A Semester Long Flex Activity

I'm trying something different this semester with my Communication I students. We've often looked at our use of cell phones, but they often do not agree with the findings. They can get pretty protective about their phones and their use. So this semester, I'm trying a different angle. One of the forms of communication that we are losing due to phone usage is the ability to have conversations. I cannot even name the number of people I have had conversations with that are simply one sided. The other person loves answering questions about herself, yet she doesn't ask any back. So we are concentrating on conversation this semester while at the same time, using our phones less.  Tricky, I know.

We are beginning with the folks in our room. It's a safe place and an easy way to practice conversations. This will grow to outside the classroom and finally into the dreaded lunch room. I'm going to be asking each student to sit by people they normally don't sit with at lunch. From there, they will have to have conversations. Once we accomplish that, we will take this skill outside of school. I would love to visit independent living areas and nursing homes.

I have never tried a semester long Flex, but I think this is the idea behind all of it. My hope has always been that my students will experience something and take it upon themselves to simply continue doing it. So we are trying that. My hope is that we can grow as communicators, but also grow as people when we get to know other people's stories.

I have plenty to work out to use more elements of TfT, but this is a start. Stay tuned.

Prayers in a bag

To end our To Kill a Mockingbird unit, I wanted to have a Flex plan that was applied to the social ladder. The Freshmen class chose to work with elderly folks. We wanted to try to create a way to let elderly people know that they are important folks in our society.
Our first plan was to go to Prairie Ridge several times to create a relationship with them. That fell through. I have too many Freshmen, and I have the Freshmen classes spread out over the day and not at good nursing home times. After about a month of trying to come up with an idea, the activities director at Prairie Ridge thought that my students could simply pray for the residents. But it was not as simple as it sounds. The Freshmen picked a person. The goal was to write three prayers a week. At the end of the week, we discovered some wrote the prayers for the wrong person. We even had wrong names (even though they had a list).

  So some residents got 6 prayers, while another just received one. At the end of the week we put those prayers in an envelope  and gave them to the Ridge. For the next week, I just went down the list. Did that go any better?  Not really. Again, several students wrote the wrong person again!  (We need to work on listening skills! ) This time they put their prayers in a card of their own. Again, they were delivered to the Ridge.
Today I received two very sweet notes from some residents. One uses our prayers as a morning devotion. Another one thanked us for the prayers. "It is a blessing to be remembered," is what he wrote. It was touching.
Like most things in life, this is not what we set out to do. Yet, it has been a blessing and good reminder. So often in life we try to do all these really big things, and while doing that we often forget about the very powerful and simple gift of prayer. My deep hope is that my Freshmen will remember this simple Flex activity and bring that into their everyday lives. My deep hope is that I will remember that too.

The Mystery Unit-making it real.

    For several years now, I've been trying to TfT my Freshmen mystery unit. We have found over the years that if there is one place that non-fiction and fiction collide, it's with mysteries or solving crimes. This year we read several fiction stories, a fiction play and a non-fiction story. We also viewed fiction and non-fiction mystery stories. But in order to make it a little more real, we invited the experts into the class. After reading a story about a car accident, Deputy Waylon Pollema visited class with a little mystery of his own. He shared a car accident and pictures with the students to see if they could unwrap the mystery of the accident. What the victims told and what the accident scene told were not the same thing.

After all our reading, we ended our unit with a crime of our own. Three freshmen committed a set up crime at school. Through the use of Deputy Nate Huizenga and Deputy Pollema, eye witnesses, evidence left behind, and the school camera, the freshmen had to solve the mystery. It was fun to watch them unravel the evidence.






I was also quite surprised how "knowing the story", my storyline, fit with this unit. Every time we looked at a story, fiction or non-fiction, the idea of looking at the entire story played in important role.

Reflections on our experience at the Village.

