Using the Internet and Social Media to Enhance Social-Emotional Learning

The news media is filled with horror stories about young people and the Internet, but what is often overlooked and not reported are the benefits that technology, the Internet, and Social media have in building and enhancing social-emotional skills.

Young people are doing what they have always done as part of their journey into adulthood, including socializing with peers, investigating the world, trying on identities and establishing independence, but now they are just doing so using the Internet and social media (Seeing Social Media More as Portal Than as Pitfall).

In 2011, the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Communications and Media issued a clinical report, “The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents and Families.” It began by emphasizing the benefits of social media for children and adolescents, including enhanced communication skills and opportunities for social connections.  (Seeing Social Media More as Portal Than as Pitfall)

Young people are using the Internet and research is showing that there can be benefits for social skills development and social emotional learning.

Engaging in various forms of social media is a routine activity that research has shown to benefit children and adolescents by enhancing communication, social connection, and even technical skills. Social media sites such as Facebook offer multiple daily opportunities for connecting with friends, classmates, and people with shared interests. (The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families)

Social media, at times, offers opportunities for the development of social emotional skills in ways that face-to-face may not.

Social media sites allow teens to accomplish online many of the tasks that are important to them offline: staying connected with friends and family, making new friends, sharing pictures, and exchanging ideas. Social media participation also can offer adolescents deeper benefits that extend into their view of self, community, and the world, including^:

1. opportunities for community engagement through raising money for charity and volunteering for local events, including political and philanthropic events;

2. enhancement of individual and collective creativity through development and sharing of artistic and musical endeavors;

3. growth of ideas from the creation of blogs, podcasts, videos, and gaming sites;

4. expansion of one’s online connections through shared interests to include others from more diverse backgrounds (such communication is an important step for all adolescents and affords the opportunity for respect, tolerance, and increased discourse about personal and global issues); and

5. fostering of one’s individual identity and unique social skills. (The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families)

The Internet and Social Media have the potential to leverage the playing field for those with special needs, not just academically but also social-emotionally.  Kyle , who has been diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder, attention deficit disorder and Asperger’s Syndrome, discusses how the social media benefited him in Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter help some with special needs and developmental disorders to better communicate:

“Two to three years ago and I wasn’t able to talk to people face to face. Like, this right now, I wouldn’t have been able to explain anything. I would have been all shy and weird looking, sort of.”  As a teenager, Kyle was introduced to the social network website MySpace, and then later, Facebook, and he credits both with helping him to be able to have friends and conversations today.”It’s basically just the fact that you don’t have to have a person staring back at you with what you’re saying. I try to share a lot of inspirational quotes,” he explains. “This one says ‘the best relationships tend to begin unexpectedly.’ I can vouch for that.”

The adults, who care and work with young people, have a unique opportunity to join and support them as they navigate through this journey.  What this translates into is using the Internet and social with intention and helping young people to also do so.  As Anne Collier notes in Literacy for a digital age: Transliteracy or what?,  social literacy is important in this age of Internet communication.

If we all grew up with social-emotional learning, we’d have greater academic success and social skills and a lot less bullying in schools and workplaces. And if we applied those emotion management and empathy skills to online spaces as much as offline ones, we’d probably witness a lot less cyberbullying and other forms of online aggression (not to mention “traditional” bullying). We’d also probably have much less of a problem with dis-inhibition, the lack of visual cues that display our reactions to one another that can make us forget that those are fellow human beings with feelings behind the text messages, comments, avatars, etc. through which we communicate in digital spaces.

A lot of talk, press, and focus in this era of learning is on common core standards and 21st century skills and literacies.  What is often neglected is the importance of building social emotional skills within the classroom.

The challenge of raising knowledgeable, responsible, and caring children is recognized by nearly everyone. Few realize, however, that each element of this challenge can be enhanced by thoughtful, sustained, and systematic attention to children’s social and emotional learning (SEL). Indeed, experience and research show that promoting social and emotional development in children is “the missing piece” in efforts to reach the array of goals associated wit h improving schooling in the United States. (The Need for Social Emotional Learning)

It’s not enough to simply fill students’ brains with facts. A successful education demands that their character be developed as well. That’s where social and emotional learning comes in. SEL is the process of helping students develop the skills to manage their emotions, resolve conflict nonviolently, and make responsible decisions.  Research shows that promoting social and emotional skills leads to reduced violence and aggression among children, higher academic achievement, and an improved ability to function in schools and in the workplace. Students who demonstrate respect for others and practice positive interactions, and whose respectful attitudes and productive communication skills are acknowledged and rewarded, are more likely to continue to demonstrate such behavior. Students who feel secure and respected can better apply themselves to learning. (Why Champion Social and Emotional Learning?)

I have written a series of blog posts that address social-emotional learning, how it can be influenced by technology, and how the Internet and Social media can be used to facilitate effective and positive social-emotional skills:

• Learner Agency, Technology, and Emotional Intelligence – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/01/04/learner-agency-technology-and-emotional-intelligence/
• Video Games and Social Emotional Learning – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/02/11/games-and-social-emotional-learning/
• Providing Opportunities for Learners to Tell Their Stories – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/01/20/provide-opportunities-for-students-to-tell-their-stories/
• An Education Filled with Wonder – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/02/06/an-education-filled-with-wonder/
• Dream-Driven Education – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/02/04/dream-driven-education/
• Connectedness, or lack of, in Education (School) – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/01/15/connectedness-or-lack-of-in-education-school/
• Social Media a Cause: Learning Activity – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2013/01/21/social-media-a-cause-learning-activity/
• Addressing Sandy Hook (and other tragedies) in the Classroom – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2012/12/16/addressing-sandy-hooks-and-other-tradegies-in-the-classroom/
• Being With Our Students As If It Was Our Last Day Together – https://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/being-with-our-students-as-if-it-were-our-last-day-together/

