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Channel / Source:
TEDx Talks
Published: 2013-06-09
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fMC-z7K0r4
I've been teaching for about fourteen years and for the majority of my career I would consider myself pally a very traditional educator this is why my classroom my students tended to sit in straight rows facing the front because I was the one who is usually talking and I directed the show I decided what we were learning when they were learning it how are we going to
learn it what the assignments would be what books we would be reading when the exam would be and of course there would be an example essentially I was the master of the universe in a very small domi and to be honest I talk like that because that's what I mean that's the way I was talked when I think of it my elementary and my high school
career that's how I learned my university even though I was trying to be a teacher it was large thing that as well and to be honest it didn't occur to me that there can't be any other way to do it and so I replicated what I saw on the classrooms at the teachers that I worked with when I was learning to be a teacher it wasn't
until my master's degree and I was I was working on a masters in and tax and design and I sit with a class with Dr Alan Karros and in that class change my life to be honest I was taking you I had it almost killed me but it changed my life it wasn't about technology although at the same time it wise it was about pedagogy and
I started learning about things like student centered learning and constructivism and inquiry and keeping our and for the first time I began to realize that Mimi my students could construct they're learning that learning is constructed in community and that maybe they could be the center of that met me will they would have something to say about it and so one day as I'm walking to class
I decided that I wasn't just my lesson plan and that is not something I did I am not a fly by the seat of my pants teacher I always knew exactly where we were going and I'm thinking as I'm walking apps you yeah I have this callow podium because I was a science teacher Sam you know who is a master of the universe with a podium
eyes got it is yeah then looking up and thinking yeah this atlas it's that I don't have to do this nobody will know any better and so they stood at the front of the room looking at my students I sat if you could design school to be anything you wanted it to be what would it look like but what if I like what I hear what
it what would he see what I feel like what would you be doing how many real life have a serious maybe I'm too right in the road and the road and the road in the middle of the laughter they chattered on the road with such passion and many began to talk and really although they did not say that that was the bottom line in the fifth
things quite kind in a don't mind that you lecture but maybe not quite so lax and yeah three cell floor share with each other past and is there we actually reconfigure our classrooms that we had this huge space probably this size in the middle and they all had these learning pies that we treated on the outside and we always sat in a circle in our classroom
so that we could discuss and I found out during this process that my students wanted to make and it turns out at the time that they had been learning about the wars that have been happening in Uganda and how children had been so didn't sleep as soldiers and the schools have been destroyed and my kids really wanted to do something and so I said okay well
you know what we need to we need to do some research we need to know who did what we're dealing with we need to know what would really make an impact it's the next day we went down to the computer lab and that we were researching and about halfway through the class one of my students comes bounding down the stairs and says to me cannabis research
thing is like really important but who actually do something and I said sure when he wanted it and so she starts telling me about this thing that he had found the schools for school competition and he's rattling off all this information and ash was telling me and bring up the web page and I plugged in our information and then it basically at the same time as
he finishes telling me all about this I hit submit I said okay were signed she looks at which is a really absolutely and so she turns around he starts shouting o'clock or part of this competition yeah so I'm in Dallas I in their texting in telling people and I'm thinking this is gonna be awesome you will raise a couple thousand dollars I feel like they're important
this'll be great and so the next scene we come back to school and it is a Friday my students come back because they say to me miss is right we have decided on a goal awesome money that we decided that we want to raise ten thousand dollars and inside my set my head I'm thinking only gosh do you have any idea how much money ten thousand
dollars in and my outside voice said also what does he do that and nearly all this is being called teach for changing basically yeah make sure he's yes he's starting to put around the city and people to put teams in them and you can raise money you have to realize I'm from moose jaw Saskatchewan that has a grand total lists you know probably if you included
all of our cats thirty five thousand people so you're going to need a lot of change jars to raise ten thousand dollars I have like okay that sounds like a terrific start so they start planning and it was great and the last for the weekend and if you think about learning when it's something that your students have decided to do if that doesn't stay in the
