Play

           To include PLAY into a class lecture is to get students to approach a topic in a way they would not have thought possible: to approach it in a hands-on and enjoyable fashion. My understanding of play in curriculum is to engage a student in a topic before they relate it to the ‘boring’ aspect of study.

My play introduction is a little more complicated than could be done at most schools, but I think it encompasses all the bullets I would want to include (more on those later) so I have decided to stick with it.

My topic for this course has been oceanography and this activity is used to introduce ocean currents.

My activity involves the school swimming pool. As a teacher I would inform the students that we are holding class in the school pool the next day (so they can be prepared with swim gear). I would then lie to them and inform them the reason has something to do with our classroom being re-wired and the pool being free so why not take a fun day. I would tell them we will be doing some fun games to pass the time. I purposefully do not want them going thinking they have to LEARN something. That surprise at the end of the lesson of play where they realize they have learned is my goal with a play activity.

So the activity requires students in the pool. It also requires at least three different float rafts and a whole bunch of rubber ducks. After lots of random playing in the pool you need to set them up something like this picture.

Then have some kids on each raft and others creating a current in a clockwise fashion. Then rubber ducks can be added in. to see how they move through the water. The kids don’t really realize what is going on except challenges you call out like “can we get the ducks to pass float 3” or “will any ducks get stuck in corners” or “how much work to get the ducks going the other way?” or “Is the heat making an difference?”

The second day of the activity is back in their classroom (which you can comment on the nice new ‘wiring’). As a normal into lecture to ocean currents unfolds, observations about the ‘continents’ and ‘currents’ and rubber duckies provides a connection for your students.

Even though this is impossible without access to a pool (and probably still hard with schedules and times and what not) I think it is a very worthwhile activity for students (of any age really). While they think they are just playing in the pool once they are back in their desks they realize the significance. So what would  normally be a dull lecture introduction becomes a positive memory of physical activity linked to future knowledge.  

Modeling

          To me the concept of modeling allows a student to understand something that’s too large for them to see at once. The best way to describe it is the use of scale when learning about the solar system. I remember completing this lab when I was in school. Each student was given a planet and we did a whole lot of math to figure out how large each would be at given distances away from each other (obviously scaled down by the teacher). We then drew them on paper and went out to the athletic fields. We are spaced apart according to our math and then held up our planet drawings. The idea that in the right light conditions I (from my spot on Earth) can see Mars and Venus but Pluto (still a planet to me) might as well have been standing in the next town for all I could see.

            So to me the educational value of modeling comes from breaking something down that is too large a topic for all at once and showing it in understandable terms.

            My specific topic is Oceanography and to me the drawback of teaching oceanography is that many kids have never seen the ocean. Many have never swam in anything other than a pool. So to get them to understand the feeling of the ocean a model is required. I believe a model is required to get students into the setting. Oceanography is the type of topic that benefits from experience. 

My graphic representation is of another project I did when I was in 6^th grade. I always remember back to this project because of how ‘cool’ it was and how much I learned from it. It was our final project for 6^th grade science and our teacher had us make Biomes. We were in groups and given HUGE plastic bags – and by huge I mean 10 feet across and 25 feet long. A box fan was attached to one opening and a doorway at the other end and once turned on the huge bag inflated and inside you could create your biome. My group had the desert and had a black bag so you couldn’t see in or out. We created the entire environment of a desert right there in our school’s gym. Each group created their own encased environment. It was magical.

            So for my representation I would take a bag/biome and create the ocean. Create an underwater experience. I would use color and motion (not hard to make those bags sway) and sound to simulate being underwater. I think a model like this is important to put kids inside the topic.

          To the left is a picture I found online of the bag. I would hope I could create the inside to look like this:

It would be ideal to be able to set up small lab experiments inside.

Embodied Thinking

        To me embodied thinking results when a learner is set about a topic from a new, different, odd angle. At first it might not seem like where the teacher starts and where the learner is to get will ever connect but through the process the learner creates the links and results in a perfect “aha!” moment. The knowledge is more deeply understood by the learner as they have made all the connections in their own brain.

