Fun in the Classroom

Introduction

Homework and rigor chafe me like a pair of 40-grit sandpaper underwear. While homework has been around since I was in school it is now a conscript in the war on children. In response to a perceived everyone-gets-a-trophy culture the educational world has responded with rigor and grit. Terms that are better suited to describing corpses and crime dramas than education.

A few years ago I started referring to homework as homefun, but my resolve soon wilted in the face of the pervasive work worship of the American educational system. When our district was trying to adopt a learning management system, the administration kept touting the gamification aspects. I was intrigued. How could we make school more like a game? Unfortunately the instruction consisted mostly of the tech guy standing at the front of the room with a SmartBoard saying, “badges and leaderboards” on an infinite loop. The idea has also been the topic of breakout sessions at the Midwest Educational Technology Conference, but every time it was presented I kept hearing the same thing, and that was not how I viewed gaming or fun. My idea of fun involved solving puzzles, discovering treasure, and hiking to a mountain overlook. I decided to research gaming and see if there was a way to integrate their design framework into project based learning.

During my research I came across references to the fourteen types of fun and realized that on every curriculum document and lesson plan that I have ever read there was not a box for fun. There was a box for the alphanumeric stew of standards. There was a box for homework. And that is about as far as I got because I usually started to doze off. Inside every board game box, often printed on the underside of the lid is a set of instructions. Every game from Axis & Allies to Candyland have similar sections called the object, contents, setup, and gameplay all of which have obvious parallels to unit plans, so why are games fun and schools rigorous and gritty?

Methodology

One possible answer is that educators, students and the school system value different types of fun. In order to collect some data on this question I developed a ridiculously unscientific and informal survey in which I asked teachers and students to pick their top types of fun. Basically if science was health food, it would be a kale and quinoa salad and this survey would be a bowl of ice cream topped with Cap’n Crunch. I thought of the idea on the drive to work and without much forethought immediately sat down at my computer to create a Google Form full of typos to send out. It was sent to educators through all school email, Twitter, and Facebook. The student survey was given to my students in class who were offered extra credit to complete it (more on this later) and passed along by other educators. I did not collect email addresses or demographic data because I did not want to broach privacy concerns or make it difficult for people to answer. Again, this was not science and did not meet any standards of ethics for using human test subjects. I am working under the assumption that participants willingly took the right survey and only responded once. In total eighty-nine educators and ninety-four students responded.

Below is a list of the fourteen types of fun as described in the survey.

Fourteen Types of Fun

• Beauty - That which pleases the senses. You enjoy art galleries, scenic overlooks, concerts, and dining out.
• Immersion - You enjoy role playing or escapist literature. You like getting lost in another world.
• Intellectual Problem Solving - You enjoy finding solutions to challenging problems and situations that require thought.
• Competition - You enjoy proving your superiority in. It is good to be first.
• Social Interaction - You like doing things with other human beings. You like social media and hanging with friends.
• Comedy - You like to laugh. You enjoy stand-up comedy and funny movies.
• Thrill of Danger - Activities are inherently more fun if the stakes are high. You are an adrenaline junkie.
• Physical Activity - This is kind of self-explanatory. You like to play sports.
• Love - Deep meaningful relationships and affection towards others. Romantic.
• Creation - You like to make things, build things, write things, and paint things that have not existed before.
• Power - You enjoy have a strong effect on others. You are an influencer.
• Discovery - You enjoy finding out what wasn't know before. It can be exploring the physical world or uncovering secrets.
• Advancement and Completion - You like achieving levels and finishing tasks. You were an excellent scout earning many badges and ranks. Eventually you earned the top rank.
• Application of a Skill - Using one’s physical abilities in a difficult situation. You take pride in your skills such as hand eye coordination or reflexes.

https://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/227531/fourteen_forms_of_fun.php

Predictions

My assumption going into this was that there would be a disparity in the types of fun that students and teachers reported liking. My students were quite adamant that I had no idea what fun was, and I assumed that this relationship was similar to what other teachers experienced. It also seemed intuitively obvious that the school system valued competition, advancement, and completion by awarding class rank, letters for athletics and extracurriculars, grades, and diplomas. It is my belief that emphasizing these types of fun over the twelve other types can have a negative impact on students’ and teachers’ enjoyment of education.



