Fostering Student Engagement with Bob Irving

In this interview with Bob Irving, we discuss our emphasis on creative coding/computing for leisure, fostering engagement with coding/CS, improving pedagogy over time, and much more.

Welcome back to another episode of the
CSK8 podcast my name is Jared o Leary
in this episode I'm going to interview
Bob Irving we're going to discuss our
emphasis on creative coding or computing
for leisure fostering engagement with
coding or CS improving pedagogy over
time video games and learning all sorts
of topics that I hope you find
interesting now in this particular
episode there are a ton of links in the
show notes you can access them most
likely through your podcast app by
actually going to the description and
clicking on the link in there or simply
visiting Ghirardelli recom and searching
for the show notes on the c sk8 podcast
page and without further ado i'd like to
begin this episode with bob introducing
himself okay oh hi I'm Bob Irving I
teach middle school computer science at
the port of gout school it's an
independent school in Charleston South
Carolina
I've actually been teaching longer than
I've been teaching computer science but
I started out as an English and history
teacher and segwayed into computer
science about 15 20 years ago and I've
been doing that ever since
and so I really have the dream gig it's
the way I look at it can you tell me the
story of how you made that Segway like
what led you to want to do that and how
did you do it sure well I think part of
it was um it was around the year is the
dot-com bubble I'm sure that some people
will remember that and that was that
everything was gonna take off and people
who were in the tech industry were going
to be bazillion airs and I had been
teaching for a while at a boarding
school and I was actually getting a
little bit burnt out and I thought well
this will be my segue into a life of
unimaginable wealth and so I think we
all know how that worked out but anyway
and frankly I always was I was one of
those early adopters with every
technology so I had a computer I had a
Commodore 64 which I realized dates me
incredibly [ __ ] up I had a
conversation for and I was always trying
to figure out ways to use computers in
my classes and things like that so I
always loved that part and so when I was
looking for maybe the next thing that
appealed to me and I went back to school
it was this was actually in Canada and
they were
a school sadly that no longer exists
called Information Technology Institute
which offered a ten-month program
intense program an intensive program for
people with who already had bachelor
degrees to try to rescale them so that
they could go into the the tech field
and so I did that it was application
development and databases and you know
teamwork and all that kind of stuff and
it was a fabulous program and it was
really great and their pedagogy really
was very influential in the way I teach
computer science today but I went back
to school and I and I did that course
and by the time by the time the 10
months was up the the the frost was
starting to settle on all of that
excitement about the bubble so I spent
about a year or two trying to break into
the tech field and not really being
terribly successful and I thought well
if worse comes to worst I guess I can go
back to teaching and that's kind of what
happened and strangely enough I guess
the time off was the time that I needed
to just kind of get my mojo back and to
get back into it and so by the time like
I did that and then I got all kinds of
responses because obviously I had been a
teacher and that I had that tech piece
right rather than somebody who was just
breaking into the tech field and had the
teaching piece so uh so I got back into
it and started and started teaching
computer science I did a lot of
technology integration for the first few
years but I think my heart was really
more in actually making things than
helping the teachers make things and so
anyway that's that's how I got back into
it and I and I've been in middle school
computer science since then and that's
what I'm doing now so at the nonprofit
that I work for we work with a lot of
teachers who have maybe been teaching
for a while but who have never
experienced computer science or
programming in any capacity mm-hmm so
there's a lot of like hesitation and a
fear around like well how am I supposed
to teach these things like what kind of
recommendations might you give or an
educator who is new to teaching see is
that's a good question and I think a lot
of that would depend on their learning
styles and
what they're comfortable with but this
is really the Golden Age of computer
science education I mean if you look at
it there's so many things online you
know just just looking at code.org for
instance or any of those CS for all
there's a dozen at least of them out
there and you can do that but I do think
that there is something to be gained by
if you can finding some program where
you can devote yourself to that and
that's what that ten month period did
for me I mean I was immersed really
baptized into this I think that was a
really good experience for me because I
went into it thinking well I really know
how to work computers so I think this
should be pretty easy for me and I
discovered very early on that the that's
not the same thing you might be pretty
good with managing computers and know
your way around an operating system but
that's not the same as coding yet so
you've got to get that into your tool
kit I think but you know there's so much
so much support material out there and
there's so many on-ramps you know from
scratch on up to whatever and so much
help that i you know i think that it's
way more doable now than it was a few
years ago so was it kind of like a boot
camp that you were a part of um I guess
it was I I mean I I've seen that
terminology I suppose it was like a boot
camp but it was ten months what they did
was they divided us into teams there we
had a cohort of about 50 or 60 people I
think and you were in a team for two to
three months and you did application
development so it was really kind of
business oriented and you had to learn
how to interact with other people and
you had deliverables and it ended with a
actual business presentation that you
gave but the great thing about it was
they divided the time fairly equally
between instruction but all the teachers
were called facilitators that that was
the first clue and I remember the first
day when they got us all together and
they said I'll never forget this the
person in charge said everything we're
going to teach you will be obsolete in
about three years
I remember thinking wow I'm really
