showtime

We had our final rehearsal today...Stew Day is tomorrow. We are having a timing issue with the music, but I have to trust it will all work out in the end. Truly, though, as I watched them perform today, I paid less attention to the "show" and reflected on the learning experience. My thoughts:

The primates love the song. It's not the kind of tune that makes you want to dance, like "Fire Burning on the Dance Floor". There are no funny or repetitive lyrics. Although the musical patterns do repeat--a more musically informed person could better describe it, I am sure, but a teacher doesn't HAVE to be a music expert to use music as a learning tool--and I mean beyond singing songs about adverbs! I'm not exactly sure what they love about it or why, but I do know they are engaged and it is the top requested clean up song as of late.

There's something about the music that strikes a linguistic cord with me, which is why we are here doing this performance! At a recent birthday party, my son received a cd of the birthday girl's favorite songs (such a cute idea!). Superman is on the cd and he requests it repeatedly in the car, so on the 50th or 60th time listening to it....a story in pictures began popping in my head...primates dancing around like autumn leaves, kids and turkeys dancing around, Farmer MackNuggett miming chopping turkey heads off, and a big finish. This is why I felt it was important to read the story with the primates, listen to the song, and exercise our imaginations in illustrating the story to the music. Music may provide the "hook" in connecting to the story for some primates.

Does the performance illustrate the story? To some degree...definitely the mainpoints: kids go on a field trip to the farm where they meet Mack Nuggett and the turkeys. They dance and play, are horrified by Mack Nuggett's speech about chopping their heads (btw, our Mack Nuggett does a fantastic job telling the grim tale w/o words), and end happily in friendship. I wish I had asked the primates to do a picture/writing retell today, but just no time. This would have served as a written assessment and opened another point of entry. maybe next year...

Primates are working together in pairs and as a whole group--successfully. They are helping each other, offering suggestions, looking to each other for guidance--these practices are important areas to gain experience because we ask primates to work together in various academic settings--and as adults in the real world, teamwork is critical. Practicing these skills in a fun experience may influence how well they can transfer those skills in another context.

The masks are a big hit. The props too. The primates have ownership in this performance via creating props and costumes, as well as sharing their acting ideas.

Working in a group, contributing in different ways, experiencing a story through musical, narrative, bodily-kinesthetic, and artistic entry points....this is MI. Again, it's not about creating a lesson that targets 8 or so intelligences. My observations of students as they work--and believe me, putting together a performance is work!!!--combined with my reflections on the learning experience with an MI lens is where you can distinguish this from a traditional intelligence view. Assessment, in this case, is informal, observational. Jotting notes about primates that stand out in some way, or notations on how each primate approached the problems and created the product would be more formal assessment.

Teachers have to make choices though, because you can't possibly capture every learning moment. There are always too many happening simultaneously in different areas--or at least there should be! So I chose to use this as an opportunity for informal assessment of the group--and my assessment is that they work very well together. A few stand out as leaders, others who struggle, but this is all information I file in my mind for now. Our future lessons will require me to use that "data", ie when forming small groups--creating a balance of leaders and strugglers, when planning another group project or performance--I can push this group further because they share a collective strength in teamwork.

I highlighted some key words: engaged, linguistic, imaginations, illustrate, working together, transfer, ownership, performance. So here is my evaluation of this learning experience:

I engaged my primates. They used their imaginations to illustrate a narrative text while working together. I believe they will transfer these skills into other areas of learning, and I will need to pay close attention to assess success in this area. My primates own this performance of their understanding as a group.

If you catch the performance tomorrow, I hope you will see the primates having fun, following a plan, telling a story--though it may not be totally clear unless you know the story, and working together. If you have read this post prior, maybe you'll see something else too. What may appear to be a cute, fun performance is also a learning experience that involves the use of various combinations of multiple intelligences.

Wish us luck!