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How do I love thee...

How Do I Love Thee : Play

      The use of play is so essential towards learning. It allows us to be creative and display our knowledge in a way that is engaging and meaningful.   Root Bernstein adds to this thought by stating, "Play returns us to the presymbolic drives of gut feeling, emotions, intuition, and fun from which creative insights stem, thereby making us inventors."  (Sparks of Genius, p. 267).  It allows us to take a concept or idea and make it our own through a creative means.

      As a classroom teacher, I feel it is essential for students to "play" with their learning.  It allows the opportunity for me assess what concepts they are grasping in their own way.  All students learn differently. Therefore, it is important to provide opportunities for students to  explore and play with the content to gain further understanding based upon their own strengths.  Auditory learners might create a song that shares the concepts that help them learn.  Kinesthetic learners would rather act out the concept or idea to share their knowledge.  It is important to provide opportunity to extend all modalities in learning by the use of play.    " Play transforms knowledge and builds understanding as we create our own worlds, personas, games, rules, toys and puzzles, and through them new sciences and arts."  Root Bernstein, Sparks of Genius, p. 268.

        My particular focus for the How do I Love Thee assignments is the elements of fantasy.  Whether it is in the classroom or at the home of many young  children, the idea of play with fantasy happens frequently.  Children love to act out and play their favorite parts from fantasy stories. Whether it is a fairy princess getting a magical dress from her fairy godmother , a knight fighting dragons, or an evil sorcerer creating potions- they are all "playing" with fantasy.  Playing with fantasy is so much fun because you have the opportunity to place yourself into the story.  Students also love the chance to experiment by creating "magical" potions for a story. Demonstrating knowledge through play is very powerful!

       My classroom had the opportunity to study the elements of fantasy this year.  As we discussed the elements of fantasy in their literature circles, they also had to come up with an idea to share their story with the class. In essence, I was asking them to play with the content so that I could assess their learning of the elements of fantasy in their literary choice.   The students were immediately excited to play with the material!  They began creating settings, and got right to work.  I had a few groups choose to create puppet shows, while another group wanted to create actual scenes in a play!  They were all engaged and focused on sharing their learning through the use of play.

In this particular example, students were sharing the elements of fantasy of the story, Georges Marvelous Medicine by Roald Dahl.  The students discuss George's magical medicine and how it impact grandma!  This opportunity to play allowed other students in class to learn about the story, as well as sharing their understanding the elements of fantasy to me.

   

    

        This next  example shares scenes that are acted out from the story, "The BFG" by Roald Dahl.  Students shared their favorite scenes from the story. I took their scenes and put them into an iMovie to share with the class.  In one of their scenes, they go on to share an element of magic in fantasy when they can blow nightmares to the giants while they are sleeping.  Another scene shares the BFG  giving Sophie a magical drink, to help her feel better from the snozzcumbers.   These scenes allow students to play with their favorite scenes in the story while also sharing the element of magic.

     

This last example is a game I created to play with the elements of fantasy.   This game uses a variety of choice (drawing, singing, acting, and sharing text) to demonstrate the elements. This game can be used in literature circles.

                                       
     

Modeling

           
      We come across models in all shapes and sizes, as well as many forms.  The use of modeling can display the physical properties or functions of an object, idea, or concept in an accessible form.   Root Bernstein shares that "Modeling requires and therefore teaches us many imaginative skills." (Sparks of Genius. p. 230).  Modeling is an essential tool that allows us to gain a deeper understanding of something that we might not be able to see or easily experience otherwise. Models are shared in many disciplines to creatively provide a representation of an idea or concept to others.

    One of the things we do very often in the elementary grades is the use of modeling.  Teachers can use modeling to provide a simplified representation of a complex topic.  A physical representation, such as groups of blocks, can be provided to explain the concept of multiplication. Students also use models to creatively demonstrate what they understand on a particular concept or topic.  It provides a tangible example of the learning that is taking place..  For example, students can create pictures as a model for understanding of the setting of a story.    Root -Bernstein explains that "Perhaps the most important thing that modeling does is to provide the modeler with complete control of a situation, object, or idea- or conversely, to reveal explicitly where control or understanding is lacking." Sparks of Genius, p. 230.  It is so important to provide many opportunities for modeling in the elementary classroom for both the students and the teacher.

     One of my favorite genres to teach to my elementary students is the fantasy genre.  They have spent so much time while they were young pretending to be wizards, princesses, magicians, and many other characters that we see in fantasy novels.  There is a great quote by Kylen Beers that states   "Youngsters grow up believing in fantasy.  They wish on candles, wait for tooth fairies, talk to their stuffed animals and play with imaginary friends".  Students are now reading fantasy novels that provide a deeper perspective of the fantasy  genre than their original ideas as a young child.  Students will  apply their beliefs and comprehension of fantasy into a tangible model for others to see their understanding.

    Creating a model for the fantasy genre provides an accessible tool that shares the elements that make it a fantasy.  Therefore, just because a story has an evil character doesn't necessarily mean that it is a fantasy story.  It might just be a realistic fiction story of an evil man that stole something and must go to jail.  A fantasy story provides so much more. In particular, the first model represents the elements of good, evil, magic, and special setting to qualify the story as a part of the fantasy genre.
I chose a two dimensional puzzle as my first model of the elements of fantasy.  I like the idea of a puzzle to represent these elements because they all fit together to create the fantasy story.  Each piece of the puzzle is needed in order for the story to be complete.