spending a lot of money yeah obsolete
but you're gonna make millions right
well they didn't actually
promised that but what happened today
was you know in this field you have to
rescale retool relearn all the time and
so what we're going to do is we're going
to teach you how to learn and how to
teach yourself and how to find the
resources because you will be doing that
over and over and over again in this
field and he started to list the
technologies that they taught two or
three years before and of course we
hadn't heard of any of them you know so
it was a little a little bit terrifying
but they really had a good way and so
the facilitators would say you would go
to them and say okay I'm really stuck on
this thing in Java I don't know how to
make this happen and they would answer
your question with the question always
and they would say something like well
where do you think you could find some
answers for that and you know we'd all
roll our eyes and we'd you know we'd say
you know we're paying a lot of money you
obviously you know but their thing was
no no you need to learn how to learn and
how to teach yourself and you know we're
giving you some instruction but when you
get you know you've got teammates here
you've got online resources you've got
all this you know and they did say look
if you're finally getting the point
where everybody's in tears call us in we
will do this but that's not going to be
our first response and as frustrating as
it was it has it's been gold for me ever
since and I you know I I've had to
rescale and you know the language is
that I'm learning now weren't prevalent
back then yep but I can do it and I do
that with with my middle school students
now I don't do it quite as harshly I
suppose they're a little bit more
nervous about that kind of thing but I
will often answer questions with
questions and try to help them to build
their learning because you know I always
tell them if I'm the answer to your
question then first of all there's 18 or
you all and you're going to sit waiting
for me to be the solution and that's not
gonna work we can't have that so I try
to teach them to find other resources
and I said I will help you and you're
certainly welcome to come in for extra
help if you want one-on-one I can
provide that but I can't provide it in
class to the extent that you might want
it
yeah actually was just speaking to some
he's going to appear in an interview two
weeks before this we were talking about
the same thing like you have to be able
to teach yourself that's like the number
one skill that you can learn it's not
necessarily learning a specific language
you're learning a specific concept of
practice but just learning how to learn
in general yeah they'll all be obsolete
shortly so it's fun it's funny because
one of the things that drew me to
computer science is that I am one of
those lifelong learners that every
school says they're trying to create I
mean I'm just cursed with this I suppose
but or black law or whatever but I love
to learn and the thing as much as I
loved English and history I mean Hamlet
never changed ever right they we didn't
have to learn Hamlet in a new language
or there was no some new Shakespearean
play you know every year or two that we
had to learn it was all you know after a
while you got it down and so it wasn't
that it was boring because you know
great literature is always great and you
know exciting history is always exciting
but after a while it was it was kind of
the same thing and so I wanted something
that was always going to be fresh
there's some days I really asked myself
you sure that's what you want Bob
because you know today it's you know
it's this and you you don't have an
answer but yeah all at all I would say
definitely if you're that person that
loves to learn this is this is the field
how has your experiences in other
subject areas kind of informed how you
approach computer science gosh that's a
good question thank you one thing that I
actually minored in in an in a dead
language in college I minored in Greek
and which is completely useless ever
since of course but the whole
grammatical thinking and syntactical
thinking has been really helpful okay
the other the other side where I come to
it is the whole idea of creative coding
I suppose having been a humanities
person I do get the humanities I do get
creativity I do get expression and soul
or whatever you want to call it I love
to bring that part of it in and marry
that with coding so I think that's a
that's a big thing for me
I do find a lot of computer science is
very much based on business which is
fine but coding is just one one way to
express yourself one means of
self-expression why couldn't it be just
for art or I don't mean just but for art
or for music or for dance or whatever
not just for you know making money so
that that's informed me a lot too yeah I
think coding and computer science for
leisure is something that is just often
not discussed because it's such a
lucrative field so the focus is on
helping kids get jobs which is great
like mmm that might be a priority for
some people but there's also just
something to be said about learning for
the sake of enjoyment or for leisure and
I think CS can be one of those things I
would totally agree and our school
you'll find that in our computer science
program we have athletes and the debate
team and the cheerleaders and all kinds
of people in our computer science
program because our cell is look you may
not be a full time computer science
person you may not go into that but
maybe you're going to go into marine
biology or language teaching or
something and if you have this coding
piece in your in your tool kit then
you're gonna be way ahead of everybody
else and every option you're going to
choose for a career now involves
computing and the better you know that
you know the better you can do in your
field it's easier it's an easy sell to
the hardcore computer science people in
a school because they're gonna be there
whether you know they'll be banging your
door down right because they what they
want the courses everybody's going to
need it to some extent and I think it's
a good point what you say just but
coding for pleasure it's fun I mean if
people write or paint or draw or dance I
don't think many people ask them that
know what you know how much are you
making at that like what you know you'll
never be able to support yourself well
of course you know it brings pleasure
and it's self-expression and so so
that's good enough isn't it yeah for
some not for others uh yeah some people
are really concerned with that which
like I understand to an extent but it's
also like okay we don't need to just
