Spring post 1: research/project design

After reading the text provided about research/project design, I have a very confused look on my own project.  I'm not quite sure how to describe my project.

The way I describe my project (without linking it to the text) is a study on the effectiveness of using a non-traditional teaching strategy in science education.  Does learning take place using hands-on, practical lessons rather than using textbooks, lectures and testing?  Essentially, my goal is to try to find an alternative to the education I had, which I found very boring and (as a result) inefficient.

The basis of the final result is heavily influenced by the students.  While there is an aspect of comparison in the study, the results aren't very empirically based.  The data I wish to collect comes from the students' perception of their performance, the feelings they have toward the project and their evaluation of the effectiveness of this strategy.  As a teacher, my primary concern is for my students.  If they aren't having a positive experience it's not worth-while to continue to subject them to something they don't like or aren't benefiting from.

Based on the Creswell text, the project I want to do seems to draw from various categories listed.  The first connection I can find is to Social Constructivism, in the sense that this project relies "as much as possible on the participants' views of the situation being studied" (Creswell p. 8).  It also has connection to Social Construcivism because this project is based on social interactions, how students will react to a different learning style.
The second connection I can find is to Advocacy/Participatory philosophy.  While I don't consider myself political or an advocacy type of person, the definition of this philosophy is similar to this study.  Advocacy/Participatory philosophy has studies that lead to some sort of change in peoples' lives.  This study being tied directly to the education of people, if it is successful it may lead to changes in the way science is taught.
This study is also linked to the Postpositive philosophy in the sense that it is challenging the accepted form of education that is in place.  While the postpositive philosophy also includes a great deal of scientific principles (scientific method, hypothesis, observation, etc.) that's not the link to my science based project.

So I stand here pretty confused as to what category my project falls under.  I have links to different categories but I'm not sure which best describes my project.  It seems my goal is Advocacy/Participatory based, my methods are Social Constructivist based and the implementation of my study is Postpositive based.

What makes a unit STEMS-y

The problem with the idea of “STEMS²” concepts is that it’s one of those things that I can’t really quantify or classify.  It’s more of a feeling than a description, for me.  When I think about what I felt were very STEMS-y lessons, adventures and activities, I think back to our 2 and a half weeks together on O’ahu and Big Island.  I suppose I could label certain vague aspects of a unit or lesson that could make it qualify as STEMS-y.

-        Generally, we were outside for our learning journeys, so, if it’s not in a traditional classroom setting, that’s a good indicator.  Even though we were inside for a few of our learning days, the things we covered linked to our outdoor experiences. 

-        Most of the time there was a Hawaiian aspect involved in our lessons.  This doesn’t mean that if it doesn’t have Hawaiian culture in it it’s not STEMS-y.

-        There were lots of hands-on activities, we were mostly doing stuff rather than reading or writing

-        People who weren’t our teachers were our teachers for that day

-        Time was a very fluid concept

It might be easier to just go over a few examples of what were the most memorable experiences for me and why I feel they are very STEMS-y

Sailing with Na Pea

This has to be my top pick for best STEMS unit we did on Big Island.  There were so many facets of this day that are so memorable.  I can go through the basic check marks.  We were outside.  We had very hands-on activities.  There was Hawaiian cultural side to it.  The kids were the ones who were our primary teachers for this lesson.  And, we totally ran over our time limit.

Why was this lesson so memorable for me?  Usually in a classroom we just learn about what the boats look like, what they’re used for and how they work.  It’s very superficial and you form no connection with the lesson.  For this lesson we were experiencing them.  I learned from the kids how to sail, along with the other side of sailing like rigging the canoe, tying ropes, etc.  I think I was just mostly impressed how much the students knew.  They had so much knowledge and were really good at relaying the information in their heads to us.  People think teaching is hard, but they were making it look really easy.  Essentially, the teacher/student line gets a little fuzzy here.  When someone else teaches the class, the teacher becomes a student who learns alongside their students.  The students get to actually see that the teacher is now learning with them.

