Tools Are Just That – Tools

In my last post, I filled in everyone on my inauspicious start in BBQing and cooking. I spend much of the weekend working on the floor in my upstairs bathroom, making mistake after mistake because nobody had showed my how to use some of the tools I needed to use.

I’m fortunate to have some fantastic tradespeople I call friends at out campground. Under their instruction, I have learned to use a small set of tools well while building our deck and three season room and can complete most tasks I need. What was the difference between the bathroom debacle and the deck/room success? Instruction. That got me reflecting about my last post and the way we far too often roll out technology in education.

That shiny Weber Kettle I received as a gift became nearly useless because BBQing experts had not taught me about direct vs. indirect cooking or even small-scale smoking. Somebody gave me a tool, but no instruction came with the tool.

Left to my own devices, I stumbled along, and came to believe that I just wasn’t meant to be good at BBQing because everything came out overdone, undercooked – or worse – a combination of both. Only after I built my first smoker with my own hands and discovered two sites where I could ask questions and learn, did I start succeeding as a cook and BBQer.

The first site – the BBQ-Brethren Q-talk forum – will scare non-techies. It’s a discussion forum site and doesn’t look all that user-friendly, but the people using that site couldn’t be more friendly. These folks walked me through my first pork but quote, asked questions, requested pictures to troubleshoot, and helped me cook a serviceable pulled pork for our family Christmas.

To me, this illustrates what needs to happen when we roll out technology to teachers. Yes, some folks will know what to do and run with it, but others need to ask questions, fail, and receive patient feedback and assistance until they feel comfortable enough top move forward. How often does this happen in a technology rollout? Too often, folks disconnected from the classroom decide on the technology, purchase the technology and then had it to teachers with an implied “Good luck!”

Another site that helped move me forward by leaps and bounds was Meathead Goldwyn’s Amazingribs site, referred to by some as the Rosetta Stone of BBQing. This site interested me for reasons that will surprise my high school chemistry teacher, Mr. Wray. I like the science behind what Meathead does on his site. I hated science in high school, but I can’t get enough of the science of cooking. I especially like when the resident physicist, Dr. Greg Blonder, dispels long-held beliefs about cooking – this one aspect, alone, makes me want to learn more every day.

Again, what if we used this approach when rolling out technology to teachers? To me, the science of BBQing meat – and cooking in general – is the “hook” that Dave Burgess talks about in Teach Like A Pirate. How can we use a pirate hook to roll out technology to teachers? Instead of just another thing they have to learn, how do we make it something they want to learn about and improve their skill set? In the case of Meathead Goldwyn above, meathead knew if he could bust myths that made BBQing seem difficult, he could get more people interested. HIs website can prove challenging to navigate at times, so you may want to check out his book: Meathead: The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling.

So, what hook should we use to roll out technology? For me, it is about helping teachers buy back time. When I first learned Google Apps, I discovered the wonderful Doctopus add-on and now I could help teachers free up hours from their weekly workload while still allowing them to provide feedback on student writing. Once teachers had that time, they always came back, wanting to free up more time. I think the “hook” answer lies somewhere in that type of thinking.

A tool is just a tool without training. My Weber Kettle, alone, did not make me a better cook. Technology, alone, did not make me a better teacher. We need to make sure we help people learn what they need to know in order to use those tools well.

Reflection: For this reflection, I want to have a question for both weekend chefs and educators.

• Weekend chefs, what’s one new BBQ or cooking skill you could share with someone new to barbecue and grilling?
• Educators, what pirate “hook” could you use to make technology more relevant for reluctant staff members and create that need for them to learn?

 

A Most Ignominious Beginning

When I got married, my aunt and uncle gave us a Weber kettle grill as a wedding gift. It was new and shiny, and I had absolutely no idea what to do with it other than dump in some charcoal, squeeze on a bottle of charcoal starter and light it up.

This made perfect sense because as a non-adult I had never had reason to pay attention when either of my parents grilled. All I know was to stick chicken directly over high heat and take it off when the outside was charred correctly.

In actuality, that made no sense. Much like putting someone into a classroom without proper training makes no sense. Oh, they know how to unlock the door, and they can mimic the way they were taught in school, but they really don’t know the art of teaching – good or otherwise.

I spent years flailing around, doing my best but not knowing where to turn for help or guidance. All of my known relatives had come of age in the 1960s and 70s where large fire and quick cook resulted in many hockey puck burgers and inedible chickens.

We can hit the fast forward button here, because I spent nearly 20 years making the same BBQ mistakes and not learning from them at all.

One day while teaching my Written Communication class for the umpteenth time, I grew discouraged by the number of students who simply went to the Tires Plus Website and copied instructions for how to change a tire. In my despair, I found inspiration and decided to learn how to do something on my own and outside my comfort zone. I’d learn how to build and use a 55-gallon steel drum smoker – something that would stretch someone who had not taken a shop class since 7th grade.

After weeks of reading and learning, I bought my first barrel, drilled some holes, found some pallets for burnout, and set it all on fire. The result doesn’t look like much, but it was a thing of beauty to me.

And the first thing I ever cooked on the smoker was this:

A bacon-wrapped, pork sausage roll known in the BBQ world as a “fatty.” I though it was the best thing I had ever tasted. My wife did not agree. In hind sight, she was probably right. In my excitement to cook something, I did not wait for the smoker to come to high enough temperature to turn billowing white smoke into thin blue smoke. And so, it probably did taste like an ash tray, but it was an ash tray I made on a smoker I made with my own hands.

I share this lackluster beginning because it fits nicely with education on several fronts:

• If I wanted my students to stop copying directions for the web, I had to show them a different way. Plus, once I learned how to make better food, I actually brought the smoker into school and gave a hands-on demonstration and fed them.
• If I wanted my students to take risks and actually learn, I had to take a risk and actually learn.
• And – maybe most importantly –  I learned the importance of failure. After that first, terrible dish, I gradually got better. I think I only made one other item that tasted too much of acrid smoke. Caught in that area of “flow” in learning, I did not have enough skill – but I wanted that skill – so I kept learning. This hands-on experience helped me to truly understand Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development.

My next post will show you some meals I made, places where I learned and how that learning impacted me as a cook, learner, and educator.

Reflection: Until next time, what is something you learned that was completely outside your comfort zone or skill set, and how did that experience help you as a learner, educator, and/or leader?