Monday, September 07, 2009
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Coming soon on Rachlovestheweb...
I just wanted to give my readers (hello...you are out there, right?) a little heads-up about what's "coming soon" on rachlovestheweb. First up, I'm definitely going to continue my exciting journey of discovery about what popular culture can teach us about the way schooling and education is now, how it could/should be, and might be in the future. I even have in mind which stories from popular fiction I want to explore next. First up, I'm going to look at the FOX television series House, M.D, a series I have been dedicatedly following for 5 seasons. I'm going to look at House (the character) as a teacher, and contrast his teaching approaches and characteristics as a teacher to some ideas in the literature about teaching and learning for the 21st century.
This might take me a little while to do, because I need to do a bit more research on two fronts. First, I need to go back and watch a few key episodes from earlier seasons. Second, I'm going to attempt to engage input into my analysis with the input of other House fans - who I'll access both from my personal family and friend networks (people I know), and from online fan discussion forums (people I don't know). As a prelude to the latter research strategy, I've been "lurking" on a fansite for the past couple of weeks, and I'm almost ready to step out from the shadows...
After the House research, I'm going to try to look at some stories from popular fiction that give us the ability to speculate about what education/schooling might be like in the future. I think this is probably going to steer me into the world of science fiction, and I've got one book in mind, Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk novel The Diamond Age. I'd love to get suggestions about any other examples you can think of which give interesting representations of education and schooling of the future - so if you've got suggestions, send them my way!
This might take me a little while to do, because I need to do a bit more research on two fronts. First, I need to go back and watch a few key episodes from earlier seasons. Second, I'm going to attempt to engage input into my analysis with the input of other House fans - who I'll access both from my personal family and friend networks (people I know), and from online fan discussion forums (people I don't know). As a prelude to the latter research strategy, I've been "lurking" on a fansite for the past couple of weeks, and I'm almost ready to step out from the shadows...
After the House research, I'm going to try to look at some stories from popular fiction that give us the ability to speculate about what education/schooling might be like in the future. I think this is probably going to steer me into the world of science fiction, and I've got one book in mind, Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk novel The Diamond Age. I'd love to get suggestions about any other examples you can think of which give interesting representations of education and schooling of the future - so if you've got suggestions, send them my way!
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
O! She doth teach the torches to burn bright!*
So in my last blog posting I said I was going to pick three fictional stories from books, television, or film, and deconstruct these to examine some ideas about:
- how they represent how schooling/education "is"
- what they say about how we think schooling/education "should be"
- and (if I can find some good examples) what kinds of possible futures they can help us to imagine for schooling, learning, and education.
I've chosen my first television show/character to discuss: Loretta West from the utterly brilliant New Zealand TV series Outrageous Fortune. The show is a refreshingly original comedy/drama that is unashamedly grounded in kiwi (or perhaps more accurately, the mythological "Westie" - West Auckland) culture, language, and humour. However, my small-scale experiments - these involved showing episodes to a Canadian friend and a Finnish houseguest - strongly suggest the show may have equally addiction-forming international appeal.
When Outrageous Fortune begins (season 1 started in 2005), Loretta is 15 years old and a student at Shadbolt High. The youngest child of Cheryl and Wolfgang West, Loretta has grown up in a family that makes a living on the wrong side of the law - through burglaries, break-ins, car conversions, robberies, and otherwise dodgy deals orchestrated by her father, usually aided and abetted by at least one of her older twin brothers. However, at the beginning of season 1, all this starts to change when Wolf is sentenced to prison for his last "job", and Cheryl decides to turn the family around and go straight. Cheryl doesn't receive rousing support or enthusiasm from her offspring (nor, for that matter from her safe-cracking father-in-law who's just moved in with the family). Yet she battles on, doing her best to carry the family through the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune". Naturally, enormously entertaining complications ensue. (I hope I have convinced you to watch the show. Seriously. But if you haven't, be warned, this posting contains a few plot spoilers for seasons 1 and 2!).
Anyway, back to Loretta. What does she have to tell us about schooling, learning, and education?
During season 1 we learn that Loretta has been frequently truant from school. The reason for this is pretty clear: Loretta finds school boring, pointless, and an utter waste of time. What makes Loretta's attitude towards school interesting is that she is obviously extremely intelligent. She's a talented writer, she's articulate, can speak confidently and argue her opinions. She's no slacker; she has big goals for herself. Her single-minded goal at age 15 is to become a film-maker, and she's already working on a screenplay with her teenage friend and fellow video store employee, Kurt.
Yes, Loretta is highly intelligent. However, she is also rather devious (or, as her model-wannabe sister Pascalle puts it, "evil").
