Today's journal was centered on an excerpt of a talk given by Michael Shermer at the 2006 TED meeting. Here's the link, for those interested in viewing (the excerpt I showed in class begins at the 9:00 minute marker) 

 http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/michael_shermer_on_believing_strange_things.html

I wrote the following writing prompts to the left of the slide on which the video played:

Watch and listen to the video and think about what you want to believe.

Can you hear the back-masked message?

What does this have to say about how susceptible we are to suggestion? 

So, if you haven't watched the video, here's a summary:

Shermer plays a section of "Stairway to Heaven" forward, then backward, then asks the audience to identify the "secret message," then displays the the text of the supposed "secret message" while replaying the section backwards again. 

Here's the first unsurprising news: The first time it played through backwards, my students couldn't understand it and took it as gibberish, but the second time through, they, like Shermer's TED audience, were able understand the words clearly. This, of course, makes Shermer's point that we look for patterns and once the sections of our brain that respond to sensory stimuli are "primed" we can rapidly build and cement patterns and meaning to that which is patternless and meaningless.

Here's the second unsurprising news: Many of the students had already heard the rumor that Zep's music was laced with secret Satanic messages and figured it was probably true.   In any case, the "believers" also couldn't understand the "words" at first, but when shown them were even more convinced of their initial belief. Alternatively, those who considered the whole thing a bunch of hooey had their beliefs confirmed as well.

So here's the interesting bit: The students who hadn't heard of either proposition became more convinced that Zep intentionally placed secret Satan-loving messages in their music after hearing the evidence that clearly showed how easily our brains our tricked. One young lady, who read her entry aloud, commented on how "scary" the presentation was and that she was now concerned about Satanists in the music industry. She was going to go home that evening and begin looking for ways to play her CDs backwards to look for more secret messages. In the discussion that ensued, I asked them to consider why we believe what we believe and why we are so easily taken in by these things. 

The answer, I discovered, was obvious when posed the following question: What is cooler, that Zep is a bunch of Satanists who are trying to convince the world to join them or that playing a record backward makes weird sounds and if we work a little, we can make whatever we want of them? 

I'm Doing My Job; I Can Tell by the Whining

I teach critical thinking. I want students to break out of the educational millworks they were placed in at the age of five. It's hard for them though, since it involves effort well beyond the multiple-choice world they are used to. These last few months have been especially painful for them since they want to simply keep providing book reports rather than conduct meaningful analyses of the literature they are reading. I have had a fair bit of success, but one bold and intelligent young lady wrote me an articulate and well argued response to the question: "How do these ideas [presented in the text] integrate into your schema?"

"Oh schema, how I still don't even know what this means. I could give you my Miss America response about how this taught me not to worry about everything. God has a plan for me or that patience is a virtue, but those are things one should already know. The meaning of [The Sundiata] to me was something I hear all the time at church so it wasn't something extremely new. What was new was the comment my mom said while she saw me sitting reading with the checklist in front of me. She simply said, 'Doesn't that take the joy out of reading" and everything clicked from there. Of course I hate reading, this is a punishment. I may find this material boring, but I believe I think that because I know that after I read I just have to write and write and analyze and make up some more stuff to write about it. This feeling can't really help my schema because I have the choice to do it or to fail, but I think it can help your schema. If one can't write for punishment [a rule I have; writing is a privilege], then why are you having us read for punishment? If I logged on to Facebook right now I could read multiple status's complaining about this, I can check my new texts which I know are about this, or I can go to the table in the morning and hear how no one even did it which shows that students do think of it that way. Yes, this may not be schema, but I know if it is taking the joy out of reading then when I become a teacher I want to make sure I'm not having my students hate to read. Maybe this is more of a rant, maybe it's because I am tired, or maybe it's a schema for my future."

She is a good writer and an excellent student, but one to whom until now learning has come easily because she is quick-witted and the assignments were simple. I wrote a response to her, as well as to another student who wondered as teens have for millenia, "why am I reading this old stuff?"

