Knowing when to ask for help

I've been very honest all along that the forms of "Making" I am comfortable with are decidedly low-tech: writing, baking, curriculum-writing--these are the things that thrill my creative genius while software and hardware leave me cold. I thought that my students' passion and expertise with technology would be enough to carry us through my incompetence, but the 3-D printer collectively stumped us.

But, no worries! One of the things I want my students to feel comfortable with is asking for help, so I got to model this behavior in order to get the 3-D printer up and running. I asked our high school technology support specialist (and 3-D printing enthusiast), Mr. Loveless,  to help us out. 

I didn't take a picture of Mr. Loveless, but this is pretty close.

Asking for help has always been hard for me, and I'm sure I'm not alone. When you ask for help, two things happen: 

1. You potentially inconvenience someone. I hate this. For example, I would much rather walk a long, circuitous route around a person in my way instead of simply asking them to excuse me and force them to move. I'm sure this reveals something interesting about my psychological make-up, but I'd rather not explore it right now.
2. Perhaps more insidious, than mere inconvenience, you have to admit you don't know how to do something. Like many precocious children, I grew up accustomed to being (or at least feeling like) the smartest person in the room. Of course the only way to maintain this status is to avoid situations in which you aren't the smartest person in the room. Not great for personal development. Also, impossible.

Because I've been teaching for more than thirteen years, I know that many of my students also are afraid of being inexpert inconveniences. This is no way to go through life because it leads to a constant cycle of avoidance! That's one of the reasons why I think the Maker Movement is so beneficial for kids--part of being a part of the Making community is getting help when you need it and providing it in turn. 

So my students and I couldn't set up the 3-D printer. Surprise! Possessing one 3-D printer for a few days didn't suddenly make us proficient through osmosis. But we knew someone who was able and, thankfully, willing to help us. And now there's a lovely plastic cat formulating as I type. 

Not knowing how to do something isn't the end of a journey, it's the beginning.

A very exciting day

We have been waiting for this moment since the first day of school. Some have been waiting for this moment since last school year when they signed up for the class.

Yes, friends, we now have a 3-D printer. 

Trying to figure it all out

I'm not sure if it's a working 3-D printer because I helped them unbox it and then told them to set it up themselves.

The first thing printed

"But what do you do?" they asked.

"I don't know!" 

"You don't know how to do anything." Harsh but accurate in this case.

"You're right. I'm just providing you with opportunities." Said in with an attitude of wisdom, not ignorance.

That's the key, right? The whole point of this class is not for a teacher to tell a bunch of kids how to do something--it's for kids to do things for themselves, to be creative. And it's not about the toys, either.

But the toys are still cool!

Maker Profile: Deus Z

Deus Z's own illustration

Since I've been writing so much about my L.I.I. students, I thought it would be fun to introduce them all to you. But to preserve their privacy and an aura of mystery, I had them all select Maker alter-egos.

Boy sure plays a mean pinball

First up is the young man who goes by Deus Z. Deus Z was actually one of the students who inspired me to create this class. He's an incredibly talented artist with an interest in graphic novels. I thought it would be so wonderful if he had a time during the school day to develop his talent and invest some time into them.

Deus Z's current project is a cardboard pinball machine. He's shown a great deal of persistence and ingenuity in making all of the components, particularly the flippers.

Deus Z says that one of his creative specialties is creating well-developed characters. He signed up for L.I.I. to focus on his creativity (although his main goal for the course right now is to just make a fun pinball machine).

When he's not making something cool, he's probably playing fantasy games.

Collaboration happening

When I first started blogging about the development of what would become LEAP Innovators and Investigators, one my biggest struggles was accepting the loss of control necessary to let (make?) this class happen. I thought I had conquered my fear of losing control, but I have realized in the past couple of weeks, how much of me was still clinging unnecessarily to my own sense of order and authority. 

The thought of 50 minutes a day, every day of the school week of free, uninterrupted and unstructured work time seemed dangerous. I decided over the summer that I would schedule "whole class" activities once or twice a week: TED Talks to discuss, routine plussing sessions. But once again, I'm having to relearn how to let go. Because I've realized that I don't need any enforced class interaction to tent-pole what's happening here. 

