My mother-in-law Facetimed my wife this morning to chat and laugh about Pet Crush Saga which she was sharing with a friend at her home. At 81, my mother-in-law got her mini iPad about 2 months ago and she has taken to it like a duck to water. I use that analogy because much like my mother-in-law with her iPad, a duck in water always seems to laugh and socialize with others. Since she began playing, my mother-in-law has become even more social than before, both virtually and face-to-face. Games such as Pet Crush Saga, Mystery Manor and Candy Crush require players to share constantly, giving gifts, lives etc. in order to remain part of the game.

Connecting people …

Research has shown again and again that seniors become more social both within their generation and cross-generationally because of social media and games. (See this article for one recent scholarly review). Moreover, gaming keeps minds open, working and fresh.

So, if social media are good for the older ones, perhaps they are teaching other generations generosity, communication skills and joy as well.

Isiklar Air Force High School “Quest for Best” Conference

Yesterday, Pearson Education enabled me to make a presentation to the 200 participants at the third annual “Quest for Best” conference put on by the Isiklar Air Force High School in Bursa. It was a privilege to share some thoughts with third year English teaching students at Uludag University as well as colleagues from state and private schools in the region. I also had a chance to talk to students at Isiklar Air Force High School and was struck by the high level of their English proficiency; military discipline and especially high motivation seem to be key factors. Congratulations to their teachers and commanders.

The theme of this year’s conference was “The Power of Reading” and I was lucky enough to follow a talk on Free Voluntary Reading(FVR) by Dr. Beniko Mason from Shitennoji University in Osaka, Japan. We also use it in the Prep year as well as in Grade 9 at Robert College and it is the single most powerful influence on creating readers of our students.

My workshop, entitled “Rediscovering Lost Creativity” centered around two useful tools to allow students to gain access and actively engage in assigned stories; different from FVR, these tools deal with fiction and non-fiction work assigned by teachers and requiring critical reading by students. Each of these tools is courtesy of colleagues at Robert College as we move forward in our own constantly evolving program.

Note: All documents referred to here and in the workshop can be accessed through the shared folder at SugarSync by clicking here.

1. “Talk to the Text” or “T-4″ in the parlance of one of my colleagues is the act of engaging with the text by having a conversation with the author, a character or even the book itself. Lower order questions (found in the text) and higher order questions (connections, musings, etc.) should dot the margins of the text, along with expressions such as “You’ve got to be kidding!” In this way, students actively engage with the story and create a curiosity that moves them forward into wanting to know, and read, more. During the workshop, participants either engaged with the first page of Roald Dahl’s “Genesis and Catastrophe” or “Eleven” by Sandra Cisneros. One participant became quite angry as she read the opening dialogue in Dahl’s twisted story and I do hope she feeds back when she finishes it. The whole exercise was to point out that when students engage meaningfully in a story they actually take on board new vocabulary and structures to access the meaning.
2. “Double Entry Journal” is another way for students to interact with a given text. On the left side of the journal, they write a quotation or passage that was important to them in some way and on the right side, they then write a connection, a character response or a meaningful question of the author or the character.

Today, March 6th, Read Aloud!

To your students

To your children

To your parents

To your pets

To yourself.

Celebrate the written and spoken word.

For more information, click here.

I post this 6 minute “Vlog” as a plea to my American friends to exercise common sense and pursue student exchanges with our school in Turkey.  Sadly, the main US media outlets paint a dark picture of Turkey which bears little if any resemblance to reality.

We have just had a wonderful exchange visit from Dalton School in New York. They are the best advertisement for open minds! Thank you Dalton School.

Please access my Vlog on YouTube here. Comments expected and respected.

Sorry but many of you will not like what I have to say.

“Sociopaths…are usually defined as people displaying anti social behavior which is mainly characterized by lack of empathy towards others that is coupled with display of abnormal moral conduct and inability to conform with the norms of the society…” (Read more … http://depressiond.com/sociopath-sociopathic-personality-disorder/)

If we see Lance Armstrong as exhibiting such manifestations of sociopathy (as I do), we need to ask the following. Was Lance Armstrong born with an illness that allowed him to move forward with sociopathic tendencies for years, or was he made? Or indeed, did his school years feed what was there by nature? He admits to being a bully:

From the transcript of the interview:

OW: Were you a bully?

LA: “Yes, I was a bully. I was a bully in the sense that I tried to control the narrative and if I didn’t like what someone said I turned on them.”

OW: Is that your nature – when someone says something you don’t like, you go on attack? Have you been like that your entire life – 10-years-old, 12-years-old and 14-years-old?

LA: “My entire life. Before my diagnosis (with cancer) I was a competitor but not a fierce competitor. When I was diagnosed, that turned me into a fighter. That was good. I took that ruthless win-at-all-costs attitude into cycling which was bad.”

As educators, should we have our radar turned on fully for the bullies in our midst? Should we be more aware of when a child is involved in unhealthy competition or taking a winner-takes-all mentality? We have access to excellent counselors who can mitigate what may be there by nature. Counselors who can allow a young person to reflect upon themselves, others and how their actions may be hurtful.