focus on learning about jobs like what
about in our leisure time things to just
help us decompress from those jobs and I
think what the humanities is we're
more than the jobs we do as humans right
and so this is just an aspect of that so
what's something you believed when you
first began working in education that
you no longer believed I think that I at
first didn't really believe in the power
of giving students choice even in the
humanities and yeah I think we still
know we're all doing this we're all
doing this this book you know or we're
all writing this essay that kind of
thing okay and perhaps it was simply
because I didn't know how to manage
multiple things going on maybe that
scared me I don't really know I don't
think I came with that kind of a mindset
that's it that's a tough question I
probably also underestimate it's young
people when I first started teaching I
think I maybe didn't impute the right
motives to them or thought that they if
given the chance they'd slack off and
things like that and my experience I
don't know if you've ever done this but
if you've ever done some self
evaluations with students it's amazing
to me how either there's absolutely
spot-on
when they evaluate what they've done and
learn or they're hard on themselves very
rarely do you come across the students
as yeah well that's a hundred because
that's you know what that's what they
want they're very rarely happens I think
that I don't think I understood at the
time how you know what their standards
were how smart they were how they really
understood what was going on I don't
think I gave them enough credit so that
hasn't I haven't done that for a while
but I think when I first started I was
like that yeah yeah that's something
that I've seen with a lot of educators
who are first starting CS the thing that
they're most afraid of is not knowing
enough and that kind of fear can put
limitations on the kids and that they
don't want them to learn too much
because then how is the teacher gonna
help them and that in the end just kind
of slows things down I just had that
happen to me today in class I was
seventh grade class they're making
scratch games and somebody had come up
against kind of this thorny programming
problem and she said well what will
happen if I do this and I said I don't
know
and she said what I will find out I do
but she said but you're the computers
you're supposed to know everything I
said I clearly do not know everything I
said I have a suspicion of what might
happen based on working with scratch and
how I think the logic might work but I
don't really know so I said try it let's
see what happens she tried it and it
came out the way that I thought it might
but I didn't know and it was funny to
see the the astonishment her hey I knew
everything and then if I back up and I
say look I teach for grades of middle
school computer science with two to
three technologies in each grade so
that's you know eight to ten twelve
different platforms so I can't possibly
know all of it about all of them and
that it changes from year to year right
so I try to disabuse them of the notion
that I'm the fount of all wisdom it
doesn't take too long what comes to mind
when you think of what an engaging
learning experiences or environment well
that's really my number one goal for
every every course that I teach in every
class period that I have every single
one is the total engagement from the
students I can't say that I'm always
there but that's what I want to have
happen I I live for those a-ha moments
when the students you know it clicks
they get the robot on the floor and it
does you know after multiple tries you
know it senses the line and it turns
left or whatever it is you know or the
you know they get ten points and it goes
to the next level in their game or their
you know the minecraft redstone project
work I love those so I try to find it's
always my first question when I'm
looking at what technologies or
platforms to use is will this engage the
student so if I look at you know the
grade level you know the interest level
and I will dump something in a heartbeat
if it's if it's not engaging I mean if
there's something that I think will be
super engaging and it's not I'll just
dump it and I won't waste
any any more time on it but and I think
that's one thing that's changed in my
teaching over the years is that I didn't
used to do that I used to we are gonna
get through this
Ibis is the plan we're gonna do it you
know right now if it's not working
I will punt quickly so I always try to
have kind of a loose hold on what we're
doing and and a willingness to drop it
and go to plan B at all at all times
there's so many good points that you
just said there you said if it's not
working not working for who
well I would say not engaging so that
now that means that because I think the
true learning comes when they're engaged
they're they care they want it to work
and so that's that's when I say if it's
not working so there's so much that I
think has to do with engagement and
motivation and interest and the want to
or whatever you want to call it that if
you don't have that well then it's
really just trying to drag rocks up a
hill and I I'd rather not do that you
know there's another way another entry
point into some concept let's find that
because I want you to want to get the
answer it sounds like you're thinking
through the perspective of whether or
not kids would be engaged and far too
often in education it's more of a
top-down thing or it's like well I as
the educator facilitator in the room
really like this thing so therefore kids
should like it too so like you and I
might be like oh this is so cool let's
do sonic pie and we're gonna code music
and like make all those really cool
compositions or live performances but
code is less interested in music would
probably be not as engaged I think
that's true and yeah so I try to give
them some leeway in that which and
that's been you know fairly recently
I've tried to to give a lot even more
choice in terms of what they spend time
making projects in but it's for instance
like Minecraft I when the first time I
saw minecraft I was like everybody else
I think this is the dumbest looking you
know foxy lousy graphics you know the
whole thing how is this possibly getting
anybody's attention but then I saw the
engagement factor and I thought well
okay if I can't figure out a way
to use this in my classes then I need to
have my teaching license revoked because
the engagement factor is so high and it
continues to be you know ten years in so
you know that's what it looks like and
they are creating and they're thinking
and they're working together and they're
problem-solving and all those things
