Oh, what a year it’s been. It seems we flew through May without taking a breath as we worked through a myriad of projects. One of our favorites this spring was completed as part of the second grade social studies unit on communities. We collaborated with our colleagues Stefani Rosenthal (@StefRosenthal) and Jessica Raffaelle (@miss_raffaelle) to build a project-based learning unit to answer the question, "Where Do People Live?" More importantly, we wanted to build a visual vocabulary to help support the thinking process using sketchnotes, maps, and three-dimensional design.
We introduced sketchnoting several years ago to educators at various grade levels. The second grade teachers never looked back. They’ve made it a staple in their toolkit ever since. The bulletin board image featured in this post represents the variety of visual thinking strategies that the learners employed to convey the different types of communities, including rural, suburban, and urban.
A closer look at the details in the sketchnotes provides a real sense of the selection process that most accurately represents what the students are thinking, not only in the types of visuals, but also in the arrangement of the descriptive information to help them fully grasp the content.
Source: 2nd Grade Students, 2015
In the next phase of the project, the students mapped out the different types of communities. They worked in groups, with each student making his or her own hand-drawn map and key. Each community contained certain must-haves, such as police and fire stations, but the land use from rural areas to urban cities made the maps quite different. It involved a lot of discussion and decision-making on their part as to how to design the roads, types of buildings, and homes.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
This involved a good deal of spatial awareness, and these charming two-dimensional maps with hand-drawn keys represent their visual acuity. The details are delightful, showing barns with silos, swimming pools in suburbia, and skyscrapers in the city. The students absolutely loved making these maps. They even took it upon themselves to add street names. With such strong maps as actual plans for the next step, it’s no wonder that the three-dimensional construction of these communities came out so well.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
The final piece to the project involved building the actual community in the new makerspace in the library. This took some planning and negotiation within the group, because they had to visually transfer a flat design into a three-dimensional environment. Occasionally, it was not without argument either. We allowed some latitude on this; it was important for them to figure it out for themselves.
In the end, they realized the first thing they needed was to lay out the road system. This help them visually see where they would need to place buildings, put in parks, provide for homes, etc. They traced the box bottom on the board, gave it a number, and then coded the bottom of the box with the same number. This made assembly of the final, painted boxes on the map easy. With a little Model Magic, the students added transportation, rooftop playgrounds, and tomato patches.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
Each phase of this project incorporated visual thinking skills that built upon the previous step. Threading the content through the various stages in the design process reinforced the essential question.
The students became independent photo journalists, taking aerial and detailed shots of the maps, and then wrote illustrated reports using the Nearpod app on their iPads. The last thing we did was to use an iPhone as a little drone that traveled through the entire map to take a video of the finished piece as a whole.
This project did more than just build a deeper understanding of the different types of communities. It fostered a stronger sense of community as a whole; the sense of pride and accomplishment on their faces was priceless.
We were hoping to have this post ready for Memorial Day last Monday, but with one week of school left, final exams, report cards, etc., the time just vanished. The data visualization used to tell the story in The Fallen Of World War II is an interactive documentary showing the human cost of war. It was written, directed, coded, and narrated by Neil Halloran. The film is a timeline of events that allows viewers to pause the narration to interact with the data.
The documentary focuses on the casualties and the pivotal moments in the course of the war when there was a dramatic shift in the numbers. It counts both military and civilian deaths. It blends the use of icons and charts with actual black and white photographs to show the human side of the war, creating a narration that is both a visualization as much as a story.
The narrator informs the viewer at the appropriate time to stop the video to interact with the charts. It occurs somewhere in the middle of this 15-minute data visualization, and again just before the end of the film. While it may seem long compared to many motion graphics and explainer videos, it is well worth the watch. We can see how our students would be mesmerized by the continuous tale recounting the huge number of victims of World War II.
It is definitely one for any history teacher’s toolkit. It is a powerful reminder of the tragedy that war inflicts on people.
Community college students everyday interact with a range of materials: handouts, worksheets, outlines, templates, PowerPoints, etc. From the simplest to the most complex, these resources are sometimes the primary conduits for information and training. The design of these materials, therefore, matters. The visual presentation of instructional tools can make the difference between detachment and engagement, between reticence and retention.
