VIF LocalInvestigations Final

LET STUDENTS

LEAD

vif international education

A guidebook on how local investigations drive democratic and global learning

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“We in America do not have government by the majority. We have government by the majority who participate.”

— Thomas Jefferson

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let students lead:how local investigations drive democratic and global learning

While it’s rare these days to hear good news about the state of public education, it continues to serve an essential role in communities and nations. As an institution, public education is often taken for granted or, worse, viewed as a failure despite a common understanding that an educated public improves the quality and health of a society. Increasing demands on teachers’ schedules, diminishing access to teaching resources, low compensation and— especially in countries overcome by the pressures of standardized testing — changing expectations of how proficiency is demonstrated by students can all distract from the role educators play in a functioning democratic society.

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The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) views access to a sound education as a fundamental human right specifically because of the influence it has on supporting democracies. Thomas Jefferson, one the founding fathers of democracy in the United States, believed in a participatory society that offered citizens an active role in decision making at the local level. Jefferson’s commitment to democratic participation is evidenced through his advocacy of public education and his belief that sharing knowledge and raising public awareness is required for preventing tyranny.1

The U.S. political philosopher John Dewey designed and promoted an inquiry-based educational pedagogy tied directly to his assertions about democratic principles. Like Jefferson, Dewey believed that genuine democracy involves

more than periodic voting. Democracy involves intelligent, active participation “in the formation of values that regulate the living of men [and women] together.” He insisted that “all those who are affected by social institutions must have a share in producing and managing them.” 2

In fact, almost a century ago, Dewey asserted connected learning principles—which are still relevant today—to engage students in the classroom by drawing on their prior experiences and eliminating the barriers between school and community. The classroom is the place to engage in local and global politics, from debates about science to close readings of literature from diverse cultures. For Dewey, the primary purpose of education is for students to draw regularly from personal experiences, connect those experiences to larger academic texts, engage in political debates and understand local issues in order to develop as citizens.

1 Reference: The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia2 Reference: Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education

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Advanced democracies are increasingly marked by apathetic communities disengaged from their local political processes, not to mention the quality of public education in their communities. Social action and community engagement are core principles in global education but support for developing comfort with those practices is often absent from U.S. curricula. Teachers are positioned to empower students to trust their curiosities about the world and to be leaders in investigating their own questions so that no information is ever out of reach. Reinvigorating educational approaches that better develop informed and active students is not impossible and it does not require deviation from standards-based instruction.

For educators, student-led local investigations are a great place to start.

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All humans engage with the world around them from the moment of birth. In fact, we are all natural investigators. We crawl, put things in our mouths, listen to the sounds of our families and caregivers, touch everything, test gravity and smell the world. Yet traditional schooling tends to untrain our natural instincts for investigation. Curiosity is traded for memorization, observation is traded for following rules that often have little connection to learning, and open questioning and research are traded for teacher-directed instruction.

How do we re-engage students’ natural investigatory instincts while developing their knowledge of core academic content? The answer is pretty simple. Students need learning spaces— and caring adults to establish those spaces— to build on their prior experiences and demonstrate true connections between academic subjects and the world students know.

What are local investigations?

1 Where is my family from?

simple questions can lead to great local investigations.

Guide oral history projects based on student interviews of family members to create timelines or maps of major events in family history.

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Effective local investigations:/ Put students into the role of investigator and charge them with identifying

and collecting the data needed to answer simple or complex questions arising in classrooms, schools or the larger communities around them.

/ Introduce expert or primary source knowledge that allows students to expand on their own existing knowledge or perceptions of topics being investigated.

/ Are generally hands-on and involve learning outside of textbooks, and often outside of classrooms.

/ May be discrete activities—under no circumstances are local investigations required to be complex, long-term projects.

/ Reveal natural connections between local topics or issues and their broader, global implications.

/ Easily utilize technology and 21st century tools.

/ Support evidence of how people learn best, and help students feel in control of their learning.

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The focus of local investigation activities and projects, regardless of their scope or subject, is for students to create content and engage in inquiry processes by collecting data and testing findings against what others considering the topic have found. This brings students into the process of co-constructing their own knowledge, supports their natural curiosities and motivations to learn about the world around them, and follows their developmental progression.

