Black Migration Narratives- Dr. Farah Jasmine Griffin

I attended the keynote speaker for the Black History Month Conference, Dr. Farah Jasmine Griffin's lecture on February 27, 2009. Her topic was the power of the slave narratives and the movement of the African American people; pertaining specifically to the 1940s and the influence of World War II. However, she first gave a detailed, but interesting background on how the emancipated slaves moved throughout the country after the Civil War. They walked for miles and miles in order to re-unite with families and start over. As they moved about, their culture came with them, as did the slave experience. After providing the right amount of context information, she moved to the central part of her discussion: the role African Americans played in World War II and how these actions laid the foundation for the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. She argued that the Second Great Migaration, and the Double V Campaign (victory abroad, victory at home), contributed the Civil Rights Movement in the decades to follow. During this period, blacks became very vocal social critics. She explained how different art forms, including music and the Lindy hop, helped blacks maintain an identity as free human beings while they fought for their freedom from the Jim Crow laws.

I thought Dr. Griffin's lecture was very interesting. While I learned some of the background she provided through years of US history, I learned a lot from her talk. She put a new spin on things and kept us interested by focusing on the early movements of the 1940s versus the much more publicized Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s (which many of us already know a lot of detail about). Her speech was very planned out, and even though she sometimes rambled with an example/story, she stayed on task for a majority of her speech. She connected to her audience by preparing and utilizing a PowerPoint, which not only helped us follow along but also kept her on target as well. The PowerPoint was straightforward and simple, with enough writing to summarize her point but not enough to be overwhelming (and had room for plenty of pictures). Finally, she incorporated technology into the very end of her speech. She finished her lecture by showing us a video on YouTube clip of some African Americans doing the famous Lindy hop on stage. Dance was a major form of movement she emphasized, and like she said herself, the point was clearer to the audience when she provided a visual because the true experience of this dance was beyond words. Overall, I thought she did an excellent job of keeping on track, connecting and maintaining the audience, and presenting relevant and interesting information within an hour time span.

Barbed Wire? A matter of classroom managment

On Edutopia, I found a very fitting article that described classroom management. It metaphorically compared untangling barbed wire laying in the grass with managing a classroom of students.

This unique analogy is very fitting for education, based on personal experience and observations from the movie "Chalk." In "Chalk," several teachers had a hard time controlling their classrooms. For example, Mr. Lowrey, the first year history teacher had a very difficult time controlling his class at first. He presented boring lectures and did not have the nerve to discipline the class. The author of this article, Ben Johnson's, explanation about de-tangling barbed wire displays strategies Mr. Lowrey should have used from the beginning. Johnson explains that barbed wire does not untangle on its own, it requires work and cooperation. He stressed the importance of working with other teachers and students to fully manage classrooms. Although Mr. Lowrey did look for classroom management tips in books and slowly started gaining control of the classroom, he should have asked other teacher's for help and advice. He is going to have a harder time enforcing some discipline and control into a classroom if he started off being really lenient and out of control in the classroom.

Johnson's article also stresses the importance of variety in the classroom in order to engage student's learning, motivation, and help ease the de-tanglement process. This is another area in which Mr. Lowrey lacks; he lectures his class day after day after day. He could have learned a lot more than classroom mangagement from other teachers, such as Mr. Stroope and Coach Webb. While neither of these teachers were perfect either, Mr. Stroope crosses too many boundaries, they both implemented variety into their classrooms. Coach Webb varied the activities done in gym each day and Mr. Stroope kept his history class fun by making jokes and taking some time to hear about the students' lives. Unlike Mr. Lowry, these teachers seemed to care about their students, which I think is the first step for effectively managing a classroom.

Luther's Opening Convocation- February 5, 2009

Dr. Diane Griffin, a molecular microbiology and immunology professor from John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, was the speaker for second semester convocation. The title of her speach was "Global Approach to Infectious Diseases" and details a lot of facts and research regarding vaccinations and diseases. While Griffin explains that death from infectious diseases has decreased in the United States, infectious diseases, such as measles and tuberculosis, remain the main cause of death world-wide. Like Griffin stressed, this can be mostly preventable. The vaccinations for these dieseases exist and only need the acceptance of developing countries to use. Griffin says that part of the problem that prevents global vaccination is that many developing countries are refusing to accept the vaccination. Due to the fact that developing countries resist these outside vaccinations, and the highly contagious nature of infectious diseases, mealses and malaria remain two of the largest preventable diseases that causes death (especially in Africa). Finally, Griffin concluded her speech by discussing how these infectious diseases are a global problem from many perspectives: humanitarian, education, world peace, importation, and ecomonic development.

While Dr. Griffin's speak was interesting, I found it a little slow and confusing. She did use a powerpoint to organize her speech, which included data and graphs to illuminate what she was saying, to help us follow along. However, throughout her presentation, she lacked charisma and used words like "uh" a lot. Becuase she often lost her train of thought, the audience got confused about where she was going with a specific example. Also, she spent quite a portion of her speech discussing her own educational journey and research. While this gave us some context for her speech, I felt like it was an unneccessary and rather boring addition. The history of her own journey did not provide a benefical connection to her views on infectious diseases; instead it just flooded her audience with all her qualifications, degrees, and awards. From her speech, I learned that just because a person has the qualifications, that does not mean they are going to be effective in presenting it. I will keep this in mind in the classroom; I need to balance the expertise I have with enthusiasm so that my students are excited to learn what I am presenting.

Teaching for the 21st Century

The topic of preparing students properly for the modern world has come up numerous times within teacher panels and classroom discussions. When Steve Chambliss came in to give us an administrator's perspective, the theme of technology and teaching for the 21st Century resurfaced again. He believes that many teachers are still teaching the same way that they have always been and teaching for the 20th Century. He notices that current students are coming into schools needing to learn more character skills, such as integrity, respect, and honesty, than they have in the past. There are many factors for this but the result is the same: teachers need to make a change in their teaching styles in order to prepare students for the world they will be in after they graduate.

I found this really interesting video clip that emphasizes this point as well. I found it fascinating that there are more honors students in China, for example, than there are students in general in America. While this has a lot to do with population, this is an important issue to address. Many students are coming into schools with tons of technological experience. With iPods, text messaging, video games, and computer social sites, students have been exposed to a variety of skills and stimulation that has not necessarily been shown to them in the classroom. Teachers, to properly teach in the 21st Century, need to adapt their lessons in order to engage their students effectively. As Howard Gardner explains, many students have multiple intelligences. Technological intelligence is a growing one and a majority of students will be ahead even of us when we start teaching. To prepare students we need to harness some of this skill and bring it into our lessons. While I am not advocating for the complete integration of technology, I am saying that we need to incorporate stimulating activities, such as review games done on the computer or classroom blogs, to provide students with learning opportunities as well as giving them critical skills that will help them survive in the ever-growing technological "real world." To sum up, I will end with the words of Chambliss: "Don't do the same thing for 41 years." He stressed that at the very least teachers should be changing how they teach a class and what they teach within that. To keep up with the competition from high-achieving students from countries like China and Japan, US teachers need to break from past traditions and base their teaching on facets of our modern society.