Narrative/Final Project

     This is the story of my professional website http://www.maryksteele.com. 

Wait!  Before you fall asleep, let me assure you that it’s much more than that.  It is Simon Sinek’s why of my professional website:  the story of how I am writing my life’s Second Act.  And just as Sinek says https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action?language=en, my why is a lot more interesting than my whats or hows.  At least I hope so!

     I was that lucky kid who knew what I wanted to be when I grew up: a writer. Through the years, that answer evolved into ‘journalist’.  But when this girl grew to walk a campus, I looked around and thought,  “I’d really like to teach at a college level.”   Almost as quickly as I had the thought, I decided that teaching would be something I’d do later in life, after I pursued journalism.  I hoped I’d have more to offer my students at 50.

     After working as a producer at various news stations, I landed at WNBC in New York, which sounds like a dream job but was more of a nightmare.  Anyway, the experience helped me realize I was quite done producing local news, no matter how large the city.  I wanted to leave the cynicism of the newsroom to return to documentary work I had just begun in my prior job.  I hoped to take the time necessary to tell deeper, meatier stories that might illuminate, examine, and teach.

     Which leads me to life-changing work for a public television series called Visionaries http://www.visionaries.org.  For several years, I produced TV documentaries looking at the why behind philanthropic and nonprofit work.  I had wanted to travel the world since I was the girl in that goofy school photo and now I was leading crews in countries like Brazil, India, Kenya, Egypt, Morocco, Azerbaijan, Jordan and many more.

We worked mainly in developing nations, focusing on innovative attempts to solve some of the world’s most intractable problems.  I also traveled all over the U.S. and was deeply affected by the positivity of people who believe there’s more good than bad in this world and that change is possible.

     Now let me place you in time: the late 90s to the early 2000s.  I was Marc Prensky’s digital immigrant https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-JcBFAuLc-0Z01KNkdIWjdsNk0/view and Scott Noon’s technocrat https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lgDAuLNDXvd_fu0nCPtLarttFR4YbHDLSkZfSfg-Olk/edit: using some technology but unsure of it.  I made the transition from typewriter to computer in 1990 and by 1998, I was learning to operate my first Mac.  But I was a late adopter of web technologies and an old-school linear learner.

     My boss, a techno-constructivist, stayed on the cutting edge of media technology, but I did not.  I directed non-linear editors but shied away from the hands-on work of it myself, maintaining that two brains were better than one.  In fact, I was afraid of technology because I doubted my aptitude.  I did not want to produce a show that wasn’t at a professional level because of my shortcomings.  {I want to note here that it was in thinking about my boss within Noon’s framework that I finally, really “got it”.  I remembered my boss’ over-the-moon enthusiasm for new cameras, editing tools, etc.  and how he would begin to spin ideas on the spot about how we could improve/change/speed up the way we worked.  He was willing to throw out established systems of operation without a backward look to try new technology and he often saw its future possibilities long before anyone else.  Not impulsive or suffering from ADD, as I sometimes thought back then, I now understand him as the epitome of a techno-constructivist!}

     During this time, I helped create a Master’s Degree program with Suffolk University in Media and Philanthropy.  I taught in the classroom and also enjoyed coaching student interns as they traveled with my crew or created their own international documentaries.  I think Michael Wesch would approve of our emphasis on real-life learning environments and the collaborative process of teaching and learning.

     Wesch would also like that the students chose the subject of their production and did their own fundraising to make it happen.  Explaining why they picked a particular issue and capturing the emerging narrative happening around them inspired good questions and gave them reasons for learning.  As their mentor, I know they found significance in their education as a result…and I found great meaning in teaching.  I do see now, through Wesch’s lens, that I could have been better at enjoying the messy learning power of process and less focused on the end product.  Because I was responsible for making sure their documentary could air within our series, I may have been a better whip-cracker than teacher in those days.  This course has given me that insight.

     By now I realized that I absolutely came alive when I worked with people from different cultures.  I loved leaving SCWAAMP behind by seeing the world through many different lens, learning bits of new languages, and creating partnerships to take action and drive change.  Simon Sinek and I share the belief that story is where real teaching and learning take place – what he might call “the buy-in. 

