One of the most dreaded student questions in all of education... WHY DO WE HAVE TO DO THIS? Ugh. When teachers hear this uttered within the hollowed walls of our classrooms, so many thoughts go through our heads...
Because I am the teacher and you are the student!
Because I had to do it and you must suffer the same fate!
Because it's on the test/final/state assessment!
Because my principal/coordinator told me I had to!
Beacuse you'll need it for college!
While some of these fleeting thoughts may be accurate some of the time, there are those lessons or assignments (more common than students think) that are applicable to life as an ordinary human being on the planet Earth. Yes, there are real people who are doing exactly what they are being required to do. When we explain this to students, we are someties met with resistance.
"No way. You're just saying that. Nobody seriously has to do stuff like this once they leave school."
In Humanities, our students have arts experiences throughout the year and write critiques of those experiences. This assignment is lovingly referred to as the HAE (Humanities Arts Experience). On the brink of our looming HAE deadline, our classes had an opportunity to have a video chat with one of the most established and well-respected critics in our area. Students submitted questions for Elaine and each class had their questions answered and heard some fun stories and thoughful insights from the mind of the critic herself. Throughout the chat, students picked up some valuable tips to make their criticism more colorful, concise, and gramatically correct. More than that, though, they got to take a journey through the thought process of a critic from the moment they walk into a venue through the performance, wiritng process, and (sometimes negative) feedback following publication.
The magic of Google Hangouts allowed us to do at school what people do at home or on the go all the time using tools like FaceTime or Skype. It was easy, accessible, and it got the job done. It is definitely something we will do again. It helps students to see people out there in the world doing the kinds of things they are being asked to do in school. Will this make the assignment more fun to complete? When it comes to writing a paper, "fun" is not a word that most freshmen and sophomores would use; however, the assignment can become more meaningful.
I am beyond grateful to Elaine Liner, theater critic at The Dallas Observer to sharing her knowledge, experience, and one-of-a-kind snark with our classes.