that those higher-level thinking skills
that we say we want kids to have they're
using them without me making them use
them so you ask you know what does
engagement look like well I think that's
that's what it looks like we've had
several conversations about what your
classes look like and I've had the
privilege of being able to look at a
draft for a book that you're working on
but wondering if you could share with
everyone what a typical class looks like
so if somebody were to walk into your
room what would they see here experience
etc okay well I have to preface this by
one of my favorite quotations which is
learning is messy so I would always I
would always try to make sure that
people understand that that learning
true learning really is messy I mean I
could get everybody lined up in nice
neat rows and that don't quietly take
notes but that's that's not how I would
like my classes to work so usually what
happened if you come in it could look a
little chaotic it could look really
chaotic actually yeah there are times
when that chaos is not really good most
of the times it's good chaos it's
learning messy chaos and I'm and I'm
good with that
I give large deep-dive projects and
we'll spend weeks on something so if
let's say we meet three to four times a
week 45 to 50 minute periods so a
project depending on what grade it's in
could last you know three or four weeks
and everybody you know we give a little
bit of an intro I like to give them
enough in introduction to whatever
platform you're using so they can kind
of navigate their way around and I show
them the first bits and then I say now
here's your goal you have to do you have
to create this a something a game a
minigame a whatever go
and then they go everybody buy that at
that point is kind of at a different
stage in their learning and I encourage
people to help other people so that
creates more messy learning chaos but
that's okay my only rule with helping
people is you're not allowed to touch
their keyboard or their mouse or their
robot can help but you can point you can
point you can't take over and we talk
about why that is how you learn and how
we don't want you know to circumvent
their learning and there's just
questions questions questions all the
time I do believe in just-in-time
learning
mm-hmm I think we might have talked
about that before yeah so for instance
take a concept like variables I mean you
can give a lesson on variables and say
well a variable is a you know and go
through it and they give him some ins
examples and they do some exercises with
variables and stuff but at the end of
that in my experience with most middle
schoolers maybe those people is they'd
say I get it so what I mean what I write
I mean I'll jump through the hoops okay
cuz I want to get a good grade or
whatever but so what I would rather say
okay for your scratch game you have to
have two working variables like lives
health score time levels whatever you
know you learn about variables and you
solve for X I have my thought when I was
in middle school was who cares what X is
equal to I mean really but now it's like
lives equals 10 oh right and then I say
so that's a variable that's and so they
want to learn it because they want to
say oh but I want to make it so that
when my you know the cheese puffs hits
the Buffalo 10 times I go to the next
level and I say well now you need what
they call a variable and here's how you
do it and so they're ready they want to
learn it right then they need to learn
it right then and so that to me that's
that's the engaging that's what you can
get you know doing it this way I'm not
against some front-loading and I will do
it if it's if it seems like it's
necessary you know if they're just not
getting it and some people do
to have it explained ahead of time and I
can do that as well I do provide support
materials like I have a YouTube channel
for some scratch videos and I always
have handouts and things like that so
they're not left just stumbling around
but I I think that the engagement comes
when they need to learn that particular
concept that's that's the strike while
the iron is hot moment yeah there's a
professor that I had at ASU named James
Paul gee he writes a lot about like
discourse analysis and video games and
learning and then something called
situated learning and so one of the
things he talks about is like when
you're playing a video game you
typically don't get the manual right up
front and read through it a to Z and
then start playing the game what happens
is in most video games and she'll start
playing and you have some kind of a
short-term objective well I could get
out of the room that you're in so you
need to figure out how to move but you
don't need to figure out how to cast
spells or to throw buckets or whatever
it is that you're gonna do in the game
but as you keep progressing into the
next areas then you have this new thing
that you need to learn and you slowly
keep adding upon that mm-hmm and I think
that's he has some really good points
about situated learning he's got several
books on it if people are interested in
it check it out
but a lot of educators feel this need to
like front load and that's basically
like okay I'm gonna read the entire
manual before I actually learn how to
walk or how to jump in the video game
itself and it's just not necessary I
didn't know there was a term for it
that's pretty cool I'm gonna write that
down situated learning it's it'll make
it sound really smart when I talk about
it later and I think that's true for so
many things but I think as I don't know
as adults we like to categorize and and
all of that that's that's really why I
have this great quotation my hero is
Seymour Papert who's passed on but um I
have this quotation up on my board and
he says the role of the teacher is to
create the conditions for invention
rather than provide ready-made knowledge
and I guess if I had to have that that's
my mantra that would be it right there
so I try to create in my room you know
you talk about what's it going to look
like well I'm trying to create trying to
every day create the conditions for
reinvention
rather than provide ready-made knowledge
and that's hopefully what it looks like
and hopefully the kids are engaged and
interested and that's usually the case I
would say 90% of the kids 90% of the
time come in excited sit down and jump
right into what they're doing and that
to me means okay I think we're getting
there so with that being said if you
were after the end of this year all of a
sudden asked to you go teach at a
brand-new school in a new location with
kids that you've never seen before what
are some of the like things that you