Additional posts relevant and related to the topic of technology and social emotional learning have been written by my colleague, Anne Collier:

• Self-definition in social media: I am not my online profile – http://www.netfamilynews.org/self-definition-in-social-media-i-am-not-my-online-profile
• Literacy for a digital age: Transliteracy or what? – http://www.netfamilynews.org/literacy-for-a-digital-age-transliteracy-or-what

I created a website of activities that use technology to enhance social-emotional learning.  Here is a list with brief descriptions of these activities:

• Acts of Kindness: Commit to engaging in acts of kindness and record those acts – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/acts-of-kindness.html
• Books Trailers: Create a book trailer of a children’s book dealing with emotional intelligence – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/book-trailers.html
• Collage of Feelings: Create a collage, via Wordle or Glogster, to depict a wide array of feelings – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/collage-of-feelings.html
• Conflict Analysis via Toontastic (from Joan Young): Learners use the Toontastic Story Arc app to describe a conflict situation at school – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/conflict-analysis-via-toontastic.html
• Conflict Management Strategies Posters: Group of learners create a group presentation of their favorite conflict management strategies using an online motivational poster generator – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/conflict-management-strategies-posters.html
• Dear Abby Letters: Using an online collaborative writing too, participants make suggestions to resolve problems posed by their classmates – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/dear-abby-letters.html
• Dream Driven Education: Identifying and tracking progress toward ones dreams as part of the educational process – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/dream-driven-education.html
• Feelings Posters with Photos: Learners take and post their own photos of a wide range of photos – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/feelings-poster-with-photos.html
• Four Quadrant Poster: Create a four quadrant or slide that visually depicts best learning experience, the one does best, most fun thing ever done, and what you wonder about – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/four-quadrant-poster.html
• I Am Poems:  Group presentation that shows individual learner’s I Am poem and associated image – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/i-am-poems.html
• Identifying Emotions Apps:  List of apps that assists learners in learning about and identifying emotions – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/identifying-emotions-apps.html
• Mobile Sharing: Learners share favorite photos, videos, or music with their group members to better get to know one another – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/mobile-sharing.html
• Personal Support Networks: Learners share personal strengths, needs, contact information with co-learners in order to create personal support networks – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/personal-support-networks.html
• Photojournalism: Community Service or Social Cause Event: Create a video mash-up of photos and/or video taken at a local service event – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/photojournalism-a-community-service-or-social-cause-event.html
• SEL Comic Creation: Create an online comic strip about a social-emotional related personal situation – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/sel-comic-creation.html
• Social Media a Cause: Locate a cause via social networks based on personal interest/desire to join – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/sel-comic-creation.html
• Tech Teach to Grandparents: Young people make a commitment to teach technology to senior citizens – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/teach-tech-to-grandparents.html
• Texting Interviews:  Pairs of learners text each other to learn about one another and report results via an online bulletin board – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/texting-interviews.html
• Twitter for Good: Learners develop a hashtag for their community of learners and Tweet out compliments about and positive feedback for one another – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/twitter-for-good.html
• What’s Your Sentence (from Joan Young): Learners write and publish commentary about a sentence that depicts what they want to be remembered for – http://seltechnology.weebly.com/whats-your-sentence.html

References

Collier, A.  (2012). Literacy for a digital age: Transliteracy or what?  Retrieved from http://www.netfamilynews.org/literacy-for-a-digital-age-transliteracy-or-what.

Edwards, E. (2013).  Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter help some with special needs and developmental disorders to better communicate. Retrieved from http://www.firstcoastnews.com/topstories/article/299239/483/Social-media-helps-some-with-special-needs-to-better-communicate.

Edutopia Staff. (2008). Why Champion Social and Emotional Learning?: Because It Helps Students Build Character. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/social-emotional-learning-introduction.

Elias, M. J., Zins, J. E., Weissberg, R. P., Frey,K. S., Greenberg, M. T.. Haynes, N. M., Kessler, R.,  Schwab-Stone, M. E., & Shriver, T.P. (1997).  The Need for Social Emotional Learning. ASCD. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/197157/chapters/The-Need-for-Social-and-Emotional-Learning.aspx.

Gerstein, J. Technology Enhanced Social-Emotional Activities. http://seltechnology.weebly.com/.

Klass, P. (2012) Seeing Social Media More as Portal Than as Pitfall.  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/10/health/views/seeing-social-media-as-adolescent-portal-more-than-pitfall.html.

Shurgin O’Keeffe, G, and Clarke-Pearson, K. (2011).  The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families.  http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/127/4/800.full?sid=4f54b3cb-d54c-4671-85db-38034f238ec9

Using the Internet and Social Media to Enhance Social-Emotional Learning by Jackie Gerstein is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Teachers’ Perceptions About the Achievement Gap: Understanding the Discursive Construction of Whiteness

About 18 years ago, I taught my first Master’s level course.  A quiet, attentive young woman sat in the back of the room.  She didn’t say much but her eyes attended to everything going on in the room.  I read her first paper and said to myself, “This woman is brilliant.”  Eighteen years later, I had the privilege to serve on her dissertation committee and witness her complete her formal education journey by defending her dissertation and becoming Dr. Virginia Padilla-Vigil.  I am so very proud of her.

Not only does this dissertation have significance for me personally, but the content has significance for me as a teacher educator and educational reformer.  As Dr. Padilla-Vigil noted in her dissertation defense, teachers are the most powerful people on the planet.  They make decisions every day that affect each of their student’s lives.  These decisions last a lifetime.  As such, diversity and cultural awareness initiatives must include examining and unlearning whiteness-at-work and racism through the development of critical reflective practices.

