Minecraft for Sustainability: Part 2

In my last post, I outlined how we set up to use Minecraft for learning in our inquiry into sustainability. Here's what came next..

After beginning the research and laying the foundations for understanding what sustainability is, what the systems for sustainable communities are, and how they work, the students began actually playing Minecraft.

Because he was the one with the Minecraft knowhow, Ben the Digital Integrator led the first setup lesson: leading the students in developing our Essential Agreement, allocating 'hosts' and talking the children through the process of setting up and joining Minecraft worlds.

Most children in the class already knew how to play Minecraft, which was brilliant - those who didn't have as much as much experience with the game soon caught up with expert tutelage from their peers. So much more effective than chalk and talk. I did my best to become a 'spy' - I snuck around the room, listened to their conversations, asked questions, recorded some 'thinking points' and gathered evidence.

We trapped chickens so we didn't have to kill them to get eggs. If you breed them you can kill the old ones to eat meat. #edtech #Minecraft
— fourlk (@fourlk) June 6, 2014

My small house doesn't use too much energy to heat or cool. Torches make light AND heat the house. #edtech #ipaded pic.twitter.com/gy89HPZA7Y
— fourlk (@fourlk) June 6, 2014

The hardest bits:

• coming to terms with the amount of playing time needed in order to make connections with the concept - sustainability. This actually makes sense - you need time for your community to develop in order to see if the decisions you've made are sustainable. It's pretty clear that this is part of the ongoing struggle with the shifting locus of control - it is always difficult to let go of the feeling that I must always be the 'director' of the learning that's happening in the classroom.
• related to the above - balancing screen time. The children needed enough time to be able to work on their worlds, but not so much that the amount of screen time was going to be detrimental. I cut back as much as possible on the use of iPads and laptops for other tasks during this time, keeping in mind that much of the students' Home Learning work was web- and app-based.

Things I learned/ was reminded of:

• children need time to work through and develop their understandings on their own. Give them plenty of thinking and working time before you start looking for evidence of their learning.
• I can learn so much from my students! Minecraft worlds are very similar AND have significant differences to the real world. Discussions we had about the similarities and differences between sustainability in the real and virtual worlds were fantastic. Despite some kids very honestly telling me that they 'were just playing Minecraft', there weren't any children who were unable to make connections between their Minecraft worlds and the research they'd already done.

The very best part:

• One of my students (a poster child for inquiry!) came to me one day and asked 'Miss Kemp, is it ok if we make our own sustainable worlds to work on at home?' When I asked her what she meant, the little girl explained 'Well, I really like what we're doing in our group, but I have some ideas that the others don't want to use. Is it ok if I try those ideas out in my own world at home?' She then came to chat to me every few days to talk about how her 'other world' was progressing, the things that had worked, and the things that hadn't. She explained her thinking, comparing her 'own' world to the one she was working on with her peers in class and made clear connections to the research we'd done at the beginning of the unit. She was so motivated and it was so exciting to see her actively researching her ideas and theories on her own, for herself.

I really enjoyed using Minecraft for this unit of inquiry. I think it has great potential as a learning tool. I am really glad that I kept a very close eye on what the children were doing at each stage - restricting playing time for the unit to 'in-class' kept a tight lid on misuse and disgreements between group members. More importantly, it made the whole process a lot more transparent - it was really easy for me to track developments in each of the groups' worlds and see the learning that was happening.

I discovered in my end of year survey that a couple of parents were concerned because their children had been creating new worlds to play Minecraft at home. I was a little bit worried about it, because I had really tried to ensure that parents had plenty of information about the use of technology in our class, and, more importantly, that they felt able to address these concerns with me directly. While I created a space on the Parent Information site for information about our iPad trial, and as a class we regularly sent out tweets and wrote blog posts about what we were doing, I'm not sure how many parents followed or found this information. Perhaps half of parents came to parent information sessions and it is impossible to tell how many read emails, website information, blog posts or tweets. One thing I would like to work more on is developing a 'team' approach to teaching children about Digital Citizenship - working with parents to ensure that children are using technology safely and sensibly. Developing partnerships with parents has been on my mind a lot this year - I think it is so incredibly important, given the rapid rate at which learning is changing: clearly fruit for a future post!

