Searching for Place

Welcome friends, visitors and KMWP colleagues!

We know you’ve got a lot to do, so we’ve organized this site so you can browse quickly, and save the in-depth reading for all that free-time you get between winning the lottery and baking those cakes.

The materials included here propose a three-step process that begins with personal writing, and leads to social action. This is not a new, or original idea to some people, but it was news to us. The tabs at the top of the page–Researching Self, Local Action, Global Action–are intended to be followed incrementally, however, students can certainly experience success by beginning at any step of the process.

Enough Already! Show me the goods!

Browse the different sections of the blog by clicking on the tabs at the top of the page. You can also browse by clicking on the tags, categories, or search bar on the right-hand side of the page. Learn more about the research and inquiry process behind this proposed action research project.

Local Action: Expanding connections with Place

Once students have made connections and established a trusting relationship with their peers and explored their sense of place, of belonging, of self, a possibility for the next step is developing connections between students and their local communities. Involvement with communities creates an opportunity for students to do real, self-directed work for authentic audiences and resulting in real world effects.

The Problem: Too often, students see education as something that happens to them, something that they experience passively while waiting for “the real world” to come. This attitude can lead to low engagement, low motivation, low achievement, and low skill levels when leaving high school.

“American youth are socialized for adult civic life by an institution that defines them as passive and subordinate and treats them in ways that are anything but democratic.” (McQuillian)

Why is empowerment a crucial part of the solution?

Read the rest of this entry »

Check out a very simplified rendition of the social action process! Click here!

Pink is a girl who can’t get started on a paper that is already late.  Her older brother offers to help, and guides her through the process of researching her town and prompting change through simple steps and real writing.

What is Social Action?

Check out the Centre for Social Action’s 5-stage process for social action.

“Social action is a process whereby young people consider what issues and problems concern them, and analyze why they exist, consider how they can act to change them, take these actions and then reflect on what they have done and what has changed” (Writing for a Change, 5).

Simply stated, social action is the process of facilitating student work on real problems toward real solutions that make a real difference in their lives. Work that students have a stake in, that they care about and are motivated to succeed at, therefore are affected positively by their success in ways that extend beyond the walls of school. The Centre for Social Action collaborated with the National Writing Project to help create Writing for a Change, a book that walks the steps of social action through the voices of many teachers who have experienced it in their classrooms. The work done by teachers and students in this book is guided by the Centre for Social Action’s Principals for Social Action. Most important to remember is that the principals of social action cannot be separated from the process. One cannot uphold the principals without practicing them. Read the rest of this entry »

Important Steps, Crucial Elements

Many teachers have written reports of their first experiences using social action in the classroom. Their reports have many common elements:

Realization
Departure
Inspiring reaction
Discussion & The beginning of a plan
Work!
R-E-F-L-E-C-T

Read the rest of this entry »

Listen

• StoryCorps http://www.storycorps.net/
• Sound Portraits http://www.soundportraits.org/
• Recording America–StoryCorps on NPR
• People & Places–Stories from NPR
• Youth Radio (podcast) NPR
• Youth Radio (blogs) Wordpress
• LibriVox: acoustic liberation of books in the public domain
• PennSound: poetry for your ipod

Citizenship

• Wikipedia entry on ‘citizenship’
• US Immigration and Citizenship Services
• Ben’s Guide to Citizenship (grades 3-5)
• Sample INS Citizenship Questions

The Human Body

• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• Mayo Clinic: Defining Mental Illness
• National Institute of Mental Health
• Until There’s A Cure: Vital Statistics
• Disability World web-zine
• DisabilityInfo.gov
• Wikpedia entry on “interracial”
• Wikipedia entry on “multiracial”
• Wikipedia entry “body image”
• Wikipedia entry “human physical appearance”
• Campaign For Real Beauty
• Beauty Quotes (Camus, Einstein, Helen Keller, etc.)
• “Beauty” definitions from About.com
• Our Bodies, Ourselves
• Adios Barbie: A Body Image Site For Every Body
• Style.com

Culture

• PBS: The Meaning of Food
• Food and Culture: Exploring the Flavors of Your Community
• World Food Habits
• Feed The Children
• World Culture Music
• FreeCulture: Students For Free Culture
• Wikipedia entry “culture”
• Culture Quest: IPL Kidspace