would take into consideration or plan to
design for in the class that you would
try and create well I don't think I
would change much about my approach off
the bat because I I've seen it work I
believe that it works you know until
these new students proved otherwise I
would go with that I guess my I would
say well where are they and what what is
the thing that gauges them and I think I
also try to provide a variety of entry
points into computer science I think
it's the CSTA says the middle school is
about exploration and discovery
so I really try to have okay we're gonna
do some physical computing we're gonna
do some robotics we're gonna do some
game design we'll do some creative
coding we'll do some you know and
hopefully some minecraft hopefully
something in there is gonna snag a kid
they'll at least find one or two things
that they'll that make that clicks for
me that's I try to have a variety of
entry points into computer science you
know you just hope that some kid will
live and that one really worked for me
and try to create whatever they need to
have that conditions for invention there
give them as much front-loading as it
seems that they're going to need and
then let them go and then support as
they go and how do you typically support
kids as they go well okay so I do I do a
couple of things one is I have a help
list on my board and I have kids sign up
on the help list and I try to get to
them in order on the list I try to tell
them look if I spend five minutes with
each person in the class is 45 minutes
long it's nine people if your
on the list guess what so I have another
thing on my board which says ask three
before me always always do that and I I
try to run it that way and the other
thing that I do sometimes is I put
another list next to the help list which
is if you know how to do something and
you're willing to help people put that
on this other help list and say I can
help with a timer or I can and then when
you come up to put your name on the help
list you know see if is there somebody
there who who knows this or I say just
get out of your seat and say who knows
who knows how to do the timer munis and
get somebody to help you and then you
know and that's kind of exciting too
because then a lot of times it's a
student who might not think of
themselves as the best coder or anything
like that but they know how to do
something they get a chance to shine
they get to be the expert and that's I
think that's gold you know and I also
have handouts I call them it's hack
packs for each unit of each project
which has hints and tips in there I've
got some videos on YouTube I'd need to
build that out more but you know I try
not to just leave them floundering but
it's a training period for them to learn
how to help themselves and how to help
each other in the absence of mr. Erving
being right there so yeah and you're
encouraging them to kind of cultivate
their own individualized expertise and
something that's interesting to them and
that's another thing that G actually
talks about in a lot of his writing is a
second how valuable that is going to be
in the future it's not about knowing the
same thing as everyone else around you
it's having something that you can
contribute to a team that others don't
know about oh I like that I heard
somebody say once and I have used this
with sub students you know it's it's not
how smart are you it's how are you smart
I mean I don't know if I'm in an
independent school and there's a very
kind of specific way of looking at
grades and all of that in an independent
school that's perhaps not like other
schools but it's very you know it's very
competitive it's very you know and it's
but it's a very narrow slice of learning
I mean I've had students who really
didn't do
in some of the academic subjects but
they were geniuses in mechanical
intelligence ya know they could pick up
the Raspberry Pi and they know exactly
what goes where and how to put it all
together and so that person has a skill
that other people don't have that we're
not really asking for in our curriculum
but doesn't mean it's not useful yeah
when I left the classroom to join boot
up full-time there was a fourth grade
teacher at the school who ended up
taking over the coding classes that I
was doing and when I went and visited he
was saying how he really saw kids in a
different way because he had seen them
years prior when they took his class it
when they're in fourth grade and when he
saw them in this environment if they
might have struggled in his class with
the language arts and reading and things
like that they might like Excel and be
some of the best programmers in the
school in the coding classes mm-hmm and
I think it's great to have that so kids
can shine yeah but I mean I get feedback
right I mean I can't say that I'm
batting a thousand but I hear from many
many students all it's their favorite
class we love this it's you know you get
to do whatever you know it's you know
right and it's it the other phrase I've
stolen from Seymour Papert is hard fun
you know and that's what that's what I
tell them they're in for in my class
it's hard fun it's hard but it's fun and
you know his same papert's thing was
kids don't hate school because it's hard
they hate it because it's boring
they don't mind hard they really don't
if it means something and it's fun and
by fun I think you know we could say
engaging perhaps in this context yeah
it's okay they don't mind it I mean you
look at what you know you're what kids
do in games are you kidding they will do
it over and over and over and over again
to master it's hard but they're not
complaining that it's boring so I think
we're you know we missed something in
education by denigrating video games and
all that and add on a point that you
made earlier if you are new to CS maybe
just try implementing one new thing or
new technology or platform every
semester or maybe even just every year
you don't have to do
all of it all up front so like I had
several languages in my class by the
time I left but we started with one the
first day that I was there yes so you
can gradually build off of that that's a
really good point and I guess I hadn't
thought about that but that is actually
how I did it I mean I built up based on
stuff that I had done before and it got
me going and then I kind of built out
from there but yeah one new thing a
quarter a semester a year one change in
a unit it's the best way to go because
then you can you'll know it's I think it
is a recipe for disaster to try to
implement multiple things all it was
right now I have had some conversations
with some administrators who are used to
seeing every kid working on the same
thing at the same time in a shared space