Another interesting aspect of this day was the concept of dealing with the unexpected.  Different people take away different things from any given moment.  For my experience, I was so stoked I got to work the sail and that I didn’t screw up.  I figured since everything went by the book my experience was solid.  The other group sailing in the other boat all of a sudden huli-ed.  They got back up and everyone was fine.  When we got back in I asked them about it, and they were so stoked they flipped.  They got to experience the procedure for when shit hits the fan and they performed well.  From the students’ point of view, they only have to execute shit hit the fan procedures if they screw up.  From the teachers’ point of view, they took away something valuable.  The students were confused by this.  But that’s the beauty of the unexpected, you never know what you’re going to learn nor what experience will be valuable. 

I think the most important aspect of this lesson that made it so STEMS is the fact that it’s so engaging.  It accesses and crosses so many different disciplines at once into an action.  Being active is another aspect that makes it a good lesson.  Experiencing the boat, the sail and the water was the part of this trip that stands out the most.    The one overall aspect of this lesson that made it so memorable, it was fun.

Night Activities

We had lots of fun night time on this trip.  Aside from the nights we had at the Tooman house, I’m talking about the couple of nights at Kilauea.  These were unscripted adventures, but were very much inspired and linked to the lessons learned throughout the day. 

Night photography may not have been inspired by anything we learned, but it was fun.  It was also a nearly perfect example of the design process in action.  Examining a long exposure pictures of the stars revealed a streak of red light.  Someone asks the question, “What is that?”  Someone says it’s a headlamp of someone walking across the shot.  One thing leads to another, and we’re taking pictures and experimenting to see which iteration of variables creates the best picture.  I’m fairly certain this was DJ’s first attempt writing the STEMS² and all of our poses.  1^st try, best try.

Other night activities were the walk back to the cabins from the crater.  I don’t remember who had the idea to walk back, but it was a good’n.  As we marched, we got to see different plants, and some shrine or prayer rocks.  I had my headlamp and flashlight full blast.  I assumed it’d be pitch black because it was night and there were no lights around.  Everyone else also had their lights and part way, someone decided we should stop, turn our lights off and enjoy the darkness.  Turns out, the glow from the crater we all saw a little while before was being reflected off the haze.  The sky was a bright orange and we could clearly see each other without our flashlights.  Pretty cool. 

Another one of these night activities was that night we sang with each other in Kona.  Just a fun exchange of cultural knowledge.  Seeing who could play the ukulele, who could sing, what songs we knew, who could dance?  Mostly though, it was just fun to be around this group and enjoy their company.  

 Shout out to Jen Seki.  Two of these are from her efforts on the trip

Free Blog

In the past (as in, during teacher’s ed), I’ve enjoyed these free topic blog posts because I’m constantly experiencing things that make me think, I need to share this with the class.  I like it cus it’s fun and I get to talk about whatever I want while still getting credit for it.   These days, I’m experiencing less of these sharable moments.  I only have one in recent memory I thought I wanted to share with the group.

This is something that happened at bowling practice one day.  I am lucky enough to be a part of a staff that doesn’t really have a “restriction” on who we are teaching.  We have three teams (varsity, JV black and JV red).  Technically my title is head JV coach, which means my primary responsibility is the black team.  The fun thing is that every one of our staff feels free to coach everyone, we’re not limited to our “own kids”.  One of these days I was watching the team as a whole and noticed one of the bowlers (kid A) having issues so I started to give him advice.  While I was doing this, the others were listening in and one of them (kid B) started chiming his own two cents.  Mind you kid B has had a total of 3 months of bowling experience under his belt, so, even though I liked the fact that they’re collaborating and helping each other, I was quick to point out that one of us has more experience and should probably listen to me (since the two cents kid B offered was completely wrong).  The rest of the conversation went like this:

Kid A: But Panda, he’s my Tutu

Me: …he’s your grandmother?

Kid A: No, no…what’s teacher?

Me: Kumu.

Kid A: Oh yeah, that.

Kid B: …I thought that was humu?

Me: That’s a fish…and not even its full name.