One of the touchstones of the design world is the unity of form and function. This “big picture / small picture” harmony is an equally crucial lesson for teachers and learners of all ages. Whereas art is something we look at, design is something we use everyday. It gives context to content and supports the relationship between the two. Good design of information delivers content that is engaging to the eye without becoming a distraction. It guides the attention through carefully controlled and selected visual components; it retreats to the background, enabling the purpose of the finished product to come forward.
In creating both tangible and digital presentations for college learners, educators can ask themselves about the desired purpose, audience, and format of their materials. Similarly, considerations of layout, font, color, and alignment can make positive differences in conveying crucial concepts. A few notions to keep in mind include:
Visual media bombard the modern eye
Images increase the level of engagement and retention
Design creates meaning and relationships
The eye reads many types of "texts"
Simple tools and techniques can aid understanding
Emphasis, typography, hue, layout, and balance are key
Many thanks to the warm and welcoming educators at NCC for inviting us and for being such gracious hosts. It was a pleasure sharing ideas and exploring the potential of visuals to make a difference in the lives of learners. We look forward to staying in touch and continuing the dialogue about design!
Education is smack in the middle of an earth swell of change. No matter how hard the system tries to maintain a rigid set of evaluative assessments, something has to give. Otherwise, we will lose too many teachers over restrictions, and worse, too many young people who know that outside of school the freedom to learn, experiment, and create exists.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
Sure, we know that the fundamentals of reading and writing are key to understanding complex information. We are not advocates for throwing the baby out with the bath water. But perhaps the recent change in Finland to dump teaching subjects in favor of topics should send shockwaves through a system that constantly tries to reinvent itself with nothing more than new standards.
While we know that schools are not businesses, we also know that the insights Stefanovich tries to bring to companies apply to any institution with the desire to promote innovative thinking. His ideas and concepts cross over into any discipline. His fundamental formula:
I + C = I, or Inspiration + Creativity = Innovation
This equation also applies to education. We seek to inspire our learners to use creative thinking to come up with innovative ideas; likewise, we hope to do the same with our approach to teaching.
To inspire others is, after all, why we teach. We rely on inspiration as the fuel for engagement. Just like a business, we want to encourage an environment of productivity for learners. To do this, we can no longer sacrifice inspiration for efficiency.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
The framework behind LAMSTAIH includes five key drivers, including mood, mindset, mechanisms, measurement, and momentum to push the thinking and change the behavior in order to extract new ideas.
The concept behind each “M” not only provides a way for leadership to look at the needs of an institution, but it also helps to promote innovative ways of teaching and learning. Educational conversations circle around many of the same ideas.
So perhaps we could learn a thing or two by looking at more, including the insightful description of the three kinds of curators mentioned the book. On the one hand we have the traditionalist, who is the keeper of objects with the role of making sure that people of the future benefit from the collection of knowledge, and the Zeitgeist curator, who captures the essence of today and connects it to the not too distant future. This sounds like the role of the teacher. And then there is the hunter-gatherer curator, who constantly searches for anything that interests him or her and shares it with the world. Sound familiar? This represents most of the learners we teach.
Source: ASIDE, 2015
So where are teachers and learners as curators? More importantly, where do we want to be? At the moment, many educators are in the middle, yet our students outside of school are hunting and gathering.
Life-long learning is far more like the migrating hunter-gatherer, and technology has opened that door. We need to harness that energy, that inspiration, and that understanding of the power of connections to explore ideas. We can’t keep kids from exploring, connecting, and learning; we want them to be inspired, creative, and innovative.
We’re in the midst of our fifth season working with our elementary students on the entrepreneur project-based learning unit. Even with the flexibility in our curriculum to teach, we still find that each year it gets harder to get kids to extend themselves, to take a risk, and to dare to be different.
Not that a car commercial could change all that, but lucky for us, Cadillac launched its new ads during the Academy Awards to promote its latest luxury sedan. In all four commercials, the last frame appears with the line:
“Only those who dare drive the world forward.”
We wrote it on the board without the credit line. Surprisingly, kids, teachers, and even some administrators who visited the classroom remarked about the statement. Of course, we then gave credit to Cadillac. By not associating the carmaker with the word “drive,” it changed the interpretation of the quote, making it a far more powerful statement about human motivation.