Table 1: My predictions of responses Predictions

Teachers	Students
Intellectual Problem Solving	Social Interaction
Creation	Competition
Discovery	Comedy
Advancement & Completion	Thrill of Danger
Beauty	Advancement and Completion

. Obviously, this reflects my bias about teachers and students. I invite you to make your own predictions prior to reading the results.

Results (Too late. If you didn’t make your own predictions it is too late now.)

Table 2

Educator (89)		Students (94)
Beauty	65.2	Comedy	71.9
Social Interaction	61.8	Creation	48.3
Comedy	57.3	Social Interaction	44.9
Love	42.7	Phys. Activity	43.8
Creation	40.4	Competition	40.4
Int. Problem Solving	37.1	Beauty	39
Discovery	36	Power	38.2
Immersion	34.8	Application of Skill	36
Phys. Activity	32.6	Discovery	36
Application of Skill	19.1	Love	32.6
Adv. Completion	18	Int. Problem Solving	31.5
Competition	14.6	Immersion	29.2
Thrill of Danger	12.4	Thrill of Danger	27
Power	8	Adv. Completion	21.3

Table 3: Similarity Score (smaller number = more similar. Positive numbers indicate a teacher preference; negative numbers indicate a student preference.)

Table 2

Type of Fun	Difference in percent
Power	-30.2
Beauty	26.2
Competition	-25.8
Application of Skill	16.9
Social Interaction	16.9
Comedy	-14.6
Thrill of Danger	-14.6
Phys. Activity	-11.2
Love	10.1
Creation	-7.9
Int. Problem Solving	5.6
Immersion	5.6
Adv. and Completion	-2.2
Discovery	---

Observations (or the point in the report when you say to yourself, “Does this guy have a life?”)

At first I was only looking for similarities in ranking and was surprised to find out that teachers and students share three of the top five; Social Interaction, Comedy, and Creation. They also share two of the bottom five; Advancement and Completion and Thrill of Danger.

I was going to compare relative rank to see which types of the fun show the most disparity between teachers and students, but then I noticed that the students were a more heterogeneous group. This makes sense because all students are required to go to school, but teachers are a self-selected group that would likely have similar characteristics, or as popular opinion would have it a group of those that “can’t.” With the exception of Comedy which is a clear favorite with 71.9% of the students choosing it, all of the types of fun fell between 21% and 48 % selection showing a fairly even distribution amongst students. Teachers show a steep decline after Physical Activity which was chosen by 32% of the teachers. Next on the list was Application of Skill at 19%.

Comparing percentages between students and teachers, Discovery shows the most similarity with both groups coming in at 36%. The biggest disparity is in the realm of Competition with 40% percent student approval and only 15% of the teachers expressing an affinity for competing.

What I find most interesting is that Advancement and Completion were ranked near the bottom for both groups with only about one out of every five participants selecting it as part of their top five. Yet the school system is entirely constructed on advancement and completion. Students literally collect credits like on an old school upright Pac Man machine at Aladdin's Castle in the mall in order to complete a level and power up. After completing the twelfth level, education designers create a secret leaderboard and anoint the top point earner the valedictorian. We might as well give the kids a trackball and have them enter their monogram for posterity. Any student earning a perfect score is enshrined as an educational deity to whom all other students are compared. There is an obvious disconnect between education design and human concepts of fun.

Conclusions (The part most of you skipped to after looking at the tables)

Schools and education have not been designed by students and teachers. Somehow the one-fifth of the population that ranks Advancement and Completion as one of their favorites has taken over the system. Perhaps one reason is because this is one of the easiest types to quantify. Subjective data driven design for Love, Discovery, or Comedy is virtually impossible unless you install arcade style love testers and laugh-o-meters in the classroom. We often describe students who enjoy the hard to measure qualities as being intrinsically motivated and we consider this somehow better than the other types.