Kid B: Oh yeah…

First I thought, that’s hilarious.  Second I thought, wow, these kids have almost no useable Hawaiian knowledge.  Is that what we were talking about this whole time, how a lot of students have zero real connection to the place they’re from when they go through their schooling career?  It made me kinda sad, that these are the kind of people who spread their limited and incorrect local knowledge to the rest of the world.  Probably why we as local people watched the re-made Hawai’i Five-0 for a little while, laughed at all the mistakes and fake pidgin accents then stopped watching cus it ended up irritating us (my experience).  I mean, recently I was reading an article in Guns & Ammo about a hunting trip the writer took to Maui.  He wrote about his fondness for the “authentic” luau he attended at some touristy establishment and how they slow roast pigs in underground pits.  He couldn’t even write imu, although it’s probably best he didn’t because his next statement was that while he was searching possible hunts to take while in the islands he’d found a guide to take him on a pua hunt.  I sat there thinking to myself, …you’re going flower hunting?

These two occurrences merged into one when I came to a thought about the importance of place-based or cultural-based learning we’re experiencing in this program.  Yes, this style of learning is largely beneficial to someone like me or to the others in our program and to many of the future students we’ll have as educators.  But that very thought of, “These kids are going to go to school in the mainland after high school and spout off so many inaccurate statements about being “Hawaiian” made me wonder about the goals of certain students’ education.  The students I’m in contact with attend a college prep school, the goal of their education being preparing them for college.  A lot of students to end up going to UH: Mānoa, like I did, but for the majority of the class, the next level of education happens at some other school on the continental United States.  I’m going to irritate people when I say, this stuff we’re learning is important but I can see why for some people they just won’t care because it’s not the goal of their education.  The goal of some people is to not be members of the culture we have here in this place.  Personally, I value the place/cultural-based education facet of learning.  Being from this place, I wanted to know more about the culture and history of Hawai’i.  I took the Hawaiian history and culture classes offered at ‘Iolani.  I took a year of Hawaiian language at UH for fun, even though I’m awful at learning languages and my degree had zero language requirements.  I bought and read books about Hawaiian mythology, even though I hate reading.  It’s important and interesting for me because I’m from here, I’m a part of this place.  Knowing more enlightens my being here and allows me to see things from various perspectives.  That’s just me, everyone’s different; apparently, especially people from the same school as me.  

Blog 3: Sense of Place

A common theme among us as STEMS²-sters is that our definition and/or understanding of “sense of place” has changed these past few weeks.  I’ve taken a place-based education course previously in the EDCS department, and even then I’ve really only viewed place-based education as a physical, geographic place that you can pull resources from to teach your class.  This geographic place is definitely still a part of sense of place and we shouldn’t look past it, but the vastness of the possibilities of what sense of place means is still a new and exciting place to explore.

The change I’ve noticed in my view of sense of place comes from what abstract places I can draw resources from when teaching a student.  Generally, when I ask someone where they’re from I wanna know either what school you went to or what part of the island or which island they’re from.  After completing and reading other’s sense of place assignments, I’m starting to think of place as a person’s background also rather than just where they’re from or where they feel comfortable.  What I mean by that is your place can be related to sports you play or hobbies you like to do or communities/organizations you’re a part of.  It’s an indicator of where you come from and what qualities or knowledge you possess.

I’ll give you an example of this and how I’m using it for my purposes.  You all know I’m not teaching in a classroom right now, my current experiences as a teacher type person are coming from coaching bowling.  This idea that place is connected to a person’s hobbies or sports background hit me last Thursday at practice.  One of my bowlers was having a hard time with picking up his spares and I reminded him of a conversation we had last year.  He completely remembered and recited for me the point I was trying to get across to him (enduring understanding, I was so proud).  The conversation from last year went like this,

Me – (after he missed a spare) What happened? Why are you throwing the ball like you’re all disgusted?

Him – You didn’t see my first ball?  It was perfect and I didn’t get a strike.

Me – So? That means you’re gonna waste a chance to get a spare?

Him – What’s the point? It’s not as good as a strike.

Me – What’s the point of your first ball?

Him – To get a strike.

Me – In other words, knock all the pins down.  What’s the point of your spare shot?

Him – To hit whatever you didn’t from the first ball.

Me – In other words, knock all the pins down, same goal for both balls.  You play volleyball, right?

Him – Yeah…

Me – Do you serve a lot?

