Cohesion, or collision of thought. Mind over matter. Relevance and interest meet common sense and contemplation. How do we as teachers get students to inherit these percussion's of ideas and behavior? Setting the stage for action does not always mean this passing of traits or semblance of knowledge will occur. I know from experience that what I think is an awesome lesson is not always what my students find engaging. Relevant maybe but not necessarily of interest. I find that to truly get these traits or encounters to collide and gel, they need to be deliberate based on personal opinion, operation, and reflection. In other words, active and authentic but also personalized. Personalized learning is cohesion. Ultimately isn't that what we want for our students? A colliding of mind, purpose, and choice.
How can we do this? Today I was a docent, nudging my students to walk about, learn from each other, appreciate the art and listen to the stories behind the artifacts. Rather than give a bunch of notes, I showed a short video clip on Gregor Mendel, just to give his background and theory. We talked a bit about the time in history in which he lived, what it meant to be a monk, how long he collected data and ultimately how long it took for his information to become wide spread and accepted. We discussed traits and simply how we inherit them? We kept it simple much like it would have been for Mendel not knowing what DNA, genes, alleles, or chromosomes were. Then I said we are in a museum of thought. A gallery of ideas created by you. I want to be a tourist and travel about the room learning about the concept of heredity, as if I was learning about it for the first time.
I asked them one question: What does heredity (remember this is our introduction so their knowledge is limited) mean to you? Go to the makerspace, use any thing you want and create a simple artifact (it must be a display that can be taken down at the end of class) but you must be able to explain why this artifact represents heredity to your group. The catch, you have 5 minutes to create it, 2 minutes to explain it, 1 minute to dismantle it and clean up your area. A 5-2-1 we call them. And so they began, I stood against the wall simply listening. I chose not to walk around during the creation phase because I did not want to distract them. I simply listened and learned a lot actually. They finished right on time 5 minutes.
The models and explanations varied: dominant/recessive, first generation/2nd generation, even a few people and the traits they acquired and how 1 allele came from mom and 1 from dad. One made Mendel and explained why he is considered the father of genetics. Very enlightening. The kids were interested in seeing all the artifacts and after the 2 minute presentations walked about quickly to observe. Then I announced begin the 1 minute dismantling and cleaning phase. Then tidiness was achieved. I then had them take out their journals and write a 2-3 sentence reflection. What did you know before the museum/makerspace activity and what knowledge did you gain after? Then finally I asked them to explain in one sentence why or why not this lesson was a cohesion or collision of ideas for them. I read through them at the end of the day and the majority of students wrote, a cohesion because a vague concept of genetics became a 3D adventure, a colorful way to visually see an abstract idea come to life and other positive comments.
Can we pass on the nature of cohesion? At least in a nature kind of way, of course a nurture kind of way would be impossible. But as any nature vs. nurture debate will attest it is in fact a true combination of genes and experience that solidifies who we are. The commotion, animation, liveliness and motion making contact with the imagination, ambition, aspirations and musing of an individual. This focus, cornerstone of knowledge, cynosure of data is what drives us forward. By asking my students to take an abstract idea and make it, tinker with it, design a new form of it, caused my students to build a new schema. It is now a picture and image rather than a word or thought. So I believe a cohesion of ideas is possible and we can pass it on to our students when we become the learner as well. The true collision is between a teacher and a student when their concepts of learning become united and together they develop strategies in which mind and matter become action and authentic learning experiences.
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