There is room for all types of fun in the classroom. It seems as if almost everyone values so called intrinsic motivation while at the same time demanding numbers to justify pedagogical choices. We should compromise and make room in our planning to consider how fun factors into our design. Obviously, given the heterogeneity of the student population we cannot please all of the students all of the time. One hundred percent engagement is a mythological beast worshipped by a small cult of wide-eyed sycophants intent on punishing non-believers, but we should analyze our own view of fun and recognize that it does not always match our audience’s expectations.

For example, it seems that most teachers, including myself, are not fans of competition. This may be because we are a bunch of nerds that were emotionally scarred by a particularly bruising bout of dodgeball, but the fact remains that students value it significantly more. We should examine our preconceived notions of the harm it might do the losers. Recently, while having a discussion with students about how to improve my lessons, a student suggested using Kahoot. I was familiar with the word from different conferences but mostly as something that I dismissed as too juvenile to use with my students. Many of the students agreed that Kahoot would be a great idea. I even asked my son, a sophomore at another school, and he said that his Spanish teachers use it. I went to the website and analyzed it in terms of the types of fun.

It is a quiz site with no more capabilities than Google Forms or Quizlet, but it does appeal to at least four types of fun. First of all it has colors and music which appeals to the students desire for beauty (This of course is in the eye of the beholder). It also incorporates a thrill of danger by having a time limit for answers, and the competitive aspect of a leader board allows students to rank themselves with their peers. Finally, it includes the application of skill and the minimal physical activity of tapping a button on their device as quickly as possible. The challenge for teachers is how to use Kahoot in way that actually promotes higher order thinking and not just recall.

I attempted to create a “serious” game for my mythology unit. One of the highlights of this school year was when I beta tested this text-based game I made about Joseph Campbell’s heroic cycle (Here is a link). Students that had not engaged in the texts, Gilgamesh and Star Wars, excitedly leapt from their chairs to make decisions about which characters to “speak to” and what objects to “pick up” for their inventory. I had assumed that the students would not be interested and offered it as an one day extra credit opportunity, I was surprised when they came back two days later asking if we were going to keep playing.

Fun is not a cure all. Those students asking to keep playing the game did not go home that night and login. They didn’t all of a sudden develop the chimeric love of learning we so desperately desire. Obviously teachers can’t be expected to be game designers or required to use websites like Kahoot. We can start to question the role that fun plays in our lessons and incorporate elements of the game design framework into our own plans. How can we structure our lessons so that students can gracefully fail? Can we effectively balance difficulty and win conditions? Can we incorporate other types of fun that cushion the blow of failure and encourage repetitive play? I don’t know all of the answers, but I am going to have fun trying.

Works Cite (Where I don’t use MLA or APA because it is fascist pitfall meant to check a box on a scoring guide.)

Heeter, Carrie & Chunhui, Kaitlan & , Chu & Maniar, Apar & Winn, Brian & Mishra, Punya & Egidio, Rhonda & Portwood-Stacer, Laura. (2004). Comparing 14 Plus 2 Forms of Fun in Commercial Versus Educational Space Exploration Digital Games. (Download the PDF here)

Matching Computer Game Genres to Educational Outcomes

MDA: A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research Robin Hunicke, Marc LeBlanc, Robert Zubek

The Design, Play, and Experience Framework Brian M. Winn

Mitgutsch, Konstantin & Alvarado, Narda. (2012). Purposeful by design?: A serious game design assessment framework. Foundations of Digital Games 2012, FDG 2012 - Conference Program. 12. 10.1145/2282338.2282364. (Download the PDF here)

Foundations of Game-Based Learning Jan L. Plass CREATE Lab New York University Bruce D. Homer Program in Educational Psychology The Graduate Center, City University of New York Charles K. Kinzer Department of Computing, Communication and Technology in Education Teachers College, Columbia University

Fourteen Types of Fun by Pierre-Alexandre Garneau [Design]

Rules for Axis and Allies

Rules for Candy Land

Diversity education is a divisive education

This is a response to an editorial in the Tacoma News Tribune. The text in black is the original. The red text is my translation.

Diversity education is a divisive education

The Great Seal of the United States proclaims the achievement of the
American Revolutionary generation: “E Pluribus Unum – out of many, one.”