Minecraft for Sustainability Part One: Setting Up

I am so excited to finally be able to write that this is happening. We are using Minecraft for learning! Gamers!

In this unit of inquiry, the children's inquiries are into systems for sustainable communities. I really loved the PBL we did for Maths, but am loving this one even more - I feel like we are using a greater and more balanced variety of tools to work through the inquiry process.

A quick outline to map out where we've been and where we're going:
We spent the first couple of weeks tuning in to the concept of sustainability - reading related literature, linking to the folk tale of the Tortoise and the Hare and then to the concept of stamina, which they were familiar with from PE class. We spent 4 days on camp in the Seewinkel National Park, learning about national parks, organic farming and living, as well as studying local flora and fauna. It was really important to me that we didn't just dive straight in to gloom and doom and 'You must do this or the world will end!', and that the children were given plenty of opportunities to enjoy nature and develop their sense of wonder for the world.

On returning to school, I introduced the PBL task: use Minecraft to collaboratively develop a sustainable community. But we didn't dive straight in.

In preassessing the children, I found that many of them didn't have much prior knowledge about the systems we use to get energy, food, water, process waste, etc etc. And so my first priority was to ensure that they developed knowledge and understanding of the different systems that communities rely on to get the things they need.

In a brainstorming session, the children identified some systems that communities need. Initially, they identified the need for systems to get food, water and energy, building and planning homes and cities and getting materials for building. It proved to be really helpful to think back to the systems in place at the WWF base at Seewinkelhof, and to extrapolate from there to 'the real world'.

The children broke up into groups and chose a research focus to further develop their background knowledge for sharing later with other groups, jigsaw style. To scaffold for these beginning researchers, I created a text set with relevant articles and videos (differentiated, of course!) that they are able to access via Flipboard on their tablets at school and home. We also have a trolley with a variety of related books from the library, that we share with the other Grade 4 classes. While the children were researching, I spent time conferencing with each group, recording related questions and slowly guiding them from the 'How do we get water/energy?' kinds of questions to the 'What are the most sustainable ways to get water/energy?' kinds of questions.

I decided that the best way for the children to record and share their thinking and research was with paper and pencil, and so each group worked to create brainstorm-style charts to show their thinking and the information that they found. These brainstorms are displayed on the bulletin board at the back of the class for ease of sharing. The children are also able to refer back to this information during Minecraft sessions and other related activities in class. Here are some pictures to show what we've done so far.

I thought about making this process entirely digital, but I'm finding that it's really important to have some things in tangible as well as digital form. We can photograph or use Thinglink to publish this information online later, if needed.

Things I really liked about this part of the inquiry: students really engaged with the content - I saw a marked increase in knowledge and understanding of the concept and related information. I am also pleased that I spent time putting together a text set with Flipboard - the children spent a lot less time surfing the internet and a lot more time engaging with relevant texts at their own level. Also, the wide range of resources available for research (books, videos, online articles) and the role of iPads in the research process led to a much more engaged group of students overall, meaning less of my teaching time was spent on behaviour management and more on helping students to work through their inquiries. Win!

After this (ongoing) jigsaw was up and running, we began playing Minecraft. I have a lot to think and write about, so will end this post here and devote Part II entirely to the Minecraft component.

iPads in the Wilderness

I am writing this from camp - our current unit of inquiry is about 'Sharing the Planet', and we have four days here at Seewinkel National Park to take a closer look and learn about wetlands wildlife, as well as the local approach to sustainability. It's an excellent camp - we cycle, observe how the stork population lives in the wetlands and nests on the chimney tops in local towns, meet with a local organic farmer to discuss sustainable farming practices, peer at insects and water plants through microscopes and go for night walks in the forest.

It really is a great way for these city kids (and their teachers!) to have the opportunity to connect with nature and to get to know another part of Austria. So you can imagine that there was some concern when I suggested we bring our iPads along with us. Questions, comments and concerns included: 'It's not fair for the other kids who don't have iPads', 'Won't they just stay up all night playing Minecraft?', 'It's completely against the philosophy of the camp - it's supposed to be about unplugging' and 'Why?'.