The following excerpts are taken from Dr. Padilla-Vigil’s (Gina’s) dissertation are especially relevant in this discussion.  I recommend reflecting deeply on her comments and findings.

Padilla-Vigil, V. (2013).  Teachers’ Perceptions About the Achievement Gap: Understanding the Discursive Construction of Whiteness. Unpublished dissertation: University of New Mexico.

As I look back on my experiences as a student in northern New Mexico schools, I would describe my schooling in the tradition of the “banking method” of education (Freire, 1993).  I was taught through a rigidly authoritarian framework and I have vivid memories of feeling fearful and intimidated as a learner in classrooms.  Critical thinking, problem solving, analysis and other higher level thinking skills were not a major part of my school curriculum and students did not have much voice in the classroom.  In fact, my school’s curriculum resembled the working class schools Jean Anyon refers to in “Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work” (Anyon, 1980).

As I heard the stories of (my study’s) participants (new teachers in an alternative licensure system), the way in which they described their schools reminded me of my own schooling experiences.  Their beliefs about the world, teaching and learning, students, themselves, and the education system shape their approach to teaching and the resulting impact they have on student learning.  More importantly, their ideologies, as precursors to beliefs, shape teacher behaviors and practices, which in turn impact student learning.

The participants expressed a general desire to make a difference in the lives of their students and to ensure their students achieve academic success.  They held a broad perspective of diversity and acknowledged it as both a challenge and an asset.  What became evident through my interactions with the participants was that while they hold positive intentions for students, their hegemonic ideologies will override their positive intentions.  Without intervention, the participants’ hegemonic ideologies manifested in their practices will perpetuate whiteness and undermine the success of their diverse students.

I do not believe they are prepared to act in the best interests of historically marginalized students.  Again, although well-meaning, the participants have not developed the critical consciousness and race awareness necessary to act in equitable and liberating ways.  They have not gone through the critical process of unlearning racism and, as such, they will continue to repress any notions of whiteness, further supporting their deficit perspectives of diverse students.  While they have gained a conceptual understanding of diversity and what it means to be an effective teacher of diverse students, their understanding is mired in hegemonic ideologies that serve to fragment their knowledge and distort their structural consciousness of it.  These hegemonic ideologies were not exposed and interrogated in the program and as a result the participants did not experience ideological transformation or a re-coding of their knowledge that would disrupt their repression and denial of whiteness.

Colorblindness will prevent them from getting to the heart of inequity where they will find urgency and purpose in counter-hegemonic teaching.  Not having engaged in the deep critical reflection required to expose hegemonic ideologies, the participants hold limited and distorted understandings about diversity and inequity that make it difficult for them to act in favor of truly equitable education.  These limited and distorted understandings are characteristic of dysconscious racism (King, 1991) and will serve as a hindrance to their success and the success of their diverse students.

Countering inequity in the educational system is no small task. Although there are numerous factors that influence student learning, it is well known that effective teachers can make a big difference in terms of narrowing the achievement gap.  Yet, our public education system continues to allow students growing up in poverty, students of color and low-performing students to be disproportionately taught by inexperienced, under-qualified teachers (Darling-Hammond & Sclan, 1996; Peske & Haycock, 2006) in under-resourced and low-quality schools.

Although I agree that teacher quality is important, I believe there is much more to being an effective teacher in a racialized society where schools serve as sorting mechanisms maintaining the hierarchial structures and preserving whiteness.  As such, it will take much more than providing children of color with access to high quality teachers.  Teachers must be critically conscious, having gone through the process of unlearning racism and positioned to engage in transformative counter-hegemonic pedagogy.  Any reform efforts aimed at improving the education of diverse students and closing the achievement gap must take into account the powerful potential of teachers to make a difference among the many other factors that impact student learning and achievement.

For true transformation to take place, teachers must realize their roles as counter-hegemonic teachers who challenge the unjust structures, policies and practices in schools that undermine the success of students of color.  Further, they need to transcend the conservative and liberal multicultural frameworks that serve as the cornerstone of most teacher education programs.  To become anti-racist teachers, they need to develop a critical multicultural perspective that will serve as a tool in subverting racism (Nylund, 2006).  Empowered with a critical lens, they will see whiteness as the“every day, invisible, subtle, cultural and social practices, ideas and codes that discursively secure the power and privilege of white people”, but that strategically remains unmarked, unnamed, and unmapped in contemporary society” (Shome, 1996, p. 503)

Critical reflection as an inward focused form of ideological critique can trigger a personal transformation where problematic ideologies are replaced with counter-hegemonic ones.  Essentially, ideological transformation can be equated with the unlearning of racism.  It is at this juncture that teachers may consciously choose their moral and ethical paths: whether to deny and repress conceptions of whiteness and continue to perpetuate and preserve it through their practices, or to acknowledge whiteness and work to dismantle it by enacting counter-hegemonic practices. The latter requires a deep commitment on the part of the teacher, and in making this commitment, the teacher subjects herself to a journey ridden in resistance and conflict, for no longer can she view her work through the rose colored glasses of the liberal framework that maintains an illusion of racelessness and the insidiousness of whiteness..

What is required is that teachers achieve ideological transformation through the unlearning of racism that replaces hegemonic ideologies with counter-hegemonic ones.  Unfortunately, given the recent pendulum shift towards standards-based, accountability models of education, it is unlikely that teachers will enter classrooms with even the bare minimum of cultural competency, as competencies related to diversity are sorely lacking in teacher education curriculum and state/national standards.

References

Anyon, J. (1980). Social class and the hidden curriculum of work. Journal of Education, 162(1), 1-11.

Darling-Hammond, L., & Sclan, E. M. (1996). Who teaches and why: Dilemmas of building a profession for twenty-first century schools. In J. Sikula (Ed.), Handbook of research on teacher education (pp. 67-101). New York: Macmillan.