04/03/2009: Purposeful Reader's Checklist Africa Responses. I finally began digging into the bulk of your work and have received some excellent responses. I found one case of academic dishonesty, and another rambled pointelessly for several pages about nothing in particular; those both received 0/50 points. 

Another student stated that she didn't "fully understand how something that happened centuries ago [could] fit into [her] life somehow." For those who feel that way, I urge you to consider the following statement by S. I. Hayakawa, a former United States Senator from California:

"In a real sense, people who have read good literature have lived more than people who cannot or will not read. It is not true that we have only one life to live; if we can read, we can live as many more lives and as many kinds of lives as we wish." 

Furthermore, we are the only species on this planet who can do this. By not considering the lives, loves, joys, and pains of those prior generations, we do them a great disservice.

I also had a fairly articulate complaint that connected directly to my personal experience as a young man and young writer. The schema section of this young lady's submission was devoted to her assertion that analyzing literature takes the joy out of reading. I laughed when I read this because her words were my words many years ago. Because she was forthright, I returned with a forthright response. I transcribe it here for you since it may apply to many who were not so bold:

"Please bear in mind that I do no assign work out of some twisted sense of cruelty. Every checklist I assign, I must grade and comment on. I am obligated to make sure you are prepared to engage material regardless of your personal level of interest. If you begin to learn how writing is constructed on a deeper level than your natural talent for writing, you can then become a truly excellent writer, rather than simply a talented, glib, 10th grader. I know this because I was a self-absorbed 20-something writer who thought analyzing writing was pointless and joyless and there was nothing left to learn. My undergraduate English teacher, Ms. Pamela Schoenewaldt, jerked me up by the collar, gave me a few "B"s, and forced me to think. I make no pretentions about being your (or anyone's) Schoenewaldt, but I am committed to try, in spite of your persistent and predictable protestations."

I also would like you to consider my qualifications and efforts thus far. I have extensive background in the world: I'm roughly 30 years ahead of you and have extensive experience in written and spoken communication delivered in a wide variety of ways to a wide variety of audiences. I understand what you are feeling, not individually, but as an adolescent. One of the reasons I understand this is because I was an adolescent, I listen to and read adolescent spoken and written language, and I read a wide range of material about adolescents. I came into this field because I have something to offer you, although I cannot make you believe me. I can ask you to trust me. I am not your enemy; I am your coach, and I want you to keep doing crunches and taking laps until you can write and read like a pro. 

If you've made it this far, you deserve to have access to the following thread: 

http://whatever.scalzi.com/2007/06/18/on-teens-and-the-fact-their-writing-sucks/

OMG! I'm Pregnant!!!!!!!! kewl!!!!

Confiscated note exchanged between two 15 year-old students:

"Does everyone know you're pregnant?"

"I put my ultrasound pictures on my MySpace page, duh!"

Teenage Life Today?

The title of this blog is the title of an e-mail a good friend sent me. His e-mail inspired me to post these short anecdotes and commentaries.

1. A student of mine told me, rather sadly, he remembered nothing of the summer between 8th and 9th grade because he was constantly high on a variety of pharmaceuticals his mother provided him. He said that although she didn't approve of his drug use, she felt that if she didn't provide him the drugs, someone else would. He told me that at first he thought it was pretty cool, but now that he can't think as quickly and the time loss is weighing heavily, he feels his mom should have been less of a dealer and friend and more of a, well, mom.

2. In 8th grade, another student of mine ditched out of her apartment to go smoke weed and drink whiskey with some friends. She became so intoxicated she was afraid of going home so she went to the apartment of a friend of her friend where she passed out. She regained consciousness in the bathroom early the next morning and remembered screaming something in the middle of the night. Then she discovered she had lost her virginity by being raped by a third "friend."

