Reading - Off the Grid - Edward Doolittle
The grid of a city, or in a few cases, lack there of, has always been an interesting topic to me. I can easily navigate the streets of Montreal, but travel down the highway to Ottawa, and their street system follows the Rideau Canal. Always confuses me. I never thought of the settler aspect of the grid. How humans typically cultivate land, reroute water basins, transform Nature to fit their needs, rather than listen to Nature and respond to what they hear. Yes, the grid "dutifully fills the space allotted" (Doolittle, 2018), but at what cost?
Stop 1 - "Too often, the specific life, qualities, and character of a particular place become subordinated to the forcefully imposed "evenness" and uniformity of the grid geometry" (Doolittle, 2018). How often does this happen in education? We accept the curriculum, the classroom setup of our desks (the author mentions the similarities of desks in rows and residential school), the daily routines and classroom management strategies. When did it become so mundane? Why have we not collectively thought outside the box? Sure, educators typically have some freedom to diversify their routines and teaching styles, but will there ever be change on a grander scale?
Stop 2 - On climate change - There is reference to how we follow a grid of time, according to our calendars. Farmers typically sow and seed their fields on the same day of the year, every year. As mentioned, "Settler summer ends on the fall equinox, around September 22 according to the grid; Indian summer continues while warm weather continues" (Doolittle, 2018). Doolittle continues "The changes we make to the universe by being part of the universe...lead to changes in the trajectory of the climate system". Considering the increase in extreme weather events (no reference), and what seems to be a shift of the seasons (how many early and late frosts have we had in the past couple of years?), shouldn't we start to listen to nature in order to produce a maximum yield? As they mentioned, the bumblebee and the flower listen to each other in order to survive, should we start doing the same?
Stop 3 - Chaotic control. I liked how the author referred to chaotic control, especially in education, "where we have the notion of the teachable moment, in which a few small "bursts" at the appropriate time might accomplish more than months of haranguing" (Doolittle, 2018). These teachable moments are so special in a given lesson, a day, week, month or even years, that I'll personally often revisit their memories. They also exist in conversation with former students, if the teacher is lucky enough to have those. Often for myself, it's the moments that I hadn't even thought of, but had such a profound effect on the student, even almost 10 years later. Have you experienced this, whether just yourself, or former students approaching you with a memory?
Part 2
An over-arching goal of the course seems to be forming as to "bring greater meaning" to mathematics learning and education. My favourite part of the weeks introduction was the concept to work "with" the garden, honouring the garden as it co-teaches along with the teacher. I've never thought of the experience of gardening in this way. In a sense, I feel more connected to my house plants, or to our veg box in the backyard. We make sure to give thanks to the fresh vegetables, but I've never considered that we work with the garden to provide sustenance.
Video
The shots from the drone were fantastic, they helped the viewer understand the precise geometry behind the dance steps. I also appreciated how one of the artists, Samuel J. Milner, also composed the theme to the video, and titled it "Binary Felt Time". The title continues, "A sonification of binary numbers from 1-100". It reminds me of the TED talk by Roger Antonsen, where he made music to represent 4/3. How else can we make music in relation to a math sequence? Such a nice backdrop for a video as well.
Activity -
The frigid temperatures prevented me from enjoying the outdoors. Instead, I was inspired by a photo that I took during my time at the cottage on parental leave. It represents a calm, early November scene, with bare trees, aside from the cedar's. Man made creations include a firepit, a close-line, a hydro pole, and several stacked woodpiles (co-created with nature). There were rings inside the trunks of the logs, and each of the maple leaves offered beautiful patterns, some almost translucent for lack of chlorophyl. The standing firepit is made of links to prevent the embers from spitting out. Recreating the patterns on the logs would be a great lesson for students, where they would then research why they exist, why some are shaped differently, as well as their different diameters and circumference.
ReplyDeleteI really appreciated your insights this week. I found myself strongly connecting to the idea you explore around accepting the curriculum and typical classroom design (desks and chairs). Some of the school sites (mine in particular) is over 100 years old. The school feel is very much tractional. It can be hard to re-imagine a different education system when the experience has a very traditional institutional feel. Your thoughts on climate change and seasonal calendars had me thinking about the book Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. I think there is power in slowing down and living and learning with the seasons and students. After viewing your sketch of the outdoor space at your cottage I was thinking about the mathematics in creating a log pile. What makes a good pile in terms of how many logs wide and what size log and how close together.
Absolutely. Alot of geometry in piling. Making sure it's sturdy, but also I was piling according to type of wood (how hot and long it would burn), number of years the wood is seasoned, saving the bigger half pieces for the base. My father sells wood out of the forest as well, so he would pile in rows of 8 foot lengths, 4 feet high, and one block long for a "face cord". Blocks traditionally measure 16 inches to properly fit in a wood stove. . A full cord would be 8 foot long, 4 feet high and 4 foot wide, or 3 blocks deep.
DeleteHey Pat,
ReplyDeleteI was drawn to your summary of chaos “control” and how you see value in it through your teachable moments experiences. I’m thankful that with my consultant role I get to visit the school where I taught. It’s nice to reconnect with former students in the school and also in the community. Often they bring up memories and experiences that I had not thought of for a long time. This year however, the last of the group of students I taught will be graduating.
Also, I thought of the branch of math, chaos theory, when I read your paragraph. How a dynamic system is highly influenced by even subtle changes in initial conditions. I saw this as a parallel to teaching or a classroom. Where human beings themselves are quite possibly the most influential initial conditions on how the class will play out. Students come to us slightly differently than they were yesterday or even before lunch. Even we as teachers are not the same from one day to the next. Other initial conditions that play into how a class turns out include things like assessments, report cards, and deadlines.
But embracing and acknowledging some chaos through events like teachable moments, could boost adaptability, non-linear learning, creativity and resilience. Each class and or teacher would have different comfort levels of the balance between chaos control and following the grid.