Freire, P. (1993). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum Publishing Company.

King, J. E. (1991). Dysconscious racism: Ideology, identity, and the miseducation of teachers. The Journal of Negro Education, 60(2), 133-146.

Peske, H. G., & Haycock, K. (2006). Teaching inequality: How poor and minority students are shortchanged on teacher quality. Washington, DC: The Education Trust.

Nylund, D. (2006). Critical multiculturalism, whiteness, and social work: Towards a more radical view of cultural competence. Journal of Progressive Human Services, 17(2), 27-42.

Shome, R. (1996). Race and popular cinema: The rhetorical strategies of whiteness in city of joy. Communication Quarterly, 44(4), 502-518.

One Billion Rising for Education

On Valentines Day, 2013, I participated in One Billion Rising:

Along with thousands spread across the globe, dancing and singing, we were participating in the “One Billion Rising” movement, an international initiative led by Eve Ensler and her V-day organization. One in three women will be raped or beaten in her lifetime; one billion women will be violated. This was a day for communities to insist on change. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/meredith-hutchison/vday-in-drc-one-billion-r_b_2692163.html)

It was one of those powerful life experiences that changed me just a little bit.  I am certain other women (and men who attended) felt the same.  I have a hunch that more women, due to their experiences with One Billion Rising, will feel more empower to use their voices to demand fair and just treatment for themselves and their sisters.

I have a dream that a similar movement can occur for education, the one billion will rise and insist on free and quality education for all.  This post seemed from a question I thought about this week, “How did such a well meaning system with the goal of educating children and youth get so out of control of its majority stakeholders of teachers, administrators, and students?”

I often tell my pre-service educators to never forget why they became teachers, which is often because they love children, their content areas, and the process of teaching.  But they do forget.  They become the mechanized information disseminators and text givers that the system grooms them to be.  I have seen same thing happen to the once passionate veteran teachers.  In these days of standards-driven and standardized curriculum and test-driven accountability, they go through the motions of being a teacher.  Too often the spark in their eyes is gone, the spark that was there when as growing up, they talked of their dream of becoming a teacher. They work from a place of fear of losing their jobs if they don’t follow the protocols forced upon them.  This is passed onto the students with too many students going through the motions of being a student.  I discuss these thoughts and ideas in my post The Most Honest Three Minutes

So when did education become more about the test scores than about the learners’ passions?  Teachers have become more focused on test preparation than on the preparation of creative, engaging learning activities.  Horace Mann, John Dewey, and Maria Montessori are identified as some of this country’s greatest educational philosophers.  Why are educators giving them more lip service than providing services and activities in the classroom based on their ideas and principles? Why has the classroom become a place of more frowns and moans than of smiles and laughing?  Why are kids running out of their classrooms at the end of the day rather than running into them at the beginning of each school day with excitement of a new day of learning?  Why are far too many teachers hurrying to turn off the classroom lights at the end of the school day rather than staying a little longer to figure out how to turn on the lights in children’s minds? When have classrooms become places of discouragement and disillusionment rather places of enlightenment?  When are teachers going to remember why they became teachers?  When are teachers going to revisit the idea that the legacy they leave will not be how many worksheets and tests they gave, but in how many sparks they helped ignite in their learners?

There are pockets of amazing people doing amazing things. There is Malala Yousafzai, the 15 year old Pakistani girl, who fights for education of girls in Afghanistan and was shot for doing so.  “Notwithstanding the constant danger she faced during her campaign, 15-year-old Malala never waiver in her belief that girls have the right to receive an education” (http://www.policymic.com/articles/20433/time-person-of-the-year-2012-malala-yousafzai-should-be-the-one).  Other young people have attempt to have their voices heard for educational reform.  See Student Voice in Educational Reform.

Teaching and students are striking. In Seattle, teachers and students are protesting the MAP tests.  See Students skipping, teachers protesting standardized MAP test.

But the problem with these little pockets of protest is that these people are seen by many as dissenters and radicals with possible consequences of becoming marginalized and in the case of Malaki, shot by gunfire.  Marie Bjerede discusses the factors that makes the education resistant to change in To Disrupt Education, First Shift the Balance of Power: Why the current education system resists change–and what we all can do to push forward.

The education ecosystem is rigid and in a state of deep equilibrium – it is nearly impossible to shift, and even successful efforts are ephemeral, with the system trending back toward the status quo in short order. Although there are many “spot solutions”, examples of education excellence in isolated instances, the system as a whole resists the spread of such innovations.

If the education ecosystem is in a meta-stable state that resists change, and if the institutions of education have near absolute power in defining and awarding accreditation, and if the processes and outcomes of this system are sub-optimal for most students as compared to our aspirations, then disruption, as with the Web 2.0 shift elsewhere, is much more a matter of removing constraints and allowing organic evolution than it is of top-down reform.

When will the collective of those passionate about educating children and youth stand up and say enough?  In this day and age of open education resources, the ability to share ideas, strategies, and content globally, and the ability to have a voice and organize movements through social media, there are infinite possibilities for every child (and adult) to receive a quality education.  This call to action is not just for free education but one of quality and substance, one not driven by corporate and political interests but one driven by educator and learner interests.

If one billion global citizens do as Marie Bjerede suggests.

Question the fundamental mechanisms of learning in light of what we now know about our brains and what we now can accomplish with technological support. Question the reasoning behind coercive education, age-based cohorts, and high-stakes testing. Question the role of education in a world evolving on Internet time. Second, demonstrate the will to build the infrastructure of personal agency and independent learning, the infrastructure of innovation. Re-imagine education as a platform that each learner can use to achieve his or her unique goals, and create the means for all children, regardless of zip code, to have meaningful access. (https://www.edsurge.com/n/2013-02-12-to-disrupt-education-first-shift-the-balance-of-power)

. . . then the system (or lack of any in countries where education is not a right) would need to listen.