walls of your class it takes on a life of its own and you don't necessarily control anymore and it just so happened that weekend at a drop in center in this job that there were kids from Uganda who hadn't gone to the schools that had been rebuilt by this organization and my kids heard sounded and heard how their lives have been changed and the math them
and they talked about in my kids were deeply impacted and so I'm gonna see me all this happened on the weekend and they came back Monday and they said to me Mrs right and they told me the whole story and the fed we decided to change our goal having irregular lower early they said we have decided we are going to raise one team thousand dollars and
my head I'm thinking gosh right come from that the down payment on a house wait you have no idea how much money it I think that was the brilliance hi and it I think if it was adultery would have struck a committee and we'd still be there figuring out how to make this happen in the wind of ray's descent but kids quite like that and I
said okay well twenty thousand dollars how do you propose we do that and that began the roller coaster of the next forty five days because that's how long we had to raise this money so we have to change for change are and then yeah we decided well you know we have a roast beef dinner and auction and so they began planning all that we call the
caterer they started you know doing all the details for that it turns out that the kids who went around the city to get every auction item I was a kid who never spoke in class and to me that was shocking this was so far out of his comfort zone but it was something he deeply believed in that he decided to do it and so there are
these high moments like you know the roast beef dinner where we raise seven thousand dollars in one evening and there are times where it's like okay it we can do this we can do is you can do this and then we planned a benefit concert we were going to you know it we had all these musicians lined up and it was on a Sunday at the
end of November on the same day and year that the writers made it into the great no benefit concert he's he's a scattering of the really big deal and so that they'll kill a hundred compensate for that okay well how do we hold the barbecue and we did it at the BA in M. beginning of December I am day when it was forty below and it
turns out that the barbecues are stored at side and that if you do that the propane tanks will freeze and so we had half a barbecue to barbecue three hundred hamburgers and hot dogs and it was %HESITATION nightmare from beginning to end and partly through when he seems like it reads like some terrible everything's falling apart you know we've to figure out how to fix this
and I looked at her and I said have you ever planned a wedding I could just meet you newbies skills and sell at the end forty five days there's a Friday our total but is fifteen thousand dollars and change I thought it's not bad and we had about twenty five kids it is more than their first goal he didn't hate we just second law and to
be honest I was somewhat disappointed but I last class thinking we did a good thing but the truth as this story was not because during that time my kids that actually split up into teams they just created them themselves we had a finance team in a P. our team we had you know fundraising teams and I would literally walk into class and say so what are
you doing today and they would tell me some of the kids who attend the PR had been interviewed by the radio station numerous times and the DJ there knew what my kids are trying to do in their goal and so he went on to their web page that day that showed our total he knew their goal was twenty thousand dollars and so that afternoon he got
on the radio and began asking people to donate to help my kids reach their goal and the crazy thing as people that by six o'clock we were sitting at nineteen thousand dollars and there is a live stream wrap up party that was being held in San Diego by the organization that was doing this and you know they saw this little city of Mostar shoot out of
no where to have Rick had nineteen thousand dollars if your social media they are actually able to get a hold of two of my students and I can't tell them what our goal is twenty thousand dollars yeah people at the lifestream part got on the live stream and ask people to donate I help my kids reach their goal and the crazy thing as people desk and
so by the end of it my students had raised twenty two thousand eight hundred twenty four dollars American at a time when we were not on par we lost almost ten cents for every dollar we raced that day I learned to believe in my students to believe in what really deeply matters to them and to remove whatever obstacles like him to try to make that happen
more importantly my students learn to believe in themselves they learned that they can make a difference they had a saying the entire forty five days we are not the future we are right now and my students learn that there is a world out there so much bigger than them that cares about things that they care about in the kindness of strangers to help them meet a
goal that they deeply deeply want our schools need to be places that set our kids hearts on fire if they can figure out what they are passionate about what we give them opportunities to so it and that we can give them a place to make a difference now one of the things that I've learned over and over from doing this kind of stuff my students is
