Like many classroom teachers, I will do whatever is in my power to provide my students with the level of support and challenge that they need to meet their goals. I strive to put the
fun into every day. There is plenty of research that supports that
fun is a legitimate, pedagogical choice in teaching a person something new. It removes fear from trying something new, produces dopamine and endorphins in the brain causing conenctions, and opens the gateways of moving new ideas into cognition. Recently, I have been in a search for new ways to bring fun into my classroom. I say new, but what I discovered in my search was something that I did as a new teacher; somewhere along the way, it dropped out of my practice.
What was that? you may ask. That was the joy of bringing "guests" into my classroom...guest as in me dressed up in a costume and interacting with my students from a different perspective.
This idea occurred to me as I faced the grand task of teaching
A Christmas Carol to my sixth grade students. I have been very fortunate to collaboratively plan with my ELA colleagues this year. They had done a unit centered around
A Christmas Carol in past that had been extremely successful in helping students master multiple standards. I immediately began to question my ability to not only effectively use the text to provide modeling of literacy standards but also and adeptly scaffold their learning within this complicated text. Furthermore, I was keenly aware that this would be their first experience with classic literature. I want my students to LOVE literature as much as I do and I didn't want build up negative opinions about these texts years before they would tackle them in the future.
While I was racking my brain, an idea crystallized. Wouldn't it be cool if kids could travel through time to see how different life was during the 1840s and 1850s in England and how that directly impacts the writing of that time? Since I found myself lacking a working TARDIS of my own, I decided to bring history to them. I decorated our classroom like Victorian Christmas time and came to school as "Clara Bennett" from 1852 England. I dressed like her, spoke like her, and created a deep history that wove together Victorian life in England and the United States (which included their 6th grade history content; fortunately, Dickens did a tour in the US which lent itself perfectly to my story).
When student arrived, they travelled through our "time portal" and then we began our conversation. Now I knew this would be fun for them, and I expected it to last for about 20 minutes of class. What I didn't expect was how engrossed in it my 6th graders would become. They asked endless questions. They had to learn to accurately describe and explain things during their time (microwaves, cell phones, televisions, video games, etc.) to someone with no background knowledge. This honed their communication skills better than any activity that I could have designed and they were totally hooked on Victorian England.
The next day, when class began they told me about my ancestor (their conclusion), Clara Bennett, and in detail about the life of Charles Dickens and Victorian life in England and America. When I asked if they wanted to read some of Charles Dickens' work, the answer was a resounding yes.
I had forgotten the impact that a costume could have upon students. Since then I have dressed up as "Faire E. Wiing" a travel consultant who connects students with a personalized travel adventure in the Fairy Tale realm. I've taken on the persona of the Mad Hatter when students shared their narrative writing projects. Each time, the students treat our learning as something special, out of the ordinary. For them it's a time to sit up, take notice because something special is going on that they don't want to miss. And true to that brain research, my students gain a deeper understanding of whatever content we are discussing and adroitly apply it to future learning.
Last week, we had several guests come to our classroom and I overheard one student tell one of our visitors, "You better keep your eyes open and be ready in Ramsayland because you never know who is going to show up to take us on an adventure." With that endorsement, I know I need to continue to look for other ways to purposefully bring the fun to their learning. I realized that as educators, we need to be willing to fall down that rabbit hole and embrace whatever method we find in meeting the needs of our learners.
photo credit: Time & Money via photopin (license)
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