3. Last year, a junior at our school fell in with the wrong crowd and was found shot to death and dumped in a large drain pipe in the cross-over bridge near the junction of the I215 and Rainbow Blvd.

4. During football games, we are required to keep students away from the cyclone fence surrounding the stadium because students have been known to throw weapons over the top to accomplices on the inside.

5. A group of boys, mostly part of a large Romany clan that lives in the area, routinely get drunk in the school parking lot over the summer break. One of these boys was a student of mine two years ago and was badly injured when the truck he was riding in flipped over on the way to the lake. Like something out of a Mark Twain novel, he and his brother and cousins were ditching school to go fishing.

6. Today, a group of students identified the feature they most had in common was that they "blazed" and they were too lazy to get up and participate in the exercise. That is, they proudly declared their love of smoking weed and sitting on their asses, in writing, on the whiteboard, in an academic environment, with an authority figure present.

7. A small minority of students become pregnant during high school. One I remember in particular became pregnant at 14 while addicted to meth. Her limbs, face, and mouth (and I presume her body) bore heavily the sores associated with meth use. With her distended, eighth-month belly, mass of scabs, and young-old features, she made the perfect picture of responsible motherhood.

8. Overheard in a group conversation in my classroom with at least 15 other students present: "So he's like got me bent back like this, right, and hes banging away, and he's like pushing my legs further back and apart, and I'm like, ow!" Laughs all around.

9. Overheard in the same forum, different day: "I told I him I wasn't going to have sex with him even though I had sex with his friend. I mean, I might consider a three-some, but not just him."

10. Interestingly, a student was expelled from school for having medieval weapons in his van. He forget to take them out after spending the weekend at the local RenFair.

11. I work in a relatively affluent area with a demographic that is mostly white middle and upper-middle class (a small percentage are very wealthy) with a healthy dose of Asian and Hispanic middle and lower-middle class families. We are considered a desirable high school.

I could go on, but I have homework. I'm starting a program to become a school librarian.

Quote-Free Friends

Chad Eklund and Linda Dickinson both asked me to be their Facebook friends. I put quotes around the word "friends" when I first typed it and then I took the quotes away. Chad Eklund was a friend in the early 1990s when we were stationed at Edwards AFB together. We never stopped being friends, we just moved and didn't bother communicating. Therefore, I suppose he still counts as a quotation-mark-free friend. Likewise, Linda Dickinson, f.k.a. Linda Weinberger, was a high school friend with whom I lost contact so she also gets a quote-free endorsement.

There is something more to say about the word's rapid morphing of meaning, but not right now.

I am also getting ready to start my second full school year as a high school English teacher. This year, I get to work with sophomores and Ms. Aspen, my own 10th grade English teacher, might want to see about becoming my "friend" so she can smile as karma takes its inevitable toll.

A Legacy of War (published)

We are back from four days in Ohio. It was lovely, green, humid and our short time was filled with eating and visiting family. While I was gone, Every Day Fiction published my short story:

http://www.everydayfiction.com/a-legacy-of-war-by-kurt-rice/#comment-6848

Keeping Wallflowers from Speaking

It's summer and I'm reading. I just finished The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky.

I'd like to be able to teach this book, together with House on Mango Street, because the protagonists are both self-reflective, teenage observers of human nature. Chbosky and Cisneros use short "chapters" written in deceptively simple English that contain truths eager for mining via discussion. There are many other comparisons and contrasts between the two works that would make for a wonderful ninth-grade unit and, as a bonus, many of last year's ninth graders are picking up Wallflower and reading it on their own. In fact, I hadn't heard of the book until one of my students gave me a copy as a gift on the day before she moved to another part of town.

So teach it, you might exhort, especially given that students are finding the book, recommending to their peers, and enjoying it all on their own! What a great gift that young lady gave you! And what better way thank her for opening your eyes to this little gem than by teaching it to successive generations of freshmen.

