Learners as teachers

Kids are really good at asking questions? That's what they do.

"Dad, how do engines work?" "Mum, where do babies come from?" "Grandma, why do you have so many wrinkles?" "Mr. Sparks, why does the light shine?" "Josie, why do you have an innie and I have an outie?"

We teachers have become very good at giving answers to their questions. And asking closed questions to see whether they have learned what we have told them. We have become "knowledge tellers", content experts, the sage on the stage and the font of all wisdom, which many of today's interactive kids regard as "totally boring".

But we also use questions to control behaviour. The threat of embarrassment when they give the wrong response (think Pavlov's dogs).  So kids look stupid in front of their peers. And shut the heck up, to stay out of trouble.

No wonder kids stop asking questions.

But what if we could capitalise on this early thirst for knowledge. And get kids to ask fabulous questions and discover the knowledge for themselves, like inquisitive scientists or mathematicians.

It's what business is doing. Shifting the work to the customer. We happily push a trolley around a supermarket to fetch the groceries ourselves. We now get cash from automatic teller machines. We book hotels, hire cars and flights on the Internet. In some eateries we serve ourselves.

What I have in mind is for kids to REALLY teach themselves. Design the lessons. Facilitate workshops. Act as mentors. Help others. Work things out for themselves. Discover knowledge for themselves.

And they can do it very well. A decade or so ago, I was silly enough to co-invent a team learning system comprising a bunch of keyboards and some software that turned a single computer into a group computer. The idea was you asked a series of questions. Everyone brainstormed their ideas, worked out what that all meant. One person operated the computer, everyone contributed.

We found that when you string a series of these rich, open ended questions together, you create thinking or decision making tools you can use over and over again. Not just for problem solving, feedback, SWOT analysis or project plans. But for almost any kind of classroom lesson.

We discovered that really fantastic teachers do this already. They arrange for kids to work in small groups and think/discuss their way through a sequences of questions until they get a result. What something means. How something works. A decision. A plan. A solution. A big idea. A new model. A theory.

Next we discovered kids beat teachers hands down at crafting open-ended questions. Seventy percent of teachers failed the task first time. Why? They are so used to asking closed questions they cant compose an open-ended question if their lives depended on it.

Here's a method for creating question sequences:

1. Describe a topic/issue in five words or less.
2. What is the context for the learning activity? Discipline, focus, age and experience etc. 
3. What will/could excite, engage or amaze the learner? 
4. Make a list of all the ideas/concepts/facts we would like the learner to discover. 
5. Make a list of all the ideas/concepts/facts we could expect the learner to already know. 
6. Craft open-ended RICH questions that explore the topic in engaging/amazing ways. Include scaffolds, rich language etc. 
7. How will we organize the questions into a logical sequence that builds knowledge as the learner goes? Begin with what we know.

Rules for crafting great questions/activities:

1. Socially relevant question e.g. The person sitting next to you tells you they have a contagious disease. What questions should you ask?
2. Open-ended e.g. Thinking about all the different times you have looked up at the sky and all the different colors you have seen. What colors were they and what was happening at the time?
3. Playful - If you could be a fairytale, cartoon, movie or TV character, who would you be and what would you be like to live with?
4. Contains cues- If you were a doctor working in in-vitro fertilization, what kind of patients would you see, what problems would they have and how could you help them?
5. Incorporate a checklist or scaffolds - Write a critique of the painting from the point of view of a person helping the artist to develop their technique. Think about style, tone, texture, materials, colour, etc.
6. Set some rules for success - Complete the series A1, B2 C3......Z26. The winner is the first to finish and the most, accurate in every way, commas, capitals, spaces, numbers and letters.
7. Pictures or documents - Use a picture or a document as a focus for the activity. Create questions to analyse the picture or document.
8. Simulations - Find simulations, e.g. www.worldtime.com or www.howstuffworks.com that can be interrogated by your question sequence.
9. Case studies - Write a series of case studies and ask the participants to explain how they would respond to each situation and why.
10. Arrange questions like a game - Arrange the questions in ascending order of complexity/difficulty starting  with the learner's tacit knowledge. Build feedback into every second or third question to give positive feedback about earlier questions. See picture above.

Creating new knowledge through collective play

Remember a time when you played cops and robbers, doctors and nurses or mothers and fathers.

Play is a way for children to explore what it's like to be an adult. In play, children actively create for themselves, by themselves, their own knowledge in a safe and fun way.

Play evolves as the child matures. In early infancy, children engage in practice or sensorimotor play, and then, prior to going to school, symbolic play emerges in the child, where things represent real artifacts. A stick for a sword. A chair for a house. A cuddly toy for a baby.

By middle childhood, play is conducted as games with rules, collectively. At age six, or thereabouts, children become conscious of their own activities and are able to organize games independently of adults. They explore novel ideas and worlds they do not initially comprehend, absorbing what they are ready for. Progressively, their make-believe creates new meaning and understanding.

Then, during the teenage years, young people are socialised out of play and into study, which is a form of work. In the senior years at school, the main remaining form of play is rule-based school sports.

Collective play has some of the features of self-developing systems, whereby new order emerges that is due to the activity rather than any conscious goal seeking. Vygotsky (1978) showed that through a process that begins with imitation of adult activity, children are able to explore collectively what they cannot do alone. "In play, a child always behaves beyond his average age, above his daily behaviour; in play, it is as though he were a head taller than himself." (p. 102)

We can use this same approach in the classroom to simulate worlds with which the learner may be only partially familiar. We may start with limited knowledge about the characters we will play, but very quickly we start to discover "if this, then that" type knowledge just jumps out of the system.

For example, when we explore the dynamics of an art critic expressing a view about an artist's latest works, we quickly discover that readers want to hear/learn about the artist's role in society and the way their works reflect or comment on changes in society rather than the colors, textures or techniques employed by the artist.

See for yourself:

1. You are the art critic for the New York Times. Thinking about a picture created by Andy Warhol, craft a check list of things to think about when writing art criticism for the newspaper (Marilyn Monroe painting).

2. You have just been to your first Andy Warhol exhibition and seen this painting. In 25 words or less, write the opening paragraph for tomorrow's column (Campbell's soup painting).

3. You are a New York Times reader. Write a letter to the Editor which says what you think about the Art Critic's criticism of the Warhol exhibition.

4. Craft a new list of Things to think about when writing an art criticism. Respond like this (1....., 2......., 3....... etc.)

5. It is several years later. You have just been to another Warhol exhibition. Write a new criticism using your new check list as a guide (Coke bottles).

6. In your opinion, who in society do you feel would have most admired Warhol's work and why?

7. In your opinion, who in society would have least liked Warhol's work and why?

8. Make a list of the roles of the art critic.

9. How did you know how to act/think/talk like an art critic and a newspaper letter writer? What informed the way you wrote?

10. How easy would it be for new kinds of roles to be created in society (that did not exist before), and why would this be so?

11. How easy would it be for new kinds of art forms to be created in society (that did not exist before) and what would be the barriers?

12. What are the major influences that help to shape our opinions about various art forms?

13. If you want to become a successful artist what would you probably have to do attract public attention or gain recognition?

Here's an iterative activity to create a method for learning via play. It has two stages. The first stage is to create a set of questions and to experiment with them. You then apply what you have learned during the first round to create additional questions that allow you to explore the topic more deeply.

