Blogs on Student Engagement

Last week I observed a tired classroom. My English 101 class looked bored and uninterested in the discussion we were having. I observed one student intently working on a crossword puzzle. He was engaged. Another student was sneaking a peek at her mobile device every so often and then quickly looked back in my direction. She was almost engaged. Some students were simply staring at me so intently that I assumed they had painted eyes on the exterior of their eyelids.

Quick. React. What do you do hot shot? What. Do. You. Do?

I'm beginning to agree with traditionalists who argue that education should go back to the old days -- if we could be assured of landing at Midland, an elementary school in Rye, New York, between 1956 and 1966. More specifically, alighting in the classroom of teacher Albert Cullum. He had an intuitive sense of what worked in education, regularly incorporating teaching methods from project learning to social emotional learning, long before they had academic labels.

Editor's Note: Our guest blogger today is Karen Brown, the creative director for the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, CA.

"Sometimes creativity goes a little bit with what we call 'misbehavior.'"

If something breaks at home, dad is the one to fix it. This was applied to me the other day when the dryer started making a clack-CLACK noise. I took it apart to see what was going on and I made a few adjustments to the drum and then put it back together. Low and behold, when my wife tried to dry some clothes, the drum would not turn. I knew immediately what the problem was.