I would like to start my argument by referencing a motto written by the
white men that so closely resemble me, in which they clearly state the
opposite of what I am about to say.  Putting aside the fact that the “many”
that they refer to most definitely meant white land-holding men.

Now comes a measure introduced into the Washington Legislature that,
if adopted, will turn this achievement on its head, proclaiming the goal
of mandating a public schools curriculum that emphasizes “diversity” and
“global citizenship.”

Now the Washington Legislature is trying to celebrate the diversity of the
many and expand our American ideals globally, and I don’t like it. I know
it is merely a suggestion, but I am afraid that if adopted, I may have to teach
about the blacks in months other than February. I just spent the last
twenty-eight days teaching about Martin Luther Coo King. Isn’t that enough
diversity?

House Bill 1314, supported by a host of the usual liberal suspects, would
direct the state school superintendent’s office to develop an ethnic studies
curriculum.

While not mandated as a graduation requirement, the bill’s sponsors hope
schools choose to add the curriculum to their 7th through 12th grade
course offerings.

The language of the bill clearly states that it is not mandatory, but I thought
I would take the opportunity to remind everyone that I have a deep seated
fear of people that are not white.

Given the overall leftist influence in our state public schools, a great
many districts are likely to expose students to this proposed curriculum.

Again, this is not mandated, but I am going to play on your tribalist fears of
the radical left. Honestly if I could justifiably put a picture of AOC with this
column, then I would. This is just another attempt by the left to brainwash
our students. I know I am in the classroom, but teachers on the right just
don’t have the same power as those on the left. Even though I tell students
(40% of whom are not white) that they should all act white they just won’t buy
into it.

HB 1314 is a bad idea and should not be approved. The great goal of the
common neighborhood public schools was to provide an environment where
children of immigrants would, over time, be welcomed into the common
American culture.

I would like to now state an opinion about free public schools that is
unsubstantiated by any facts, examples, or references. I am most likely
referring to our grand history of missionary schools that stole Native
American children from their families in order to beat the brown out of
them.

Even immigrant adults would attend night schools to learn English as
quickly as possible. To become “American” did not mean immigrants had to
forgo the language and ceremonial life of their country of origin. However,
most made it their primary goal to enter into the common culture as quickly
as possible.

I am fond of using made up statistics. I will disguise this fact by not actually
typing any numbers, but instead referring to “most” to reassure the reader
thatwhat I am saying is true, and as long as the number is over 50% nobody
can call me on my bullshit. Honestly, I don’t even realize I am doing this.
Many people have said that I am a good writer, and I have been published in
the best newspapers.

Of course, this increasing emphasis on cultural diversity is not just about
school curriculum but part of a larger agenda to implement the goals of
identity politics.

This is my new favorite phrase. I’m not exactly sure what it means, and I am
surely not going to explain it. I just know that  “identity politics” is a bad thing
and if I repeat it three times, the Fox will appear to agree with me.

This way of thinking is based on the assumption that certain groups of
Americans are inherently marginalized in our society and are the victims of
ongoing discrimination.

As an educated person, I am perfectly aware that certain groups are
systematically marginalized by our institutions and continually victimized by
ongoing discrimination, but I am going to pretend that this is not the case. It
is not fair that white people can’t maintain their grip on our cultural
institutions, so I am going to conveniently discover “equality” now that it
benefits me.

But the increasing emphasis on some identifying characteristic, such as race,
gender, sexual orientation or nationality, undermines a historical American
achievement:

Our historical achievement of building the most powerful nation in the world
on the back of brown people and slaughtering the millions that lived here
before us.

Creating institutions, like broad-based political parties, has served to unite
diverse groups around policy proposals that bond Americans to a common
enterprise. Even if this goal has not always been realized, it was assumed the
effort ought to always point toward its achievement.

I am going to seriously suggest that our current political system is bringing
people together, and not rapidly causing a retreat to the opposite poles of the
political spectrum.

The real problem is this: The proponents of measures like HB 1314 no longer
support the American experiment. They don’t want to encourage new
immigrants and new citizens to integrate. They think America is inherently
racist and discriminatory at every turn.

