Recent Problem Solving Experience in Honors British Literature

In Honors British Literature, I assigned my students to make infographic resumes/profiles of literary characters. Click here for some real-world examples.

An infographic, I told them, is not just a poster with pictures and text. A good infographic has fewer words than it has images: graphs, icons, maps, etc. Click here for a good example. Here is one that actually moves.

Of course, I didn't expect my students to be able, yet, to make something as impressive and professional as these, but I wanted them to try.

I gave them four tools to use: infogr.am, piktochart, venngage, or easel.ly.

I also gave them two of my own attempts, although they aren't finished. I was reluctant to try show them too much because I didn't want to give them any ideas.

My examples are here and here. They are not as serious as I would like the students to have theirs be, but I thought they would be helpful.

The students soon ran into some problems.

1. None of these online tools are designed for collaborative work. Since this is a group assignment, they needed to figure out how that would work when they worked at home. Some groups decided that they would just text each other when they were going to work on it and text when they were finished, so they could avoid the problems of too many cooks spoiling the dinner, so to speak. Other groups decided that they would just have one person manipulating the infographic itself while the others supplied the quotations, ideas, etc.  They did run into some problems, with things being deleted or not saving and two students doing similar work without knowing it.  
2. Some groups realized right away that coming up with interesting and insightful graphs or charts sounds fun, but they struggled with actually coming up with ideas. It was interesting to see the students' puzzling this out. Using a numerical spreadsheet to make a graphical representation of ideas, personalities, or events in a story is new to them and they struggled.   In order to make a graph like the one below, they need to populate a spreadsheet like this one.  

   

   Spreadsheet

   

   Graph

   For me, the best way is to look at the various sorts of charts a person can make and see if there is any way to use it for my own purpose. Other students were drawing things on paper and loudly brainstorming. In the end, most of the groups came up with good ideas.
3. All of the groups struggled with the online infographic tools and had to solve those problems--sometimes over and over. All four of the tools can be glitchy, they have limited icons for free users to use, and this sort of work is almost totally new to all of the them.

Overall, I would say that I had some concerns before starting, but it did work out well. I was worried that the students would spend the majority of their intellectual energy on design and fonts and not on the exploration of the text and characters. I think they focused on the proper things, though, in the end. I was also worried that they needed to have very thorough walkthroughs of all four tools in order to get anything even started. I refrained, though, in an effort to let them solve their own problems.

I am mostly happy with the outcome. Their work could be better.  They could have tried a bit more to be creative, and they could have included more textual evidence.

However, it was a worthwhile assignment and it was successful, for the most part.

Click here to see them all.  This is perhaps the best one: click here.

Present at our first gathering in December: Wendy Carter (now sadly lost to the Robotics Team), Nate Mattson, Kelly Momsen, Paul Pearson, Karen Snyder, Lon Weaver, and Cheryl Wulff.

After reflecting on the first meeting and the participants additional comments thereafter, I think the discoveries of members of the group can be generally divided into three areas: (1) barriers to problem-solving, (2) processes for problem-solving, and (3) pedagogical responsibilities and institutional implications for the teaching of problem-solving.

Barriers to problem-solving were noted by Cheryl and Kelly. Cheryl has noted that students tend not to have problem solving skills and require greater opportunities for independent, non-teacher-dependent problem solving. Kelly attributes the absence of—or hesitance to cultivate—problem-solving skills to fear of failure and obsession with having to have the right answer.

Wendy, Paul, Nate, and Lon addressed the process of problem-solving. Wendy and Lon addressed the difference between the types and/or stages of problem-solving. Wendy noted that in science there is both a creative, generative step for developing solutions as well as an exploratory, evaluative step in which critical thinking is core to scientific studies. Lon saw a similar distinction between creative problem-solving in which brainstorming generated ideas and reflective problem-solving which honed in on solutions, both of them key to ethical practice. Nate reflected on the need for the inclusion of problem-solving opportunities in the study of English, especially related to the interpretation of materials in nonfiction. Paul pointed to the work of George Polya, specifically his four-step framework of “(1) understanding a problem, (2) devising a plan, (3) carrying out the plan,” and (4) reviewing the process. He noted that teachers and students, alike, are tempted to jumping to step three without due care in completing steps 1 and 2.

Finally, Karen addressed the pedagogical and institutional significance of problem-solving. First, she pointed to the importance of both modeling problem-solving and tenaciously coaching students in the practice. Second, she noted the importance of doing foundational work in problem-solving in the middle school to provide the basis for honing the skill in the upper school.