mmm so what might you communicate to an
administrator who kind of like walked
into your class and like this is their
first time seeing kids working on
several different projects in different
ways all at once the first thing that
comes to mind is that other way of doing
things that's the industrial model right
the factory model and that was great I
suppose when you were preparing kids to
work in factories their whole lives
doing the same thing all at the same
time but as we know those jobs are gone
so look at a look at any workplace today
if we if I mean I suppose it would
depend what that administrators goals
are but if their goals are we want to
prepare our students for the workplace
find me a workplace where everybody is
doing the same thing at the same time
individually together I don't think
you'll be able to find I can't think of
anything so they have to learn how to
work alongside other people that are
doing other things yeah I think that's
an extremely valuable point it kind of
goes back to the cultivating
individualized expertise and whatnot
yeah because I mean the other thing and
I had this little talk with one of my
classes I said you know statistics seem
to indicate that you eighth graders in
your lifetimes will have you know
between whatever two and five careers
right whatever the you know I don't know
how they come up with this and what the
number is now but I said that's not jobs
that's separate careers so you have to
you know that learning how to learn and
adjust on the fly and individualized
instruction and learning that's what
you're gonna need to succeed in this
world so what do you wish there is more
research on that could inform your own
practices I guess I would like to see
now that you've told me what it is it's
situated learning I really think and I
could be totally wrong about this but I
don't think I am but how much research
is there on gaming and learning and the
crossover like what can we as educators
learn from what game designers know
about how people learn and building in
motivation and individual paths and all
that kind of stuff you know because I
think that would be super helpful you
know a lot of people I mean I think the
research would be pretty persuasive if
if you're a serious educator if they
could say you know here's what we here's
what we learned about how kids learn in
games here's what could work in a
classroom or in a learning situation I'd
love to see that yeah there is a growing
amount of research on that I'm just
gonna kind of throw out some names and
I'll put some of the Google Scholar
profiles in the show notes like James
Paul she's one of them I already
mentioned him curt Squire is another
Constance Stein cooler Sacha Berube -
like there's a lot of people who are
doing this kind of research and who are
looking at this like intersection of
video games and learning mm-hmm there's
more it's just there's not a lot of
discussion about it other than
gamification of computer science and
whatnot which I would argue is kind of
basically just putting extrinsic
motivators
generally speaking into a game format
mm-hmm and I don't know if this is even
relevant to the question you asked but I
had a discussion with somebody they were
talking about I just an administrator in
my school so I don't get this how kids
can watch youtube videos of other kids
playing games like what's with that
and I said well do you ever watch you
know football or basketball games yeah
well those are other people no they're
playing basketball and you're watching
them play so you want to do that oh oh
well I guess when you put it like I
don't know it's a form of learning in a
way you know there's there's there's
something about that but I guess you
know as far as their the research
question goes that's that's the thing
that would occur to me you have an
approach to education that is working
really well with the kids that you are
with mm-hmm how are you continuing to
try and refine that each year in what
way is your pedagogy like iterative or
just constantly developing well I have
every student in the Middle School for a
quarter which is nine weeks ish and so
every quarter I start all over again
so I iterate that curriculum four times
a year and inevitably you know quarter
two is a little bit different from
quarter one quarter G because sometimes
you know as I go through it something
and of course you know if you've ever
taught multiple sections of the same
course on the same day you know that you
know you can have the most amazing
lesson you know yet the first period of
the day the same lesson two periods
later and it just crashes and burns so
you know it you know I kind of try to
take that into account as as I ate that
sometimes just some things just don't
work with particular groups even though
I have this okay here's what we're gonna
do I'm still willing to modify how we do
it based on the group that's sitting
there in that classroom if it's obvious
that whatever I thought worked for the
last several years whatever I was
selling these kids aren't buying it you
know and right you always have to to
iterate I mean and so my curriculum is
always in flux always and I and I'm
lucky in a way that I get to iterate it
four times a year because that's four
times through okay this really really
worked and this worked you know with
every single group that I had this
worked with most of the groups this with
this didn't work at all with anyone
and so I'm always kind of you know
fiddling with it around the margins next
time through to see okay that's good so
it's it's it's a learning experience for
me yeah I think that constant reflection
on how things are going is very valuable
one of the things that I really like to
do is also videotape that just like put
the camera in like the corner of the
room so it kind of shows the whole room
and just I would go back and watch the
videos of the classes that did not go
well and I would just be constantly
asking well what could I have done
differently or mmm what was I unaware of
that was going on in the room that like
kind of made it so it wasn't as great of
a lesson if you're able to record in
your class that can be a very helpful
tool and that was directed at like
people listening that towards you well
like I could benefit from it too I I
think that there's you know there's
always a you can always get better
right I mean and the other thing you
have to remember too and this is you
know one of those chestnuts but it's I
think it's especially true in middle
school you know we teach people not not
subjects you know each individual's as
well and so I try to vary my
interactions with students according to
what is gonna work for them I do a lot
