The Sorcerers and Their Apprentices

Ken Gordon at PEJE suggested on Twitter that those of us interested in "changing education paradigms" (thank you, Sir Ken Robinson) read The Sorcerers and Their Apprentices by Frank Moss, the former director of the MIT Media Lab, which is what RealSchool wants to be when it grows up.

The MIT Media Lab

In the book's Preface, Moss lays out the chapters and simultaneously shares the vision at the heart of the MIT Media Lab. Following is a summary of that vision, one which will sound familiar to anyone who has been drinking the RealSchool Kool-Aid , ahem, participating in the RealSchool learning endeavor:

• Chapter 1 is about the creative freedom researchers have at the lab, which allows them to "invent according to their passions and curiosities, in an environment where the only real rule is that there are no rules, and where there is no such thing as failure."
• Chapter 2 describes the anti-disciplinary nature of the work that takes place in the lab, where people from many different disciplines can cross-pollinate with each other and arrive at innovative solutions to problems that have been addressed in more narrow ways. 
• Chapter 3 is one of RealSchool's favorites, describing the hard fun researchers enjoy in the lab because they are encouraged to "express their most fanciful ideas by building them and then seeing what happens when people use them" 
• Chapter 4 is about serendipity by design, or what happens as a result of the fact that the lab encourages "accidental" encounters among students and teachers that enrich and improve the projects the different teams are working on (xiii-xiv). This philosophy of design by chance is described well in Steven Johnson's book Where Good Ideas Come From. We showed the following clip narrated by Johnson at RealSchool's first meeting this year:

Now that you're acquainted with some of the Media Lab's values, here's RealSchool's mission, which was hashed out by the RealSchool members of 2011-12 and Mrs. Tikvah Wiener, RealSchool's founder and director. Of course, RealSchool is not only a group of clubs, as we describe it below; it's also as an educational philosophy that can be used to form an academic program as well. In fact, baby RealSchool is going to be a toddler next year, because it's going to be offered as an elective at The Frisch School in Paramus, NJ. 

RealSchool's Mission Statement (see our website for more information about the program):

“If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I?” -- Hillel, Ethics of the Fathers, 1:13

RealSchool is a group of clubs that are linked together by a matrix of shared beliefs about how one learns and the way learning benefits the self and others. One of the key values of RealSchool is that learning should be self-directed, that is, what one learns should be chosen by the individual. However, once a student has selected a RealSchool team in the area of interest s/he has, all learning takes place collaboratively. Learning at RealSchool is also primarily experiential rather than based on the knowledge of an expert, commonly referred to in the past as a teacher. In addition, RealSchool encourages -- no, demands -- divergent, creative thinking that enables students to apply their knowledge and skills to real life and the challenges of the real world.

The relationship that all RealSchool members are taught to create within the RealSchool community and with the broader world is a caring, symbiotic one. Students may join a particular RealSchool team because of a talent or interest they have, but they must learn about the talents that others possess and how to help others pursue their interests. Therefore, though the process of joining RealSchool  begins with the self and an individual’s interests, it ends in a stronger community, as students are not only consumers, that is, recipients of help from RealSchool teams, but are also producers, that is, ones who give help to fellow teams and ultimately to the larger community.

Built into RealSchool’s DNA, then, is a focus on student empowerment: students choose what and how to learn. However, students also come to realize that by doing the very things they love, they can benefit not only their peers but the community and world at large.

Stay tuned for more sound bytes from Frank Moss' book! 

Work Cited:

Moss, Frank. The Sorcerers and Their Apprentices. New York: Crown Business, 2011. Print. (Yes, people still read books!)

Self-Directed Learning in Senior English Elective

For the last part of the senior year in Hot Topics, the Frisch twelfth-grade English elective course, students are completing a self-designed project. Here are the questions they answered recently about their choice of topic:

Setting up the Project

1) What do you want to learn or produce?

2) How will you go about learning or creating your project?

3) Are you going to work alone or with someone?

4) How much time do you think your learning process or project will take?

5) What will the presentation of your learning or project be?


At the end of each period, students describe what they accomplished over the course of the period. Sometimes they share aloud, sometimes in posts to the class GoogleDoc about the project, and sometimes in an app. Here are some written responses:

Sample Student Projects

J.A.'s topic is extreme sports:

Today we researched the topic extreme sports. We have discovered new and exciting extreme sports, such as Snowscootering, sand boarding, and even kayak jumping. Each of these sports requires courage and the willpower to overcome the fear of death. Our presentation will include many of these death-defying sports that will blow your mind.

