The obvious message was one of working together and communication. In order to fully complete the task, we had to develop an easy way about talking through the process. We worked for a minute without communicating, getting a general "idea" before starting to discuss strategies as a whole.
I thought of a few other variations on the rules/parameters. As it was, we knew it was a 4 x 4 grid, we were told we had 8 of the 16 pieces and we were permitted to talk. A few other ideas:
- Suppose that we were only allowed to use 25 words. We'd have to figure out how to communicate with a limited vocabulary and carefully think about exactly what we're describing. Take this idea one step further - suppose we had a limit of 25 words, but were NOT given a list. Every word we spoke would be recorded and permitted. Once we passed 25 (or whatever magic number was decided), we would have to limit ourselves strictly to those. This would force an even more careful attention to our choices and being succinct.
- I also like the idea of printing the other team's pieces on the back of ours. This would make it ridiculously tough as we'd first have to discover who was paying attention to which pieces. I think this might be fun for a challenge for grad students, but would likely be far out of the reach of middle schoolers.
- The picture we had used exactly 16, non-repeating pieces. Each team had 8 of them. Suppose that 2 or 3 were repeated and there were ones missing. How would we resolve these issues? I think this would work well as a parallel to the scientific process. Frequently, you are forced to proceed with incomplete information and make inferences about what's missing.
It was so cool! I really loved watching you all figure it out - it was a great demonstration. I have to say that I also loved the small then large group discussions afterward, too. It really got me thinking about how I might be able to use a "game" like that in the ELA classroom. Hearing from the other groups, like you science-y folk, made me think even further outside the box about application in a classroom. Your ideas #1 and #3 above sound really great but #2 is giving me anxiety sweats thinking about it! :)
ReplyDeleteWell done, Mr. Lamb!!
Thank you kindly! It was really interesting to be inside the fishbowl. I agree with you...the second one would be a bit tough/impossible. I bought my mom a puzzle once that had 1000 pieces with the same image on both sides, rotated 90 degrees. Fascinating problem solving with it...though it took quite a while.
ReplyDeleteI think #3 is particularly intriguing. One quote that has stood out to me as we write our final papers is, "Life outside school is hardly ever like a multiple-choice test." With four possible answers, MC questions have always frustrated me, because life usually doesn't present you clear choices. Forcing your students to solve a problem with unknown variables is fascinating, and I think would instill a great life skill.
ReplyDeleteDavid your modifications are very interesting! I also liked hearing bout your experience as a participant of the activity. Do you think it is important for everyone to have a chance to be the person figuring out the puzzle? With some of your modifications that seems important, how would you make sure that everyone gets a turn with out this taking up too much time?
ReplyDeleteI also agree with Eliza about #2 making me very nervous but I think it could be a strong exercise to help students think before they speak!