By Adora Svitak
[Adora is the eleven-year-old published author of three books and the world's youngest teacher.]
Power to the people! Power to the students!
You may wonder why I declare this. Today’s disenfranchised youth cannot vote; the lower grades cannot drive; we can’t drink—well, that one’s not so important, but in general, minors are not the decision-makers. Where should minors have some control? Education.
When kids of my age are told to do things, we generally are not so excited about doing it. Think in the vein of “take out the garbage” and “eat your vegetables.” When the educator is always at the head of the table, students may not be so apt to eat, or, in other words, to learn.
One of the best ways to get kids engaged in the classroom is to give us some control in our learning experience. I know this first-hand as a student and a teacher. When I teach writing, one of my favorite activities is collaborative writing. Instead of giving each student an individual assignment from the get-go, I instead have students lead the way by suggesting words, characters, and even storylines in response to questions. This gives students a feeling of accomplishment and a feeling of control in the writing process. I use technology like Microsoft Word and an Activboard to show students their ideas come alive in real-time.
As a student, I know how control gets me interested. I attend an online public school, the Washington Virtual Academies, and I am able to learn at my own pace, deciding when to learn what lessons, and where. Although the regular brick-and-mortar school might have a more standardized approach, there are many online ways to get students more involved in the learning process. These include blogs, wikis, and online document sharing.
“Writing is the mark you make on the world, and you want to make sure that mark is something you are proud of.” This is one of my favorite mottoes to share with students. Posting student work on a class blog does many things; it makes students aware that they have an audience, and more considerate of the quality of their writing; at the same time, it gives students who want their writing in the spotlight a chance to demonstrate their work. A blog allows students to reach higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy, such as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation, through editorials, stories, and essays. It gives students a feeling of participation and involvement, and gives them the chance to share their work with the world. A blog could act as a paperless class newspaper, and can be circulated to a wider audience on the World Wide Web. For some years, I attended afterschool classes at my home with students from around the neighborhood who needed homework help. We set up a blog, www.seedsoflearning.blogspot.com, on which we posted our writing.
A blog is also a powerful organizational tool. If you have ever seen the inside of a grade-schooler’s binder, you may reconsider giving them back that masterpiece writing assignment without making an online copy first! The weblog allows you to easily save student work—because even the most eloquent of essays can get lost somewhere in the shadowy depths of a backpack.
Another powerful tool is the wiki. Wikis allow a class to collaborate on a project or get more in-depth on a topic. I highly recommend the video, “Wikis in Plain English,” part of the “Blogs, Wikis, or Nings? Part 2” article by Tara Seale. One way to use a wiki, as the video mentioned, was to create a list. A wiki could be used effectively as a site for students to brainstorm ideas for a project.
A wiki could also be used as a writing tool. For instance, if the life science class is learning about the difference between plant and animal cells, the teacher could set up a wiki for a compare-contrast article and write a paragraph introducing plant and animal cells to get the wiki started. Next, Student A could note that plant cells have cell walls and animal cells do not. Student B could add a few lines about how plant cells have chlorophyll. And the wiki goes on. Every student becomes a part of the project.
I am a big believer in the power of free stuff in general (think dumpster diving), and my philosophy applies to education, minus the dumps. Well-respected online document sharing programs like Google Documents can be excellent collaborative writing tools. They let students exchange ideas back and forth. One plus of using Google Docs is the privacy; Documents only allows those people who have been approved by “Collaborators” to contribute to a piece of writing.
Not only do these technology options give your students control, they are all fairly user-friendly and do not require too much technological expertise. Although technological expertise should not be something you—or your 21st Century students—are lacking in. J
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