Loretta discovers the perfect way to avoid her mum finding out that she's not going to school: blackmail. Several years earlier Loretta's young and attractive female teacher entered into a thoroughly unprofessional and unethical affair with one of Loretta's older brothers, while he was still a student. Young Loretta took some incriminating photos, and now years later is using them to keep her teacher quiet on her truancy. However, through a series of plot twists and turns this plan eventually falls through and Loretta has no choice but to go back to school. (As an aside, by this time she has already blackmailed the video store owner into giving her the store - but that's another story).
In season 2, Loretta turns 16. This is both the legal school-leaving age in NZ, and the age at which each of her three elder siblings has left Shadbolt High. She is momentarily overjoyed - only to be foiled by her parents' insistence that she remain at school to develop her full potential. So Loretta does something to get herself expelled. But even this backfires, as her parents decide that she will have to attend a private Catholic Girls' school instead. Finally, in a stroke of genius, Loretta cuts a deal with a young homeless woman of a similar age and appearance. The homeless girl will attend the school as "Loretta West". In return, she receives a free education, a place to sleep, and payment. This frees the real Loretta to get on with her "real" life - managing her video business, and working towards her first film. As you can imagine, things don't work out exactly as she planned, but again, I can't give too much away....
In a truly digital-age convergence of television and the internet, you can read Loretta's view of school in own words, right here on Loretta's Blog. (N.B. I briefly debated about whether to put quotation marks around "Loretta" or "own words", but I decided you don't really need me to underscore the fact that it's a fictional blog written by a fictional character:)
So what can Loretta West of Outrageous Fortune tell us about how schooling is? I know that Loretta is a highly fictionalised character, and many elements of her life have been exaggerated for dramatic and comic effect. But I think there's something interesting simmering underneath this portrayal of a student's deep antipathy towards school. In representing secondary school, Outrageous Fortune has played on a stereotype or cliche not uncommon in television or filmic portrayals of school: The disaffected student, who finds teachers boring and uninspiring, doesn't do what she is told, and eventually goes on to become so disruptive that the school is happy to see the back of her. These kinds of students are rife in the film world - although usually they're often set up to be saved by a charismatic teacher who "won't give up on them" even when every other teacher has. Thus re-engaged, the delinquents become stars, show the world not to dismiss them while they're at it. Think Dangerous Minds, Sister Act 2, Take the Lead, etc. These cliches about students "work" partly because they are grounded in truth. Plenty of kids are disengaged by school by the time they reach secondary classrooms. Plenty of kids, like Loretta, have extremely complicated lifeworlds that sit at odds with the culture and practice of the secondary classroom. Plenty of them leave early, as soon as they are legally entitled to, with few or no qualifications. And not all of them are as resourceful and resilient as Loretta West. The question is, do we think this is just "part of life", "the way things are", "the way they are always going to be"? Or can we imagine something different?
*The title of this posting is a line from Romeo and Juliet. In case it's not obvious, this is an homage to the writers of Outrageous Fortune (the television series) who have borrowed both their show's title, and the titles of each episode, from William Shakepeare.
- how they represent how schooling/education "is"
- what they say about how we think schooling/education "should be"
- and (if I can find some good examples) what kinds of possible futures they can help us to imagine for schooling, learning, and education.
I've chosen my first television show/character to discuss: Loretta West from the utterly brilliant New Zealand TV series Outrageous Fortune. The show is a refreshingly original comedy/drama that is unashamedly grounded in kiwi (or perhaps more accurately, the mythological "Westie" - West Auckland) culture, language, and humour. However, my small-scale experiments - these involved showing episodes to a Canadian friend and a Finnish houseguest - strongly suggest the show may have equally addiction-forming international appeal.
When Outrageous Fortune begins (season 1 started in 2005), Loretta is 15 years old and a student at Shadbolt High. The youngest child of Cheryl and Wolfgang West, Loretta has grown up in a family that makes a living on the wrong side of the law - through burglaries, break-ins, car conversions, robberies, and otherwise dodgy deals orchestrated by her father, usually aided and abetted by at least one of her older twin brothers. However, at the beginning of season 1, all this starts to change when Wolf is sentenced to prison for his last "job", and Cheryl decides to turn the family around and go straight. Cheryl doesn't receive rousing support or enthusiasm from her offspring (nor, for that matter from her safe-cracking father-in-law who's just moved in with the family). Yet she battles on, doing her best to carry the family through the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune". Naturally, enormously entertaining complications ensue. (I hope I have convinced you to watch the show. Seriously. But if you haven't, be warned, this posting contains a few plot spoilers for seasons 1 and 2!).