1. Craft an idea for an interaction/world you would like your class to explore e.g. Prosecutor, defender, judge and prisoner interacting during a trial. Mechanic and car owner discussing a needed repair. Aircraft pilot and air traffic controller on approach. The US and China as economic powers and what they expect from each other or fear the other will do.

2. For each role, write a short story about the role they might play.

3. Craft a series of questions/instructions for a workshop/classroom group to explore the interaction.

4. Trial the questions and record what you learned from the activity.

5. Write some meta-questions about the issues that the role play exposes.

Note: You can download the images of the Warhol artworks from www.artchive.com.

Vygotsky, L.S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Learning to feel like an artist

Living the life of an artist is much more than applying paint to a canvas. And it's much much more than  technique, media, color, shapes, textures or random muddling through.

It's the visual expression of ideas so others understand the changing times. It's seeing the world through fresh eyes, from alternative perspectives. It's helping us mere mortals better understand who and what we are becoming as we make the transition from a predictable past to a fuzzy future. A roller coaster ride of emotions, from the passionate to the prosaic.

How does it feel to be an artist? How can we ordinary mortals experience the intensity of the artist's struggle with their works, their audiences and their lives, as they channel the future on our behalf? How can we inspire more young people to embark on such careers of creativity, to explore the world in novel ways, to wrestle with society's big issues, to follow in the footsteps of the greats who have gone before them? So we have a greater pool of cultural creatives to lead us to the future.

The moral, political and social quandaries faced by artists are often captured in what they have to say about their own struggles with their art. Their relationships. And the artist's role as creator, analyzer, interpreter, reporter, provocateur, inspirer, judge and moralist.

Here's a workshop to explore what some say about art and the role of artist:

1. Oscar Wilde said in the Picture of Dorian Gray, “All art is useless.” Write a story that explains this idea.
2. Michelangelo said “The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.” Jackson Pollock said “It doesn't matter how the paint is put on, as long as something is said.” Craft a dialogue between the two.
3. "Every great work of art has two faces, one toward its own time and one toward the future, toward eternity" – Daniel Barenboim. Write a story about the Mona Lisa, looking forward and looking back.
4. "All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up." – Pablo Picasso. Write a story about your own struggle as an artist.
5. “Art is moral passion married to entertainment. Moral passion without entertainment is propaganda, and entertainment without moral passion is television.” - Rita Mae Brown. Write a dialogue between a priest, a politician and an actor to show this idea.
6. “Nothing is more the child of art than a garden.” - Sir Walter Scott. Write a story in which the character finds inspiration for her art in nature.
7. “Art is either plagiarism or revolution.” - Paul Gauguin. Write dialogue for a heated argument that explores this idea.
8. “I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone, because I am the person I know best.” - Frida Kahlo. Write a sad, lonely, contemplative monologue that extends this idea.
9. “I cannot live under pressures from patrons, let alone paint.” - Michelangelo. Write a story where the character has writer’s block and how it feels.

Check out these images at www.artchive.com

Building firmer maths foundations

Ever wonder why young people struggle with mathematics? Some say it's too abstract. But very practical users of maths like accountants and store clerks would probably disagree. Others say it's too disconnected from real life, but most tradesmen would point out you cant build a house, lay bricks or make furniture without it. Some think its because we teach maths as technique. But architects, engineers and physicists rely on  routines to make numerous calculations simple.

Another view is that unless your teacher knows their mathematics, neither will you. But as any teacher will tell you, neophyte teachers often learn more about a subject by teaching it. That's how I learned to love maths.

The biggest problem maths teachers face - especially in secondary schools - is the poor foundations on which they are having to lay more complex concepts in algebra and geometry. It's like trying to stand a skyscraper on tree stumps.

The problem begins in primary school. If you can't understand numbers, fractions and decimals and the four basic functions - add, sutract, multiply and divide - you are not in the race. Or if you can't tell the difference between a circle and an ellipse, or a square and a rectangle, or comprehend angles, you are also in trouble.

Most primary teachers have very little confidence is their own maths ability and even less in their ability to help young people learn the basics. The last time most primary students in the UK studied maths was towards the end of secondary school. Now the UK government is spending million of pounds to hire 13,000 maths specialists to coach students and teachers. The USA has similar problems. Just 27 per cent of 600 Massachusetts teachers who took a teaching licensing exam passed the maths part of the test, although most of those who failed, went on to become teachers.

But simply knowing your maths may not be enough. How you learn maths could be much more than important, such as learning to discuss mathematical ideas, in addition to knowing how to use mathematical techniques/operations.

I have had the pleasure of working with some gifted mathematics teachers such as Ian from Middlesborough in the north of England. They are gifted because they inspire young people to fall in love with mathematics. It's not only because they know their mathematics but because they know how to engage young people in exploring the patterns and the mysteries.

Middlesborough Ian helps "feral" secondary students become capable mathematicians in less than 12 months. He uses an approach which is more akin to the "change management" tactics employed in big corporations. Very few of the techniques are specific to mathematics. But every primary school teacher would recognize the teaching techniques he applies as the fundamental principles of "co-operative learning".

The students practise working/learning in groups. They give leadership to their peers, helping each other achieve their goals, resolving conflicts and communicating ideas. They value their own opinions and the opinions of others. Along the way, they play with mathematical ideas and begin to think, act and and feel like a community of mathematicians. They could be just as easily be learning to think and act like geographers, scientists or writers.

The class is organised into three groups. A demonstration team guides other groups through whole-of-class learning activities using a team learning system. A resource team searches the internet for images, videos, simulations and sounds that can be used with questions and question sequences used to explore mathematical topics. Activity builder teams, which includes everyone in the class, design and create the questions and methods and decide which to trial.

Most class activities begin with a ten minutes-long engaging, fun activity that reflects on previous learning, not necessarily about mathematics, but often about general student literacy or a mental oral activity.

Six months into the school year, the culture of the class begins to change. The teacher is no longer "the enemy" but is valued as a mentor and challenger. The students begin to see themselves as "risk takers", willing to explore any new ideas to which they are exposed. They take full ownership of their activities and the bad behaviour evaporates.

There is a good explanation for this change, and it is provided by Complexity Theory, which predicts how systems change state, like the shift from ice to liquid water. A group of students is just another system. New order emerges in the group "auto-catalytically" when the discussion cross-fertiilizes other discussion. This occurs when the ideas provoke so many new ideas, that the process becomes, self-sustaining.

Like a contagious disease!

Here's an example of a workshop designed to help students create their own learning activities:

1. Search the internet for an image, simulation or website that would help you learn about the names of the parts of a circle, and how to calculate the diameter and circumference. Make a list of the sites, images etc.you have discovered and what each explains.

2. Design an activity/sequence of questions to a) describe all the parts of a circle and b) how they relate or connect to each other.

3. Describe a technique for calculating the circumference of a circle if you know the radius. Give an example

4. If you know the diameter, how could you go about calculating the circumferene of the circle. What's a really simple trick/technique to remember?

5. Describe a technique for measuring the area of a circle if you know the radius? If you know the diameter?

6. Explain the number Pi to a five year old.

Fitzgerald, R.N., & Findlay, J. (2006). Transforming a mathematics classroom with new roles, rules and tools. Presentation at Transformational Tools for 21^st Century Minds conference, Rockhampton, October 25-27, Queensland. Download this article.