The first two comments were management issues and easily dealt with: children would work in teams and share the tablets with team members; and the iPads would stay with a teacher at night time, and any other time not designated for learning time. These rules were made very clear to children, and reflect the rules we already have in place for class. The answers to the remaining two issues are much more interesting.

My first argument for bringing the iPads with us on camp was this: I believe that students benefit most from the use of 1:1 technology when it breaches the walls of the classroom. During the 'regular' class week, the children take their iPads home with them to continue their inquiries outside of school hours, with good results. In addition, I'm in the midst of an action research project, and bringing the iPads with us is providing us with more data. Basically, how would the benefits of iPad use in class and at home transfer to iPad use on camp?

Second, I'm not sure that I agree that this camp actually is about unplugging. It's about sustainability and developing a sense of wonder for our amazing world. My belief is that sustainability is not about abstention so much as it is about balance and building sustainable systems. My vision for iPads on camp was that the children would carry their iPads with them throughout the day, recording their observations on film, in photos and in notes for reflection later in class. With a wifi connection in the evenings, they could do research and find answers to questions developed in the field. Just another tool, along with binoculars and microscopes, to explore the national park.

One thing that has been important to me throughout this trial is that the children come to understand that the iPads are one of many tools that they may choose to use for their learning. Of course, there are some times when we are learning about a new app or skill and all children will be asked to get their iPads out. But as they become more and more proficient at using the iPads for a range of tasks, my expectation is that they are the ones who decide when the iPad is the best tool to use. Of course, it's a popular tool, but more and more, children are thinking carefully about what they're doing and will choose the tool according to its appropriateness, rather than for the coolness factor.

So on camp the message to students has been 'Your iPad is here. If you would like to take it out in the field today, pop it in your rucksack. If you'd prefer to leave it behind and use the camp booklet, go for it.' On the first day in the field, about half the children took their iPads with them. On the second, all the iPads stayed locked away in our guesthouse. And the third.

This is really fascinating to me. I'm really not sure why the children have been ditching their iPads - I'll have to interview them when we get back to Vienna. Here are a couple of guesses:

1. The responsibility of carrying the iPads around in an unfamiliar place weighs too heavily on the children. I know that many kids are worried they'll lose their iPad out in the national park and the weather has been rainy as well. Nobody wants a soggy tablet.
2. There are too many other things to do - the children are playing games, running around, exploring, working with experts in the field and socialising. There's just no time for iPads as well.
3. The children weren't sure how to use their iPads in the field, and needed more scaffolding and/or modelling. Hindsight being 20/20, we ought to have had a few practice runs using tablets in some 'camp-like' contexts. This is definitely one to talk through with the Digital Learning Integrator.

Let's see what the children have to say about it next week...

If I was Queen of the Universe...

In my last post, I wrote about the need for culture of creativity throughout a school's community, not just within classrooms. It was bothering me, and I hoped that writing about it would get it out of my system. It didn't - I'm stuck on the idea of developing schools as creative communities, as opposed to institutions that inspire kids to be creative. I want an action plan.

A quick definition to explain what I mean by 'schools as creative communities' and 'schools as institutions'. A creative community is composed of students, teachers, non-teaching staff, parents and other stakeholders who are inspired and inspiring. The institution is an hierarchical organisation with the purpose of spitting out creative kids.

My big question: How can we develop schools that are creative communities in which all members inspire and are inspired? More practically - what can I do?

To inspire kids to think outside of the box, I need to be an out of the box thinker myself. I need to be inspired.
So what inspires me?
My list:
An inspirational environment - aesthetics, culture, people, resources. Collaboration. Playfulness. Flexibility. Energy. Connection. Communication. Empowerment. Feedback. Risk Taking. Boldness. Openness. Encouragement and Opportunities to lead. Reflection.

And what kills my inspiration?
Rigidity. Canned curricula. Timidity. Hidden agendas and resource-hoarding. Fear of failure. Bullying.