I believe that I did a good job of being a Community-builder, I just didn't anticipate how difficult it would be to do. I lived my plan out by being friendly and starting conversations with the residents, I was just shocked by the amount of effort they put into speaking even though I knew they could not communicate very well before we arrived. As we talked about on the bus on the way back to Orange City, it was incredibly difficult for the man in the reading room to speak one mumbled word. Watching the residents communicate with the workers I learned how much we depend on speaking to communicate and saw first hand how frustrating it is when others cannot listen to you. I was also challenged to use different forms of communication like posture and facial expressions to see what the resident was trying to communicate. One thing that was tough about this morning was watching the residents try to communicate with me. Seeing them struggle to form sentences and listening to their stories about why they cannot talk very well made all of the difficulties in my life seem small. As I talked about in my previous journal response I was hit by how much I take for granted my ability to do simple things like talk and walk. It was also very tough for me to communicate with the residents because I am used to speaking quickly with my friends and had to deliberately slow down when I responded to their questions. Though it was difficult to communicate with the residents, it was delightful to hear their stories and how they ended up at the Village. Each resident was full of happiness even when they were describing the horrible car accidents that changed their lives forever. Despite their situations they were able to find joy and I enjoyed talking to them about my own life as well.

Yesterday, I picked the community-builder knight's armor trait. I was working on using peace, encouraging, and being honest. I didn't do as well as I wanted, but as a group, I believe we still build community. I went with some of the residents well they were drawing and painting. Well, I was there the lady told us that through art the residents have a way to paint their emotions. I learned communication is really a wonderful gift. I tried talking to many of the residents and most of the time I go no response verbally. Even though some didn't respond verbally I still got lots of smiles. This morning was tough because it showed me truly how blessed I am and how I take the simple things like talking for granted. It was also a struggle because you want to do more to help the residents. It was also delightful because even though the residents have everyday struggles they are also so happy and joy-filled. Overall I really enjoyed this experience because it helped me realize my blessings.

I think I successfully lived out being a Temple - Respecter. The people were delightful, so it really wasn't that hard. I learned that communication cannot just be a one-way interaction - even if it seems like you really won't be understood, or the person doesn't verbally respond, there are still responses that you get, even if it isn't verbal. So getting a response by form of some kind of eye or hand movement in the nonverbal room was pretty cool. I always find it tough to see people not be able to do basic tasks, not that I don't love them, it can just be such a harsh reminder to me that the world really is broken, and there isn't anything that we can do to make it truly unbroken. Yes, we can help maybe mend it a bit by loving others, but it can just be such a reminder that some things are out of our control. However, it was really delightful to talk to some of the people, or even just be by their side and see how the majority of them seemed so happy. I thought it was really enlightening how many people just had smiles on their faces, especially Todd, a man that sat at my table near the end of our time, who just had a smile on his face the whole time. 

In our visit to the Village this morning, I was awed by the employees' ability to glean meaning from the residents they assisted. What came across as jabber to me was obviously a request for a puzzle, what seemed to be a spasm was clearly a reach for a cup of coffee. Communication can be built upon significantly by time spent observing the sender, and much patience is required from the receiver. I struggled in knowing how much to say or do: Would I come across as ignorant or rude if I asked a resident a question they couldn't answer? Am I going to provoke a poor reaction if I touch them? However, it was delightful to make re-connections with residents that I knew from church or volunteer work, and it really was encouraging to witness the dedication each employee had to the residents.

The Gift of Communications

The first chapter of our communications textbook refers to communication as a gift. My learning target was for students to live out communications as a gift. So yesterday, the Communications I class experienced, through role playing, what it is like to lose the ability to communicate. One student lost the gift of speech and had to communicate that she wanted to watch a ball game on television. Another could only use her eyes to communicate. to ask that her left leg be moved. The class found it difficult and frustrating to try to figure out what these people needed. They also found it frustrating to try to communicate.

They were then assigned a pre-flect to prepare us for our block schedule class the following day. We were going to travel to Sheldon to visit The Village. My deep hope for the students was that they realized the gift of communication and also saw the blessings of technology that enables folks to communicate today. So in their pre-flect, they had to come up with a game plan for our visit. I asked them to pick a Knight's Armor that they could live out and also notice how impacting  and perhaps life changing it is to  know the story of the residents. 