Working together on a Google Chrome extension

For example, the idea of the weekly structured plussing/feedback sessions? Totally unnecessary. Kids are naturally seeking out feedback and help from each other. I watch them collaborate in this organic way, just as I watch them walk in the door, grab their projects and start immediately working, and it seems like magic. I designed a system to give them wings, and they are flying. Are all of them doing the kinds of projects I had imagined? Nope. Some of them, I don't even really understand, but here's to letting go and trusting, both myself and them.

Triumph!

No profound thoughts today, no musings. Just some pictures and some good moments.

Taking apart electronics

Sewing a "plushy"

Making a video game with Scratch

Today, one of my students literally cried with happiness because she finally was able to understand a concept she had been struggling with.

Today was a good day.

Struggling

Succeeding

Good fences

As our first full week of school draws to a close, I have this line from Robert Frost's "Mending Wall" running through my head, "Good fences make good neighbors." 

As an English teacher, it is my gift and my curse to frequently think in poetry. And as I watch my LII students wade through the expectations of the course, Frost's ambiguous words seem most appropriate. In creating the course, I wanted to give students the freedom to make and play. However, as I've learned through my work with little children (particularly my own), whether or not we want to admit it, boundaries often give us the freedom to explore and grow safely.

I think many of the kids who signed up for the class were drawn in by the promise of freedom. And they are struggling with the few constraints I have in place. While they are free to make what time, equipment, and safety allow, I am requiring them to show evidence of following a design process, to take the time to set strategic goals, to reflect on their progress. I believe this is chafing to some. As Frost's speaker ponders, "Something there is that doesn't love a wall..."

At the same time, some people get imprisoned by a lack of boundaries. People who don't have organizational structures or who don't have any pressure to be intentional about goals and processes can struggle to take risks and see things through to completion. In my own personal experience, I can attest to at least three unfinished novels lurking in my Google Drive because nothing is making me finish.

As I've walked students through my project submission process and my demands for the use of a design notebook and Maker blog, I've seen the glaze frosting over their eyes and felt like a bit of a soul crusher. But, on the other hand, my intentions are for my rules to set them free from some of the challenges that have prevented them from being successful creators in the past.

I think humans have a paradoxical relationship with boundaries. We hate that they are there, but at the same time, we need them. Without them what are we aiming for, how do we have a sense of direction? How do we exceed our limitations if they don't exist?

Path of totality

Today was The Great American Eclipse, and our high school lay in the path of totality. We set aside the normal school routine and learned about and celebrated this amazing demonstration of nature's power.

I was so excited to see the eclipse today. But I am a 35-year-old woman who is self-aware enough to own the fact that she is a tremendous nerd. What would the students think? Would they be too cool, too self-conscious? Would they be awe-filled or awful?

In her essay about a total eclipse she observed in 1979, Annie Dillard describes a terrifying, mystical experience: "There was no sound. The eyes dried, the arteries drained, the lungs hushed. There was no world. We were the world’s dead people rotating and orbiting around and around, embedded in the planet’s crust, while the Earth rolled down." I wondered if I would be terrified, too, along with 2,000 of my closest teenage friends. Dillard described people screaming as totality finally occurred, unhinged by a world that seemed to have been turned upside down. Would I need to solicitously comfort a distraught sophomore?  Would a sophomore need to solicitously comfort me?

In a demonstration almost as amazing as the eclipse itself, what I encountered today was a group of adolescents who still had a sense of wonder. Kids who unashamedly gawked at the sky with their eclipse glasses and carefully hole-punched eclipse viewers. Kids who excitedly pointed out to one another the dappled light and rippling shadows.

In the minutes before totality, clouds started passing over the previously clear sky. The football field was filled with groans and then shrieks of joy as the eclipse disappeared and reappeared from their eclipse glasses. Totality occurred and another cloud covered the sun. Unable to see the corona, the kids I was sitting with gloried instead in the sunset colors all around us and a flash of lightening far in the distance.

Finally, the cloud passed, and for a few seconds, we saw it: The flat black disk of the moon encircled by the thin, shimmering white light of the sun. The students gasped and cheered. There were no screams of horror, but a few boys close to my excitedly yelled together, "Totality!"

This is what I want to remember about today. However deeply buried (and for some kids, it's very deeply buried), our students still have a sense of wonder. How powerful would it be if we could find  a way to let it show, unobscured? A space to pause, a space to play, a space to ask questions, a space to marvel, and a space to be marvelous. Totality.