     My focus on teaching through global storytelling shifted when I found a niche in historical documentary.  I became a techno-traditionalist, using technology to accomplish many more tasks.  By now, I was experienced with word processing and email and I used Google and the Internet for much of my research.  With editors, I was exploring ways to make antique still images come to life.  In 2006, I directed the creation of a website for a documentary series and updated my “Producer’s  Blog” for it every week.  It served area teachers, museums, libraries, as well as our viewing audience and it included interactive educational tools.  Unfortunately, it’s no longer active or I’d link to it here.  If only I’d been the expert at screenshots that this class has made me, I’d have evidence!

     Some years after that experience, it happened: my 50th birthday.  As it turned out, my young self had been right—there came a time when I was ready to put production down.  I had lost interest in keeping up with the rapid-fire changes in the medium brought on by the digital revolution.  So much so that I no longer wanted to teach documentary or news production.  So the question became:  just what would I teach?  It took over a year for me to put together the pieces but when I did, it felt like a small epiphany:  I would teach English as a Second Language to adults! Yes, I see it as a way to return to fulfilling multi-cultural work.  But at the core of this decision is my belief in story as the way humans connect and literacy as key to accessing opportunities everyone deserves.

     The bottom line is that I want to help immigrant and refugee students express their mature thoughts in meaningful, useful ways: to tell their stories.   But first I had to learn a new language myself, that of being a teacher in the world of ESL.  I started the M.Ed. in TESL program at Rhode Island College.  The path has not been smooth:  in 2015 my husband and I were hurt when we were struck as pedestrians by an SUV and last Fall, he was diagnosed with cancer (he’s doing well now).  Because of those things, it’s taken me longer to complete the program than I planned and it has often been physically and mentally challenging to stay on track.  

     That said, I’ve been gaining experience in my new field in my internships and as a substitute instructor at RIC.  After ten months as a volunteer teacher, I was hired as the part-time ESL instructor at the Refugee Dream Center in Providence http://www.refugeedreamcenter.org.   The rewards are rich:  recently one of my students reported she was able to take her daughter to a doctor and tell him what was wrong, because of our unit on health.  My heart swelled when she exclaimed, “I thank God and I thank teacher!

     Danah Boyd http://www.danah.org/books/ItsComplicated.pdf and I could have a good conversation about my adult learners. When she writes that there is no magical relationship between technological skills and age, I think of new research showing adult learners have no innate disadvantage when learning a new language.  The difference has more to do with exposure, time, and motivation.   That’s news I want to share with other teachers of adults.  Which finally brings me to my professional website!  Eager to gain teaching experience, I created this site aimed at potential employers.  It was a class assignment and the first website I created myself.  It is pretty basic; not a hyperlink or group communication tool to be found! But during this course, I began to see that my website could be so much more. 

     After listening to several This I Believe podcasts http://thisibelieve.org/podcasts/, I was inspired to reflect upon my dedication to refugee students and critical research I want to share about their unique learning needs.  As a result, I decided to focus on adding resources for refugee teachers and advocates on my website.  Down the road, I’ll add digital tools aimed specifically at students.  This course made me more comfortable rooting around Weebly to enhance my website and address a serious need.  I find that most ESL teachers don’t understand the real impact of trauma on language learning and how that affects refugee students.  I began by adding a scrollable Resource page with an extensive list of supports, as well as a downloadable version.

     To include a PowerPoint that I created for Professional Development purposes, I discovered I could export the presentation as a movie, upload that to YouTube, and create a link.  Now that I understand Screencastify, I plan to re-do that movie with a voiceover added.  I was also able to link to a related RITELLER article and provide a downloadable version.  I plan to add other features as I continue to build this page, but I’m pretty excited about the new skills that helped me get this far!

     So here I am, at 53, on a different stage for my Second Act but in many ways still answering the calling I had as a kid.  Using story to connect, illuminate, advocate…to teach and to learn.  At the core of my beliefs as an ESL teacher are these three words:

·       STORY

·      OPPORTUNITIES

·      ADVOCACY

Like Sir Ken Robinson and Michael Wesch, I believe our diverse students learn through their own experiences, social context, and natural curiosity.  As I complete my M.Ed. in TESL and particularly as I finish this course, I see my job now as awakening and developing their powers of creativity.  You know, if you met my refugee students, you’d hear epic tales of resiliency.  I'm looking forward to helping them discover new ways to share those stories and I'll be including some of those on my website down the road.  I hope you’ll check it out.