How do we change the world?
We do it one classroom at a time.
We do it through dynamic teaching, reaching students on a
level that they understand, that they already have mastered. Teachers attempt
to reach their senses of hearing, seeing, touching, tasting, and smelling so
that they can etch the lessons into their minds. This is an art that cannot be “taught” but
rather discovered. There are those instructors around us, and you know the kind
I write about, that are so amazing at what they do, so innovative, that they
change the very dimension of teaching. By their very nature, they flip the
classroom upside down and those students that would be discipline issues for
another teacher are attentive and adherent learners in their apt hands.
I speak of the teachers who look at our students and don’t
just see them for WHO they are, but for WHAT they can be. They see little
Johnny as a struggling fifth grader, but on the other end of the pendulum they
see him as a scientist who may find a cure for cancer. They look at the worst
in a child and see the best. They take
water and turn it to wine so to speak. They see the “half-full” arguments and
say the glass is actually only “half-empty”.
My first and second grade teacher was this way. She managed
to see me for my potential and not for the tangled mess I really was at the
time. With her guidance and faith in me, I was able to learn in ways I never
fathomed. To this day I still find myself doing touch math for a tip at a
restaurant and assessing the value of need versus want before I decide to buy
something. These lessons may have been taught to me a lifetime ago, but I still
apply them on a daily basis. Mrs. O'Hara will always have a special place in my
heart because she was one of the few teachers in my journey that showed me,
quite frankly, at the start of my learning experience, that I could learn in ways
that I would never forget once I applied them.
For my story, I know there are thousands more out there. I
know that some of you reading my words even now contemplate back to a time when
you had a teacher share with you and entrust in you, a lesson or series of
lessons you have never forgotten. It is because of their advancement of you and
that you are the person that you are today. It is because of their guidance,
support, and nurturing love that we have seen the success of our own abilities take
flight and soar higher than anyone could imagine.
The joys of this are that there were plenty of teachers in
my life I will NEVER forget. It wasn't just one or two teachers that molded,
defined, and helped identify the man I am today. No, it was a collective
effort, across years of my existence, from kindergarten well into college. I
had several teachers I will never forget; the ones who taught me that no matter
what obstacles life throws at me, no matter what hardships may come, never give
up and always stay true to myself.
So looking at my words now you understand that innovation in
the classroom starts with the teacher.
Couple that with the way our students learn in today’s environment
versus thirty years ago, and you see a
landscape totally different. While our world of k-12 back then was made up of
crayons and markers, it is now comprised of a digital nature. It is a place
where 1 and 0 collide in holy matrimony. It transcends any physical boundaries
we could ever set for it and has made the classroom transform from a platform
of learning inside the 4 walls of a specific place, to a vast digital landscape
riddled with possibilities. It has redefined the roll of the teacher in ways
never before expressed, and because of this has allowed, for the FIRST Time,
the teacher to decide their own fate.
Teachers across the globe are using this digital landscape
to create a classroom environment they never could have before. They have
invented a learning model based on student interaction anytime, day or night,
Christmas Eve, or at the Thanksgiving table. All the walls and boundaries that
once held a teacher’s knowledge and skills at bay from their students, has now
been unleashed in ways never before seen. Using websites like Edmodo, Moodle, and even
Pearson Open Class, teachers can have collaboration with their students day and
night, vacation or not, holiday or furlough. The idea is simple. Give the
students the tools to succeed at all moments, NOT just the moments inside the
classroom. And these tools are showing
an increase in student interaction across the boards at least where I am at.
Several surrounding counties have put millions of dollars in
technology implementation (Teach 21 Initiatives and other such programs) into
the classroom. In 2011, Pickens County
Schools surpassed both the state average and all of our neighboring counties in
standardized test scores in the realm of End of Course Testing for 9th
thru 12th grade. Just this year we have begun to receive funding (SPLOST)
for new technologies in ways that other counties have had for several years.
Yet we have continued to innovate and increase test scores in all subject
areas.
This says a lot about the teachers we have here in Jasper. I
have to say this and be very firm on this, even before the sweeping changes
that came in 2010; we were an amazing school system. The fiscal year ending in
2011 showed one of the greatest strides in testing scores, achievements, drop
out decreases, and overall improvements in a myriad of areas.
It continues to be my firm belief that we are a city on a
mountain top. Our teachers dot this city in bright lights, illuminating an
entire landscape with their qualities, with their morals, and their values. We
see their inspiration in a community of volunteers during the most difficult
times, we see a host of social events they are a part of, intertwined with our
business leaders, our church leaders, our political leaders. We see a place
where true magic has happened for years and it is because of a group of
dedicated teachers and the support structure of the great community they call
their own.