Violence against woman is a more pressing, serious issue but I am borrowing from the One Billion Rising theme song Break the Chain as a call to action

Let’s break the rules.  Let’s stop the pain,  Let’s turn it upside down. It’s time to break the chains.

Photojournalism Activity: Community Service or a Social Cause Event

Recently, I had an amazing experience attending a local One Billion Rising event.  I enjoy taking photos and video of special events like this one.  I spent the afternoon following the event creating an Animoto mash-up of the photos and video taken while I was at the event.

The process of putting together the video mash-up provided a great opportunity for me to deeply reflect on the event.  I saw and experienced things I did not get to during the event.  This experience made me think this would be a great learning activity.

Goals:

• To create, as a means of reflection, a video mash-up of photos and video taken during a community service project or a social cause event.
• To learn some skills related to ethical photojournalism.

Procedures:

• Ask learners to identify a community service event or an event that is promoting a social cause that they would like to attend.  Examples include serving meals at a holiday event, a dance fund raiser for a charity, collecting food for local shelter, neighborhood clean-up, or a community rally like One Billion Rising.  Many news shows feature weekend events that include these type of events.  For younger kids, this could became an activity for parental engagement.  Parents and/or parent volunteers can help with the travel and logistics.  A Google spreadsheet could be set up to list these.
• Prior to the events, review with learners how to take photos and videos at public events. As learners will be acting in the role of photojournalists, go over the National Press Photographers Association Code of Ethics.

• Practice sessions can be set up where learners take photo and/or video of their peers during learning activities.
• After the event:  Decide which video mash-up tool will be used for creating their videos.  My preference is Animoto as it permits the upload and use of photos, video, and text.  Here is a Animoto video tutorial:  http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/animoto/index.html
• To further reflect on their experiences and video, learners can answer some of the following questions via a blog post or a Voicethread where the video has been uploaded.

• What about your community involvement has been an eye-opening experience?
• Describe a person you’ve encountered in the community who made a strong impression on you, positive or negative.
• How has the environment and social conditions affected the people at your site?
• Has the experience affected your worldview? How?
• Have your career options been expanded by your service experience?
• Why does the organization you are working for exist?
• Did anything about your community involvement surprise you? If so, what?
• What did you do that seemed to be effective or ineffective in the community?
• How does your understanding of the community change as a result of your participation in this project?
• How can you continue your involvement with this group or social issue?
• How can you educate others or raise awareness about this group or social issue?
• Talk about any disappointments or successes of the project. What did you learn from it?
• What sorts of things make you feel uncomfortable when you are working in the community? Why?  http://www.servicelearning.umn.edu/info/reflection.html

Video Games and Social Emotional Learning

A lot of talk, press, and focus in this era of learning is on common core standards and 21st century skills and literacies.  What is often neglected is the importance of building social emotional skills within the classroom.

The challenge of raising knowledgeable, responsible, and caring children is recognized by nearly everyone. Few realize, however, that each element of this challenge can be enhanced by thoughtful, sustained, and systematic attention to children’s social and emotional learning (SEL). Indeed, experience and research show that promoting social and emotional development in children is “the missing piece” in efforts to reach the array of goals associated wit h improving schooling in the United States. http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/197157/chapters/The-Need-for-Social-and-Emotional-Learning.aspx

It’s not enough to simply fill students’ brains with facts. A successful education demands that their character be developed as well. That’s where social and emotional learning comes in. SEL is the process of helping students develop the skills to manage their emotions, resolve conflict nonviolently, and make responsible decisions.  Research shows that promoting social and emotional skills leads to reduced violence and aggression among children, higher academic achievement, and an improved ability to function in schools and in the workplace. Students who demonstrate respect for others and practice positive interactions, and whose respectful attitudes and productive communication skills are acknowledged and rewarded, are more likely to continue to demonstrate such behavior. Students who feel secure and respected can better apply themselves to learning. (Why Champion Social and Emotional Learning?)

Two principles guide this article:

1. Social-Emotional skills and strategies should be addressed and taught in school settings.
2. Video and online games can promote SEL skills and as such, should be integrated into classroom instruction.

Social Emotional Skills in School

According to the Collaboration for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL)

Schools that create socially and emotionally sound learning and working environments, and that help students and staff develop greater social and emotional competence, in turn help ensure positive short- and long-term academic and personal outcomes for students, and higher levels of teaching and work satisfaction for staff.

CASEL identified core competencies for social-emotional learning:

http://casel.org/wp-content/uploads/Core_Competencies_3_White_Back.png

Social Emotional Benefits of Gaming

Self-Awareness

Self-awareness is accurately assessing one’s feelings, interests, values, and strengths; maintaining a well-grounded sense of self-confidence (http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/). Video games, by their very nature, provide ongoing feedback about personal performance. The gamer becomes a critical learner, a highly self-aware individual able to critically assess, compare and contrast the various virtual environments s/he finds her/himself within. In other words, the side-show mirror reflection of him/herself that the video game provides is not naively accepted, but critically examined (http://www.etc.cmu.edu/etcpress/node/209).

Video games also provide powerful opportunities to explore and experiment with different aspects of one’s identity:

Video games allow people to adopt virtual identities. According to Przybylski, Weinstein, Murayama, Lynch, and Ryan (2012), the appeal of video games is in part due to the players’ ability to explore aspects of their ideal selves that might not find expression in real life. Gameplay experiences that were congruent with perceptions of a player’s ideal self were the most intrinsically motivating and emotionally engaging http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/positively-media/201208/video-games-problem-solving-and-self-efficacy-part-2#_ENREF_12

 The Future of Identity, one of the influential Foresight reports that looks ahead to highlight emerging trends in science and technology, found . . .