Anyway, back to Loretta. What does she have to tell us about schooling, learning, and education?
During season 1 we learn that Loretta has been frequently truant from school. The reason for this is pretty clear: Loretta finds school boring, pointless, and an utter waste of time. What makes Loretta's attitude towards school interesting is that she is obviously extremely intelligent. She's a talented writer, she's articulate, can speak confidently and argue her opinions. She's no slacker; she has big goals for herself. Her single-minded goal at age 15 is to become a film-maker, and she's already working on a screenplay with her teenage friend and fellow video store employee, Kurt.
Yes, Loretta is highly intelligent. However, she is also rather devious (or, as her model-wannabe sister Pascalle puts it, "evil").
Loretta discovers the perfect way to avoid her mum finding out that she's not going to school: blackmail. Several years earlier Loretta's young and attractive female teacher entered into a thoroughly unprofessional and unethical affair with one of Loretta's older brothers, while he was still a student. Young Loretta took some incriminating photos, and now years later is using them to keep her teacher quiet on her truancy. However, through a series of plot twists and turns this plan eventually falls through and Loretta has no choice but to go back to school. (As an aside, by this time she has already blackmailed the video store owner into giving her the store - but that's another story).
In season 2, Loretta turns 16. This is both the legal school-leaving age in NZ, and the age at which each of her three elder siblings has left Shadbolt High. She is momentarily overjoyed - only to be foiled by her parents' insistence that she remain at school to develop her full potential. So Loretta does something to get herself expelled. But even this backfires, as her parents decide that she will have to attend a private Catholic Girls' school instead. Finally, in a stroke of genius, Loretta cuts a deal with a young homeless woman of a similar age and appearance. The homeless girl will attend the school as "Loretta West". In return, she receives a free education, a place to sleep, and payment. This frees the real Loretta to get on with her "real" life - managing her video business, and working towards her first film. As you can imagine, things don't work out exactly as she planned, but again, I can't give too much away....
In a truly digital-age convergence of television and the internet, you can read Loretta's view of school in own words, right here on Loretta's Blog. (N.B. I briefly debated about whether to put quotation marks around "Loretta" or "own words", but I decided you don't really need me to underscore the fact that it's a fictional blog written by a fictional character:)
So what can Loretta West of Outrageous Fortune tell us about how schooling is? I know that Loretta is a highly fictionalised character, and many elements of her life have been exaggerated for dramatic and comic effect. But I think there's something interesting simmering underneath this portrayal of a student's deep antipathy towards school. In representing secondary school, Outrageous Fortune has played on a stereotype or cliche not uncommon in television or filmic portrayals of school: The disaffected student, who finds teachers boring and uninspiring, doesn't do what she is told, and eventually goes on to become so disruptive that the school is happy to see the back of her. These kinds of students are rife in the film world - although usually they're often set up to be saved by a charismatic teacher who "won't give up on them" even when every other teacher has. Thus re-engaged, the delinquents become stars, show the world not to dismiss them while they're at it. Think Dangerous Minds, Sister Act 2, Take the Lead, etc. These cliches about students "work" partly because they are grounded in truth. Plenty of kids are disengaged by school by the time they reach secondary classrooms. Plenty of kids, like Loretta, have extremely complicated lifeworlds that sit at odds with the culture and practice of the secondary classroom. Plenty of them leave early, as soon as they are legally entitled to, with few or no qualifications. And not all of them are as resourceful and resilient as Loretta West. The question is, do we think this is just "part of life", "the way things are", "the way they are always going to be"? Or can we imagine something different?
*The title of this posting is a line from Romeo and Juliet. In case it's not obvious, this is an homage to the writers of Outrageous Fortune (the television series) who have borrowed both their show's title, and the titles of each episode, from William Shakepeare.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Using popular media to "shift thinking" about education (Or: How i learned to stop worrying and love TV )*
"How is education supposed to make me feel smarter? Besides, every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain. Remember when I took that home winemaking course, and I forgot how to drive?” (HOMER SIMPSON)
In this blog posting I want to blend together two things I love. Namely, (1) shifting thinking about education; and (2) watching television. If you think these two things are incompatible, I hope to change your mind. Let's begin with a true story, which starts with (1) and ends with (2):
True Story: Jen takes on the legal education system
My friend Jen teaches Public Health and Social Research Methods at university. In recent years she's become interested in exploring the spaces where public health, research, law, and ethics intersect - so last year she decided to go back to school complete a postgraduate degree in Law. Being herself an educator, Jen has sometimes felt compelled to challenge and critique the methods and style of teaching she experiences at Law School and was even moved to write an essay on the topic (which she kindly shared with me) entitled "It could have been different: Emphasising Student Empowerment (Voice, Agency, Needs) in Modern Legal Education". In this essay, she examines and critiques some of the messages that legal education is transmitting through some of its most traditional and entrenched teaching practices. These include: the use of strongly hierarchical learning environments, aggressive or intimidating pedagogies, and a culture which teaches students that legal opinions ought to be written to sound as if they were produced by some invisible, disembodied entity of pure rationality and detached from embodied experience. I won't go into detail here, but Jen believes (and argues rather convincingly in my opinion) that legal education needs to do some serious shifting-thinking about education in order to address and accomodate the many challenges, criticisms, that have been levelled at it by various students, scholars, theorists, and educators. (If you want to know more about this, ask Jen!)