Creative writing with constraints

Fancy yourself as a poet? It's actually quite easy if you practice the arcane literary art of constraint-based writing. Leave out a letter. Use only certain letters. Use only some words.

Imagine the havoc that missing "a"s or "e"s would have on Shakespeare's Macbeth, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales or Charles Dickens A Tale of Two Cities. Gibberish perhaps.

But not when you deliberately write that way.

Christian Bok, author of Eunioa, which literally means beautiful thinking, is a master of the art. Eunoia has five chapters - A, E, I, O and U. The words in Chapter A contains only "a"s such as all, ball, bat, chat and abracadabra. Each chapter follows the same rule.

Australian teen author John Marsden teaches young people to write great stories using sets of rules, which implement some of these constraints. Rules such as "Don't let language bully you", "Capture the voice of the character" and "Show, don't tell a story."

When he asks you to "Write a story about the ocean without using the letter "e", all that rolls of your ball-point sounds like poetry. It's a form of constraint-based writing.

Some of the people in our network use these kinds of fun activities to warm up the conference crowd before we get down to the strategizing and decision making. Here are some examples of what some people collectively contribute. My favorite is the pirate talk, achieved by breaking the lipogram rules and using words containing "e", but simply omitting the letter:

• Crabs fly through big salty H2O. Happily nibbling on all and sundry. 
• Swimming cold. Trusting cool liquid to quickly coat my throat. I spang to my fins, arms thrashing in windy rolling mountains of foam.
• Da c is big and runs from wall to wall. Its long and high and if you fall in you will want to dry off. My mum says that it was not so high as it is now, that it is low at night.  I think gravity has a tug and that this is why it slops about.
• In aqua crystals. Starfish, sand, and a pail of clams. I go for it, baby!
• Oshorn ar to b sailin d ruddy o's'n aaaaarrrrrgh @ d nd to b shor ma 'arty splis d bldin main bras i'll b skutlin yr buttlin on d mount of yi (splash splash splash) undr d oishin hoit da joli rogr o giv mi a 'ome v'r d mrmaids doz roam aayh.
• An old man took a boat out far into a vast and wild mass. His craft was still and placid. It could not align with fish nor fowl.
• Foam. Flotsam. Rolling loud crashing fluid. A shark fish swam in coral again.
• An old man's rod knocks against boat in a tidal pool whilst fish, stingrays and crabs swam in salt flats.

So here's a workshop to practice your skills using various kinds of constraints:

1. Write a story about the ocean without using the letter "e"

2. Write a story about your life using ONLY the letters a,e,t,h,m,n,r,s,w.

3. Write an anthem for Africa, America, Australia or Asia using ONLY words that begin with the letter "a". e.g. Artists and artisans are attracted as Africa arises. Ascendant.

4. Write a story on any subject using ONLY or ALL the first 100 most frequently used words in English.

5. Write a story using words with no vowels using this list. You might have to use a dictionary to see what the words mean:

6. Write some snazzy words for a song to celebrate what your class, school, team, group or organization is going to do next year. Use alliteration, so most/all of the words start with the same letter. Choose any letter you like. e.g. Smart Students Sing Scintillating Songs.
7. EUNOIA means beautiful thinking and contains all the vowels - a, e, i, o and u.  Make a list of words containing ONLY the vowel “e” for example, men get.

8. Brainstorm words with ONLY the vowel "a". 1 vowel = 1 point, 2 vowels = 2, 3 vowels = 5, 4 vowels = 10, 5 vowels = 50, e.g. abracadabra = 50 points

9. Write a story using words that only contain the vowel "a", such as lava, cat.

10. Brainstorm words with ONLY the vowel "e”. . 1 vowel = 1 point, 2 vowels = 2, 3 vowels = 5, 4 vowels = 10, 5 vowels = 50, e.g. abracadabra = 50 points

11. Write a story using words that only contain the vowel "e", such as better, lever, me.

12. Brainstorm words with ONLY the vowel "i”. . 1 vowel = 1 point, 2 vowels = 2, 3 vowels = 5, 4 vowels = 10, 5 vowels = 50, e.g. abracadabra = 50 points

13. Write a story using words that only contain the vowel "i", such as sit, bit, wilt.

14. Brainstorm words with ONLY the vowel "o”. . 1 vowel = 1 point, 2 vowels = 2, 3 vowels = 5, 4 vowels = 10, 5 vowels = 50, e.g. abracadabra = 50 points

15. Write a story using words that only contain the vowel "o", such as moon, pot, soon.

16. Brainstorm words with ONLY the vowel "u”. . 1 vowel = 1 point, 2 vowels = 2, 3 vowels = 5, 4 vowels = 10, 5 vowels = 50, e.g. abracadabra = 50 points

17. Write a story using words that only contain the vowel "u", such as cut, mutt, bus.

Preparing for the school inspection

A sudden visit from the school inspection service (OFSTED in the UK) can bring terror to the heart of even the best and most experienced Head Teacher.

These days, not only do teachers have to demonstrate their pedagogical competence but they also have to show how well they work alongside parents, carers and other agencies such as the police and health services in the interests of the children.

OFSTED is the acronym for the Office for Standards in Children's Education and Skills which one Catholic School wag once described as standing for "Our Father Send Thee Eternal Damnation" which somewhat summarizes the general feeling of many head teachers.

The inspection process is a combination of self-evaluation, visitation/observation and a review of the records of your students' performances.

Prevention is better than cure. If you take positive steps to make improvements to your school ahead of inspection, the chances are you will be judged well, despite the difficulties you may encounter such as chronic absenteeism, bullying, racism, mass disengagement - 60 per cent of students in OECD countries are bored by school - or the 1-in-6 who leave school unable to read, write or count properly.

UK schools are judged on:

* Student performance (attainment, progress, dealing with disabilities/learning difficulties, whether they feel safe, adopt healthy lifestyles, contribute to the school or wider community. develop workplace skills that help them be successful in life ad whether how well they are catered for morally, socially, culturally and spiritually)

* Teacher performance (quality of teaching, assessment to help learning, whether the curriculum meets student's needs, and the care guidance and support that teachers give students).

* Leadership effectiveness (how well the leadership team drives improvement of teaching and learning, the role of the govering body in tackling issues, engagement with parents and carers, partnerships with others, promoting community cohesion and spending the budget well).

Parents also get to have a say about your performance and so do the students.

If you are taking positive steps towards improvements in all critical areas you will earn brownie points. If the parents think you are performing wonders, even though the changes are snail's pace incremental, then that will help your case. If you address individual learning styles, student safety and enjoyment and the special needs of students you will be rewarded.

The four ratings you can be given are Outstanding, Good, Satisfactory and Inadequate.

There are 25,000 schools in the United Kingdom and at any one time 40% of those schools are judged Satisfactory. That's 10,000 Head Teachers who live in constant fear of a downgrade to Inadequate or in the earnest hope their efforts will be judged Good.

Here's a check list of what schools can do to make life easier for themselves:

* Self-evaluation: Regularly and collectively complete the school self-evaluation against the "schedule of judgments". Develop develop strategies and action plans to deal promptly with every issue where the school has shortcomings. Expand the programs that work well. Involve the board of governors in planning for the future.

* Parent and carer engagement: Regularly conduct workshops with parents to get on top of their concerns about student progress, safety and wellbeing. Set up mini task forces so parents/carers can take some responsibility for resolving generic issues.