What do I already do about all this? What more can I do?
Concerning my own day-to-day practice, I have a fair amount of freedom. So in that sphere, it's pretty straightforward.

• share things that inspire me with my students, colleagues and their families, and inspire them to share with others
• be bold
• use a variety of technologies for learning, teaching, connecting
• collaborate - within my school's community and beyond
• invite community members in, in a variety of formal and informal contexts
• engage in open dialogue with students, colleagues, parents, other community members
• create inspirational spaces, and space for inspiration
• be positive, encouraging, give things a go
• invite a variety of outcomes when trying something new 
• persevere!

Ok, so now for the Queen of the Universe part.
Somewhere in my travels around the internet, I found this sentence and wrote it down to think about.
'The School provides the freedom for our teachers to be creative and bold in their practice, to collaborate with colleagues and to challenge themselves to try new methodologies.'
I really like it. Really. Especially 'bold'. We definitely need to be bold.
But.
Is it enough just to 'provide the freedom'?

I think that, to be inspirational, 'providing freedom' is the bare minimum any organisation can do. Here are a few ideas for scaffolding inspiration.

• redesign spaces for learning and community activities
• provide a variety of opportunities and media for community participation
• develop an inclusive and inspirational culture
• de-institutionalise - is it necessary for children to always walk in straight lines, call their teacher 'Mr' or 'Ms', have regular meeting times, do it because that's how it's always been done?
• designate time and space for community members (not just teachers and students!) to share things they've been doing, things that have inspired them
• designate time and space for collaboration with community members
• develop a culture of participation for all community members - everyone is responsible for creating an inspiring and inspirational community

Creativity

Creative - you've gotta be it to thrive in the 21st century. You've got to be flexible, think on your feet, embrace change, think critically, consider issues from a range of perspectives and draw on a variety of strategies for solving problems. As a teacher, one of my responsibilities is to inspire students to think outside the box. I need to provide opportunities for kids to take risks and try things out in a supportive environment.

Ken Robinson's hugely popular speech on this topic (worth a look if you've not seen it already):

This is clearly really important. But it's nothing new - unless you've been living under a rock, you've heard it already.

What is interesting is that while we are all talking about blended learning, inquiry learning, problem based learning, student-centred classrooms etc etc, we forget about revitalising all the other parts that make up school. Learning's not just about pedagogy - it's about the culture and the institution. To create an environment that nurtures students' creativity, we need also to rethink the the work and relationships that are not with students. Grownups' creativity needs some nurturing, too.

A bit of background to catch you up with where I'm coming from:
A non-educator friend invited me into his workplace to see and talk about a recent office refit, and generally about the company he works for. It was pretty cool - lots of open plan spaces, light, plants and space for light-heartedness. It's really clear that this company wants its staff to be motivated, comfortable, inspired, happy, part of a community. There's a cafe area (with good coffee!) on the first floor, complete with patio and garden. Conference rooms are themed - from a Mad Men-esque kind of executive suite to country and western to black booths with disco-light wallpaper (still a bit disappointed about the lack of lava lamps in that one..). Areas for desk work are open plan - no designated seating! One of the conference rooms is set up as a friendly place for mothers on maternity leave to meet up. And there's a slide. For grownups. And yes, I'm really peeved that I didn't go on it - stupid floaty skirt fabric. The space itself is really cool.

Also cool was the underlying culture. There's no dress code - wear jeans, suits, shorts, pyjamas, whatever. Work from wherever you want. There's no expectation that you'll be in the office every day. You do your best work on the beach with a cocktail? Go hard. There's no clocking in or out - you work as many hours as you need to, to meet your goals. And of course there's all the tech that you need for real time collaboration - video conferencing, screen sharing, an in-house network for online chats, emails, voice and video messaging etc etc. All kinds of fun and games.

The community-building stuff I really liked. I've already mentioned the meeting space for mothers, the cafe area and the slide. As well, there are projects for staff to work collaboratively to raise money for charities, space in the mail room to store bikes, a 'Bring your Daughter to Work Day' and, of course, opportunities for members of the public to come in and see how it works. I'm sure, like any workplace, it has its ups and downs, but you could see that a lot of thought and planning goes into making the staff's experience a good one.