. . . that far from creating superficial or fantasy identities that some critics suggest, in many cases it allowed people to escape the preconceptions of those immediately around them and find their “true” identity. This is especially true of disabled people who told researchers that online gaming enabled them to socialize on an equal footing with others.  The internet can allow many people to realize their identities more fully. Some people who have been shy or lonely or feel less attractive discover they can socialize more successfully and express themselves more freely online.

Management of Emotions to Reach Goals

Self-management is the ability to regulate one’s emotions to handle stress, control impulses, and persevere in overcoming obstacles; setting and monitoring progress toward personal and academic goals; expressing emotions appropriately (http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/). The impact of gaming comes from its emotional connections and from the gamer managing those emotions as s/he works towards achieving the game’s goals.

Hugh Bowen fielded a national online survey with 535 gamers to explore how important the range of emotions is to the success of any particular game.  Half of all gamers he survey stated that emotion in games is extremely or somewhat important.  Here is a list of feelings that gamers say video games most strongly inspire.

http://www.bowenresearch.com/studies.php?id=3

Jane McGonigal in How Might Video Games Be Good for Us? explored research that examined the types of emotions gamers sought from the gaming experience.

The top ten positive emotions of video games range from bliss, to relief, to personal pride, to feeling emotionally close to another player, to surprise, to curiosity, to excitement, to awe and wonder (see survey results at Top Ten Videogame Emotions).  What’s extraordinary about these ten positive emotions is that gamers have figured out how to spark and feel them whenever they want, no matter where they are, or what kind of day they’re having. It doesn’t matter if they’re bored or stressed or lonely or frustrated or anxious – gamers can change how they feel, just by starting to play. We know that this is true even for gamers in incredibly difficult conditions. For example, children in hospitals prior to surgery are able to control their anxiety by playing a handheld video game (see the research), while soldiers in Afghanistan are able to reduce psychological stress by nearly 75% by playing video games for three to four hours a day (see the research, specifically pages 33-34). In fact, recent clinical trials have demonstrated that online games can outperform pharmaceuticals for treating mild to moderate depression and anxiety. (See the research)  Even if games don’t change anything else in our lives, the power to change how we feel in the moment is a very good thing indeed. Games give us more control over our emotional destiny.

With the increase in gesture-based games, there is also an increase potential for video games to help identify and regulate emotions:

Numerous studies have shown that movements or postures generate cues the mind can use to figure out how it feels, a phenomenon dubbed the physical-feedback effect. [Gesture-based games like Kinect] and Wii games might also create emotions between people through “emotional contagion,” where the brain can make us feel what we see, hear, read or think others experience. (http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/wii-emotion/)

Social Awareness

Social awareness is being able to take the perspective of and empathize with others; recognizing and appreciating individual and group similarities and differences; recognizing and using family, school, and community resources (http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/).  To be socially aware is to be able to see the world through another person’s eyes, to be empathetic.  In her Psychology Today article, How Videogames Can Promote Empathy, Susan Krauss Whitbourne proposes that video games with a pro-social theme can promote compassion and altruism among the players.

Dr. Mathew Chow, a psychiatrist who studies gaming and behavior, discusses the development of pro-social behavior via gaming in an NBC interview:

Video games have evolved into a shared experience. No longer are people playing these games alone in their parents’ basement. People expect to be able to play online. People join online communities populated by tens of thousands of individuals around the world. They participate in pro-social behaviors such as cooperative play, trading, negotiating, forming alliances, and creating rules of conduct.

You need to be able to get along with a diverse community in order to succeed in online play. Antisocial people are often marginalized and even banned from popular communities. If you told me that a child was participating in an activity where she was cooperating with tens of thousands of people across the globe to accomplish a shared objective, I would probably label that as pro-social. People playing video games are doing this right now. (http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/ingame/worried-about-your-childs-gaming-psychiatrists-say-play-them-1C7660207)

Relationship Skills

Relationship skills is considered establishing and maintaining healthy and rewarding relationships based on cooperation; resisting inappropriate social pressure; preventing, managing, and resolving interpersonal conflict; seeking help when needed (http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/).

As Cheryl K. Olson notes video games may promote social skills through actions such as sharing tips with one another, guiding one another to websites for cheat codes, and engaging in online team endeavors and tasks through games such as Minecraft and World and Warcraft.

Responsible Decision-Making

Responsible decision-making is making decisions based on consideration of ethical standards, safety concerns, appropriate social norms, respect for others, and likely consequences of various actions; applying decision-making skills to academic and social situations; contributing to the well-being of one’s school and community (http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/).

Video games, by their very nature, overtly teach gamers decision-making and problem-solving skills.

Problem-solving is a central theme to many video games, and kids of all ages are taught to recognize patterns and strategize in order to win. For example, Nintendo’s “The Legend of Zelda” series includes many puzzles and complex levels that challenge players. When Link gains an item, he must then use it to advance to what were previously inaccessible areas of the game. Many of the puzzles in each game also employ these items. Obstacles are often put in the way of achieving a goal in “Zelda,” which is arguably similar to many situations kids face in real life, like working hard to learn a difficult mathematical concept in order to succeed on a test at school.

Games like “Portal 2” keep the mind sharp and alert through hours of unique, mind-bending puzzle solving. This game emphasizes the importance of navigating a new environment carefully and recognizing and utilizing the materials available in a game. These problem-solving video games teach kids the importance of patience and perseverance by forcing them to think cognitively when trying to master a challenge. By working hard and choosing not to give up, kids achieve an “a-ha!” moment, where they realize the solution to a problem and feel smart for doing so. In this way, games like “Portal 2” not only help stimulate a child’s mind, they also boost confidence. (http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/family/life-skills-video-games-can-teach-kids1.htm)

. . . and video games have the potential to elicit ethical and moral decision-making choices.