Obviously, those on the left hate America. I will also exaggerate their
argument, so that you will have no option other than to disagree. I mean if
they see racism everywhere (they don’t), then they must be wrong.

In their view the best way to change the country is to call into question the
common stories that serve to sustain a common American identity. In its place
they will substitute alternative stories – those of diversity, which aim to divide
and not unite.

I will continue creating a false sense of their political view and point out that
they don’t like white people because they try to tell everyone’s story. Even
though telling additional stories does not erase the old ones, I will strongly
suggest that the left is creating a new false history of the U.S. As a history
teacher I choose to believe the one that I have been teaching from the
textbook. Politics has never played a role in textbook adoption. If the left
would stop pointing out that people are different, then we could unite under
one supreme culture.

What can be done, beyond saying no to HB 1314? This is not a call to ignore
the real transgressions of justice in American history. It is, however, a
reminder that this country was not created on the assumption that no
injustices would occur, or that all existing injustices would be immediately
eliminated.

I am going to cover my ass, by pointing out that there may have been a couple
of dark moments in our history, but I mean come on, nobody is perfect. And
obviously we can’t make all injustice go away immediately. Come on, can’t
YOU people just wait a little longer?

As President Abraham Lincoln once observed, the right should always be
looked to even if it could not be achieved all at once.

I am referencing Lincoln because I know that black people like him, though I
will ignore that he wanted the “better angels of our nature” to touch the
chords of memory, and focus on some idea that we can’t achieve everything at
once. Though don’t expect a quote, because that would cause me to slow down
my rant.

This is probably the worst result of the identity politics of those who want to
push a diversity education agenda in our schools. The movement represents a
loss of faith in the foundational institutions of the American experiment, and
worse, undermines those institutions.

I am particularly fond of hyperbole, so I am going back to that well again.
You see if we learn about other people then it will DESTROY EVERYTHING
we love about America. By everything, I mean whiteness.

I can do no better than to end with the wisdom of Lincoln: “A House divided
against itself cannot stand.” That’s exactly what will be accomplished by
diversity education: a house divided.

Oh, now I have a quote because I want to emphasize that if we passed this
non-binding legislation, then it will lead to a civil war.

Mike Jankanish is chair of the history department at Tacoma’s Wilson High School.

Semester 1 '18-'19 Reflection

Expectations

Contrary to what most politicians and some of my relatives think, the school year for
teachers begins in June or July. During this time I had been planning an
interdisciplinary unit for our Exploratory class at the alternative school. Each semester
all teachers in the school teach this class in which we have an all school read and project
based assessment. This semester was going to be called Cold Dead Hands and focus on
the effects of gun violence on the community.

When I workshopped it with some teachers over the summer they were concerned that
my personal bias might affect the teaching. I used to agree with this stance, but my
opinion has evolved. Since it is impossible to avoid bias, I have decided to embrace it. I
tell students up front my personal opinions about controversial subjects, so they can view
what I say through the proper lens. I am not a big fan of guns. I also understand that I have
come from a privileged background in which I don’t need guns. I only get viralently anti-gun
when they become feteshized.

Point is I came up with a great project based unit in which the students would read
A Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds, watch speeches from March for Our Lives as
well as pro-gun advocates, and delve into local and national statistics on gun violence.
This would culminate in an interview project in which students would learn the stories
of community members who had been affected by violence and create a memorial for
those that have been lost.

Then about a week before school started my principal called to say that we would be
cancelling the Exploratory class. At this point I need to give a little background. Last year
it was determined that our science teacher could no longer work with us because she was
not certified for high school students. In the state of Missouri there are exceptions made
for alternative programs when it comesto certification. Putting aside the fact that we were
losing our most empathetic teacher, the real travesty was that she was going to be replaced
with online classes.

I recently earned my master’s degree and a certificate stating that I am qualified to teach
online courses. I understand there value. I also understand that forcing at-risk students
into an environment that requires a significant amount of self motivation is not a good idea.
Most research indicates that at-risk students suffer academically in online courses and are
more likely to fail. In order to mitigate the failure rate it was decided that we would offer a
“study hall” for the students to work on these classes, thus necessitating the cancellation of
the Exploratory class.