Most of our students didn’t realize that the carmaker was a 112-year-old company, nor that the association with the word “dare” represented a company not afraid to reinvent itself by making connections with other innovators such as fashion designer Jason Wu, “Boyhood” director Richard Linklater, and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. It even promoted the social media connection with its #DareGreatly hashtag. Needless to say, it became our mantra for the spring. Those who dare to think, see, and do things differently change the way we think.
We piggybacked “The Daring, No Regrets” video from Cadillac with the motion graphic “What Is Innovation?”, designed by Rafa Galeano and written by Fast Company blogger David Brier. Brier’s post on the making of this video describes his own inspiration for the theme and the motivation to use his essay to make a motion graphic on innovation for others.
It provided our students with another view of how ideas, from the discovery of fire to their own electronic devices, came from the motivation of others who saw the potential in their creations.
Perhaps the last four lines of this video drive home the point we want our kids to understand:
"So what is innovation? Those other dots. The ones others miss. And having the certainty to know that the dots you see are not only valid, but necessary if the world is to move forward."
Providing opportunities for students to see the potential of others driven by need, or a desire, helps them to let go, to dare. We want them to not only see the possibilities of being an entrepreneur, but also to embrace the notion that it can be a reality. That’s when we showed them 11-year-old Lily Born’s Kangaroo Cup. That made the most impact on the kids and their ideas.
Lily wanted to build a better cup to help her grandfather who has Parkinson's disease. Lily's advice to fellow pre-teen entrepreneurs actually applies to all ages: "Don’t freak out if you screw up or fail, because you’ll fail a lot before you get it right." She also says, "Don't be afraid to ask for help." She used her ingenuity to rethink how best to change an ordinary cup to help others. She dared to make a change and never gave up on her idea. This video made an impact on the students.
With a little ingenuity, Lily redesigned an ordinary cup to function for someone with special needs. More importantly, she started making prototypes at the age of eight. It took three years and plenty of iterations before going to market.
Creativity takes time, and it’s not a simply "point and click." Cultivating that initial idea remains the hardest part for our young entrepreneurs. We push them to think beyond the craft kit, bake sale, or carnival game. Frustration often sets in because immediate gratification isn’t the name of the game. It takes hard work, failure, and perseverance.
Accepting feedback, or a simple, "no, that idea won’t work," sends some off in tears. They come back. Some build a prototype to prove their idea works, some return with a new iteration based on an earlier model, and others completely scrap an idea for a new one. Great! This is exactly what we want. We only have a semester, not three years, but nudging them out of their comfort zones is all part of the process. And sometimes, it’s not an easy thing for many a 10 year-old.
Steering learners away from
settling on the status quo forces them to see the potential of taking a chance on their ideas.
Dare to be different, dare to take a risk, and dare greatly. As
educators, we believe it will foster their entrepreneurial spirit for a
lifetime.
The misconceptions about visual thinking are alarming. On one hand, this critical skill seems integral for contemporary learning, since almost every modern input is visual in nature. Yet this key proficiency seems almost entirely absent from state standards and daily classroom lessons.
Is visual thinking just a polite nod to Howard Gardner's quaint modalities? Or is it a genuine habit of learning that unites the external codes of pictorial metaphor and digital imagery into a seasoned curriculum of higher-level interpretation?
Source: ASIDE, 2015
Visual thinking is a close partner to graphicacy, which is a spectrum of analytical tools to decode and encode pictures. Luckily, many educators on the web have shared strategies for reaching children via optical data.
Here are five terrific presentations about the power of visuals to craft a layered approach toward teaching with creative design. Each of these slideshows offers a specialized take on graphic learning. They would all be valuable resources for educator professional development or for regular practice with children.
With cabin fever at an all time high in our students from what seems to be the never-ending chilly weather, we fully expect to get our fair share of practical jokes today on April Fool’s Day. We will no doubt try a few pranks ourselves on them as well.
But, as history teachers, we inevitably look for ways to give them a little bit of history about the day. The "Ask History: April Fools" video produced by the History Channel has the answers to how practical jokes became associated with April 1, complete with a little prank at the end.
For a little April Fool’s Day math, check out this graphic from Forbes on who is most likely to get fooled. By all accounts from the Harris poll survey, bosses are safe. We wonder if that will pan out for teachers, too. It might be a good opportunity to poll the students electronically using Kahoot to see whom they would put on their lists.
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