Video games are a great way to walk in someone else’s shoes, if only digitally. Depending on the game, you can do good deeds for the love of humanity or the love of money. You can swing a sword for freedom or for oppression. According to Dr. Andrew Weaver, your game choices are more obvious than you’d think. When it comes to moral decision-making, how you play your game is how you live your life–and you’re playing morally.

For their paper, “Mirrored Morality: An Exploration of Moral Choice in Video Games,” Dr. Weaver and his fellow researcher Nicky Lewis had 75 gamers (40 men, 35 women, ages 18 to 24) play Fallout 3, a game that starts with relatively little game play and multiple character-building decisions. These gamers also took the Moral Foundations Questionnaire (you can take the self-scorable test, here) to evaluate their psychological foundations of morality, such as whether they value loyalty to a group or whether they respect authority. From this, Weaver determined that players used their own moral foundation to make their choices in-game. The key finding was players largely made moral decisions just as they would in real life, that is, they were doing the right thing. Even when given the opportunity to be violent, they were choosing non-violent acts. http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolpinchefsky/2012/11/28/you-and-your-videogame-avatar-are-more-moral-than-you-realize/

A recent Stanford experiment provided evidence that video games can be designed to encourage and elicit altuistic behavior.  During the experiment test subjects were given Superman-like flight in a virtual reality simulator which in turn made them more likely to exhibit altruistic behavior in real life.  Although this is a beginning of a series of experiments, the researchers found that:

While several studies have shown that playing violent video games can encourage aggressive behavior, the new research suggests that games could be designed to train people to be more empathetic in the real world. It’s very clear that if you design games that are violent, peoples’ aggressive behavior increases.  If we can identify the mechanism that encourages empathy, then perhaps we can design technology and video games that people will enjoy and that will successfully promote altruistic behavior in the real world.

Using games in the classroom is more and more becoming an acceptable and accepted instructional practice.  The benefits of games, when used strategically, should not be overlooked in increasing and enhancing the learners’ social and emotional competencies.

References

Benedetti, W. (2012).  Worried about your child’s gaming? Psychiatrists say ‘play with them’  NBC News.  Retrieved from http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/ingame/worried-about-your-childs-gaming-psychiatrists-say-play-them-1C7660207

Bowen, H.  (2011). Can Videogames Make You Cry? Retrieved from http://www.bowenresearch.com/studies.php?id=3.

CASEL. (n.d.) SEL skills and competencies.  Retrieved from http://casel.org/why-it-matters/what-is-sel/skills-competencies/.

Choi, C. (2010).  How Wii and Kinect Hack Into Your Emotions. Wired Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/wii-emotion/.

Kilgore, N. (n.d.) What life skills can video games teach kids? TLC Family. Retrieved from http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/family/life-skills-video-games-can-teach-kids1.htm.

Krauss Whitbourne, S. (2011). How Videogames Can Promote Empathy. Psychology Today.  Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201109/how-videogames-can-promote-empathy.

McGonigal, J. (2012). How Might Video Games Be Good for Us? Big Questions Online.  Retrieved from https://www.bigquestionsonline.com/content/how-might-video-games-be-good-us.

Pinchefsky, C. (2012). You and Your Videogame Avatar Are More Moral Than You Realize. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolpinchefsky/2012/11/28/you-and-your-videogame-avatar-are-more-moral-than-you-realize/.

Weight, J. (2007). Self, Video Games, and Pedagogy. Retrieved from http://www.etc.cmu.edu/etcpress/node/209.

Ice Breaker: What Do You Wonder About?

The Four Quadrant Poster is the newest activity added to Technology-Enhanced Social Emotional Activities.  I love using this activity as an icebreaker for students to get to know one another and to provide me, as the educator, with a lot of information about student interests, passions, and thoughts.

Goals:

• To provide a forum for learners to explore and identify their learning interests, strengths, and personal wonderment.
• To help learners get to know one another.
• To provide educators with diagnostic information about each of their learners.

Materials:

• Hands-on: One 8″ x 8″ piece of cardboard or plywood per learner, lots of paint and paint brushes; paper and markers
• Technology-Based: Google Presentation doc shared so each learner can each have a slide; Internet access to find images and/or mobile devices so learners can take images.

Procedures:

• Explain to learners that they will be creating a four quadrant poster that includes images or symbols that represent the following:
  • Quadrant One – The thing you do best
  • Quadrant Two – Best learning experience ever
  • Quadrant Three – The most fun thing you’ve ever done
  • Quadrant Four – One thing you wonder about
• The following slide can be used as a template.

• For the hands-on version, provide learners with poster board or plywood and paints/brushes.
• Here are some examples:

Fifth grader Marc believes he is best at writing, finds art to be his best learning experience, being with girls to be the most fun and also wonders about girls 🙂

Second grader, Jeff believes he is best at computers and finds computers to be his best learning experience. Playing with friends is his most fun thing and he wonders about sunsets.

• Once done, tell learners that they will then present their posters to their peers.  To prepare for this sharing phase, distribute blank paper and markers.  Help learners divide paper into blocks equal to the number of students in the class and to put names of their peers as labels for the blocks; one peer’s name per block.  Explain that as their peers share, they are to sketch into the blocks the one quadrant that they find most interesting.   See example:

• Note/Reflection: The act of orally sharing one’s poster can be a powerful experience.  It was time for one of the fifth grade boys, John, to share his poster.  He was a blend-in-the-woodwork type of kid – not popular, not ridiculed, just kind of ignored.  He got to his fourth quadrant.  He had painted a picture of a man with a jet propelled backpack.  He stated that he wondered when humans will fly on their own.  Several of the boys at the same time spontaneously yelled out, “cool”.  The look of pleasure on John’s face when they did so was priceless.)