In addition to prejudice piece of policy, the powers that be also determined that the courses
I was teaching would no longer be offered. They wanted the names of my classes to match
the names of the courses offered at the high school. We had specifically titled them
differently in order to facilitate scheduling. Since ELA standards repeated themselves from
the fourth grade on, it doesn't really matter what the class is called. When they decided to
change the classes it meant a total restructuring of my curricula.

This particular event may have actually been a benefit as far as my teaching. It forced me
to revise and repackage my existing lessons that may have been getting a little stale over
the years. While it created headaches for scheduling, and forced a few students to
experience portions of lessons they had last year, at least the lessons were fresh and up
to date.

I entered the school year with mixed emotions. I was excited about my revitalized lessons
and was able to move the Cold Dead Hands project into my Lit & Comp class, but
I was irritated by the constant meddling and the harm done to student learning.

Experience

Lit & Comp - For the first semester of Lit and Comp students worked on the
Cold Dead Hands unit. Students really enjoyed the book, and it was an easy enough that
round-robin reading worked well. Of course the heavy lifting would come with the interview.
I was a little surprised by the amount of scaffolding required to teach the students how to
interview. The only types of interviews they were aware of were job interviews or police
interrogations. It took a while to get them to learn active listening skills and to understand
that these interviews were more like conversations.

Since I was sending them out to members of the public and was dealing with a semester
end deadline, I could not rely on  constant reteaching of the whole class. We watched
some instructional videos, did informal practices, formal practices, and reflection. I would
not assign an interviewee until students had successfully completed these tasks.

I have been impressed with their ability to interact with the public. Those that are
completing the project are highly motivated because of the authenticity of the project.
Many of them come to me incredulous, yet excited about interviewing a stranger. Yesterday,
two studentsinterviewed the assistant superintendent, and it went remarkably well. The
turn in rate will not be great, but the students that have begun writing the interview essay
have some intriguing stories to tell.

I will have the adjust the time a little to help fit it into the semester better. I did not have
enough time to scaffold the actual essay. Most of the students have never read a narrative
essay based on on interview. We should read a few examples to help them get started.

I will definitely be keeping and refining this lesson.

American Literature

This one had another semester long project. Over the summer I attended a presentation of
teachrock.org and became excited about finally using the blues to teach my students. I
started working on the project during a workshop on PBL and originally was just going to
slightly modify a lesson that was presented on the TeachRock website. It changed
significantly from the original conception.

We started by reading Fences by August Wilson. I usually use baseball as the entrance
into the text because that is my passion. This time I decided to use music as the hook.
The book provides many songs for analysis, most notably Ol’ Dog Blue, but the first thing
we did is look at the history of the devil in African American storytelling. We looked
specifically at Robert Johnson’s Me and the Devil Blues and Murder was the Case by Snoop
Dogg. We compared what happened to the characters in these two songs with what is most
likely going to happen to Troy.

We continued our “blues” readings by looking at three crime ballads based on actual
events in St. Louis, Frankie & Johnny, Duncan & Brady, and Stagger Lee. We
spent the most time with Stagger Lee. I attempted some discovering learning by assigning
each song to a group of students for them to research. I envisioned each group realizing the
St. Louis connection and all of the students realizing how the songs were similar when each
group presented. This failed, and I don’t why. Many of the groups failed to even figure out
the St. Louis connection. I might need to give them some focus for their research. Perhaps
I can make a google form for each group to fill out.

The most interesting part was that through studying these song with the students is a
discussion of what it means to be “gangsta” and why it plays such an important role in
African American lore. The discussion would become quite heated, but each student
seemed to have their own answer, so this eventually turned into an essay assignment.
In a graphic novel about Stagger Lee the author, Derek McCulloch, posed a question
about why Stagger Lee has so few redeeming qualities. I decided to write McCulloch
on twitter to see what he thought the answer was. I was way more excited than the
students when he answered with a twelve tweet thread.

During one of the class I had an admin. Walk through. She questioned teaching a
controversial subject. Actually she was more concerned that the students come up
with their own answers. They had some answer in previous classes, but most of them
were along the lines of “black people are just violent.” (I have all black students). I
pointed out that this was a slightly racist viewpoint. When I was being observed, I
was trying to provide an alternative way of looking at the issue.