The number of technology tools currently available allow students to collect data from sources ranging from oral histories to bird migration patterns, and to analyze and share findings with large communities. For example, online open science applications, such as iNaturalist and the Encyclopedia of Life, enable citizen science projects supported by experts and resources and invite students and teachers to contribute data to real-time, crowd-sourced scientific investigations. Oral history projects such as American Memory and StoryCorps provide opportunities for all communities to document their own histories and connect them to larger social and historical narratives. Through these types of investigations, students learn that historians, scientists and artists are constantly interpreting, reinterpreting, debating, arguing, researching and arriving at new understandings of the world around them.

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Simple questions can lead to great local investigations.

2 What kind of plant is this?


Explore the genealogy of plants common to the community.

How are businesses started?

Where does our tap water come from?

What kind of bird is that?

Investigate resources provided by the local chamber of commerce and research or visit local businesses to learn more about their reach.

Visit a local water utility or treatment plant to learn more about your community’s water sources and what’s being done to protect them.

Research local animal species and their migrations to the region, and explore other locales where these species are found.

Why don’t we throw trash on the ground?

Investigate local environmental policies and trace what global issues they relate to.

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3 Where did you get that shirt?


Investigate the geographic and resource origins of students’ clothing.

Simple questions can lead to great local investigations.

Why do we celebrate Mardi Gras, clam chowder, flowers, blues music, etc?

Why do you talk like that?

Explore regional traditions (e.g., cuisine, festivals, music) for global origins, connections or meanings.

Investigate regional dialects to reveal their unique origins.

Who built that?

Consider local architecture and whether it reflects other places in the world.

Investigate local landmarks and places.

Why is that building or street named after a person?

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Local investigation practices in education are not new. Almost every good teacher knows, for example, that if students have opportunities to interview family members about their immigrant experiences, knowledge is deepened because the information is relevant to students’ lives. Imagine students then comparing their own family immigrant stories with digitized primary sources available through the Library of Congress to understand how their stories align with historical U.S. narratives.

Local investigations serve another critical function by providing teachers opportunities to implement culturally responsive teaching strategies. Education researchers have long documented the cultural biases that exist in schools in the U.S. and other countries with highly diverse student populations.3,4 Educator biases, curriculum content, assessment procedures and overall school cultures tend to privilege dominant groups within a society. Students with diverse cultural backgrounds are often framed within deficit models that view their experiences as something to overcome and contribute to a downward spiral of low achievement and marginalization.

Implementing instructional approaches that engage and serve students from all backgrounds can be challenging if inquiry-based and student-centered strategies are not central. It is not possible for teachers to know every detail about a student’s background, nor it is necessary. Structuring time for students to consider and share what they already know about a topic allows teachers to better understand their diverse backgrounds and existing knowl-edge, and it reveals the misconceptions to address through investigations.

Why are local investigations important to student learning?

“Students come to the classroom with preconceptions about how the world works. If their initial understanding is not engaged, they may fail to grasp the new concepts and information that are taught, or they may learn them for purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions outside the classroom.”— from How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

3 Reference: Multicultural Education: Issues and Perspectives4 Reference: The Importance of Multicultural Education

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Local investigations put students in the driver’s seat and provide opportunities for students’ unique personalities, curiosities and strengths to shine. Challenging students to lead their own learning is also essential for building trust in the classroom. The importance of the relationships between students and teachers cannot be overstated. When student-teacher relationships break down, diverse student perspectives risk being undervalued or ignored and will result in students feeling disconnected. Achievement gaps are easily understood in schools not actively undertaking efforts to develop student-centered and culturally responsive classrooms.

Again, maintaining a culturally responsive and effective learning environment does not mean that teachers must be experts in the cultures and backgrounds of all of their students. In fact, willingness to admit not knowing everything can be a strength as long as it is accompanied by an openness to students and a curiosity to learn more about them as individuals. With this in mind, local investigations should not be conducted only by students. Teachers need to be active participants in the process—not just as teachers but as fellow researchers and learners. For trust to be built, teachers have to share and build on their experiences, too. Reciprocity is critical.

For trust to be built, teachers have to share and build on their experiences, too. Reciprocity is critical.

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The most effective approaches to global learning don’t necessarily start by focusing on things or places far away from students. Curiosity and perspective-taking are critical global competencies to help students develop, and those skills are nurtured when students thoroughly explore their own backgrounds, communities and cultural contexts. New literacy standards underscore the need for students as young as kindergarten to compare and contrast because understanding is strengthened when students analyze the similarities and differences between something they recognize and something they don’t. Local investigations provide compelling foundations for connecting student curiosity to global contexts because students can’t begin to explore the world unless they recognize where they are.