* Other agencies: Conduct regular meetings with other agencies to deal strategically with issues that cross agency boundaries e.g. crime, truancy or violence.

* Student voice: Conduct workshops with a large sample of students to learn how to better meet their specific learning needs, what captures their attention, what they like and don't like about their lessons and which kinds of pedagogical approaches work best.

* Professional and leadership development: Use the student voice outcomes as a basis for individual professional development.

Here's some workshops from the School Futures and Children Matter software applications from the Zing range of education titles that can help schools prepare for inspection and elevate their performance:

* A self-evaluation workshop to report on the effectiveness of the provision. There are six workshops which help staff collectively prepare for inspection:

1. Quality of teaching: How does teaching promote learning, progress and enjoyment for all pupils? e.g. range of teaching styles/activities, use of time, appropriate use of technology, builds on what students know, lesson planning etc.
2. Quality of teaching: How is assessment used to meet the needs of all pupils? e.g. the pupils know how they are doing, personalised learning, effective questioning, alert to errors/misconceptions.
3. Curriculum: How is the curriculum relevant to the needs of individual and groups of pupils and its impact on outcomes? e.g. memorable experience, rich opportunities, designed/modified to meet individual/group needs, extended/improved, etc.
4. Care, guidance and support: How is care and support provided to promote learning, personal development and well being? e.g. making use of parent and pupil views, welcoming environment, transition from nursery, between years and to secondary. vulnerable groups. challemging behaviour and to promote attenance.
5. Care, guidance and support: Write a story/case study about a potentially vulnerable child and show how you school provides effective, care guidance and support.

* Student voice workshops. See the blog: What young people want from school.

* School development: A professional development planning workshop to follow on from a student voice review of what students enjoy/dont enjoy about their school experience:

1. In 20 years time, what skills, capabilities and knowledge will our current students need to be successful in the world?
2. Describe the current problems that teachers experience in the classroom and how this affects teaching and learning. Respond like this (problem: impact).
3. Describe the current successes that we have in the classroom and how this benefits our students or society. Respond like this (successful activity: benefit)
4. If you had the task of remodelling/creating the ideal school, how would it be structured differently/the same? (classrooms, facilities, furniture, equipment, play areas, style).
5. What approaches to teaching and learning should we ideally retain or further develop to help equip our students for the future?
6. What aspects of our current approaches to teaching and learning will be need to eliminate if we are to be more successful in the future?
7. If we were to create a model of the ideal teacher, what would he/she be?
8. If we were to create a model of the ideal principal and senior staff, what role and management style should they have?
9. What should we do to cater for different learning styles?
10. What should we do to deal with current learner dissatisfiers with school, especially boredom and anxiety?
11. What should we do to deal with learners with disabilities?
12. What should we do to deal with learners who learn at differential rates.
13. What models of teaching and learning should we apply and in what contexts?
14. What should we do better manage the transition from primary to secondary schools?
15. What should we do to ensure that students at risk of non-completion are identified early and assisted?
16. What new/emerging pedagogical methods should we be aware of and be experimenting with in our school?
17. What should we do to deal with/capitalise on the differences between teacher and learner technological competence?
18. What should we be doing to satisfy or manage the expectations of parents, employers etc.
19. What models of teaching and learning around the world are we aware of that we could either emulate or surpass?
20. What should we be doing to cater for differing career paths, especially the vocational and academic divide?

* Engaging with parents: Here's the Staying safe workshop from the Children Matter workshop series. The six workshops are designed to achieve desirable health, enjoyment, achievement, positive contribution and economic well-being goals for young people.

1. How can we ensure children & young people and their carers are informed about key risks and how to deal with them?
2. What steps should be taken to provide children and young people with a safe environment?
3. What steps should be taken to minimise the incidence of child abuse and neglect?
4. What child protection arrangements should be put in place to meet the requirements of "Working Together to Safeguard Children"?
5. What should we do to ensure children and young people who are looked after are helped to stay safe?
6. What should we do to ensure children and young people with learning difficulties and disabilities are helped to stay safe?
7. How can we ensure that children affected by repeat domestic violence are identified, protected and supported?
8. What guidance and training should we provide to staff, carers and the public on how to recognise and raise child protection concerns?
9. How should we ensure there are secure arrangements for the recording and sharing of information on children and young people at risk, especially those crossing council boundaries and countries?

Talk like a scientist or expert

Although most of us can list the big inventions of the last century, very few of us can explain the theories. Think electromagnetism, nanotechnology, quantum dynamics, thermodynamics, nuclear fission or fluid dynamics.

Now, thanks to on-line encyclopedias such as Wikipedia and websites with interactive models, most of us can go on-line and learn about the theories for ourselves.

Knowledge that took centuries for the best brains in the world to discover and turn into well-tested theories can now be acquired in an afternoon by almost anyone.

But the act of observing a colorful, interactive model all on your own, may be just as ineffective as trying to memorize the old paper-based models they replace. Medical students, motor car mechanics and computer programmers can attest to the complexity/difficulty of rote learning new families of concepts, what they mean and how they connect to each other.

But there is a more effective way.

When you discuss a model/theory with others, the concepts become associated with concepts we already know. Over time, as we use the words, we strengthen the neuronal connections associated with the concepts, and so our own personal Google - our frontal lobes - has less trouble finding stuff when we need it.

In this way, learning shifts from being a left brain/hippocampus activity to a right brain problem solving/sensemaking approach.

By playing with and talking about any of the tens of thousands of models that your will find on-line you can start to think/act/talk like a scientist, mathematician, geographer, writer or the expert you would like to be. For example, How Stuff Works is a treasure trove of working models which you can link to and explore with others as shown in this image

Theories and models have come to have a life of their own. We often treat them as the real thing. The computer simulation, the town plan, the business spreadsheet, the script for a play, an orchestral piece, the steps for a dance, a shopping list, the cargo manifest or an airline ticket with its destinations and flights. They all represent something else.

What begins as a vague concept can grow up into a theory or a model and become a psychological tool that can be used initially by a handful of experts or professional few, but at a later stage of development by novices who learn the specialized language. At the same time a lexicon is developed. We name the parts of the technologies/tools to explain the ideas/methods to the novices which contributes to the further development and the spread of the language associated with the tool.


Here's an example of a method to discuss how an engine works:

1. Go to How Stuff Works and look at the engine simulation
2. Make a list of all the parts of the engine, e.g. piston, valve
3. Choose one engine part. Name the part and describe what you think it does.
4. Choose another engine part. Name the part and describe what it does. Improve on other people's ideas.
5. You are a mechanic and you have to explain how an engine works to an apprentice. In 30 words or less describe how an engine works.
6. What improvements do we need to make to our descriptions of how an engine works?
7. Use the best descriptions of how an engine works to improve your description of how an engine works.
8. What did you discover/learn today?

Collecting-connecting words via "language games"

Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein showed that concepts are part of a language game. They live in wondrous webs (or families) of meaning, connected by how similar or different they are to other concepts.

Brains remember by association. The memory of a concept can deliver up its' friends. They are autocatalytic and catalyze other concepts. When our own personal Google - our frontal lobes - goes out to search for associated ideas, it links to stuff we have experienced, read, seen, heard or felt before.