Eventually I had the students write an essay to define what a “gangsta” is and why
he is so important to the culture. I was able to tie Fences back into this lesson by
presenting Troy,Rose, or Corey as a “gangsta” type. Unfortunately, I did not get many of
the students to turn it in. I modified frequently by adding an outline and sample introduction
to the class website.I have now posted a couple of student samples to help my classes
next year. I want to keep the essay because it helps analyze the characters and gives
insight into a culture that is still alive today in the characters portrayed in rap music.

World Lit

I moved one of my traditional World Lit lessons into this class as well as a unit from
what was previously my mythology class. We started by reading Tartuffe by Moliere
and focusing on the concept of satire. This unit always works well. The kids seem to
get the humor and are able to pick out the elements of satire. This year I added the
movie Saved! to the lesson so the students could see a slightly more modern version
of religious satire. I was pleasantly surprised by how much the students took to the
movie considering it is about suburban white Christian kids. Next time I do this lesson
I want to make stronger connections between the film and the play instead of just
saying hear is another example.

I also tried to re-engineer this unit into a PBL. I originally was going to have the
students produce a satirical video, but determined that the amount of scaffolding for
movie making would take too long. Instead I had them storyboard their concept using
Google slides. They chose a topic and then explain how they would apply at least three
of the elements to create their satire.

After the satire unit we made a rather jarring transition into my hero unit. We read
Gilgamesh and learned about Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey cycle. The students did
not hate the story, but it did take a lot of “translating” on my part. If I was able to take the
rather stilted language and restate it in the vernacular, it went pretty well. (This is not
nearly as racist as it sounds)

For the project I had the students apply the character archetypes and the elements
of the cycle to a modern film. Students then created a website to publish their
information. I did not have good turn in, but I did gain a new appreciation of John Wick.
Actually, I was excited that student gained a new perspective on the movie.

One of the most exciting things to happen during this class was I shared a text based
game that I programmed with the students. I originally created this for a class while earning
my master's degree, but I fine tuned it so that it could be used as an assessment of the
student's understanding of the epic journey. I was afraid that I was just geeking out and
showing off, but we played the game as a class, and the students were really into it. They
even came back the next class and asked to finish it.

Number of Failures

This semester approximately 70% of the students failed each of my classes.
This was overwhelmingly due to missing assignments. I currently have a policy that
allows students to turn in any assignment at any time during the semester without penalty,
so I don’t understand the low turn in rate. I have discussed several possibilities with my
colleagues.

• Failure rates were higher for everyone for this particular group of students.

This could be due to the selection process, the lack of our cross curricular class leading

to a clear and cooperative effort from the staff, or just luck of the draw.

• I did shift even more heavily into PBL. Students have traditionally ask for more

worksheet type work, and historically they will take MC test that get them enough points
to pass the class. I considered giving more MC tests, but I feel like it would be lowering
my expectations.

• Phones are a distraction - I have implemented a voluntary phone check in policy

for second semester.

• I was not clear enough in my expectations. Invariably students will say that I

did not teach anything at the end of the semester. Usually this is a last ditch effort to shift

blame, but I considered that this year my expectations were not clearly laid out. It seems

ridiculous to continue with whole class instruction for extended periods of time considering

the lack of participation in discussions, so I have moved a lot of the data dump online.

I noticed that many of the students that complained about me not teaching did not even

realize that I had a website. For second semester I am making a concerted effort to

constantly emphasize the website and make sure that students are responsible for their

education. If they want to learn, they need to make me teach. This will give me a chance

to individualize instead of homogenize. My responsibility is to give constant reminders to

ask for help.

• Traditionally students here do not like to read and write. It is becoming painfully

obvious that most the world does not like to read or write.

Summary

For second semester I will implement the voluntary phone check in, emphasize the
expectations of the class my role as a facilitator and their job as a student, continue
workingon my patients with students, and adopt a slightly more authoritarian classroom
management style while letting them know that I would rather teach them to be literate than
to behave.