Him – Yeah…

Me – What’s the point of serving?  What’s your ideal goal when you’re serving a ball?

Him – To get a point.

Me – Okay, say you serve the ball and it’s a beauty.  You send it right where you want it, then the guy on the other team dives and pancakes it.  What do you do, walk off the court?  Say aww crap, I didn’t get a point screw it…?

Him – No, cus they’ll return the ball over to us and we can try again to still get a point…oh…

Me – Same goal for both balls, so why are you putting less effort into one of them?

Every student has prior knowledge.  Everyone has some unique way of looking at or understanding new concepts.  For teachers, adapting or relating what the students already know to what you’re trying to teach them is a great way to relay information to students.  As a teacher, I have my prior knowledge that I’ve gained from my sense of places.  Students may not have the same knowledge base that I have while others do.  Luckily for me, a lot of students are athletes too.  If I can explain things through sports I know and they know, great.  A lot of sports have lots of aspects in common and can easily be translated.  If not, maybe movie or TV references.  I just gotta find that one thing that they’ll understand.  

'Iolani Bowling

‘Iolani Bowling

Even though I’m not employed as a full-time teacher at a school, for my school portrait I’m showcasing the ‘Iolani Bowling team.  As an alumnus of the program and as this is my 7^th year as a coach, I feel like I have a pretty solid idea of what our program is all about.  This summer marked my 10^th anniversary of being a part of the ‘Iolani athletics department.  My participation with ‘Iolani athletics began in the summer of 2005, as a student athlete.  Throughout high school I participated in various sports, mainly bowling, but also wrestling, judo and track and field. 

The ‘Iolani athletics philosophy is, as I’m sure many of you know, the “One Team” philosophy.  Branded by Father Bray, it represents the corner stone of what we try to instill in all of our student athletes.  “One Team” is more than just a motto, it’s what we strive to express on a day to day basis.  At its basis, “One Team” means that we strive to achieve our goals, not as individuals, but as a cohesive unit.  We treat no one like they are more important than any other team member because no one team member IS more important than anyone else.  We strive for victory, humbly and with dignity.  But even if we don’t win, we strive for unity, cooperation, comradery, humility, pride and sportsmanship.  Which, if we display those qualities, is more important than a victory.  ‘Iolani students are taught these ideals and are expected to live them.  At the end of the day, we aren’t trying to produce great athletes, we’re trying to produce great people.   

As a coach, I try to first and foremost, teach my players what it means to be an ‘Iolani student.  They have been given a privilege coveted by many, and they should appreciate what they’ve been offered.  Secondly, I try to teach them to the best of my ability so they can improve as bowlers and find success in whatever form they’ve set out as their goal.  I try my hardest to be the coach I wish I had in my early career as an ‘Iolani Bowler.  It’s a long and complicated story.  To be brief, I am a four year varsity starter, however, I was initially put on JV my freshman year because my coach was not happy that I came in with prior lessons.  She enjoyed having everyone be her product, and since I didn’t learn from her, I must have learned wrong.  I was treated differently than everyone else and had to prove myself more-over to get anywhere on the team.  In the end, she screwed up as a coach and put herself in a position to be removed from that position.  I strive every day to be everything she wasn’t so that this generation of bowlers have a positive experience while under my coaching. 

My bowlers all share the same schooling and same values that I was taught.  However, they come from different backgrounds.  For example, I came into the bowling program as a bowler.  I had prior lessons and had my own coach.  I learned from someone else.  These guys come to me fresh, in my 7 years as a coach, I’ve only had a handful of bowlers; real bowlers (had formal lessons and compete outside of school).  Most come to the bowling program because they hear it’s easy and fun, which it is.  Not many athletic programs can boast that the only conditioning is the air conditioning.  They do, however, come from other athletic programs and have their own set of skills they bring to the table.  I try my hardest to convey the knowledge I have in ways they can understand.  One of the sentiments from the Place and Community Based Education in Schools book we had to read was that students have previous knowledge.  They have ways of looking at things based on what they already know, it’s the teacher’s job to translate what you want to teach them in a way that mirrors what they already know so they can understand it.  My bowlers come from various other sports, baseball, basketball, football, volleyball, etc.  I’m not well versed in many sports, I grew up playing baseball, what I did for ‘Iolani’s wrestling team stretches the definition of the word “wrestle” and I went out for track because the throwers ate a lot.  I have a fair understanding of the different sports in the world, so I try to relate information about bowling to their backgrounds.  Getting to know my bowlers as people, I think, is what gives me the most success when I try to reach them as a coach.