For the the next example,  I wanted to zoom in on two particular areas of the puzzle, good vs. evil. I presented a three dimensional model of these two areas in a snow globe. The snow globe provides a container for these elements that work with each other.    Providing two characters in a globe will generate much discussion of these elements of fantasy and how they interrelate with each other.   While the use of the other elements are minimally represented (the sparkle for the  magic and the enclosed snow globe as a representation of a special contained place), the discussion of the fantasy elements represented evolves to include the other elements of the story.   The three dimensional model provides another perspective of these elements.  I look forward to students taking turns using this snow globe to model/represent elements in the story.

      The last example  is a model for discussion of the story elements. I have created a story cube for the students to use to guide their literacy group discussions to include each element of their story.  I believe this story cube will be very effective in generating discussion as well as including examples from all elements.  Each  student will be able to roll the cube and participate in the conversation about the particular element of the story.

Embodied Thinking

    Embodied thinking combines movement and balance of the body to connect with the mind.  Root Bernstein states, "This is body imagination at work, when the feel of of muscle movement or physical tension or touch is enacted in order to think and create,". (Sparks of Genius p.162).  Empathy ties into embodied thinking by viewing the situation from another perspective- feeling what they feel. Our body connects to our moods,which exhibits how we feel.    Connecting your mind and body to  a particular topic sparks imagination and creativity.  Root Bernstein states, "Sensations of muscle movement, body feeling and touch act as a powerful tool for imaginative thinking,". (Sparks of Genius, p.164).    When we allow our body to connect with our mind, we are more fluid with a clearer understanding of the task.  We allow objects such as a paintbrush or piano keys to become mere extensions of ourselves when our minds and bodies connect to a particular task.

       The idea of embodied thinking fits in well with the topic of the fantasy genre.  When we read a fantasy novel, we face characters that represent the elements of good, evil, magic, and supernatural powers.  When these elements are present in the story, their thoughts, feelings, actions, and movements represent the character and clearly impact the plot of the story.    As we read the story, we can feel the characters thoughts and motions as we work towards the climax of the story.  Often we will act out a story to gain deeper understanding of the characters as well as the elements of the story. We place ourselves as those characters and mimic their movements and feelings to gain a meaningful connection and understanding of the fantasy.

    I chose to use an example of a supernatural power, as well as an example of magic to represent embodied thinking.   As characters such as Peter Pan and Superman exhibit the power to fly- they both share with other characters how their body and concentration are reflected in that supernatural power.  Balance, control, equilibrium are just a few of the traits that are exhibited through the body and thought as they are flying.  Their body and mind represent balance and focus.   This also ties in with the second example of magic.  Magic demonstrates mystery, power, control, perception and focus to emulate their response over an object or person.    "All people need explicit practice in moving their bodies, manipulating instruments or tools, and gaining awareness of the kinesthetic and proprioceptive responses, " (Sparks of Genius p. 179) .   Students often choose to use their imagination to embody themselves as a character in a fantasy story, whether it be as sweet as a princess or as powerful and determined as a sorcerer.  They will use empathy to feel and act like the characters they are portraying.   Role-playing sparks creativity and imagination.   Connecting our bodies and minds  to the characters and elements allow us to gain a deeper understanding and perspective of the story.

     

Abstracting- Good Vs. Evil

picture by Flyinfrogg

Balance

   Light       Shadow

Bright               Fallen

   Shine                          Darkness

  Honesty                                  Deceit

  Wisdom                                          Demise Redeeming                                        Malevolent 

       This week for our How Do I Love Thee assignment, we are examining the idea of "abstracting".  What is abstracting?    Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein state in Sparks of Genius, " They reduced complex, visual, physical or emotional ideas to bare, stripped images, revealing through simplicity the power of purity.  In other words, they abstracted." .(p. 72 ) We find great abstracts in amazing works of art, and also abstract ourselves on a daily basis when we whistle a part of our favorite song.

     

        My subject matter for this assignment is the elements of fantasy genre. I wanted to work on abstracting one single element from the fantasy genre, and represent the abstraction through two different mediums.   I decided to focus on the element of good versus evil.  In the fantasy genre,  the theme of good versus evil  consistently appears.   How this theme appears can vary, whether it is through superheroes, animals, or even places.  Therefore, it is important to know that this element exists and it can be experessed  differently with each novel read.

      I chose the photograph above as my first example of abstracting the element of good versus evil. I am a very visual person and I liked the way this picture takes this idea and exhibits two opposite forms (good versus evil) on one person.   This picture begins to tell a story by the use of minimum detail- such as the difference of color in the eyes, or the lightness to darkness of the face.     The color change of the eyes can represent the  idea of a human turning to the "dark side". It also suggests the idea from natural to supernatural.   The changing from lightness on one side to darkness provokes the thought of good versus evil.   This photograph also represents the lightness and darkness characteristic through the bird and its feathers.    This picture can also be used to bring in more elements of the fantasy genre (such as the bird and the idea of flying and its relation to good versus evil).

         My second medium was a poem that I created  to exhibit good versus evil.  I thought the poem is a good representation of the qualities these elements demonstrate in a fantasy novel.  Goodness portrays the light, virtue, and goodness of the objected represented. Deceit, power, and demise come along with the darkness of evil that is shown in the object or character/s contained in that genre.   As the poem goes to opposite ends, we also see this happening with good and evil- it is a goal to find the center, or "balance" to maintain equality.  

     

      I find this idea of abstracting such a fascinating tool because it is something I am asked to do on a daily basis as an elementary teacher.  In every subject matter we are to take a complex topic and strip it down to the bare essentials in order for students to begin to understand the concepts.   It is essential as an elementary teacher is to be careful to focus on one main detail or element at a time.