O.B. is working on a presentation about exercise:

It is important to exercise because being active will prevent your muscles from becoming weak and flabby, your heart and lungs from not working effectively, and your joints from becoming stiff and prone to injury. Exercising reduces the chances of getting high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, & other diseases. Exercise also helps improves stamina by training your body to be more efficient and use less energy to do the same amount of work as you did previously. Using weights and other forms of resistance training develops your muscles, bones, and ligaments for increased strength and endurance. Stretching exercises are important for good posture, which will keep your body limber so that you can bend, reach, and twist. Improving your flexibility will reduce the chance of injury and improve balance and coordination. Exercise is important for weight loss as well. If you burn more calories than you consume, you will lose weight. Exercises will also improve the quality of your life, because it helps you reduce stress, lift moods, and sleep better. Exercise will keep you looking younger and healthier throughout your life.

Three students are working on a project about drugs. Here's R.A. on his portion of the project:

My segment of the lesson on different kinds of drugs will be devoted to “hallucinogens,” “entheogens,” in other words, the “psychedelic” side of drugs. These drugs are known to create hallucinations or visions that are not real or can never be possible. Some of these drugs include LSD or “acid,” psilocybin mushrooms, Spice, and JWH018. First I would like to talk about the names of the category. For example, entheogen means literally: “creating divine within.” These drugs are often used in religious practices in order to experience prophecies and to get closer to the deity. Other times these drugs are used recreationally or to treat depression.

Apps in Self-Directed Learning

This past week students used Educreation to record their progress on their projects:

These students are gathering images about their topics and
then narrating how their projects are progressing. 

Educator Dan Rosen Weighs in On the SAT's vs. 21st-Century Learning

Welcome Guest Blogger, Rabbi Daniel Rosen, English teacher at The Frisch School. Rabbi Rosen weighs in on SAT's, 21st-century learning and RealSchool's T-shirt campaign.

Geste Post

Before you say anything, geste is a word. I looked it up. Yes, it is archaic, but these days, who isn't?

Education is a tricky thing. I just taught you something and it probably didn't hurt, mostly because you didn't know that you were being taught and you needed the information I presented in order to appreciate fully the title of this blog post. Usually, education is painful. Learning about math and science and junk-like facts that haven't happened in 200 years seems like a waste of time. And having a teacher in the classroom telling the students that so much of this stuff is somehow relevant and useful, when we all know it isn't, doesn't help.

So why do we do it? Why do we memorize the Bill of Rights, or learn how to speak Lithuanian? I say what I am about to say only half facetiously: We don't need to learn stuff if we have the external brain that is the internet to present us with this knowledge at a moment's notice. Facts become a waste of brain cells. Now, I have railed, recently, against this idea of handing over the keys to our intellect to the virtual world. I don't like the idea that people have changed and now need to have data presented differently. But the fact is, it used to be necessary to know how to use a slide rule, but since technology has outmoded that skill, we rarely teach their use any more. So if we are talking about an evolution in education, one which allows the number crunching and data aggregation to be the task of the CPU on some server farm, and one which makes it OK, even desirable for a student to have his "head in the cloud" (HA!), then what is the role of the human brain?

The answer is "collaborative problem solving." Students don't need to memorize facts but to learn how, and more importantly, when, to access the facts and use them. Giving students real-world challenges and situations which ask them to APPLY information might prepare them more accurately for the real world. But why aren't we doing this? Why are things like project-based learning still sputtering at the starting gate? The answer is a basic three-word phrase:

ess aiye tee

The SAT and other standardized tests do not ask students to think and apply. They do not challenge students to use information. True, they don't ask for pure spit-back of knowledge (well, some other tests do) but they don't ask for the synthesis of any new ideas, only for recall and simple inferences. By the way,  since I'm an English teacher, I'm talking about the Verbal sections. Apparently, there is math on the test, but I can't rail against something I don't understand.

And, to make matters worse, the world acts (for a brief window of time from March of 11th grade to November of your sophomore year of college) that the SAT grades matter. That you can be compared to others based on your scores and that anyone from the outside can quantify your skills and potential based on how well you bubbled in some circles. 

The backlash is here, though.

We are selling shirts in the school where I work which read "I Am More Than a Test Score." I'd like to think that a few shirt sales should resolve the entire issue of the underlying structure of our educational system, but I have my doubts.

First, to colleges, I am more than just a test score. I am a test score and an application fee. Sometimes a photo.

Second, I may be exactly a test score, but it depends on the test. Like a blood test? Yep, that's me all right.

And third, I'm significantly less than a test score. I did really well on the SAT's and consider that to have been my academic peak. I haven't approached that ever since. I WISH I could be my test score.