The visit was great. One section of students worked with souls who were non-verbal. Another group went to an art room. The room I stayed in was a reading/ conversation room. The men in there were very willing to share their stories. And we were shown the many ways workers at the Village used to assist in communication. After that we went to the break room with the residents. On our way back to school, we reflected a bit on the bus. The students enjoyed talking to the residents. One student noted that for one man to say three words it took him about two minutes. He said, "It looked like it hurt him to say a word." One girl noticed that the art work helped the residents communicate. She said, "The art work was awesome." 

On Friday, we will write a reflection, talk about our visit more, write thank-you's to the residents and workers, and discuss the blessing of communication. The learning target was to see the gift. We did that and even more.  

Flexing Summer Ideas

As summer is upon us, (everybody exhale:) I am looking at working on my English curriculum. While doing that, I'm also looking at bringing TfT elements to my co-curriculars (I've also found some dandy ideas for other teachers). One thing I'm working on is a Flex activity for the audiences of our spring production, which will be the The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Since this is based on a book, I'm looking at inviting others to bring a favorite children's book or books to the production. We always give a matinee and I was thinking that giving the area grade school children a chance to be involved would be a good thing. I don't have it all figured out yet, but the idea is to gather books to give to the Castle Hospital in Sioux Falls. Edward himself goes on quite the journey in his story and folks who are in a children's hospital are on quite a journey too. I'd like to have my cast make some sort of note for each book. And then of course, we'd deliver them. Stay tuned!

Finding FLEX in Family

For over 30 years, I have worked with Freshmen on writing Family Projects. Stemming from a love of gathering my own family story, I've put that in my curriculum. But up to this year, I have never added a FLEX activity to it. This year we are trying a FLEX. It has been a painful journey!

One part of the written Family Project is an essay of thanks. Who is one person in your family that you are thankful for?  Why? That's the premise of the paper. This essay will be mailed to the person that is the topic of the Freshmen paper. I thought it would make a lovely gift, and it certainly is a real need for real people.

Draft #1: Shallow and poor writing. It disappointed me that they took this so lightly. It was just basically fulfilling the assignment without much thought or depth. So we went back to drawing table. I showed the picture of an ice berg and applied that to their writing. We talked specifics. I outlawed the phrase "there for me". Then I asked this question--If this person were gone tomorrow, what would you have liked to have said?

My deep hope is that they dig deep. I want them to be brave enough to write what this person means to them with detail and specifics. And of course I want it to be good writing, which is isn't right now. So stay tuned. Draft #2 is up to bat tomorrow.

Building Lives Begins

Here is a taste of the beginning of our Building Lives document.

https://plus.google.com/collection/kmWLVF

Building Lives

The College Composition students will begin their journey of finding stories of folks in our community who have inspired others, sacrificed for others, or showed real servanthood. So many reporters on television or online seek out stories that inspire us. Lester Holt with Nightly News often ends with a story called "Inspiring America". A favorite of mine is "On the Road" with Steve Hartman. Mike Rowe has his own show, "Returning the Favor". All of those stories celebrate the goodness in folks. So that's what the College Composition folks are going to be doing in their own backyard. We will be adding those stories to a google plus document. If all goes well, we will certainly be building community in the deepest sense of the word.

Here's a link to the page called, Building Lives.
https://plus.google.com/collection/kmWLVF

Stay tuned as we add to this page story after story of gracious folks in our community.

Reflections on the Greatest Generation

Today the College Composition classes went to the Prairie Ridge to share their reflections from knowing the stories of Louie Zamperini and a Sioux County Veteran. I will let the student's do the talking with what they took away from knowing the story.

"I believe that getting to know the story of Louie and researching my veteran helps me to better see God's hand in other people's stories as well. These stories truly illustrate the redemption of God's people even after enduring things that feel so far from him. Knowing the story allows me to see God's Kingdom in a grander way. We all play a piece in God's story for his glory. The foot print that we leave on this earth will leave a positive, or a negative impact, its our choice if we are remembered as a kingdom seeker or not."