Furthermore, are we taking good children and turning them towards a form of sociopathy with high-stakes testing, fierce competition for schools and winner-take-all attitudes in college entrance?

In Turkey, we drag children from the well-spring of creativity so they can answer 100 rote questions at the end of Grade 8 in order to get into the handful of good schools that exist. Then again four years later, cram schools and high-stakes testing for the handful of decent college places in the country. Are the values of “crush or be crushed” reigning supreme over common decency? Are people really so enamored with what they want Lance Armstrong to be, that they cannot realize that he has indulged in crushing everyone for years? That he has no sense of common decency, even now.

Lance Armstrong should be taken off the air unless he becomes a poster-child for getting treatment for his real illness – sociopathic personality disorder. You don’t want to believe me?

Here is a Wordle of Mr. Armstrong’s choice of words during his interview. Real food for thought – “sorry” is a speck:

From @JYerushalmy pic.twitter.com/9NRmyrRj

One of my colleagues, Ulkem has introduced us to “Habits of Mind” as an excellent adjunct to our written curriculum. There are many versions, however the linked version addresses student habits in particular. From their poster are:

Habits of Mind:

• Persisting
• Managing Impulsivity
• Listening with Empathy and Understanding
• Thinking Flexibly
• Metacognition
• Striving For Accuracy
• Questioning and Posing Problems
• Applying Past Knowledge to New Situations
• Creating Imagining and Innovating
• Finding Humour
• Gathering Data Through All Senses
• Remaining Open to Continuous Learning
• Responding with Wonderment and Awe
• Taking Responsible Risks
• Thinking and Communicating with Clarity and Precision
• Thinking Interdependently

I have highlighted Managing Impulsivity as this is one that affects us especially as we enter the new year. How many of us have made new year’s resolutions to lose weight, to exercise more, to do something less, to do something regularly? Frankly, the mindset is more important than any resolution. The question is simple:

“Do I value the present me more than the future me?”

Think about it for a moment. I am 55 (the US speed limit on divided highways) and want to be a happy 80 (the Canadian kph limit on undivided highways). How do I get there? By valuing the future me more than the present me. By foregoing that whole Toblerone for a smaller portion once a week. Each person has ways of modeling the value of “future me” for our students.

And fatalism … not so keen on it.

As an adult, I want to take this course! Our Arts Department holds an autumn course in Studio Art Portraiture open to all students. They start with a self portrait and end with .. well, you can see where the journey takes them. These are not our “artists”. The teacher takes all students to a place they never knew was within.

This course allows students to discover the inner something that may have been driven out of them by standardized testing to get into our school.

Our school is about academics. It is also about the Arts. It is also about Sports. It is about discovery. Kudos to Ms. Hope-Brown and her fellow artists.

Our 1000 High School students are 100% Turkish. They come in to Robert College with excellent Math knowledge because of the rote Turkish system, though the skills need honing with the critical thinking skills we imbue. They need work in both the content area and in English itself.

As our students are all second language learners, “Math” in Robert College is also “English” – as are the content areas of Science, Art, Music, PE etc.

Our Math co-chair, Ozgur has created a model lesson plan using GoogleDocs. Underneath the math are the skills of problem-solving in English … and underneath these are the critical thinking skills of responding to the learning the students are doing. Metacognition. I commend her for supporting us as English teachers and giving voice to the students who want so much to comment / respond about the learning they are doing. Kudos.

The Lesson Plan

The Sample

The Language!

The Reflections

Reflecting on 2012, I came across an unpublished piece that speaks well of our community.

On November 10 at 09:05, Turkey comes to a standstill out of respect for its Founding Father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Sirens from ships in the Bosphorus, from ambulances, fire trucks and police cars wail throughout the country. All else is stilled and silent. At Robert College on that day, 1000 students and perhaps 200 adults stand silently in respect. Where else, when else, can 1000 adolescents remain stock silent? Here is but a brief clip …

The Silence of Respect 2012

From midnight, Saturday, December 22nd through Wednesday morning, December 26th, I “went dark”. Thus, for three days and change:

No – Online connection

No – TV

Yes – Radio

Yes – Normal telephone

Reactions? Surprisingly few. I woke up Sunday morning with a tinge of a need for my “news fix”, but made breakfast, read a good book and went for a long walk. Over the three days, I did a lot of “quiet”. I found it interesting how much I tend to cloud my thoughts with extraneous input on a regular basis. Music is on while I read or write or cook. Perhaps a news program will be the background to working in the garden. Singularity of action is rare in our modern world. I rediscovered it during these three days. It helped that I was outside the city and alone.

In the book, “Quiet”, Susan Cain posits that one third of us are introverts, quiet people. We do our best creative work alone rather than in groups. It is important that we are given time, space and quiet to be the best we can be. We need to allow our brains to go quiet to allow the input to develop into creative output. I hope to be able to do it soon again.

A telling note: one colleague signed on for one day but did not make it past 6 hours before she succumbed to the need to tweet and its internal dopamine fix. One student made it through 26 hours. Well done Zeynep! Perhaps you are one of the quiet ones.