And fourth, consider the small child whose parents, due to an unfortunate misunderstanding, named him "Test Score." There are over 100 results for the last name "Score" in the US. Some kid will be judged as a Test Score because he wants to be. Who am I do say I am better than he is.

So, in sum, what I want you to take from this entry is "current state of education, bad, technologically aided shift de-emphasizing fact gathering and accentuating coordinated application and problem solving skills, good, T-Shirts, potentially offensive but useful at creating cool tan lines.

RS The Arts Salutes Jamie as Best Poet in Recent Poetry Slam!

This past week, multi-talented RS member Jamie (she's also busy designing logos RS needs for various events and projects) won Best Poet in a Poetry Slam on March 4 The Frisch School attended at Rambam High School. Here are the poems Jamie submitted:

Free Verse

Dirt at the Base of a House
The basement
The perfect place to be
When I'm tired
So tired of this

I need to unwind
To reflect in this room
To use fatigue as fuel

Fueling my time
With messy emotions
That grow from rubble
At the root of my heart

Base human emotions
are Meant to breathe
To be vital, to be cruel

Feeling worn down
Is as basic as dirt
Wearing down these sturdy boots
Slowly and fully

So I unlace my boots
Walk down seventeen steps
To the place I can sit and just be

Found Poem

Rereading the Bible 
In G-d's heart
I tried my level best
But I failed to see how
For the thousandth time

I was sure I'd never seen Him before
And His eyes were the problem
Blind to the whole affair
I looked away late in the winter

I was reading the same book over and over
And that's when the math kicked in
I saw the long list of fatal flaws
So why bother with it?

I don't know... It kind of helps
Whenever you read without a moment's pause
Well, it's a metaphor... See?
And yes, I'm doing okay.

Here was The Challenge:

A)    In honor of Passover, one poem concerning Jewish Identity will be presented in the form of “Found” poetry in honor of the numerous “Found” moments in the Exodus story: Pharaoh’s daughter finding Moses, Moses finding the burning bush, and of course, the nation finding freedom.

B)     A Free Verse Poem on leaving Home and the centrality the Home has in Jewish life

The Prizes:

Winners will be chosen in the categories of “Best Poet,” “Best Free-Form Poem,” “Best Found Poem” and “Best Speaker.”

Click here for more information on found poems.

Fashion Show Update

At our weekly Fashion Show meeting this past Thursday, February 28, we got a lot done:

1) In keeping with the spirit of Purim, which was last week, we announced on Shushan Purim that we would be selecting our models by casting lots, that is by choosing names from a bag. On Thursday morning, during our meeting, we sent girls from the fashion team around the school to see which female students wanted to submit their names. We'll be selecting our models this week.

2) In the meantime, members of the Fashion team working as designers began to plan what kind of outfits they wanted their models to wear. The juniors are working on one set of designs for models dressed as professionals. That's to represent the daughters of Tzlafchad, who in the Torah ask Moses if they can inherit their father's land even though they aren't men. Yeah, those girls went there, even though they lived during Biblical times! Here are the junior ideas so far:

Welcome to the new freshman designer team, made up of Miriam, Ayelet, Jessica and Racheli. Those girls are already hard at work.

3) The Finance team is busy finding out how we can work with Not for Sale to promote the organization and the work it does before and during our event. Here is the latest script we wrote for Caroline and Julia, who are going to contact Not for Sale:

Scripts for Fashion Show

Of course, we made sure Not for Sale has 501 (c) 3 status -- meaning it's a non-profit -- but we also
used social media to make certain it had enough Likes on Facebook to be considered a popular organization.
It's not UNICEF, which had 2.4 million Likes the day we checked FB, but it had 44,000, which is respectable!

4) The Arts team is working on the art exhibit for the fashion show. The art will focus on subjugation of women still happening in the world today. We've decided to do a photo exhibit and modify images using apps or other digital media. We'll line one wall of the auditorium with those photos. Right now, The Arts team is conducting research on human trafficking; Elisheva found the following site, which we posted on our Facebook page last week:

Trafficked

5) Finding kosher Fair Trade foods is harder than we thought it would be. Faculty advisor Mrs. Ahuva Mantell has been hard at work trying to find food traded fairly that has proper kosher supervision. Her efforts and the Health and Environment team's cooking event on Thursday night led us to pose the question of whether kosher supervision should mean not only that a food has been prepared according to Jewish law and but also in an ethical manner. Share your answer on our FB page:

What Should "Kosher" Mean?

Stay tuned for more info about the Frisch Fashion Show!

App Making Makes Progress!