Let’s consider a few more detailed examples. Oral history projects conducted by students in any U.S. classroom will find global connections among family or community members within one or two generations. The inherent diversity of the U.S. population is something educators can use to create units of study built on the premise that the majority of U.S. Americans come from somewhere else in the world. Several questions might drive these types of investigations and students may develop interview protocols to explore their own stories. What brought their families and ancestors to this country? What global event triggered their families’ immigration? What was the relationship of newly arriving immigrants to the communities already here? How did they adapt to their new homes?

How are local investigations relevant to global learning?

Local investigations provide compelling foundations for connecting student curiosity to global contexts because students can’t begin to explore the world unless they recognize where they are.

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Most local communities are linked to the global economy in real ways. Community mapping projects will reveal

local companies with inherent global connections established through trade, markets or outright ownership. Chambers of commerce are excellent resources for data and information about local and global business relationships that may be core components of local economies. Inviting local business leaders or planning a field trip to a local business will make these global connections transparent to students. Guest speakers may focus on how the products they produce locally are critical to relationships across cultural and geographic borders and to the success of their businesses. Diving deeper, students may explore how local businesses have changed business practices and product development to ensure that they are connecting to diverse markets and customers, including how local businesses have adjusted to changing demographics in their own communities. In addition, many communities have experienced the loss of manufacturing industries and students may examine the global forces that contribute to such capital movement. Where did these business go? Why did they move? What other businesses took their place?

Local investigations driven by political and history curriculum standards might involve interactions with representatives

from local, state or national governments. Students may conduct research and compile questions and then engage—virtually or in person—with political staff or local elected officials to discuss various aspects of the political process, the roles of elected officials, pending legislations, policy agendas, etc. These types of efforts may be integrated into standards-based projects that connect the study of U.S. government to local investigations of political representation and local-global interdependencies. Investigations such as these are also essential for students to understand how governments work and that they have a role in their own governance. Engaging directly with representatives through student-led questions is an excellent first step in making civic responsibility more transparent to students.

Finally, local investigations create connections that help students recognize that most jobs will require

them to interact with and communicate effectively across diverse cultures. They also allow students to utilize technology tools, and to learn and apply technology literacy in their research. These are the types of applicable skills and insights that students need to interact effectively with their communities and with the world.

4 Where do you live compared to where I live?


Map neighborhoods or local communities, using Google Earth or other online mapping tool, to identify community assets and landmarks.

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For many teachers, local investigations are already integral to everyday instruction. For others, curriculum and accountability mandates may feel too pervasive and time consuming to comfortably adopt a student-centered approach. Educators interested in integrating local investigations into instruction need to feel comfortable putting students in charge of their learning, which requires not only trust in students but also planning to provide the structure and guidance needed for students have some authority in their learning process.

Local investigations do not abandon curriculum standards in favor of student interests. The most effective local investigations happen when standards-based instruction can be supported, enhanced or transformed by investigations sparked by student curiosity. The list of local investigation dos and don’ts on the following pages will help you get started and demonstrate that these investigations will not steer you away from standards-based curriculum.

Next steps

Local investigations do not abandon curriculum standards in favor of student interests.

5 What does a mayor do? How are laws made?


Facilitate virtual or in-person discussions of policy and decision-making processes with representatives from the local government.

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DO/ Let students lead. Establish routines at the beginning of the year that build students’ responsibility and ownership in the learning process. Make the high expectations you have for students clear and ask them to sign contracts agreeing to be leaders in their own learning.

/ Know your curriculum. Remember that local investigations do not always need to be full-blown interdisciplinary units. Investigations can be as simple as autobiographical essays — just know where to plug local investigations into your curriculum and how they will deepen your students’ learning.

/ Let students’ interests indicate where they might engage more deeply with the curriculum. Allowing time for students to wander and wonder around topics reveals new thinking and often leads to deeper understanding of content. Don’t consider this getting off track.

/ Investigate alongside your students. Where are you interested in further developing your own content expertise?

/ Take advantage of local connections in your community. What expertise can be offered on investigations of local topics by your colleagues or your students’ families?

/ Communicate with parents and guardians about local investigations being central to students’ learning processes. Ask for their participation and input to build trust and buy in.