Where I’m From, exemplars/models

• “Where I’m From” Template http://www.swva.net/fred1st/wif.htm
• “Where I’m From” Poems (students and professional) http://www.studyguide.org/where_I’m_from_poem.htm
• “Where I’m From” by George Ella Lyon http://georgeellalyon.com/where.html
• “Where I’m Comin’ From” music video (lyrics)
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1STrrKm99xU

Home

• Definitions of home (Google “define home”)
• Definitions of place (Google “define place”)
• Google Maps http://maps.google.com/
• Flickr Maps http://www.flickr.com/map/
• Flickrvision http://flickrvision.com/
• VoiceThread “Classroom 2.0″
• Community Walk http://www.communitywalk.com/
• National Geographic Map Machine http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/map-machine
• Google Earth (free download) http://earth.google.com/
• Homeland Security Advisory System Recommendations: Neighborhood (pdf.)
• Homes and Communities–Multifamily Housing: Neighborhood Networks
• Neighborhood Cats: the feral cat experts

Neighborhood

• Wikipedia entry on ‘neighborhood’; includes a definition of the modern neighborhood
• Find Neighborhood Profiles http://realestate.yahoo.com/neighborhoods
• Wikipedia entry on ‘neighborhood watch’
• Mr. Rogers Neighborhood official site
• Ben’s Guide to Your Neighborhood (ages 3-5)

Defining Neighborhood (excerpted from Wikipedia, 2. the sociology of the modern neighborhood)

1. Neighbourhoods are common, and perhaps close to universal, since most people in urbanised areas would probably consider themselves to be living in one.
2. Neighbourhoods are convenient, and always accessible, since you are already in your neighbourhood when you walk out your door.
3. Successful neighbourhood action frequently requires little specialised technical skill, and often little or no money. Action may call for an investment of time, but material costs are often low.
4. With neighbourhood action, compared to activity on larger scales, results are more likely to be visible and quickly forthcoming. The streets are cleaner; the crosswalk is painted; the trees are planted; the festival draws a crowd.
5. Visible and swift results are indicators of success; and since success is reinforcing, the probability of subsequent neighbourhood action is increased.
6. Because neighbourhood action usually involves others, such actions create or strengthen connections and relationships with other neighbours, leading in turn to a variety of potentially positive effects, often hard to predict.
7. Over and above these community advantages, neighbourhood activity may simply be enjoyable and fun for those taking part.

Maps & Memories (materials):

• The Assignment
• My Memory Map (teacher model)
  
• Concept Map (teacher model)
  
• The Rough Draft (teacher model)
  
• Final Draft (teacher model)

Sharing our stories helps us connect to a real audience. This section includes ideas for publishing, examples and links for further exploration.

Internet Publishing

• Authentic Audiences: Publications Which Accept Student Submissions
• Teen Ink http://teenink.com/
• The Writing Conference Inc. http://www.writingconference.com/writing.htm
• Center for Sports Poetry http://www.internationalsport.com/cspoetry/
• Internet Enhanced Literacy (K-5) http://www.cobbk12.org/sites/literacy/WritingPublishing.htm
• Creative Communication http://www.poeticpower.com/Intro.htm

Digital Storytelling

• Center for Digital Storytelling http://storycenter.org/
• Stories for Change http://storiesforchange.net/
• Digital Directors Guild http://www.ddguild.org/
• These Stories from These Pictures http://www.storycenter.org/canada/index.htmlA

For more Internet resources, browse my del.icio.us account for “digital storytelling” http://del.icio.us/jmill123/digitalstorytelling

Publishing Video & Images

• A N I M O T O http://animoto.com/
• Circavie http://www.circavie.com/
• Dvovler http://www.dfilm.com
• TeacherTube http://teachertube.com/

Blogs, wikis

• 21 Classes http://www.21classes.com/
• Think.com http://www.think.com/en/
• Edublogs.org http://edublogs.org/
• pbwiki.com http://pbwiki.com/education.wiki
• Zoho (wikis, blogs, etc.) http://www.zoho.com/

Podcasts

• ReadWriteThink: Podcasts and Videos
• Guides and Tutorials http://www.guidesandtutorials.com/podcasting-tutorial.html
• Audacity Tutorial: creating a simple voice and music podcast

Browse more options

• KMWP Tech Matrix http://techmatrix.wikispaces.com/
• Teach Web 2.0 http://teachweb2.wikispaces.com/