Technology-Based Option

• For a technology-based option, set up a Google Presentation so that there is a slide for each learner.  Ask learners to locate or take photos to represent each quadrant.  They can use their mobile devices to take photos or find copyright available images online.  Here is an example:

• Learners can use a Google Spreadsheet to record information about each peer’s Four Quadrant poster.

An Education Filled with Wonder

I started my journey as an educator as an outdoor educator.  One of the first books I was asked to read was Rachel Carson’s A Sense of Wonder.  Some quotes from this book that should (hopefully) resonate deeply with educators include:

A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full or wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune that for most of us that clear-eyed vision, that true instinct for what is beautiful and awe-inspiring, is dimmed and even lost before we reach adulthood. If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years, the sterile preoccupation with things artificial, the alienation from the sources of our strength.

If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement, and mystery of the world we live in.

A current focus of Michael Wesch, the renown professor from Kansas State University, is The End of Wonder in the Age of Whatever:

What is needed more than ever is to inspire our students to wonder, to nurture their appetite for curiosity, exploration, and contemplation, to help them attain an insatiable appetite to ask and pursue big, authentic, and relevant questions, so that they can harness and leverage the bounty of possibility all around us and rediscover the “end” or purpose of wonder, and stave off the historical end of wonder.

Here is clip from a keynote about this topic:

The story in his video reminded me of a day I was substituting for a 2nd grade class.  It had begun to snow as we arrived to school that morning.  By mid-morning, a few inches covered the ground.  It was time for recess but, as expected, a voice came over the intercom to state that recess would be inside within each teacher’s classroom.  I heard the kids moan as they came to school dressed for snow with boots and winter jackets.  I threw caution into the wind.  I asked the kids to bundle up so we could go outside.  The kids became . . . well, kids.  They ran through the fresh snow looking back at the footprints they created.  When one found something of interest, they called the others over to see.  They caught snow flakes with their tongues and made snow angles in the snow.  There were no conflicts nor arguing as was common to this group of kids.  They just ran, played, and laughed together as a unified group reminding me of a flock of geese.  I watched them with a tear in my eye, one that reflected the beauty I was witnessing.  We all experienced a sense of wonder and play that day.

Wonder can’t be planned nor scripted.  Wonder rarely occurs as educators plow through pre-established, scripted curriculum, worksheets, and test preparation.  I want to create the conditions for my students of all ages to have their eyes opened with and to wonder; their mouths open to say “wow”, and their hearts open to say this feels so very good.

Dream-Driven Education

Seth Godin in Stop Stealing Dreams states:

Have we created a trillion-dollar, multimillion-student, sixteen-year schooling cycle to take our best and our brightest and snuff out their dreams—sometimes when they’re so nascent that they haven’t even been articulated? Is the product of our massive schooling industry an endless legion of assistants? The century of dream-snuffing has to end. The real shortage we face is dreams, and the wherewithal and the will to make them come true. We’re facing a significant emergency, one that’s not just economic but cultural as well. The time to act is right now, and the person to do it is you.

We can teach them not to care; that’s pretty easy. But given the massive technological and economic changes we’re living through, do we have the opportunity to teach productive and effective caring? Can we teach kids to care enough about their dreams that they’ll care enough to develop the judgment, skill, and attitude to make them come true? (http://www.squidoo.com/stop-stealing-dreams)

I propose that educators take a proactive stance to move from a system that may steal kids’ dreams to one that promotes the actualization of learner dreams. I have a dream today and everyday that education can become a conduit through which learners are provided with the time, knowledge, strategies, and tools to make their own dreams come true.   We are living in an era that education can be passion-based and dream-driven.  In this context, the role of the educator becomes that of dream-facilitator.

The dreams we need are self-reliant dreams. We need dreams based not on what is but on what might be. We need students who can learn how to learn, who can discover how to push themselves and are generous enough and honest enough to engage with the outside world to make those dreams happen. (http://www.squidoo.com/stop-stealing-dreams)

One of the first tasks of the educator as a dream-facilitator is to discover and help his/her learners discover their dreams, passions, and interests.  Some guiding questions to help learners identify and articulate their dreams include:

• Given no restrictions, what would you like to do in your spare time?
• If you could wave a magic wand and be or do anything you want, what would it be?
• In one year from now, 10 years from now, what would you like to be doing that would make you happy?
• What would your life be like if it were perfect?

Learners can be provided with a choice with how they answer theses questions: verbal or written responses, video or audio recording, or a drawing.  An extension of this activity might be asking learners to create a vision board (see Vision Boards for Kids and Visions & Values for Kids).  Technology could be used for this process by giving students the opportunity to create a Glog or an Animoto of images that symbolizes their dreams.

Support systems or personal learning networks could then be established based on grouping learners with similar dreams.  The group would act as cheerleaders, support-providers, progress-checkers, and resource providers for one another.   One of the group’s learning activities could focus on expanding their personal learning networks to include folks with similar dreams who they locate via social networks like Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, and other social networks.

Dreams will only come try if actions are taken to achieve them.  As such, the educator should facilitate a method for learners to reflect on progress towards their dreams.

• What did you do today, this week to achieve your dreams?
• What obstacles are you having or foresee having in progress towards your dream?  How can you overcome your obstacles?
• What resources did you locate that can help you fulfill your dreams?

Blogging or micro-blogging (e.g. Twitter) could be used for this reflective process.

My parting shot to my pre-service teachers as they enter the world of teaching is to always remember why they became teachers in the first place.  I encourage them to ask themselves each day of teaching, “What did I do today to leave a positive legacy for and with my learners?” I propose that all educators should regularly ask themselves this question.  I believe that by facilitating dream-driven education, they will have a positive response to this question.