Freshman Year 2006

Sophomore Year 2007

Junior Year 2008

Senior Year 2009

2008 HHSAA medal

Senior year Kaua'i 4th place

The Eddie Hamada Award

Boys JV 2010

 

'Iolani Boys Bowling Varsity JV Black and JV Red 2011

Just one of the medals my Boys got for winning the ILH

'Iolani Boys and Girls JV 2012

Boys JV 2013 

Boys JV 2014

Boys Varsity and JV 2015

Culture of community around the school – how does that culture feed into the school?

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/HI/Honolulu/Moiliili.html

The community surrounding ‘Iolani is Mō’ili’ili.  Historically, this is a community of Japanese American farmers.  The surrounding structures and establishments speak to this.  The Japanese Cultural Center is located not far from the school.  There are Buddhist churches in the area as well as former Japanese Language schools.

Based on the history of the area geographically, the type of people who would settle here would be farmers.  The topography of this region, at the time of Japanese immigration to the cane and pineapple fields, was fertile swampland.  Immigrants looking to make a life for their own would have settled here to grow crops.  My family was one of the farming families who settled this area in order to start their new lives, after working in the fields.  My family turned from agriculture to real estate when it converted the home on their property into an apartment building for rent.

http://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/HI/Honolulu/Moiliili-Demographics.html

http://www.areavibes.com/honolulu-hi/mxcully-moiliili/demographics/

 Today’s layout of this area speaks to this change.  Brought on by the construction of the Ala Wai Canal, urbanization of the area formed the dense population in such a small area.  The area surrounding ‘Iolani School are various high-rise condominiums as well as low-rent apartments and run down houses.

The racial population of Mō’ili’ili remains mostly “Asian” (the majority of that group being Japanese).  However, a good sized portion of the population is Caucasian.  That’s likely due to the fact that the three major condo’s (the Royal ‘Iolani, ‘Iolani Court Plaza and Marco Polo) attract a lot of retiree’s who want to spend their golden years in Hawai’i.

School culture itself – iolani’s culture

The school doesn’t derive a lot of its culture from the surrounding area.  To be perfectly honest, not a lot of the families within the surrounding areas would be able to afford to send their kids to ‘Iolani.  While there are expensive condos where people live, the majority of the housing in the area are houses that are falling apart or crowded old apartments.  The majority of the students in this area go to Kaimuki High School, which is one street over from ‘Iolani. 

‘Iolani, as a private school, has a prejudiced view from the general public.  It does have a high tuition to go to school there.  Currently, full tuition without scholarship is $20,900.  Considering high school education costs more than college in Hawa’i makes people make a big deal about this. 

Average commute time for ‘Iolani is 23.6 minutes.  This is just an average amount of time students take to get to campus.  This is not an accurate estimate of where the students originate from.  Students can live in the buildings next to campus (as I do) or can live as far away as Makakilo, Kahuku or Waialua.

The ethnic demographic of ‘Iolani has as its largest category “Asian/Pacific Islander”.  However, I can assure you from my experience the number would be just as high if the “Pacific Islander” category was left out of the “Asian” category. 

http://private-schools.startclass.com/l/116087/Iolani-School

 The fact that this is a private institution and is very expensive to go to, ‘Iolani generally has a target on its back.  Whether it’s for athletics, academics or for general prejudices people have about the school or its students.  In our defense, not all the students who come out of ‘Iolani act privileged and spoiled.  In the defense of those who prejudge ‘Iolani kids, yeah, some are spoiled brats.  In the athletics department, historically our teams have viewed themselves as the underdogs due to their limited size (being mostly a Japanese student body has its physical limitations).  It’s interesting to think that a school with so much resources views itself as having to rise up over obstacles.  Despite not being a dominant power in the ILH for many sports, ‘Iolani has other areas that it competes in and does well.  The various clubs and teams ‘Iolani endorses have had their successes in the past and present.  The various robotics teams have done well on the state and national level as well as speech/debate teams and the economics teams. 