We get to know the concepts at the periphery of our memory by using them more frequently, especially if we use them in the context of other words. The synapses between the neurons in our brains are strengthened and recall becomes easier/faster/more automatic.

We can use this knowledge to design learning activities which develop new and strong associations with new or unfamiliar concepts.

Most often we know what we experience by the labels we give to events, things and how the events occur. And once we label something, the label sets it apart from ideas that are similar. Or its' opposites. The word "yes" can easily recall its' opposite "no", or indeterminate, "maybe". Or be connected into different kinds of categories.


If you ask people to perform a word association activity the words come tumbling out. Think vegetable and you immediately get carrot, potatoes, peas, lettuce and tomatoes and dozens more. We know these words because we consume them frequently. If we ask people to list the parts of a plant the words may be recalled more slowly, but if we direct their attention to the various aspects of the plant and stages of development with prompts e.g. petals,... or e.g. seed,... the task is made easier. By using the words frequently we become familiar with their meaning and their links to other words.....think roots, stem, branches, leaves, flowers, fruit, stamen etc.

Acquiring new words maybe slow to start but over time it becomes an avalanche, especially if you read and talk about stuff, often. Generally around 5 to 10 new words every day. A child of three has a vocabulary of 500 and 1000 words developed via 200,000 and 500,000 lifetime interactions. The more interactions, the more words and connections.

Over time this is how we progress:

3-year old: 500-1000
5-year old: 5,000
13-year old: 20,000
College student: 50,000-60,000 words

Here's the 100 most frequently used words in the English language. We learned most of these when we were very young. It's a whole bunch of basic verbs (doing words, e.g do, make), pronouns (that define who/what we are talking about, e.g. the, I, you, me), prepositions (that tell give a sense of direction/place/space, e.g. in, on, over, into) a handful of nouns (the what words, e.g. year, day, house, John), adverbs (that describe the verbs e.g. ran quickly, spoke clearly) and adjectives (that describe the nouns e.g. blue sky, happy boy).

"the, be, to, of, and, a, in, that, have, I, it, for, not, on, with, he, as, you, do, at, this, but, his, by, from, they, we, say, her, she, or, an, will, my, one, all, would, there, their, what, so, up, out, if, about, who, get, which, go, me, when, make, can, like, time, no, just, him, know, take, people, into, year, your, good, some, could, them, see, other, than, then, now, look, only, come, its, over, think, also, back, after, use, two, how, our, work, first, well, way, even, new, want, because, any, these, give, day, most, us."

Australian teen author John Marsden has a wonderful workshop exercise to teach young people how to write brilliant prose. To practice the rule, "Don't let language bully you" he asks you to "Respond to the calling of the class roll", with "Yes, Present, Here Miss....etc." In a few minutes a group of students will generate a list of 30-40 variations on the theme.

So here's an example of workshop where we practise the use of new concepts in a way which helps us remember their connections to words we already know. You can use a visual thesaurus to access words you don't know.




1. Make a lists of all the different kinds of relationships you have e.g. friends, etc.
2. Brainstorm a list of different kinds of emotions/feelings you experience e.g. happy, angry.
3. Choose one emotion from this list and explain what causes you to feel that way. Angry, happy, sad, bored, lonely, excited, nervous, stressed.
4. Based on your personal experience, what are the best ways to make and keep good friends?
5. Based on your personal experience, what are the best ways to have a bad relationship with other people?
6. From this list of aspects of personal relationship issues, choose one and describe what it is - trust, support, meanness, dishonesty, friendship, empathy, sympathy.
7. Make a list of all the events in your life where you feel a sense of gain/improvement.
8. Here are some positive relationships events. Empathy, sympathy, concern, congratulations, hugs, hand shake, caress. Choose one and describe how this could contribute to a feeling of wellbeing.
9. Make a list of all the events in the life of a person where there might be a sense of loss.
10. Here are some serious relationships problems or events; bullying, racism, fight, theft, assault, revenge, criticism. Choose one and explain how this could contribute to a sense of loss.
11. Make a list of words about relationships and feelings you discovered/played with today or better understand their meaning by linking it to other words you know. e.g. miserable - sad, unhappy etc.

Learning faster with gestures

If you are a teacher who organizes small group conversations or uses new tools in the classroom it is really important to give clear instructions to orchestrate the group activity.

Fluff your lines and the participants will not be sure what to do. Make a mess of using a tool and you might appear incompetent, and so destroy your carefully cultivated professional image.

But there is a faster and more certain way to remember and fluently give instructions to your students or participants.


It's all connected to how we "program" our brains using language and gesture. It's the way we learned to do new stuff when we were very young.

At a certain stage in their development, children talk silently to themselves to sequence and organize new actions. Older people occasionally do the same. We think aloud when faced with a complex/difficult task, when under pressure or when we feel tired. If we are a teacher or presenter, our external "inner speech" can quickly become a muddle with hard-to-remember precise instructions, old speech routines that belong to another topic and the authority speech we use to keep the group under behavioral control.

But if we associate gestures with the instructions, magically we remember the correct sequence, a kind of spatial or kinesthetic memory. Memories of the words and gestures point to each other in memory and reinforce each other.

Gestures and speech go literally hand-in-hand. They fit like a glove. Sometime gestures complete what we say, or explain with a flourish what we mean, develop a life of their own or even become independent languages. Emblems are gestures with special meanings such as thumbs-up for "Yes!" Signs are a language in their own right, such as pointing to yourself to indicate "me". And pantomimes are complete stories using gestures of various kinds.

The orchestration of speech and gesture occurs in Broca's area, a part of the brain where the sequencing of motor and speech actions are side-by-side. The same mirror neurons fire when we see others performing an action as when we do it ourselves. What begins in young children as pointing and grasping becomes a veritable avalanche of gestures at about age three co-expressed with the sequencing of words.

Here's a workshop to practice gestures, emblems, pantomimes and signs:

1. Brainstorm a list of all the different kinds of GESTURES you have seen people use when they communicate with others e.g. OK sign where the thumb and pointer finger make an “O”.
2. Take turns to explain to your partner, “what Life’s like at my house”. Make notes of the GESTURES that each person uses and what they were saying at the time. Then capture a list of the gestures: what people were saying.
3. As a group, play two rounds of Charades. After each turn, from memory name the mystery activity and describe the GESTURES each person used to offer clues.
4. EMBLEMS are gesticulations which have developed their own special meanings e.g. V for victory. Describe as many emblems as you can.
5. SIGNS are a complete language in themselves. Design a language using a mixture of signs for common concepts as such as me, you, come, go, up, down, into, through, house, car,
6. PANTOMIMES are sequences of gestures that tell a story. Craft a description of some gestures and the story that they tell.. e.g. you and I will drink tea...(points to other person, then points to self, then holds thumb and first finger together and lifts to mouth).
7. Propose a hypothesis for how gestures, emblems, pantomines and signs might develop in childhood. Consider these points in your theory. Brain cells represent cells. Speech and gesture are co-expressive. The orchestration of motor and speech actions are side by side in Broca's area of of frontal lobe. The same mirror neurons in Broca's area fire off when people watch others perform an action and when they perform the action themselves.
8. Design a learning activity which makes use of the features of mirror neurons and the co-expression of gesture and speech.

Out of control

The lecture is a very persistent "meme" that refuses to go away. This curious form of "knowledge telling" is the main way teachers and lecturers communicate with students.