            For this project I have stuck with my subject matter of oceanography but have not narrowed down to one topic. The reason is that I have had a hard time with my topic this week. For those who follow the news you may be aware that the Tall Ship Bounty was sunk off the coast of North Carolina last Sunday in Hurricane Sandy. I used to work aboard her and called her my home for almost a year. Many of the crew onboard are my friends and the man lost one of the best men I have ever sailed for. (If you have not heard I suggest her Google it – she was a beautiful ship). This is a photo I took back in 2008.

 For the project I wanted to bring other people – who may have never even seen the ocean - into my feelings for it. To teach them the draw of the waves and the power it has. I went through tons of the pictures I took but none lead even me to beginning of understanding. Movies seemed to fake as well. Then I remembered a poem I had actually memorized at one point and could not shake from my head once it popped in. It works perfectly to give the experience of the draw of the ocean to others.

            So I would like to share John Masefield’s poem Sea Fever first published in his book Salt Water Ballads 1902.

                      

                        I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and sky,

                        And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,

                        And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s dong and the white sail’s shaking,

                        And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.

                        I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide

                        Is a wild call and clear call that may not be denied;

                        And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,

                        And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

           

                        I must down the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,

                        To the gull’s way and the whale’s way, where the wind’s like a whetted knife;

                        And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,

                        And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

            To me this poem has the ability to lead anyone into a physical and well as mental understanding of the power the ocean holds over men. The mental images created have such a strength in their imagery that they last once the reading is done. I think this links well to the idea of the ocean: once you see it, it never leaves you. In fact I am sure many people once they are done reading this poem actually read it again. Just like those who see the ocean will always be drawn back to it.

Abstracting

Why is the Ocean Salty?

I was first introduced to the powers of abstracting in learning as an exchange student in high school. I was living in Australia and while I perfectly understood everything the teachers were talking about my “sister” – another exchange student from Brazil who was placed with me – did not. She knew English quite well but a lot of more complex terms and ideas were lost on her. I became very good at explaining things in different terms, from different angles. I didn’t realize it then but years later when I became a teacher the strength of being able to take a topic and come at it from a different angle is very important. To me abstracting in the classroom is paramount to student understanding.

My main topic for this class continues to be Oceanography. For this project I chose the question of ‘Why is the Ocean Salty?’ I picked this topic because it is in fact a very simple answer, but one that many people don’t know.

For my first abstraction I wanted to make a visual image. I have seen thousands of pictures of the water cycle used to describe ocean salinity – many just have more arrows drawn or little salt shaker cartoons tumbling along the picture. I did not want to use words. I find many scientific images become so over burdened with words that students lose sight of the image. So here is the image I created:

I liked the concept of the funnel. Instead of keeping land as it is normally seen (as all the water cycle images do) I propped it up so the idea of runoff is clearer. All the people I have shown this to agree that it depicts rainwater washing something down into the ocean and then the water going back up again. Which is exactly what I wanted to show.

            For my second abstraction I knew right off the bat I wanted to create a Wordle. For this particular one I used part of a US Geological Survey Publication entitled “Why is the Ocean Salty” by Herbert Swenson.  I went through many different Wordles from different passages of this article and finally settled on the introduction. After pasting it into the Wordle application I played with the layout and colors and came up with this:

I knew I wanted to use a Wordle because of the basic concept of visual words. Since my first abstract was a pure image I wanted to go the opposite this time and use all words. But the beauty of this program is that the words still create something cohesive.

            The weaknesses of my abstractions lie in their reliance on an explanation. Neither would stand-alone as the sole answer to Why the Ocean is Salty. They both require some spoken or written explanation.

            I think the strength in both of these abstractions is the visual. Explaining why the ocean is salty is a very basic one-sentence description. Thus it is usually left to just a few slides in a PowerPoint presentation. Being able to put it into different contexts allows a greater understanding especially with visual learners.