Epiphany-ish

For the past two weeks, I have been leading book discussions in class on text the students should have read (were assigned) for that day. They were going well, but it was basically the same four or five people in each class participating and leading the discussions and honestly, the quiz grades (my co-op does reading quizzes) were weak at best. So then I decided to show a video clip from one of my favorite shows that discusses tragic flaws. It was the first time one of my students, Frank, took his head of off his desk the entire year. After the video, we discussed tragic heroes in pop culture and Frank (who had never talked before - save for inappropriate comments) basically lead the whole discussion. The quiz the next day (designed by my co-op, but using the material I taught them) went amazingly. Almost everyone got an A. It felt like a break-through, and it proved to me that engaging the students - ALL the students - in content that they see in the world around them really does change everything. Just a thought.