You'd be right, of course, but the book contains instances of 1) straight premarital sex, 2) gay premarital* sex, 3) illicit drug use, 4) underage drinking of alcohol, 5) underage smoking of tobacco, 6) sexual abuse of minors by family members, 7) use of taboo language like "shit" and "fuck," 8) abortion, and 9) bad driving habits. Kicking the shit out of a gay student is also in the book, but would be of little concern to those who would be opposed to my teaching the novel.

It is no surprise to find out that Wallflower made the American Library Association's 2007 most challenged book list. Check out the list and you'll see the dirty fingerprints of arbitrary religious values all over the young and shapely bodies of 10 books written for young people (including the number one most challenged book, And Tango Makes Three, a children's picture book about penguins that supposedly mentions homosexuality and is "anti-family.")

Alas, the inability of teachers to bring into the classroom a sensitive and reflective protagonist immersed in a real and compelling coming of age in modern America further deteriorates their credibility in the eyes of their charges.

*Thanks to the State of California I couldn't have written "gay premarital sex" and had it mean anything legal until yesterday. Let us pray to a kind and loving deity that the Christian Right doesn't force me to revise my phrase.

Moving to the Tenth Grade

It looks like I'll be heading up to tenth grade with many of my current students. That is a good, since I can continue to get the struggling students ready for Nevada State High School Proficiency examinations. I hope that those who did not choose to do much this year will experience an epiphany over the summer and come back ready to engage. It's hard to teach writing to those unwilling to write.

Still, the overwhelming majority of the final essays I received showed at least a moderate amount of improvement from those I received at the beginning of the year. Students did pick up skills along the way, even if they failed the class. That's a good thing, because I have heard that summer school English classes are easy to pass and I'll be kicking them into high gear at the beginning of next school year. Can anyone say, "First-quarter research paper and presentation on a creation myth of your choice?"

(I was also voted "Goofiest Teacher," "Most Popular Teacher," and "Most Involved Teacher" by my colleagues in the Freshman House. Those three and a buck-fifty will buy me a coffee at Denny's. I didn't get "Hottest" or "Best Dressed," which made me ponder my ragged mortality once again.)

Yo Peeps! Mr. Rizzle Be da Teacher a da Month!

I was surprised last week by a phone call from our local pop hip-pop station. I was wary when the guy on the other end of the line identified himself as being from 98.5 KLUC; had my closet love of all things gangsta been somehow leaked to press?

Fortunately not. Instead, he was calling to inform me that one of my students had entered me in the station's "Teacher of the Month" contest and he needed to know when it was convenient for him to come down to the school and pass me a plaque and say a few words. We decided on last Tuesday morning, when the student who wrote the winning essay would also be in my class.

I got my plaque and the student and I got a coupon for a free sandwich at a chain sub store. Furthermore, I am automatically entered the Teacher of the Year competition sponsored by Southwest Airlines, Nevada Power, and Nevada State Bank, and Findlay Toyota. Airline tickets are definitely on the table, although I'd just as soon have a break from my summer electric bill.

Nice, right? It gets way better. These guys handed me a golden teaching opportunity on a chrome-plated spinner, yo. All the kids know the station and half of them worship it. And here I was, with the class's full attention after a member of their crowd had just achieved his first encounter with literary notoriety. So I took my Slim Shady chance and danced my words out:

"Brandon did this, not me. Brandon wrote 100 words and Brandon's words made something happen in the physical world. His words had the power to get me this award. So many times I have tried to explain why it is important to become skilled communicators and now, now you can see words in action!"

It was exhilarating, wonderful, f-ing amazing to watch all those minds behind all those faces get it. At that moment, the light of wonder and intellect fired around the room. It was a totally bitchin' experience.

To see the young writer's name next to mine, go to http://www.kluc.com/pages/1635063.php

Don't Chew on Non-Jews

I need to start an annual award for the best student malapropism. In the absence of any real motivation to do so, I will instead post them on this blog.