In and outside of schools, there is a lot of thinking going into how we can facilitate students' creativity. What puzzles me is why we so rarely put time and effort into creating the conditions for adults to work creatively in the school community. It just seems to make more sense - if we want to inspire children to learn through play, be creative, engage with the community, shouldn't the adults in their lives also be inspired?

Some cool teaching moments. Thanks, iPad trial :).

I have already posted about it, but I just want to celebrate the awesomeness that is teaching with tablets. I know everyone's preaching it and I'm sure there is a bunch of you out there rolling your eyes at this 'latest trend', but having 1:1 iPads has transformed teaching and learning in our classroom.

My students are Minecraft crazy. I wouldn't have know that if we hadn't taken a gamble and put it on the kids' iPads. We haven't even gotten around to using Minecraft in class yet, but it has already provided the fodder for our best discussion in class this year. Yesterday morning in class, one of my students asked if he could present his passion project. 'It'll take like, 10 minutes, Miss Kemp', he said. 45 minutes later, the children were still going strong, discussing the ins and outs - the best materials for building various kinds of buildings, the best strategies for vanquishing baddies, etc, etc. How's that about learning?
Well.
Most of my students are not native English speakers, so this discussion gave them the opportunity to use subject specific technical vocabulary in an authentic context. The child who presented managed questions and guided the discussion without adult interference. Nobody needed prompting. The children practised appropriate etiquette for participating in a large discussion.
Thank you, iPads, and thank you, home learning.

Blended learning. It's really happening. At the beginning of the school day, we talk through the various projects/tasks that the children can work on. At the moment, there's an extended Maths PBL task, and a narrative writing task, as well as preparation for their Student Led Conferences next week. Incorporated into the mix are also shared and independent reading times, small group instruction (Maths and Language mini-lessons) with me and any other smaller tasks that come up. Keeping in mind the necessity of balancing screen time with other activities, the children manage these tasks on their own. The quality of the work the children are producing is high - they're engaged, they're interested and they have the control (most of the time). I feel like I am teaching much more effectively, because I'm not stuck out the front with my whiteboard markers - I'm sitting down with the kids, working with them side-by-side. For specific skills and content that have to be 'covered', I pull out small groups throughout the day and we talk through it in mini-lessons. So much more time-effective, so much more enjoyable and so much easier to do with iPads on hand.

Roguishness

Spring here in Europe is awesome. A return to colour, smiles on people's faces and an end to the collective Winter grumps. The days get longer and there's time to do things in daylight before and after school. Things become a bit more lighthearted, the way they're supposed to be.

Spring is also a great time at work. By this time of the school year, my kids and I know each other well and we have built a strong rapport. We know each others' limits and expectations and generally, the classroom is a pretty comfortable place to be. The cool part of this is that by this time of year I also know the things that make individuals in the class really excited; I have a much better idea of how to tap in to what it is that the children are passionate about, or more likely to be passionate about.

For whatever reason, Spring is when I'm at my most creative. I'm feeling good and wherever I look, there's inspiration for something to write, make, think or talk about. Spring is when I want to try fun new things, play, make big messes and go where our questions take us.

The killer is that this is also the time of year that we teachers are hurriedly reviewing the curriculum to make sure that we have 'covered' all the stuff, and are on track to 'cover' all the rest of the stuff before the Summer. A small part of me dies every time I think 'outcomes'. And 'data'! Conversations about
data make me want to stick a fork in my eye.

Yes, data is valuable. It's useful. It helps to inform my teaching. I gather it every day, in various forms. But I did not become a teacher because I had a passion for data. Nor do I think that a data-obsessed culture is going to produce critical, creative, passionate lifelong learners. And it ain't a recipe for inquiry learning.

All these are perfect ingredients for my 'Argh! I'm doing something awesome' soup. I'm going rogue. And I'm taking the iPads with me.

(...and yes, I'll get the report writing done as well...) Sigh.