DIY is authentic

Mark Frauenfelder in THE ATLANTIC :

Imagine a school where kids could do the following: clone jellyfish DNA; build gadgets to measure the electrical impulses of cockroach neurons; make robotic blackjack dealers; design machines that can distinguish between glass, plastic, and aluminum beverage containers and sort them into separate bins; and convert gasoline-burning cars to run on electric power.

No such school exists, but in August I went to Detroit and met the kids who did all these things, and more. They—along with 22,000 other people—had come from all over the United States and Canada to demo their creations at Maker Faire, a two-day festival of do-it-yourselfers, crafters, musicians, urban homesteaders, kit makers, scientists, engineers, and curious visitors who congregated to present projects, give performances, and swap ideas. Having attended eight Maker Faire events since 2006 (they’re put on by the same company that owns the magazine I edit), I’ve become convinced of two things about children and education: (1) making things is a terrific way to learn, and (2) schools are failing to teach kids to learn with their hands.

My son attended a technical high school and while he has a natural proclivity for physics, he struggled at first with chemistry. His chemistry teacher suggested that the problem may have been that he thinks with his hands. I don't know if that's true, but I know that the men in my family have an engineering-tinkering proclivity.

The challenge is to come up with some Language Arts DIY -- I mean beside the annual literary magazine and the increasingly irrelevant monthly newspaper, which are only semi-authentic as it is. They really only serve as a function of the school community without any direct outside use or application. But surely students can produce work of more general application. Perhaps they could develop a sustainability plan for the district, which would be a cross-disciplinary project with the Science Department. Or work with the police department and write a safety plan (although that may involve confidential matters which makes student participation impossible).

How about online wikis for the general community; job or recreation resources. Create study or discussion materials. Develop a One Book plan for the entire community. The municipal library may be able to steer students towards needs it or its patrons have.

But the point of these projects is not to look at them as something to earn Community Service points toward graduation. They each have literacy education value of their own. Remember, when our parents and teachers saw us acting out in frustration, they would tell us, "Use your words." Why not use our words to actually make stuff?

The jury is still out

Web 2.0 is definitely exciting for a teacher, if for no other reason that it is exciting to our students; one can't help suspect that somewhere in this welter of interactivity, there are powerful tools for learning lurking.

But first, back to my former life. Back in 1999, I was working at CNBC. I was at the center of the investor universe, hearing about all the latest business trends before anyone knew they were trends. In those days we were at the height of the Internet Bubble. Every day new companies were making buckets of money by launching new IPOs based on business plans glittering with buzzwords about this new business frontier. Everyone was convinced that because this was new and exciting, it had to be the opportunity to make money.

And, of course, a year later we saw the beginning of the end. IPOs began to sputter out. Start-ups ran through their initial capitalization without ever producing a product. Investor money dried up and by early 2001 it was virtually all over.

But the internet is still here, everyone recognizes its value and some people have made money in it. But it took time. And it took relentless experimentation and a tolerance for error, and the opportunity to go down blind alleys, double back and try again. No one's giving up, but we all realize that exciting doesn't mean obvious or easy.

To me, at the moment, Twitter feels like Internet 1999. Wikis, blogs, Skype, Ning, all of these have clear applications in the classroom, and it will just take some time to develop curriculum-specific adaptations. But honestly, whereas I see that Twitter may be useful for administrators and educational leaders to communicate with each other across distances, I do not see it as a powerful communicative or collaborative medium in the language arts. I may just be a geezer lacking insight. But the economic-technological barriers (for example, we cannot guarantee all of our students have ready access) and the 140-character limit diminishes the immediate possibilities, IMHO (to employ a tired Web 1.0 idiom).

For all the postings I have seen about Twitter in education, I have yet to be directed to a complete, classroom ready lesson plan in high school language arts employing Twitter. I'm not saying it can't be done; it's just that I haven't seen it yet myself. Sorry :(