The word "lecture" comes from the Latin lectus, which is the past participle of legere "to read" which is what some people do when they simply read aloud the words crammed onto their Powerpoint slides or the text of their lecture notes.

At first glance, the lecture seems to give a speaker considerable control over the audience. People sit quietly/respectfully in their seats. They listen. Some make notes. Others ask questions at the appointed time. Most remain in their seats until the lecture is over. Then they leave.


But the reality can be quite different. Unless the audience is so entertained by the topic or so enthralled by the speaker their minds may be somewhere else. Thinking about sex, shopping, what to buy for dinner or the hot guy in the first row. Some snooze. One or two snore.

My friend Professor Emeritus Sean O'Connor conducts a workshop to demonstrate the difference between the lecture and the workshop. He shows how workshops allow the facilitator to exert remote control over the learning experience.

He divides the session into two half hour activities. The participants are invited to use a sequence of questions to guide their discussion about a poem, such as Samuel Coleridge Taylor's poem..."In Xanadu did Kubla Khan, a stately pleasure dome decree...." Then he asks the participants to critique their discussion.

Most groups report that the process was very democratic, everyone had a say, they were very creative and it was fun. They also conclude the process gave them control over their own learning.

Sean begs to differ about the issue of "control".

He begins by asking "who gave you the task?

"You did," they tentatively reply

"Who gave you the process to explore the topic?"

"You did." they say.

"Who performed the task as requested?"

"We did." they chorus.

"So who was in control?"

"......You were." they reluctantly acknowledge.

You too can regain control over the learning process by combining the "information" elements of the lecture and the "interactive" elements of the workshop...even if the audience is seated in rows like a lecture hall or classroom.

In doing so you can become a challenging Interactor - an inspirer, provocateur, orchestrator and facilitator of knowledge creation - who asserts power and influence by helping people engage with each other in new and interesting ways. They will never forget you, the experience or what they learned during the process.

Here's a workshop to help you achieve the best of both worlds:

1. Briefly describe a topic and the main points you would like to communicate to an audience about a theory, method, concept, idea or issue.
2. Choose a topic other than your own (from question 1), and brainstorm an open-ended discussible question that you could ask the audience to discuss in pairs for 2-3 minutes.
3. Choose a different topic (from question 1) other than your own, and brainstorm an activity, experiment, exercise, you could ask two people to perform in pairs (and the results shared with another pair in front or behind them). e.g. draw something, act something out, observe a set of actions.
4. Design an interesting way that a large number of ideas could be collected from an audience and recorded and displayed for all to see.
5. Thinking about all the Multiple Intelligences, brainstorm an idea for an audience participation activity that could tap into two or more of the different learning types. Bodily-kinesthetic. Interpersonal. Verbal-linguistic. Logical-mathematical. Naturalistic. Intrapersonal. Visual-spatial. Musical.
6. Describe a method you could use to get an audience to find the patterns in some data collection activity e.g. the colour of people's eyes, favourite pastime, most dangerous experience.
7. Describe an amazing activity you could design which gets the whole of your audience on its' feet at the end of your "interactive lecture" that resonates with your big idea. e.g. a Gregorian chant of slogans for next year.
8. Imagine yourself as an Interactor. Describe how you might deliver a 30-minute "interactive lecture" in which you have three activities interspersed through the process that engage your audience interactively, perhaps with a resounding finale.

Sitting still and being quiet

They were a bunch of kids from a school on the outskirts of London. They were "disruptive", "difficult", "disengaged", "problem" children. Some were on the verge of being expelled.

This was their last chance. And it was my first and last chance too. The big test was to see whether a collaborative, interactive, conversational approach to learning would make any difference.

The electronic meeting room was set-up in a large hall. Down one end. The teachers observed from a respectable distance so the students would not feel intimidated. A dozen keyboards were connected to a laptop. The image was projected on a large screen. The tables and chairs were arranged in clumps, so people could talk/discuss/argue/think together in groups of 5-6. Nothing like the traditional classroom where students sit alone and in rows, facing the front, so they can't talk to each other

I explained what we were about to do and asked for a volunteer facilitator, to take over my role half way through the session. But only if they thought they could do it AND it was worth doing.

The session began with some fun questions to establish the Talk-Type-Read-Review etiquette, which helps quickly orchestrate/organize a group. This was followed by a seven question workshop about personal goals, and a similar length workshop about how to deal with bullying, and finally a feedback session. In just one hour.

Two students volunteered to facilitate. One was chosen and conducted the remainder of the session with minimal assistance.

It soon became clear why this group was in trouble. When asked "what's the nicest thing that's ever happened to you?" it was a chorus of kinesthetic learners whose voices I clearly heard. "When I signed my first contract at [name deleted] athletic", "I scored the winning goal", "won the really good cup for the football team", "scored a hat-trick", "I scored the winning penalty....and broke my shoulder", "when I scored the winning goal in netball" and "riding a scrambler bike".

School for these kids was like a prison sentence. Twelve years of sitting perfectly and silently still in class. Unable to converse with each other or do stuff. This brief experience with an interactive technology was probably their first and last. It was for them, a glimmer of hope that the mind-numbing and body-numbing experience we call school could perhaps one day be different.

At the end of the session this was what the students had to say about our collective performance, warts and all:

Pluses

* I think that positive things have come out of this whole trial. We can see other peoples feelings without maybe embarrassing them if they had to speak their feelings.
* It was all good because it is an interesting way of learning, it was very modern and would help keep interest and also gelp people from getting distracted.
* The + were we got to use great technology this is fantastic all the equiipment we ggot to use. _ were missing English my favourite subject.
* I have learnt about other peoples feelings and emotions
* It is a different way of learning so keeps us more occupied.
* It is good to see everyones point of views.
* People who are quiet could also have a chance to be heard if they didn't have the confidence to speak in front of everyone.
* You don't have to write and you show and say your ideas without having to acually put your hand up and say infront of everybody
* The pluses of this session was we learnt how to use some new technology and we can see what other people feel when they are being bullied or if someone else is being bullied.

Minuses

* None
* Some people didn't take it seriously and think that its funny to display immature messages.
* I think that it was all good.
* It would be very confusing at first but you soon get the hang of it. It takes a long time to do very few questions,
* Some people might of been silly about their answers
* Ermmm...nothin was wrong with this apart from we missed a valuable english lesson
* Its brilliant nothing wrong with this
* It was all fine not to hard or easy just rite a good class

Points of interest

* The whole thing the program was great and I think it is great that the oldest person you have working for you is 21.
* I learnt how to use this package which I thought was very fascinating and glad that I have come here this afternoon, its been great thank you very much.
* I learned that learning could be enjoyable!
* I thought that this was was a really good experience trying something different
* I thought the whole idea was very interesting and a fun way of learning. i learnt other people point of veiws instead of just my own or [another student's name deleted], that was interesting to see what other people think.
* It was really interestin the way you could type somethin from over here and endin up on a screen over there. this use of technology would be brilliant in our school. would be interesting to see if it boosts up teachers and students grades
* Finding out what other people think about points an ideas '
* A new way how to talk without looking or feeing embarassed of your opinion

So what would school be like if we all asked our students what they like or don't like about their lessons? What if we listened to what students have to say and changed some of the ways we teach?