We admit App Making has taken a long time to get off the ground, but with the addition of some new sophomore members to RealSchool and a new action plan, the team is making steady progress now! We've registered RealSchool as an App Developer in Apple's App store and now we're working on the features of the RealSchool app.

Timesaver: the RealSchool App Team decided to use templates and not to code from scratch

Here's the app in the making:

The app links to RealSchool's webpage
and also will collect the Health and Environment team's green recipes

RealSchool's faculty advisor knows nothing about making apps, so all the progress the students have made has been on their own!

Who's the Fairest of Them All?: Fashion Show Update

Our Charity

“IT OUGHT TO CONCERN EVERY PERSON, BECAUSE IT IS A DEBASEMENT OF OUR COMMON HUMANITY. IT OUGHT TO CONCERN EVERY COMMUNITY, BECAUSE IT TEARS AT OUR SOCIAL FABRIC. IT OUGHT TO CONCERN EVERY BUSINESS, BECAUSE IT DISTORTS MARKETS. IT OUGHT TO CONCERN EVERY NATION, BECAUSE IT ENDANGERS PUBLIC HEALTH AND FUELS VIOLENCE AND ORGANIZED CRIME. I’M TALKING ABOUT THE INJUSTICE, THE OUTRAGE, OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING, WHICH MUST BE CALLED BY ITS TRUE NAME — MODERN SLAVERY.”

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA

It's confirmed: part of the proceeds of the Who's the Fairest of Them All?, our Fashion Show this year, is going to Not for Sale, an organization that works to end slavery. Also confirmed is our Fashion Show date: May 19!

Here's a video from the founder of Not for Sale:

We may want to consider the ethical products available from the Not for Sale store: Not for Sale Store, and we also want to contact the organization to see how we can work together for the show.

Finance 

Speaking of making contacts, we also worked on a script for the girls on the show's finance team. Those girls are going to be contacting vendors who will sell their ethical products at the show. 

Here's our script:

Script for Vendor

Hi, my name is _________________, and I’m calling from The Frisch School. We’re making a fashion show for women only on May 19 called “Who’s the Fairest of Them All?” and we’re focusing on fair food and fair trade practices. Our school has over 500 students and is connected to the local Bergen County community, and an active parent association and alumni network. We’re donating part of the proceeds from the show to the school and part to Not for Sale, an organization that works to end slavery around the world.

We wanted to bring in vendors to sell products that are in line with our ethical fashion focus and fashion in general. Before and after the show, anyone attending will have time to shop and eat fair trade food products. Since you sell ___________, we wanted to know if you wanted to display and sell your merchandise at our show.

Script for Fair Trade Chocolate or Coffee Donation

Hi, my name is _________________, and I’m calling from The Frisch School. We’re making a fashion show for women only on May 19 called “Who’s the Fairest of Them All?” and we’re focusing on fair food and fair trade practices. Our school has over 500 students and is connected to the local Bergen County community, and an active parent association and alumni network. We’re donating part of the proceeds from the show to the school and part to Not for Sale, an organization that works to end slavery around the world.

We want to know if you’re interested in donating fair trade food products such as kosher coffee or chocolate. We’ll include your store name in emails and print media we create to advertise the event. We’ll also prominently display your store name on the night of the event, on posters and near the food tables.

Orange is Our New Black

Don't think our choice of script color is accidental: Orange is our new black, because orange is the anti-slavery color. That means our Fashion Show T-shirts are, of course, going to be orange. We've set some artistic students the task of coming up with a logo for the fashion show, which we'll then put on a T-shirt we sell for the night. Our models will wear the shirts as well, when they come out for their final turn on the catwalk.

Choosing the Models

On Monday, Shushan Purim, an appropriate day for this, we think, we'll be choosing the models for the show. The way we choose is as follows: we announce to all the girls of the kingdom, sorry, the school (we got carried away with the Shushan Purim thing), that they can submit their names to be chosen for the fashion show. We'll have a box for each grade, and we'll choose 4-8 girls per grade. We'll have to decide, and we'll have to see how many girls submit their names. The selection will take place on Monday afternoon, at Mincha.  

The Clothes

Once we have our models, each grade's designers can see what size and shape girls they'll be dressing. The designers will work out the outfits they want for the two styles of clothes they have to create (see the earlier blog post if you forgot: Outline of the Show). Once the designers have their ideas, we'll contact a department store to see if they want to loan us clothes. We'll also raid all of our own closets and perhaps also work with Project Ezrah, an organization that donates and/or sells gently used clothes at reasonable prices to families that are experiencing financial difficulties. Project Ezrah works well with the ethical fashion mission we're on!

Great work, Fashion Team! We're getting so much done!