parts. First there is the poem itself. They are provided their two copies (always this for poetry, one to mark and annotate, the other to keep pristine out of respect for the art that it is). They are given several minutes to read individually and "rip it into its pieces," as we say in class. For those who have not read this work since High School or College, or would simply enjoy reading some of the best verse in modern times, here it is:
Next, form groups of 3-4, being sure to equip them all with a good mix of creative, organized, and high-reading-level students. The mix is not essential, but it does create a more complete experience as the individual talents support each other. Then provide them with the guiding questions and tell them they have a time limit. That time limit requires that they produce, not simply discuss. To quote Kipling: "If you can think, but not make thoughts your aim." Here's a look at those. Try them for yourself!
And then, watch the work. As aforementioned, when responding to questions meant to find that easy ramp, I respond only with quotations. There is of course the added bonus of witnessing the consternation tinged with joy that kids emote when met with a challenge. Do I care that they cannot link the first few words to Conrad or Guy Fawkes? Does it bother me that they have never read Milton or Dante? Will it destroy their interpretations should they stumble with the vocabulary and terminology? No, not one bit. At the museum, do we say: don't look at Picasso, you're too young to understand the transformative nature of his technique as a response to the realists and the photograph? Or perhaps at the concert, do we cover the ears of our children thinking: no, Beethoven is too advanced for you until you understand the way romantic emotions and feelings evoked by music began to trump the mathematical beauty of Mozart and Bach? Then, why do this with poetry? They have enough tools, they have my guiding questions, and they begin to climb. And, at the end, they produce analysis that is equal to any one might hear in far higher levels of education. Below, I'll include a couple of group's answers from two different classes. I have left their grammatical and rhetorical errors intact to remind us that these are the products of 5th graders after a single quarter of the study of poetry. These are only two out of many groups offering amazing answers and interpretations.
Extension
Now the context. For those that finish early, a video linking the poem to WWI soldiers. This one. I enjoy it as students point out to me the few times the reader makes a mistake: their ears are open. Most groups begin with the same comments: "We were wrong!" And, they receive my inevitable answer: "No, you're not wrong, there is no right interpretation, this is only opinion. But, how can you tie your former answer to this new information?" And for some, a new summit peaks (sp. intended) above the clouds.