Here's a workshop for students to give us feedback:

1. What do you think hinders your learning?
2. What do you think helps your learning?
3. How do you learn best? What kinds of activities/experiences excite and interest you?
4. What bores you the most?
5. What could teachers do to make learning more interesting for you?
6. If you could learn about anything you wanted to what would that be?
7. If you had more responsibility for your own learning what would you do?

The wise application of knowledge

Futurist John Naisbett famously said in his 1981 book Megatrends, "We are drowning in information but starved of knowledge". But at the start of the 21st century, he might just as well have said, we are drowning in knowledge but unable to apply/use it wisely.

Wisdom workers have been around forever. Tribal elders. Religious leaders. Politicians. Captains of industry. Pillars of the community. Their job is to make the best possible use of our knowledge, to help us survive as a species, to live a better life, to live more lightly on the planet.

The knowledge and wisdom industry combined is huge. Each year about 1.4-1.5 million peer reviewed scholarly articles are published in 24,000 academic journals. Some 2-3 per cent of people have a doctor in front of their names. Two percent of people work as teachers, lecturers or trainers. Wisdom workers in the form of leaders of all kinds comprise another 2-3 percent of all workers.

Yet despite this huge massive effort we still have many unsolved wicked problems that never seem to go away. Poverty. Famine. Disease. Environmental degradation. Crime. Chronic unemployment. Species loss. Just to name a few.

Maybe it's time for all of us to play a role. One possibility is to think about wisdom in the same way that a computer programmer does and become our own determiners of what is wise. Wisdom is at the pinnacle of the data hierarchy. Activity. Data. Information. Knowledge. Wisdom.


At the base of the wisdom-data hierarchy is Activity. Activity is simply events. Physical events such as the earth revolving around the sun, water freezing as ice or an apple falling off a tree and striking the ground. Chemical events such as a fire burning or steel rusting. Geological events such as earthquakes and volcanos. Biological events such as the flowering of plants, sex or consuming other species. Social events such as a conversation, party, meeting or war.

The process of collecting data requires some kind of measuring device. Observation by our senses - sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. Or a ruler. Measuring tape. Microscope, Telescope. Beaker. Balance beam. Spectrometer. Or gamma ray detector.


Here's how it works. Consider this image. Some parts are colored black, some deep blue, other parts are white and some are brown. That's all data is. Pixels, symbols, numbers, letters or words wthout any meaning.

It's only when we analyze what we see, usually through a theoretical lens, that we can decide what the data means. This generates a kind of smarter data we call information....perhaps the white fluffy swirls in the picture are clouds, the red patches are deserts, and the circular rim is the boundary between the earth and the rest of the universe. Or if we suspect it's a picture of a beach ball, the patches of color are just the designer's imagination run wild, and the circular boundary is the limit to the ball.

Next, we use the information we have collected to create knowledge. We make judgments about whether the data represents a picture of a ball, a planet or some other other object. Knowledge is merely our collective best guess. Its' often represented as a diagram, a model, an equation, a graph, a list, a process, or a statement about relationships between the subject of our study and its component parts.

We can process our best guesses even further, and choose how to apply the knowledge with wisdom. For example, we could use the knowledge acquired by analyzing the magnificent image of earth photographed from space, combined with other kinds of knowledge about our planet, to work out how we might more wisely live on space-ship earth or be more compassionate about our fellow travelers.

Here is a workshop so anyone can learn how to convert data into information, information into knowledge and begin to apply it wisely:

1. Activity – What is our field of our study? What kind of events/objects are we observing? What observation method/tool are we using?
2. Data – What can we see/observe or measure? e.g. color, shapes
3. Information – What could be the meaning of what we observe/measure? e.g. brown parts might be earth/deserts
4. Knowledge – What are the patterns, if any, in our interpretation of the information? What is our hypothesis or best guess about what we observe?
5. Wisdom - How could we learn from this? How could we apply our knowledge wisely to benefit not just ourselves but all others?

Learning as a game

Imagine for a moment a computer game based on traditional classroom methods, the lecture, the closed question, worked examples, tests, and learning alone with little or no interaction with your peers. How many kids would play such a game?

Computer gaming has become extremely popular with “children” of all ages. It has proven so engaging that the design principles are now being adapted for learning technologies to attract students who are bored by conventional classes.

So what are the game design principles we can apply to learning?


Malone & Lepper suggest seven intrinsic motivators. Think of them as design rules. The "learning game" should immerse the player in some kind of fantasy world. It should appeal to their curiosity about what comes next. The task should be challenging, but not so hard that the learners switch off. You should feel in control of your destiny. There should be some kind of competition/engagement with another player, but at the same time some kind of co-operation with others, and finally you need to receive rewards or recognition as you progress.

The rules for "learning games" have their origins in Flow theory which shows that enjoyment is the main reason people play games.

Flow theory is the brainchild of psychologist Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi. He found that when people engage in activities they enjoy like chess, rock climbing, rock dancing, skiing, brain surgery, computer games or making love they so lose themselves in the experience that time seems to pass in a moment.

Learning games work best if they quickly attract and keep a player’s attention for hours, and then progressively increase the player’s perceptual, cognitive and memory workload.

They become enjoyable when they are challenging so players want to keep playing and achieving. However, the tasks should not be so challenging the game far exceeds a player’s ability that they become anxious or be too easy so the game is boring and not worth doing. Because Flow is a moment-to-moment experience, an overly difficult or irrelevant task can change the mood and level of engagement.

The learning game should progress. As a player masters one level, more complex and difficult tasks remain. Players should learn as they play, receive rewards for making progress and, if they get into serious difficulties, receive hints or be able to read a simple on-line manual. Ideally, the cues should be present in the game.

Our research shows that sequences of open-ended discussible rich questions, with self-contained prompts and check lists, perform much the same function as a game.

The questions help the learner recall what they already know or could know in an interesting way, then build progressively on this foundation. The prompts/check lists remind the brain where to look for associated concepts. Along the way, there should be interesting/surprising twists. Some questions should include/anticipate the responses from earlier questions, to give small intrinsic rewards.

Here's an example from Knowing Knowledge, a workshop-based Theory of Knowledge course for the International Baccalaureate:

1. Brainstorm a list of all the different kinds of arts. e.g., theatre, novels....
2. Choose two of these art forms with which you are familiar, and describe what you like about each one. Ballet, rock music, jazz, opera, poem, movie, paintings, novels, sculpture, photographs, comics, cartoons.
3. Explain what might be artistic about Cage’s musical composition 4’33”, which is four and a half minutes of silence.
4. Explain what might be artistic about Andy Warhol’s painting of a can of Campbell’s tomato soup.
5. How might science fiction contribute value to people’s lives?
6. How might public buildings, architecture, parks and gardens e.g. monuments, obelisks etc. be considered artistic and contribute to our lives?
7. Explain how the photograph of a shantytown, ballroom dancing, a bird song, a newspaper advertisement, the design of a chair, a watch or a household appliance might be artistic,
8. Can anything be artistic? Where does artistic begin and end? Explain.
9. Do all artistic things have to have meaning? Give your reasons.
10. When people say, "art is in the eye of the beholder” what do they mean?
11. Oscar Wilde once said, “All art is useless.” What could he have meant?
12. If something is meaningless, can it be art/artistic? For example, are paintings by monkeys and elephants artistic? Give your reasons.
13. When people explain/interpret a work of art, what happens to the work of art if people say good things or bad things about it?
14. Who decides whether a work (music, theatre, film, novel, website) has value/meaning and what kind of process do they go through to make these decisions?
15. In what ways might different cultures decide whether a work of art is valuable? Explain Umberto Eco’s idea that advertising a Mercedes Benz in New York might lead a handful of people to buy one, and more people to go out and trash one.
16. Can crafts be considered artistic, or is there a dividing line between the arts and applied arts?
17. How do the arts play a role in people’s lives? In what ways might the arts be a form of knowledge?
18. Give an example, (name of the work if possible), of each of the following art forms that you have seen/experienced and how each made you feel. Ballet, rock music, jazz, opera, poem, movie, paintings, novels, sculpture, photographs, comics, cartoons. Respond like this: Father of the Bride, amused; ........
19. Give examples of how experiencing artistic works expands the way we think.
20. What are the characteristics/features that different kinds of arts have in common?
21. Brainstorm a list of things that your consider to be beautiful?
22. What do beautiful things have in common? e.g. colours that...
23. Here is a list of different aspects of beautiful things. Choose one or two and explain why they are beautiful? Repeating patterns. Harmonies in music. Rhythm in dance. The intensity of jungle drums. The symmetry of a circle or square. Curves that have an interesting shape. Shapes or colours that mimic nature. Art that exaggerates or makes more real.
24. Explain the difference between the ordinaryness of everyday life and the form (shapes, patterns, colours, sounds etc.) found in artistic works?

Malone, T.W., & Lepper, M.R. (1987). Making learning fun: A taxonomy of intrinsic motivations for learning. In R. Snow & M. Farr (Eds.), Aptitude, Learning, and Instruction: Cognitive and Affective Process Analyses. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Thesis, Antithesis and Synthesis

Students who undertake the Theory of Knowledge Course for the International Baccalaureate, the ultimate in secondary education, are required to prepare and submit an essay that argues the pros and cons of a contemporary issue such as climate change, intelligent design or whether "all art is useless".

The students explore how "we know what we know" through the lens of the natural and human sciences, arts and languages. They examine the role that reason, perception, emotion and ethics play in the creation and application of knowledge.

The course acknowledges that knowledge creation is a collective process. The students are encouraged to discuss and debate the topic from a myriad of perspectives. But not so the essay. It's an individual work judged on a personal performance.

But what if the essay writing component could have a collaborative element that "walks the talk"? Each student would choose a topic. Then they would work as a team to help scope out each other's essays, in much the same way a teacher might provide assistance. They would collectively explore the possibilities. Develop a framework. Construct an argument. Reach a tentative conclusion. And get a head start. Not only for their essay, but for life in the real world, where leaders in business and government need to be able to create new knowledge together.

Each student would then fly solo. They would do the hard part themselves; the literature review, write up the arguments, reach their own conclusions, and dot the "i"s and cross the "t"s. It would be all their own work.

This is an approach I like to adopt in my own research but prefer to go even further. I choose to write papers for conferences and academic journals with colleagues because when we do, like Vygotsky's children in collective play, we "perform as if we were a head taller."

So here is a workshop method to implement this idea. It is as old as Socrates. You begin with the thesis (one side of the argument), develop an antithesis (the other sides of the argument) and resolve them into a synthesis (an overarching new and better solution) which hopefully resolves the conflict.


You can also use the method to analyze any issue in the broader world of business, politics, religion and community.

1. Who are the main protagonists in this argument? Names, titles, organisations.....
2. What are the main arguments put forward by the protagonists?
3. What interests do each of the protagononists represent, what biases may they bring to the discussion, and what are they trying to achieve by participating in the debate/discussion?
4. For each of the arguments that each of the protagonists, put forward what kinds of knowledge (reason, intuition, gossip, deductive reasoning, abductive reasoning) and what support is there for that knowledge (documents, independent research, paid research, hearsay).
5. On what issues do the protagonists agree, and for which there is no dispute?
6. On what issues to the protagonists disagree, and why is there a dispute?
7. Considering all of the sources, their reliability, and the biases/interests of the protagonists, what would you conclude (and why), if your were a disinterested observer?
8. How can we be sure this is a real problem? Is it merely an isolated localisated disagreement or an issue with much broader consequences? Give your reasons.
9. What biases do you bring to the issue that you need to make public and discount?
10. What possibilities are there for the two different positions to be reconciled by abductive reasoning (using a new metaphor) that allows you to create an overarching solution which is consistent with all of the information/data/knowledge upon which the protagonists rely?
11. Why might the protagonists reject the “third way” that you have developed?
12. How can you improve/enhance the proposed solution so that it better meets the needs and interests of all the parties?
13. What might be the benefits/advantages of the protagonists embracing the “third way” that you have develeped which is more consistent with the sources.
14. What are the consequences of the status quo/doing nothing.

Learning via immersion

Much is made of the human capacity to plan/think ahead. This ability to time travel began with the invention of writing to keep records or prepare plans.

But there is a limit to our imagination. As many developers of new technologies will explain, its often hard to know how people will use a "new-to-the-world" product/service until it exists and you can play with it.

The same can be said of the rules of complex systems. It is not until you immerse yourself in a culture/system/world/activity with which you are unfamiliar, that you can really grow to understand it. Like stepping into the world of thinking/acting like a mathematician, scientist and technician.

We apply the principal of learning via immersion when we play a series of quasi-maths games to help students discover how to think like a mathematician.

We begin by asking them to list the rules for judging the winner of this game:

"Complete the series A1, B2, C3......Z26"

As soon as the students have experienced the game they can "see" the rules immediately, including quite complex variations. A task that was previously beyond them.

It's the power of our right frontal lobes to help us survive novel, dangerous situations, and which formulate possible solution. Here's a typical set of responses:


The rules for judging the winner of the game are: all the numbers from 1 to 26 and letters from a to z must correspond, capital letter only, no missing/extra letters or numbers (should not end in 25/27), no spaces, separated by commas, no spaces between the numbers and the letters.

And if you ask the students to play the next game they quickly improve their performance as well:

Complete the series, AZ, BY, CX.......ZA,

It's just like the underlying rules/standards of algebra, geometry and arithmetic that mathematicians use all the time. You know you are more likely to have a promising solution, if after applying Occam's Razor, the solution is:

* The simplest.
* The most complete.
* Unique.
* Unambiguous.
* Contains no errors.

So, when you are designing a learning activity, it's a good idea to immerse the learners in the activity, and have them discover the rules, theory or model for themselves and perfect/correct it, because when they derive it themselves they will be more likely to remember it. Here's an example. You don't have to complete all the questions...just the most relevant:


1. Go to www.worldtime.com. Look at this simulation where the sun is shining on earth. Explain what you see, why some part of the earth is in sunshine, some in darkness and some in twilight. Also explain why one of the poles is in sunlight and the other in darkness.
2. After everyone has responded, print out a copy for everyone. Then respond to these questions
3. In what ways, if any, could we make this simpler? Small, concise, tidy, looks good
4. What do we need to do to make sure this is unambiguous/exact?
5. In what ways, if any, could we make more logical? Follows what has gone before, is the next step.
6. What do we need to do, if anything, to ensure it is reliable/correct? We will get the same outcome no matter who performs the process.
7. What do we need to do, if anything, to make sure it is complete? Is everything included?
8. Write a new description that explains what is happening in the www.worldtime.com model.