"Learning from the stories of each of these war heroes I am comforted and assured of my place in God's plan. Though I may feel small and insignificant at times I know that at this very moment God is crafting my story in a unique and diverse way to glorify His name above all."

"Researching my veteran gave me a greater appreciation for the people who have put so much effort into making our country what it is today. My veteran, Don Brommer, was the same age as me when he was sent to a foreign land with a gun to fight to the death for freedom and for what was right. I can't imagine going to war right now with the thought of dying. I have so much respect for all the men and women who have put their lives on the line for freedom no matter where it was. It just shows the love of God from these people who are willing to put their lives on the line for people they don't even know."

"Researching my veteran has taught me that we are to be grateful for every day God blesses us with. We need to recognize the beauty of our "normal" daily happenings, because we don't know when those will be ripped away from us. I now know that my life is extremely blessed and I savor the people, the opportunities and the memories more now than I did before."

"This teaches me that faith is valuable. I can't do anything with my own strength, but I need to rely on God. Relying on Him will be so much better than trying to do anything myself. God shows us that He has a plan for us in all circumstances. Ralph's faith was strengthened so he could go through other trials in his life and be a witness to the world of His faith. In my story, I need to learn to rely on God more for everything instead of trying to use my own strength to get through problems."

"It is out of this communal memory sharing perspective that learning both Louie's story and the story of Arie Moerman (my veteran) became important. When society says forget about that, let's live for today it is stories like Louie's that remind us that that isn't the responsible option. Stories like Louie's remind us of God's power to turn the worst of sin and transform it into something glorifying. As I find myself in God's story, it is important to remember other's stories as they connect us and open our eyes to the way God works. In my research of Arie Moerman I was continually reminded of the way God, as he did in Ruth and does to us today, gives dignity to small stories. The way God picks up all the scattered pages of our lives and through Christ binds them into a larger, greater, and new story. Our individual histories and pasts will not be forgotten but will be celebrated. In my reading of Unbroken and my research of Arie Moerman I am reminded of our responsibility and blessing to remember."

Try Try Again

When the Freshmen class finished the movie, The Boys Next Door, I invited folks into the classroom who have family members that have special needs. Jon and Kauline Groskreutz spoke about their adoption of their three special needs children, Juliana Tien spoke about having a brother with special needs and Lori Poppema spoke about her son with special needs. A common thread through all their stories was that they wanted their loved one to simply be viewed as a regular person, and that they never really were invited to do things like normal teenagers. So we decided to have an evening at Unity for them. How to do that was the tricky part. About a dozen students from Unity were excited to help along with five other staff members. We sent invitations to the public school folks, put the invite on Facebook, and personally invited others. Our initial date was for December, but due to horribly cold temperatures, we instead went with January 19. We lost some Unity students to other curricular activities, and we lost a few other folks who were going to attend due to the flu. Even though we had only five special needs folks, it was a great night. The Unity students had a great time with the guests. The staff members had a fun time doing something with each other beyond school things. And I think there were blessings all around. After our guests left, the Unity students wanted to try this again at a later date. We are plotting how to get the invitations out better.

Having Unity students take charge of this would be a goal. They have great hearts. There is great need to see folks as simply folks. We did accomplish that goal last night. Servant workers, community builders and beauty creators were busy last night. It was a joy to watch.

When the unplanned becomes a better plan.

Sometimes TfT elements just sneak into the picture. After collecting and grading the College Composition papers on their Veterans, the higher audience, the Sioux Center Historical Society and the Sioux County Museum, both received copies of the student's work.But without any planning on my part, the students will get an additional audience this coming week. Unity will hold a Veteran's program on Tuesday, so the process of this paper and each paper will be available for the visitors that attend the chapel on that day. So sometimes what you don't plan for with a TfT lesson becomes an even better lesson. My deep hope is that what the student's discovered in their research will serve as a memorial for those Veterans and for those who read the papers.