Blog 1: What I been up to

Blog 1:

As you all know, I’m currently not employed as a teacher.  It’s not like I don’t want to be a teacher, but, I’d prefer to focus on this program.  That being said, I’m making attempts to get into the classroom and hopefully maneuver my way into a job once I’m ready for it.  Since the summer journey we all took, I’ve applied to ‘Iolani to be on their sub list.  Basically, I just said, “hey I wanna sub” and they said they’ll call me if they need one.  Whenever that call comes and I’m in the classroom, I’ll let you all know.

Mainly what I was going to report on was my vay-cay with Nicole on Kaua’i.  I had a blast hanging out with her.  It’s so nice to see people from this group in person, especially since we all lived together for that two and a half week stretch of time.  I was so excited to go on this trip I couldn’t sleep Thursday night.  Friday came and I was just sitting and waiting for my flight time to creep nearer.

I was on Kaua’i because my friends have a family camping trip in Waimea and I’ve been meaning to go for a few years now.  The possibility of seeing Nicole

was an added selling point for me to go, so I went a day early to hang out.  We only spent a day together, but it was packed with fun stuff. 

First night, after we ate at Hamura’s, we did some of the readings together before we went to bed.  It’s strange, going on a vacation to do homework, but that’s what we did.  I guess that’s what STEMS² did to us???  On our full day adventure we observed and interacted with the wildlife in the area, visited a farmers market, worked on Nicole’s daughter’s boat project, went to a beach, talked story with an interesting couple, and I got to visit Nicole’s classroom.

Princeville Wildlife Reserve:

If anyone saw the FB videos and pictures, you’ll know why that name is funny.  It’s one of those fountain waterfall type pond areas people are supposed to look at and go, oh, rich people…  Interestingly enough, the pond was rich with wildlife.  The reason we went was to catch guppies for Nicole’s fish tank, but in the process, we noticed the natural habitat of a native bird species, and an unexpected creature, catfish.  As we spent more time there, a worker of the resort came out to feed the birds and fish.  We chatted with him and he was telling us that the moorhen is endangered but is thriving in the ponds.  He pointed out a thicket of tall grass that the adult birds dodged in and out of because that was their nest, and there were a few hatchlings hiding in there.  The catfish were unexpected, and he was saying they just popped up and have been thriving in that water.  And are likely the reason for the decline in guppies Nicole noticed earlier.

Hanalei Farmer’s Market:

There’s not much to report here.  Basically, a farmer’s market.  Natural produce, arts and crafts for sale, and a guy playing ukulele and singing songs that reminded us of the songs we sang on our trip.  

Boat work:

Interesting part about this was Nicole’s use of the hala pods as paint brushes.  It was really fun work and I wish I got to do more.

Anahola Beach:

You never know what will happen next.  The randomness of life is so interesting.  After we went to the beach to rinse of the sweat from the day, we stopped at a strangely placed lunch wagon on the side of the road.  We figured we’d stop because we were hungry and because I was curious what a “pronto puff” was.  Turns out it was a typo, supposed to be “pronto pupp”, hotdog on a stick.  Underwhelming.  What was interesting was that the uncle and aunty who run the truck had a wealth of knowledge about the place and Hawaiian history.  He told us a story about the bones that were taken to the Smithsonian for testing and dating.

Nicole’s classroom:

It’s always interesting to see someone else’s space of teaching.  I’ve never been to Kapa’a High School before, so it was an experience already.  But I think it was more fun helping Nicole set up something her students would enjoy.  It was her second attempt at installing a fish tank in the class, and hopefully it would work this time.  Not to mention it was fun being able to populate this tank with fish that we had caught earlier in the day. 

This brief summary of the trip isn’t a very good description of the experience as a whole. I just wish, instead, I could have shared that experience with everyone.  The fun that we had and the enrichment we gained from just spending time together just adds to the sentiment that we really really need to get together and be a group again.