I always have believed in our teachers. Do I believe that
every single one of these teachers is motivated and dedicated as our
trend-setters? No, of course not; but that doesn't make it any less credible.
My credence comes from the teachers I never expected to share their passion
with me in the ways they have. Teachers who have spent their entire careers
making a difference in their students’ lives. I had a teacher just last week
tell me if I can reach just one student and make a difference in their life
then it’s worth it to me. The tears are worth it to me. The pain is worth it to
me. That alone is enough to fuel me to my last dying breath with what little I do
right now.
In writing this blog, I’m pouring out my words in the best
way I know how I can. I only hope it reaches the right person, I can only pray
that what I am sharing now will make a difference. Even if it is in the life on
just ONE teacher, then that to me is worth it. It means that what I am doing is
needed and is justified and not just a filler for the internet. To the
naysayers I can’t explain why. So many ask me why? Why do I give so much when I
am not even considered an employee of the system I support? Why do I push so
hard when in the end when all that will happen is politics and people pushing
in the end? Why do that to myself? To that I say one word… Hope. I hope for
something greater than me, something greater than my post, something greater
than I could ever be.
I hope for a change that no one can stop. I hope that what I
am doing now will birth a true enlightenment, an innovation beyond basic
explanation, and through it see our teachers take flight and soar into the
heavens. See them go to places they have yet to experience, and only ever
dreamed of going. To take the sands of time and scatter them across the heavens
in a glittery cosmic collision of innovation none of us can stop.
This past school year I was able to personally be a part of
something truly innovative. For the first time we had two students graduate
from our Pickens Mountain Education Charter High School (An evening high school that
uses a state-of-the-art online interface that allows the students to learn at
their own pace with certified teachers on hand to answer any questions they may
have during their learning process.) that were inmates at our local Pickens
County Jail. I worked closely with our administrators of PMEC and this local
Jail, with the help of our Sheriff Donnie Craig, to make this option a possibility. After a great deal of planning and
execution we were able to set up a reliable hard-lined network to connect the
students the way they had to be connected. Using the power of Skype, the classroom
interface of Novanet Courseware, these two students were able to finish their
remaining classes up and obtain a fully accredited diploma from Pickens
Mountain Education Charter High School. Being a part of that was more inspiring to me
than I can ever put into words.
Seeing the parents of both of these students in tears during
the entire graduation ceremony was enough for me to realize there is something
greater here than just the four walls of a High School. When you see the mother
of a child at the moment of something never imagined, it honestly is
life-changing. These two kids were already a lost cause in most people’s eyes.
They had already been put in a place for their choices and the last thing
anyone would have ever expected was them to go into Pickens County Jail as a
drop out and walk out a graduate of a fully accredited high school. To be a
part of something like that is indescribable.
Imagine being just a spark of something magical like that? Imagine
being a part of change the likes of which no one ever saw coming? This is what
I am talking about. I know what is coming in 2014 and I am offering a way,
showing a way for our teachers to see this for what it is, cost effective for
one because it is absolutely and undeniably FREE. The second point is that the
change is coming no matter how much we try to stop it so we might as well
embrace it and adapt now.
See the changes for
what they are, use them to our advantage. For the first time, in all of my time
working in the education field, we can meet this change head on, long before it
comes to fruition, and we can make the changes now. We can show our teachers
they don’t have to have a doctorate to understand how to make the new changes
work in their classrooms.
All of these changes can be made now, with what we already
have in our classrooms. As long as you have internet access as a teacher, a
laptop or desktop at your disposal that you use for instruction, and some other
interactive device (Whether that be an interactive whiteboard or software such
as Smoothboard or Splashtop to control your desktop computer/laptop through
your wireless device/tablet.) In my final blog I will list my last set of
videos showing how to install, configure, and implement these various options
into your classroom environment. (I will post these last series of videos by
Wednesday the 21st.) In the
end, if and when you decide to use them, you will have already understood what
it means to bring Core Curriculum into your 21st century classroom
and integrate it into your current lesson plans. Once you understand HOW to do this that is
half the battle. The other half is engaging your students on a level only you
can and seeing them in ways those of us that are not teachers can never see
them.
While we may see Sandy as a trouble maker, you see her as
tomorrow’s head of the Democratic party.
We see little Mark already as tomorrow’s criminal when you
see him as a seasoned counselor/teacher reaching troubled kids on a level we
never would be able to.
Its Inspiration and Revolution like that no computer or Siri
can ever replace. It’s the human aspect of this digital future that makes all
the difference. The students of today may be our future, but it is our teachers
from the Past, the Present, and the Future that make it all possible.
Thank you again for reading this blog.
Aaron
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