Knowing the Story

At the end of reading Okay for Now, the freshmen responded to the questions that the storyline asks.  What did this story teach you about knowing others, teach you about yourself, and teach you about God? Here are some answers.

Learning about Doug's life has taught me that even if I am broken there are always people I can go to and talk to who will help guide me through life and make me a little more whole. 

Doug's story has taught me that if people are acting different or being obnoxious it's not just because they are weird or different, but it could be because something hard could be happening in their life.

Learning about/from his story has taught me to love more and see the people who love and care about me.

God puts different people in everyone's life for a reason, to impact them somehow, for better or worse.

Reading Okay For Now has let me see that many people have back stories and you can't judge a people  by their covers.

Okay for Now taught me to be aware that more than likely the people I rub shoulders with every day don't have the perfect lives I think they do.

Learning about Doug's story has taught me that community can make a huge difference.

Reading "Okay for Now" has helped me learn the importance of knowing other people's background. just like I feel that if people knew my story they would understand why I seem distant at times and struggle with social anxiety.

Doug's story has taught me that I should first off, be thankful for what I have and my good family. His story also taught me that I will always be okay for now because I have a community of people around me, my great cloud of witnesses.

I think God is working out all things to fit together in my life and I know that people are helping me out along the way that are shaping me into the kind of person he wants me to be. God's story in all of our lives is that he can take whatever struggles and hardships we have and can turn all of that hard stuff into a beautiful and happy life.  

These two stories connect together through being broken and then restored at the end. Throughout history, people grow up in broken families, cities, countries, etc but the people who know God can be restored again, a little broken still because of what they lived though, but God fills them up with love, shows them compassion, cares for them, etc. He helps them come to Him which helps their lives from what they were to where they are now.

Wrapping up a Unit with a Flex

The Flex activity for our novel Okay for Now,  was choosing 2-3 people who encouraged the freshmen in their life and to write a simple thank-you to those people. Throughout the entire novel we looked at the role of community in Doug's life and in our own. As we read, we did small exercises to introduce the idea of our own communities that exist in our lives and to understand what those communities mean. After finishing the book, we made a timeline, tracing the main character's community as it unfolds in the story. We then made a timeline of our own. As an adult, it was a great practice for me too. Seeing all the people God placed in my life was nothing but a blessing. So my deep hope is that these little notes of thanks will be a big blessing to those who receive them. I also encouraged the students to write notes to folks without it being an assignment. It's a great life skill that does address a real need and real people. 

Working Through a Novel: Okay for Now

Beginning a year with Freshmen who represent four to five different feeder schools can be a challenge. The idea of community needs to be created. And I have found that the novel, Okay for Now,  by Gary Schmidt, to be the best way to create community and gather the Freshmen in for some wonderful storytelling. This is my second year at attempting to TfT this novel. Whenever I begin the brainstorming process, I always begin with the "How do we get peculiar" worksheet. Here is my attempt of adding TfT elements to this novel. Last year I had good success with it. I'm trying to be more intentional with reflection and storyline this year.

How do we get Peculiar?

Claiming Learning for the Better Story

Subject:Freshmen Unit: Okay for Now

1. What is your deep hope for your students in this unit?  What story do you want to invite your students into?

My deep hope is that students will grow from knowing Doug’s story, will connect his story to God’s story, and will see our own story through Doug’s story.

My deep hope is that the students will identify and appreciate the encouragers they have had in their life.

2. What do your students need to practice to become these peculiar people in this story?

Seeing others first. 

3. What real needs can they meet in the study of this unit?

Sending thank-you’s to those who encouraged them.

4. Who is the potential audience or ‘Real People’ for this learning?

Classmates and mentors.

5. What real (Baraka) work can the students do?  How can they co-create with God in the making of all things new?

As they reflect on their own lives throughout the novel, they will see the encouragers in their life and practice being one to others. 