of individual interaction because
there's not a lot of me talking them
taking notes and I try to find out so
what's what's working for her and what's
working for him and what do they respond
to and what does that person not respond
to so it's it's a constant evaluation I
find for me anyway yeah so what
questions have I not asked that you
would like to discuss where do you where
do you get your inspirations for
teaching and it's particularly teaching
computer science and for me I would say
most of the inspirations I mentioned
Seymour Papert who really is my hero and
his book Mindstorms and I think other
ones call I think it's the the child's
computer the children and computers I
came here what it's called this guy was
doing this kind of stuff in the 70s
which is just unfathomable
that that he was doing this and he
really laid the groundwork for
this approach and it's it's kind of a
constructivist if you want to put a
label on it approach in computer science
and that's why I really like what he did
so it if somebody's wants some
philosophical underpinning for this kind
of thing I would highly recommend his
books the other thing
and I have another book that's been my
inspiration called the Dow of teaching
like the TA Oh Dow of teaching by a
woman named Greta Nagel
and that's not about computer science at
all but it's about teaching and it's
about kind of applying its it sounds
kind of silly but it's an every it's
these short chapters on Taoist
approaches to philosophy and life and
different people that use them in their
classrooms and she has somebody who
teaches elementary school and somebody
who's just high school and somebody
teaches college and talks about she
takes it a quotation from the daodejing
for each chapter and talks about how it
works and that's been in terms of my own
personal approach to teaching in the
last you know 15 20 years that's been my
Bible I mean I have almost every line
underlined in that book and I like to
revisit it once or twice here it's funny
you mentioned doubt I have around my
neck a charm that is a kanji for Dao and
then I have a tattoo that's like on my
side that takes up the most of my side
that is the kanji for Dao right in
Japanese it's dull or Michi it means
like the way or path so that's a big
part of my way of being sounds like if
you've got if you've got a tattoo that
large of the kanji it might be your kind
of book yeah
odds are what kind of questions do you
wish the field would explore more well
this is probably gonna be an unpopular
thing but I'm not I mean I I get
standards and I get the need for them
but I sometimes wonder if it's kind of
choking the life out of our topic and I
and I get that we want to make sure that
they understand these concepts and they
you know they broaden their understand
and all that I get that but I would just
love to see us not approach it through
that funnel and of course the maybe
that's just me winning school to be fun
and all about learning and everybody on
fire for learning all the time and
perhaps that's just not really realistic
but I hate to see you know today we're
going to talk about boolean variables
yeah do you know anything about the the
UK computer science curriculum and how
that developed and where they are now
with it
you know when they made it mandatory
right I seem to recall reading something
in the last few months that they were
kind of disappointed with the outcome in
terms of kids graduating and how many
were going into computer science and all
that kind of thing that they it wasn't
as I don't know what is effective as
they thought it was going to be you know
anything about that no I hadn't heard
that kind of an update did they indicate
what they thought was the reason for
that well if that is what happened I'm
sure everybody has a different take on
it right why it is so I don't really
know but I'm wondering if you know if
they made it a little bit too
prescriptive and less exploratory yeah
you know if it's just one more just one
more thing that the kids got to do you
know whereas it could be it could be
engaging in fun but I'm actually the
person that thinks that any subject
could be this engaging in front of you
modified your approach to it I don't
think there's any subject that has to be
innately boring since you voice what I
believe you called an unpopular opinion
all kind of add on to that I questioned
the value of making so many subjects
mandatory across the curriculum because
I get the feeling that a lot of teachers
kind of do this coverage approach with I
need to make sure I hit all the
standards and then they don't actually
really dive into what's interesting
about a subject area or they're at not
able to because they can only go an inch
deep and a mile wide yes so for me I
think would be interesting if we kind of
honestly moved away from requiring
everyone to learn 20 different subject
areas and in
dead opening it up and saying well what
do you actually want to learn and dive
deep in to develop your own
individualized expertise I love that I
like the way you think Thanks
I mean the other thing is that Finland
which never ceases to fascinate me and
amaze me their their educational system
didn't they just say they were gonna do
away with subjects I hadn't heard that
that'd be interesting oh yeah they're
just trying to break the silos or
something I think so I'm not really sure
but I thought wow that's
well that's brave because you know I'm
not I'm not even sure what I think about
that but I you know I'm sure that
they're probably trying to go in the
direction that you're advocating you
know which is let's you know let's dive
deep and the stuff that really interests
us and then we can see all the
interconnections because then you have
like the oh well that's math so we can't
you know and that's art or that's
science and so we can't talk about that
here because that you know that's right
everybody grows up with those silos
firmly implanted in their heads and you
know the the reality is it's all
interconnected yeah and if anyone's
listening and is interested my
dissertation kind of talks about this in
Chapter five and six so I looked at this
discussion forum and there's like over
they're engaging with music was with old
video game hardware and software and so
they would like take apart like in a
Nintendo Entertainment System and then
like write new software for it and then
they would create live music with that
and when they were engaging in that it
was in like this transdisciplinary way
and that the problem that they're trying
to solve was I want to make music with
this thing that typically isn't made for
performing live music and so to do that
they had to engage in a lot of hardware
