Carrie Lobman and Unscripted Learning in the News!

Happy Holidays Everyone,

I had a very exciting December. On Friday December 14th the New York affiliate of WABC Eyewitness News aired a segment on Improv and Teaching featuring Unscripted Learning and the work of Allison Addison, one of the current Fellows in the Developing Teachers Fellowship Program at the East Side Institute.

Reporter Art McFarland visited Addison’s classroom in P.S. 399 in East Flatbush Brooklyn and observed her third-graders playing improv games – a new twist to classroom teaching that is ”giving kids a sense of what’s possible.” The segment introduced my work as a teacher educator and co-author with Matt Lundquist of Unscripted Learning: Using Improv Activities Across the K-8 Curriculum, and the Developing Teachers Fellowship Program that has brought improv into 30 schools across the tri-state area.

My favorite quote was when I said, “Improv supports children to grow and develop. And when you’re excited about that, you can learn anything!"

I hope you'll check out the clip at this link: Improv and Teaching on WABC You will have to scroll through several of WABC's recent education stories.

Have a Happy and Improvisational New Year.

Carrie

Developmental Learning for All!

As both Matthew and I have said before, one of the most important and least talked about educational discoveries in recent years is that much of the achievement gap between rich and poor kids can be attributed to the cultural experiences that middle and upper middle class kids get outside of school. This is clearly not a secret to upper-middle class and wealthy parents, as can be seen in Alison Cowan's article in the New York Times (Schools Deep Pocketed Partners). This article discusses the role played by wealthy parents in school districts across the country who are forming private foundations to raise money to bring among other things theatre, sports, greenhouses, music, dance, mountain bikes etc into the schools in their towns.

Unscripted Learning is our attempt to open that secret up to everyone, rich and poor, urban and suburban--real learning, developmental learning, requires that children be involved in and exposed to human creativity and culture. The well-off have always known this, but if we are to do anything about the achievement gap between rich and poor then we need to bring that kind of learning to all children. While the article discussed ways in which these foundations are working to serve all the children in their suburban districts--both the well off and the not quite so well off, our goal is to bring creativity into even the poorest school in the poorest district in the country.

A Playful Antidote to Standardized Test Stress

In the past few years the release of New York City's standardized test scores has become a spring ritual for anyone with connections to children, teachers, schools, or politics (pretty much anyone). Each year there seems to be one grade level which everyone hails as a huge success and another whose scores evoke concern. This year, according to the New York Times article by David Herzenhorn (New York Eighth Graders Show Gains in Reading), its the Eighth Grade that has made significant gains and the third and fourth grades that showed decline. Last year, if I remember correctly, the opposite was true. One of the more disturbing aspects of this constant shifting of concern and pride is that it leads to an enormous amount of stress among teachers, parents and children.

In writing Unscripted Learning one of Matthew's and my goals was to create a book that could be used by teachers who worked within the real world of high stakes testing and its ever shifting priorities. While I believe that the assumptions behind standardized tests are about as undevelopmental as you can get, I think there are opportunities to create test taking performances that have the potential to be developmental for everyone involved. The best program I've ever seen that does this is called TeamPlay for Test Stress developed by Gwen Lowenheim and Stuart Sears. This program uses improvisation and team-building to help inner-city elementary school students and staff deal more productively with test anxiety and stress. The teachers and kids work together to come up with test taking performances and while obviously each child has to take their own test, the class approaches the test as a team and works hard to help everyone succeed. Its one of the best examples of creative teaching out there.

Did you know there was a National Museum of Play?

Well there is, and its in Rochester, NY. They even have a Toy Hall of Fame. In it are such toys as the Slinky, Legos, Candyland, Lincoln Logs, and Mr. Potato Head. But, my favorite is that last year they inducted the Cardboard Box into the Hall of Fame. Very cool.

I was at the museum because they co-sponsored a conference called "Play Matters", co-sponsored by The Association for the Study of Play and the International Play Association. Once again I did a presentation on the Developing Teachers Fellowship Program and the use of improv in the classroom. The audience was made up of other play researchers, teachers, social workers, and playworkers (apparently a career in the United Kingdom). I had the luxury of having over an hour for my session so in addition to presenting on the methodology of the program and the work of the Fellows in their classrooms, we played several games from Unscripted Learning. We played several rounds of Yes, and and went on an Emotional Bus ride. One of the participants said that she had been feeling a little depressed at the conference until she heard about the work of the teachers.

I attended a couple of really interesting sessions. One of them was organized by Ana Marjanovic Shane and Beth Ferholt. Beth was discussing the Playworld project that she is studying. I've been a big fan of this program for several years now and try to hear Beth talk about it whenever I can. Playworlds is an international project for early childhood classrooms where the teachers take books and bring them to life in the classroom. For example, in Beth's case the teacher and researchers brought the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe to life in a first grade classroom on an army base in San Diego. Its amazing work that allows the children to improvise with the script of the books, but also creates an incredibly intimate environment between teachers and children. Ana showed a film from arts based camps for refugee children during the war in the former Yugoslavia. The films are wonderful and I have been encouraging Ana to get the out to more places. Finally, I attended a session led by Fraser Brown who does playwork with Romanian orphans. Again, if you can every get a chance to hear him speak--do so. It is truly inspiring work.