It’s a near constant conversation about what the individual owes the group and what the group owes an individual. In a school that wants to build on a community of learners, it’s a necessity for the students to understand how their individual actions affect the group as well as the ways in which they can define the larger group through their actions.

I took two statements:
“I can say and do whatever I want” and “Our whole group helps everyone to be successful”.

Then we wrote about when these statements are true and when they are false. Their comments will be the basis of tomorrow’s circlerectangle.

“I can always say do and say whatever I want but whether or not it’s appropriate is another story.” JW

I can say and do whatever I want when I am designing my own project.

I can say and do whatever I want when “I’ve earned that right.”

I can say and do whatever I want in lunch, I guess. In school you can never really do what you want.

Our whole group helps everyone to be successful. (R: I feel like people is for themselves and can’t nobody give me my diploma but the teacher) (Love this honest response as it will give us much to talk about.)

Little behind this week…

Today we drew pictures of someone saying done. Then we added captions of things they say when they’re done that indicate that their work is outstanding.

During our conversation, we made a list of reasonable things to say, things that were about the process, and things that were ridiculous. The ridiculous example I provided was “my mom says my work is outstanding.”

Pictures to come later (Dead phone)

Thought: one thing that is happening is that we have so emphasized the process (with good reason) that our students embrace it as everything; in other words, if you’re passionate, work hard, track your work, revise your work, it necessarily must be outstanding.

Sadly, this is not the case. How do I continue to emphasize the process and pride in the daily work without making that the only thing? In Ron Berger’s words, how do I develop a culture of craftsmanship that extends both to the process and the product?

IB: I think you should be looking at the effort of a project during the time when you’re getting feedback and seeing the before/after of it. But the quality or RESULTS should be looked at when the project time is over.

TC: If you have a big project and it takes longer than it’s supposed to you should look at the effort to judge how much work was done.

TJC: When you should look at effort when the project may be difficult and you know the work won’t complete if the student put in work every day and they tried to get it done. So when the work isn’t complete you should look here.

AB: The difference between effort and quality work is effort isn’t always quality work but quality work takes effort.

Thinking about a group

Is it me?
Is it adolescence?
Is it the culture in the room?
Is it the culture of the school?
Is it the culture of the neighborhood/city?
Is it me?

What can I do?
What do I need to remember about adolescence?
What work have I done in the room? What work have we done as a class?
What work have I done in the school? What work have we done in the school?
What work have I done for the city? What work have we done for the city?
What can I do?

I get this song stuck in my head. A lot.

We continued our conversation about how to get projects to the outside world. I tried to build on yesterday’s deep thoughts about the difficulty of moving projects from idea to completion, particularly school projects that are aimed at the real world.

We drew mountains. We put complete, outward-facing projects on the top of the mountain. We talked about all the steps it takes to get to the top of the mountain.

I wanted to spend today thinking about the obstacles that prevent students from connecting their projects to the outside world. But I have spent too much time around Simon Hauger so I had to try and phrase the prompt in a positive way first: how do you, your school, and your life help you connect projects? And what in those areas slows you down or gets in the way?

My favorite moment and a great conversation point was from the first document: “You have to be careful about yourself and how you get out there?” Combine this with a great point raised by another student — “I’d be afraid to take on an outside project because of what could happen if something went wrong.”