and software practices relevant to
computer science they get engaged in a
lot of them visual art practices
entrepreneurial stuff when they went and
sold their music like all these
different subject areas all combined
around this one form of engagement which
was making chip tunes and so it would be
really interesting to see what that kind
of experience would look like in a
formalized setting like what you're
describing that is that's fascinating I
guess the the question you'd have to
find
though do you need areas of expertise
like subject matter experts for all of
those things if you're gonna say well
we've got these two kids in the school
and they want to do chiptunes and that's
their passion so do they have a faculty
sponsor or you know how to say how does
that work and what does that individual
know or not know about Nintendo systems
and their sound chips and whatever
language they use to program in and all
that you know sound synthesis and all of
that
where are the those people that know all
that that's subject matter expertise or
is they you know do they not need those
people it's distributed so I'm saying to
you a lot in this but G writes a lot
about affinity spaces and so an online
affinity space is like geographically
and timewise there's like no separation
if you're able to go online like you can
communicate asynchronously with anyone
across the world and because of that
you're able to kind of utilize expertise
from different areas so in a space like
that you might not need to have a
faculty member staff member whatever who
has an expertise in that area but you
need to somewhere be able to network to
people or resources outside of the space
itself so like just being able to search
online for resources and how to do
something and then to have somebody
there to kind of help guide through some
of those processes might help so then
you need people who you know there's
this whole division between teaching and
learning right you need people who are
experts in in learning who aren't
necessarily teachers I expose you know
actually there is a school if I remember
correctly it's called like Sudbury it's
a model of school where like everybody
has a say and everything so like a
kindergartener can like yay or nay a
like budget approval just as much as
like a staff member can and when kids go
into the school they choose what that
ones would want to learn when they want
to learn and like one of the famous
stories that came out of it was this kid
who like showed up every day and for
like two years straight was just like I
want to go fish
and so we're just like fish at the river
that was at the back end of the school
and then one day was just like all right
I don't want to learn astrophysics or
like some other like completely out of
the blue subject area and so they talked
about how when given these kind of
environments the what were they called
staff members had to approach it
differently in that you're there to
really kind of help them with their
learning not to teach them the
information but to kind of like guide
them towards the information and whatnot
and while that's sound like one end of
the spectrum in terms of like
progressive land it's something that we
can at least look at and go okay what
can I take from this and potentially
apply into the classrooms that I'm
working with well I think you need some
really forward-thinking people willing
to experiment yeah experimenting is kind
of tricky when you know you know the
students are the the subjects you know
you want to make sure that they get what
they need and I your experiment fails
and they don't and that's not good so
then maybe that's where we can have the
you ask me what what research you know
could be brought to bear on this so
maybe that's that's an area so that we
don't just kind of go kind of try to
figure it out with live subjects yeah I
mean on that note I will say that
there's this interesting disconnect
between computer science education
research and educational research
outside of computer science mmm there's
this tendency to kind of try and
reinvent the wheel or do things that
were already done decades ago and have
been since abandoned for a variety of
reasons but computer scientists scholars
don't necessarily always know that if
all they're doing is just kind of
reading within the field itself so if
there's one thing that I can really
recommend for educators and education
scholars in general is just read outside
of the field so read outside of not just
CS education but even education itself
like a G doesn't necessarily always talk
about education and I've learned a lot
from him on this another person Henry
Jenkins is a media scholar and I've
learned a lot about education from him
and he's in media studies so basically
the more the story read a lot where can
people go to kind of connect with you
and to learn more from you the Twitter
is my main thing so I my twitter handle
is at BIR vie to be our RV - I'm also
I've got my small number of scratch
videos are on YouTube I do hope to keep
building up my channel and my thing
there is crouching Python all one word
capital C capital P so that's those are
the the places where I hang out the most
for learning and that concludes this
week's episode for the CS k8 podcast I
hope you got as much out of it as I did
I really enjoyed this conversation with
Bob and I look forward to many more down
the road I hope you consider following
him on Twitter and subscribing to him on
YouTube I will have the links for that
in the show notes speaking of just as a
friendly reminder you should be able to
access the show notes in your podcast
app otherwise you can find all of them
at jared O'Leary com if you haven't done
so yet I highly recommend using the SI
sk8 hashtag and sharing resources and
asking questions on social media on
various platforms I hope you enjoyed
this week's show and I hope you tune in
next week for an episode where I unpack
some more scholarship thank you so much
for listening

Guest Bio:

In his career, Bob Irving has taught every grade from 1st through adult, spent time teaching English and history, and for the last 15 years taught computer science at the middle school level. He has been a Minecraft Global Mentor, a Raspberry Pi Certified Educator and has presented at numerous conferences. He lives for the "aha" moments. Recently retired from full-time classroom teaching, he has launched his own educational services business: CrouchingPython EdVentures. You can visit his website at www.crouchingpython.org, his YouTube channel under his avatar "CrouchingPython", or read his book "Hard Fun" on Amazon. In his spare time, he has a musical alter ego named Chicago Bob who plays blues guitar.