You might be wondering how a law course would even allow a student to submit such an essay. Well, stay with me, because now we're heading towards the good bit - the television part:) The class for which this essay was allowed was jurisprudence, the study of the theory and philosophy of law. In addition to allowing students like Jen to write essays critiquing the very practice of legal education, the teacher of this class encourages students to watch and dissect representations of law and the legal profession in the popular media. We're talking about TV shows like Boston Legal, or Law and Order, films like Legally Blonde,The Firm, books like Bleak House and The Crucible, and even excerpts from bodice-ripping Mills & Boon novels! In the teacher's view, the exploration of these fictional texts is a potent way for students to develop a "big picture" view of the workings and ethics of law - for example, in the way that the narratives raise legal issues, problems with the legal system, bringing in context, consequence, and clients' perspectives. This "woods for the trees" approach sits in contrast with the tendency of law teaching in other courses to focus on minutiae and the micro-analysis of facts and wordings.
Suffice to say that Jen's story has been extraordinarily stimulating to my television-loving mind. It's got me wondering how I might be able to draw on some examples from popular media to frame up some ideas relating to "shifting thinking" about teaching and learning in the 21st century. So I've set myself a little assignment - one that I'm really looking forward to. I'm going to pick three fictional stories from books, television, or film, and deconstruct these to examine some ideas about schooling and education:
- how do they represent how schooling/education is?
- what do they say about how we think schooling/education "should be"?
- and (if I can find some good examples) what kinds of possible futures can fictional stories imagine for schooling, learning, and education?
You're welcome to join me in this assignment. It's easy, just switch on the TV (or open a book), and of course, switch on your mind. Let's get together again soon and compare notes, shall we?
* I borrowed this title from the film "Dr. Strangelove", but it's slightly misleading. I haven't stopped worrying, and I've always loved TV.
Sunday, January 06, 2008
Winter Travels Part 2
Here is part 2....London to New York! As usual, watch with sound up :)
Sorry if your internet connection is crappy - you'll have to wait for the Director's Cut DVD release I suppose....
Sorry if your internet connection is crappy - you'll have to wait for the Director's Cut DVD release I suppose....
Monday, December 17, 2007
WINTER TRAVELS PART 1
Fans of my previous iMovies India: Snapshots and Tel Aviv Summer (the latter can be viewed here) may be pleased to know that I am working on some new movies about my Winter Travels.
I started to create a movie that included everywhere I've been since leaving Israel in late October, but it was getting a bit long so I've decided to break it into parts. Part 1 covers Scotland to Bath/Wales, and Part 2 begins in London and ends...well actually it's not finished, so I don't know where it will end yet!!
So without further ado, may I present Winter Travels 2007, Part 1. (Please view with the sound turned up)
I started to create a movie that included everywhere I've been since leaving Israel in late October, but it was getting a bit long so I've decided to break it into parts. Part 1 covers Scotland to Bath/Wales, and Part 2 begins in London and ends...well actually it's not finished, so I don't know where it will end yet!!
So without further ado, may I present Winter Travels 2007, Part 1. (Please view with the sound turned up)
Sunday, December 16, 2007
New York, part 1
I've just returned (to Summit, NJ) from a weekend in Manhattan, staying with Aviva in the upper West Side. New York was fun! I went out to mingle with the locals on Fri and Saturday nights, I caught up with a few different friends in the two days - and I met one of my third cousins on my mum's side of the family. For the genealogically uninformed, your third cousin is someone who's great-grandparent is brother or sister to your great-grandparent. (As an aside, I believe that I am, in addition to being myself, also my OWN third cousin several times removed, but that is another story). I'll be here in Summit, enjoying the company of Sue, John, Xander, and Buffy until Tues when I am headed back into the city to take up temporary residence in Brooklyn thanks to the always helpful and hospitable Jeff, who just so happens to have an empty apartment there. THANKS JEFF!!
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