In this episode, we hear from a young lady, Miss H, who diligently tackled my research paper assignment. In an effort to limit peer-to-peer plagiarism and make endless grading more palatable, I assigned students to write an expository research paper on an event that occurred in the public arena within one week either side of the day they were born. Miss H chose Mr. Bobbitt's castration at the hand of his irate wife, Lorena. In her award-winning line, Miss H soberly reported that, "Lorena Bobbitt masticated her husband's gentile area." I was able to finally recover but H laid me out again with her closing paragraph, in which she concluded that, "men should not rape their wives and women should not masticate their husbands."

Advice we would all be wise to heed.

JuNu

I occasionally drop by YouTube and am often disappointed. On the other hand, I sometimes find something, always by accident, that makes me feel good. Those who know me can be absolutely certain I am not talking about sentimental poetry, or puppy pictures, or a video of Old Glory flapping over Amber Waves of Grain.

Steady readers may recall my love of Andy Mckee's guitar style. I periodically return to "Drifting" and let it play in the background. It's as if his music is mine and strangely personalized in a way that I can't adequately explain. It's just a video of a guy playing the guitar. Millions have seen it and yet it feels somehow as if I stumbled into a small pub on an off night and there was this guy up by the bar, just jamming away to nobody in particular. It's the same feeling I got on the few Sunday nights we made it to The Falkland Arms in Great Tew and crammed in to catch a buzz on real ale and listen to British folk pounded out on beat up guitars. In Great Tew, we sang along, pressed up so close to the musicians I could smell the beer as they harmonized, breath moist and malty, the chorus to "The Green Fields of France." It was an intimate, human connection.

This evening I ran across another artist. I never heard of her before and simply clicked on the link that only showed someone's hand on a fretboard. This young woman's work makes me feel good: not ecstatic, or overwhelmed, or amazed. She is not musical hyperbole but she seems an honest musician with talent and a good lyrical turn. She's trying hard to flog her CDs and shrug off misogynistic comments and insults. She is not a polished product* and, like the happy harmonizers in Great Tew, that may be a big reason I like her performance.

In any case, lean back and catch Julia Nunes as she performs her original piece, "Into the Sunshine." I smile when I listen, maybe you will to.

* Although I suppose her videos could be carefully crafted by EMI to look informal in order to generate a following and maybe test the market's waters. I would do it if I ran a record label.

"Probie"

So here I am again, the beginning of the second semester and trying to do a better job this time. I'm still a "probie."

Yesterday, I received my second evaluation for this school year. I get one one more this year and, if it is satisfactory, I'll be taken off probationary status. The district doesn't call it "tenure," but being post-probationary means essentially the same thing. Starting next year, I will receive only one evaluation per year and will be pretty much left alone to guide or abandon my charges as I see fit. A moderate amount of laziness won't get me fired, lack of detailed subject matter knowledge won't get me fired, giving out unproductive busy-work won't get me fired, inability to keep my students engaged and learning won't get me fired.

It's scary how much luck is involved in whether or not your child gets a competent teacher.

Oh, and I now have a second piece published in Grumble.

E-Published

I'm finally published, e-published, that is. It is nice to have someone who has never met me, isn't connected with anybody I know, and is interested in maintaining a quality product, choose to publish something I wrote. Loyal followers of this blog will recognize the piece, a slightly polished and renamed blog from earlier this year. To read it, go to the current issue of Grumble.

Join in the Discussion

I invite you to go to my new class blog, Extension, at http://mrrice.edublogs.org/ and join in the discussion.

I started it because it gives students time to reflect on a piece of text and then discuss it without the distractions and time restrictions we have in the regular classroom. I told them the whole world can read and contribute to the discussion. This seems to have done some good, since I have received thoughtful comments from students who normally do not do any work.

Those of you who have visited A Conspiracy of Silent Voices will recognize the poem being considered, but I told the students this was a "found" poem and thus must be viewed isolated from biography or history.