Education Reflections: Discovering Community in Brandon

In this ongoing series from the Discovering Community desk we hear from another participant at the VFC’s 2019 Summer Institute for Educators, held in St. Johnsbury last August. Educator Dave Praamsma of Otter Valley Union High School in Brandon came away from the program inspired to launch a “Vermont Folklife Digital Storytelling Project” in his 8th grade classroom.

In late November Dave sent us the following reflection upon the completion of the project. We are inspired to hear about the transformation Dave saw in his students when they were asked both to bring their own voice into the project and listen to the voices of others:

It has been about 3 weeks now since my two 9th grade English classes have finished their Folklife Podcast project, and I am struck by just how many objectives a project like this addresses. Certainly this is a project about Community Connections. It is noteworthy how much a project like this facilitates substantive interaction and learning about the people in our region – an effort that is all-too-often neglected by our teens who are almost entirely surrounded by their same-age peers. And I think it must be recognized how much a project like this is also about inquiry-based learning –formulating and asking good questions. Too often I do believe we –public educators - have become an institution that defaults to intellectually spoon-feeding our children rather than honoring the “holy curiosity of inquiry” (Albert Einstein). I think it must also be recognized that these types of undertakings are prime examples of Project-Based Learning that also need to be kept on center stage in classrooms. To enlist young people as “Ethnographers in Training” and turn them loose to create a final product for contribution to a larger community is exactly the type of authentic, genuine and meaningful work that we need to be doing more of educators.

But what stands out for me as an English teacher is that this project is also about Student Voices. The longer I teach, the more I am troubled by the sadly repeating malpractice of disingenuously asking for the voice and writing of our young people, but failing to really honor their words and their need for a larger audience beyond a solitary teacher and a rusty file cabinet.  This is a project that answers that challenge quite effectively. “Publishing” student work can take many creative forms in a classroom, but I am greatly encouraged by the opportunities that technology is now making available. A Podcast or film project not only provides a platform to showcase their contributions, but it quite literally brings their voice to classroom communities – and perhaps even beyond. 

Discovering Community’s Mary Wesley conducts a model interview in Dave’s Class

To all who listened to the final products of early October in my classroom, I do believe an unspoken consensus was in the air: the more authentic and meaningful the challenge, the more students invest themselves. They all knew the stakes were high. And they knew that the living history they were documenting was not a mindless hoop they were jumping through as students. At the end of this project the final results were quite remarkable. We had students who brought thoughtful and sensitive questions to Hurricane Irene survivors. We had others who found themselves deeply invested in the stories of struggling farmers. We even had one who went out of his way to make contact with our Lieutenant Governor Zuckerman to discuss the complications of hemp growing in the region. 

It will be an on-going effort to find avenues for students to contribute their voices, but the world of podcasts and audio productions cannot be overstated as a uniquely engaging, powerful and meaningful tool. It stands as perhaps one of the most layered, and pedagogically-fertile opportunities in our 21st Century learning landscape. What is exciting about it is that the tools are all now available – something previous generations of educators probably would never have imagined. I can only hope that this very worthwhile best practice grows in popularity. 

You can see a final project by one of Dave’s students here. Thank you to Dave and his whole class for all their hard work!

Thank you Dave for acknowledging that project-based learning with collaborative ethnography generates authentic, genuine, and meaningful learning for students. Your students have made a brave contribution to the larger community through their inquiry-guided projects.