English for Action Structure Board

English For Action

Group discussion with Tony about the culture and Providence’s ethnicity, population, education, and social structure has helped me to understand the diversity of this city. English for Action is currently located at one of the elementary school in Olneyville. It was purposely placed in Onleyville to serve the concentrated population of Latino immigrant families. It is English for Action’s goal to provide a language center which program methods are using visual arts, theater of the oppressed, and action projects to engage adults and younger learners in dialogue, reflection and collaboration. I have been helping out in childcare program, Ourschool. While adults learn English, their kids, about thirty children, are gathered in a classroom, overseen by a few supervisors to help them with their homework or have some interactive actives with student’s age from five to twelve. It has been interesting to see kid’s interacting among themselves; some older kid will look after a younger one as if the younger child is his or her sibling. Additionally, it is both positive and negative to have such a diverse age group. It is interesting to see variety of preferences, skills, and understanding of each age group; however, at the same time, it is hard to coordinate the activities that all age will enjoy. Overall, EFA community is very optimistic, full of positive energies which creates inspiring atmosphere to learn for learners, fun place for teachers to teach and good-intentioned volunteers to help out. It is surprising to see them sustaining their key value of creating a community and creating leaders who can help the one’s who are in need. EFA have been going through some huge adjustments but the reason why it still manages to exist is because of these strong positive beliefs and their goal of good cause.

where my thoughts been

A Better World by Design
what is design?
what is elegance?
what is economical?
what is life-saving?


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Are the MDGs the Best Place to Start?

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Product design initiatives for Humanity, Habitats, Health, and Happiness.

Project H Design is a charitable organization that supports, inspires, and delivers life-improving humanitarian product design solutions. We champion industrial design as a tool to address social issues, a vehicle for global life improvement, and a catalyst for individual and community empowerment.

Project H Design encourages the reorientation of the design industry towards a more socially-impactful and humanitarian entity through a variety of Initiatives that include design thinking, production and distribution, funding, design academics, and local chapter projects.

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Grain mission

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Doing Good is Good for People, the Planet and for Business

"If you read my work, you likely know that I believe every person and every business and institution should make an effort to put people ahead of all else and contribute to making the planet a better place to live and work."

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Seventh Generation is a business that operates according to a new and different set of principles… We work to create a corporate culture in which people are energized and fulfilled as members of an intentional community.

"Today, we live in a world of increasingly widespread social disruption caused by imbalances in the natural and societal systems human beings depend upon for survival. Our civilization is overly reliant on non-renewable sources of energy. Our economic system spends more on weapons than schools. Our oceans are being scoured clean of life. Chemicals in our food, air, water, and soils air are disrupting our health. The list seems nearly endless and it leads to perhaps the most pernicious dilemma of all: problem fatigue and the widespread cynicism and powerlessness it generates.

"In response to these and other challenges, new ways of looking at purpose-based business-ing is slowly and yet, progressively happening. Seventh Generation is a business that operates according to a new and different set of principles, values that in many ways are marked departure from those long considered “traditional.” We offer employees avenues not to express their greed and ambition but their idealism, passion, and commitment to causes larger than themselves. We promote this approach to doing business not only among our employees, but to each of our stakeholders from manufacturing partners to our consumers."

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AVO

Problem and Mission Statments for the Project

Problem Statement

Solomon Islands are deprived in Free Primary Education. They are in a process of applying for the grant, and their goal is to start the Free Primary Education in 2009. To sustain the education, they need to provide a good education to create leaders. Leaders, who will graduate from school and help the family, community, and the nation.

Mission Statement

To create leaders from education, a creative learning has to be applied. Education should provide not only information but help children develop their thinking and understanding.

Born into Brothels

I've thought Kids with Cameras were not relevant to my project of creating a curriculum in Solomon Islands; however, as I was researching what a good education was, I could not help but to keep relating the key points to Born Into Brothels.
Their simple activity of carrying the camera and taking picture was the active learning.
Kids not only learned how to use camera by physically doing it, they were actively engaged. free to explore and document their interest and surroundings.
Next step why it was a great learning experiment was because it had potential implication, it gave them purpose of why they were taking the picture: to share it with others, to show in the gallery.
At last, it was done in a group form. They had peers to share their learning and experience....

I underestimated the happy accident, education process. Because it all started with the director's simple desire to document and understand the Brothels, without a real plan of education, I didn't see it at the beginning. There is not greater success than BEING there, understanding the need in hand, and solving the situation on the spot.

Random Information Research

Basic Teaching Strategies (from GMU)
"The advantages of the lecture approach are that it provides a way to communicate a large amount of information to many listeners, maximizes instructor control and is non-threatening to students. The disadvantages are that lecturing minimizes feedback from students, assumes an unrealistic level of student understanding and comprehension, and often disengages students from the learning process causing information to be quickly forgotten."




the Science Education Resource Center at Carleton College
On the Cutting Edge - Professional Development for Geoscience Faculty
Designing Effective and Innovative Courses

• Research shows clearly that a person must be engaged to learn. People learn by actively participating in observing, speaking, writing, listening, thinking, drawing, and doing.
• Learning is enhanced when a person sees potential implications, applications, and benefits to others.
• Learning builds on current understanding (including misconceptions!).

As you enter a classroom ask yourself this question: "If there were no students in the room, could I do what I am planning to do?" If your answer to the question is yes, don't do it.

Gen. Ruben Cubero, Dean of The Faculty, United States Air Force Academy

"What would it be like to teach in a general education classroom using the strategies and techniques I was using with gifted children?", Carol Horn asked herself. "In my new heterogeneous classroom of sixth graders, I first presented a more challenging curriculum for all students, and then adjusted and differentiated as needed in order to accommodate a variety of readiness levels. . .I found that all students thrived on and were motivated by a challenging and complex curriculum." (Classroom Leadership On-Line, September 2000)

Education Value of Chess

"Research shows, there is a strong correlation between learning to play chess and academic achievement. In 2000, a landmark study found that students who received chess instruction scored significantly higher on all measures of academic achievement, including math, spatial analysis, and non-verbal reasoning ability (Smith and Cage, 2000).

While studies have shown chess to have a positive impact on kids in elementary, middle and high school, AF4C targeted second and third graders as the evidence, and certainly our experience, suggests it's the ideal age. Eight and nine year-old minds and thinking skills are developing rapidly, and chess teaches higher level thinking skills such as the ability to visualize, analyze, and think critically.

If you teach an adult to play chess, they quickly comprehend where they should and shouldn't move pieces to capture or avoid capture. Young Kate knew the names of the pieces and how they moved, but initially moved her pieces randomly. Soon she was saying, "If I move my piece here, you could capture it, right? Then I'm not going to move there." You can almost see the mental changes taking place. "

Thinking Skills

"It was once thought that the teaching of thinking skills was not a possibility, since they were believed to be innate. As these tools were developed they were then believed to be appropriate mostly for more intelligent or more advanced learners. Now we understand that the skills of problem-solving, analysis, synthesis, creativity, evaluation, and other higher order thinking processes can be taught and learned, even by those considered to be less able than their peers. Most of these tools can be embedded into the teaching of any subject, and many can be facilitated through specific software programs. As students use computers as tools to learn, they also exercise their thinking by learning how to ask the right questions, pursue research on the Internet, and evaluate their sources of information."

Confucius I hear and I forgot I see and I remember I do and I understand