6. What through-lines (habits of discipleship) can they practice in this unit? 

Community Builder, Temple Respecters, Beauty Creators

7. What is the driving question for this unit?

What can community do for a person?

8. What are the Essential learning targets for this unit?

To identify the Audubon birds blended throughout Doug’s story. 

To see God’s story in Doug’s story.

To live out the lessons we learn from Doug’s story in our own lives.

“To know the story” and it’s impact on our own lives. 

Reflection:

What did Doug’s story teach you about people?

What did Doug’s story reveal about your own story?

Flex:

1. Students make a heart and identity 5-8 folks who have encouraged them in their lives. They also explain what each person provided.
2. The students travel throughout the room writing words on encouragement on other students worksheets.
3. The students will pick 2-3 mentors in their life and write a thank-you note to them. 

Visuals:

1. We will add to my storyline board as to how this novel helped us see stories.
2. Based on this quote: “When you find something that's whole, you do what you can to keep it that way. And when you find something that isn't, then maybe it's not a bad idea to try to make it whole again. Maybe.” 

The students will take a picture that represents them. The next day in class they will break the picture and then put it back together. They will journal as to how this picture reflects their life and also write about the process of putting it back together. How did that process reflect life?  What did each student learn about brokenness and putting things back together?

Making Non-fiction Live in Your Area

College Composition reads Unbroken for their first book. In the past, I tried connecting Louie’s story of God’s resilience in his life to someone from today. It didn’t work. I tried it twice and failed. So this year I’m trying to bring in the “real people” part by letting them soak in stories about Veterans from Sioux County from WWII.  We began with my storytelling about my Dad, followed by Larry Wielenga’s stories about his father and father-in-law. The next day we met Jim Schaap at the Orange City Cemetery where he told us stories of his mother-in-laws finance who died on D-Day and his father-in-law’s brothers story and how he died state side. He also told more stories of veterans  who lived past the war. The next class period we met at the Sioux County Historical Museum. There Arlo Van Beek walked us through the Veteran, WWII, section of the museum. On Friday, we visited Northwestern College so see their display of Ralph Mouw. All of this soaking up information hopefully will give them a curious mind to dig deeper into Louie’s story but also to know that they have some incredible stories in Northwest Iowa too. From our week of soaking, the seniors will be assigned the following paper, bringing in the real people part of TfT.  

Find a WWII Veteran from Siouxland and research his story. You will need at least one source, but better yet would be 2-3 sources. If he has family in this area yet, interviewing them might be a great source too. Between Sioux Center Library, books, NWC library and museum information, we should be able to find a person for the job. Dig deep. Let this be a work of honor for this person. The end result should be 2-3 pages, DS, MLA with a works cited page. You will need to come up with a thesis for your person. If you can connect to the Unbroken story, do. If not, that it OK too. I will grade the final draft, but I will also give a copy of your work to the Sioux Center Library and the Sioux County Historical Museum.  

Handing over the final project also fits into the TfT element of a higher audience. 

Making It Visible

One elements of TFT I'm trying to be very intentional about is making things visible. Not only will this be something I can add to throughout the year, but something that will be before us all year, reminding us of this driving force. Our school's storyline is about planting seeds this year, so one side of my room refers to that storyline. My overall deep hope for the students in my room is the hope that we can always be great communicators that help build communities. My learning targets sit by my door on clip boards. My storyline for my room is a bulletin board that we will add information to throughout the year (for some reason that pictures did not get here). So here's to making things visible this year and making these things a part of our lessons, conversations and activities.

#knowthestory

This year in my classroom, my storyline is #knowthestory. A storyline is suppose to "drip" with the teacher selecting it, so the idea of "story" in my room fits the drip.  My hope is to build community in my room, town and world as we learn more about God's story and the impact of that in our lives, to learn about others stories and what we can learn from them, and what we learn about our own stories and how that helps us grow. My hope is to bring that storyline to life on this blog through pictures and the activities we do. I will also be including other Teaching for Transformation ideas on the blog to hopefully be a springboard for ideas for other teachers.