/ Be mindful when engaging students in local investigations that require investigative work beyond school hours since this may inadvertently favor certain students while isolating others. As much as is reasonable, allow students to conduct investigations during school hours.

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DON’T

/ Don’t overcomplicate local investigations or overthink the planning phase. Implementing successful local investigations doesn’t always mean taking students outside of the school building. Start with small projects to develop procedures that you are comfortable with and go from there.

/ Don’t throw out tried-and-true best practices. Wherever possible, use local

investigations to complement and strengthen everything you already do well. / Don’t always be the expert. In fact, don’t ever be the expert!

Local investigations promote inquiry by allowing teachers to learn alongside their students.

/ Don’t be afraid of student questions—they are the most important part of any inquiry process. Too often, as educators, we race through or don’t allow student questions because we believe they take time away from the curriculum. But students cannot connect to any curricular activity unless they feel connected to the outcome. Using a simple Know-Want-Learn chart is a great way to have student questions drive your instruction.

/ Don’t avoid controversy. Many administrators and parents fear students being involved in difficult conversations. However, the classroom should be the place for these conversations so that students learn essential skills such as effective argumentation, using evidence to support particular positions, and the critical difference between opinion and fact.

/ Don’t be limited by curriculum pacing. The perennial problem of breadth over depth reflected in many, if not most, district pacing guides can be difficult to manage. However, local investigations will strengthen any curriculum area or focus. Remember that local investigations may be discrete activities or they may serve as interdisciplinary projects that anchor six- to nine-week periods.

/ Don’t endeavor on local investigations if you can’t commit to their implications. Local investigations require pedagogical approaches that are student-centered, inquiry-based and that ask teachers to give up their role as experts in order to learn alongside their students.

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American Memory

Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education

Encyclopedia of Life

Google Earth

How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

The Importance of Multicultural Education

iNaturalist

The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia

Library of Congress

Multicultural Education: Issues and Perspectives

One T-Shirt Changed the Way Students in a North Carolina School Think About the World

StoryCorps

Tech Tools: Our 4 Favorite Online Mapping Resources

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

Resource Links

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Contributors

Julie Keane, PhDJulie leads research and evaluation for all VIF programs, contributes to professional

development curriculum design, and is a key contributor to the development of VIF’s digital badging system. She holds a Ph.D. in education from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a master’s in political science from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Julie grew up in the New York City borough of Queens in one of the most ethnically diverse neighborhoods in the world, Flushing. By simply walking through the neighborhood, residents and visitors of Flushing,

Queens may encounter Irish, Greek, Russian, Italian, Indian, Sri Lankan, Malaysian, Colombian, Salvadorans, Indian, Pakistani, Afghan, Bangladeshi, Chinese and Korean

people and communities — just to name a few.

Tamara Oxley, MATamara manages marketing initiatives and operations for VIF. She holds a master’s in media and cultural studies from The University of Texas at Austin, and a B.A. in communications from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Tamara grew up on the eastern coast of Florida where, as a kid, she spent a lot of time playing around huge shell mounds that are remnants of the early Native American tribes that once inhabited the area. The history of Florida is rooted in Native American cultures and the influence of those cultures is still apparent throughout the state.

Lauren HanfordLauren leads visual design efforts across VIF marketing and product

initiatives. She holds dual bachelor’s degrees in design and computer science from North Carolina State University. Lauren is a North Carolina native and her favorite retreats are to the Blue Ridge Mountains, an area with a rich musical culture shaped by the traditional styles and instruments of the English, Irish and Scottish immigrants and African slaves who settled the region in the 18th century. The music of the Blue

Ridge helped launch genres of music that we know today as country, bluegrass and blues.

Name: Date:

Know-Want-Learn chart

What do I KNOW What do I WANT to find out? What have I LEARNED?

learn.vifprogram.com/localinvestigations© 2015 Center for International Education, Inc.

VIF International EducationVIF International Education partners with districts and schools to develop global-ready teachers and students. For more than 25 years, educators have used VIF’s professional development and curriculum, language acquisition and cultural exchange teacher programs to create engaging learning environments that integrate technology, cultural literacy and other 21st century skills into classroom instruction. VIF is a certified B Corp and ‘Best for the World’ honoree headquartered in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.© 2015 Center for International Education, Inc.

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VIF LocalInvestigations Final