How to savor the real world when "Reality is Broken"? (title of book by Jane McGonigal)

In this photography unit, I have been thinking about the experts' advice to seek meaning in the world and to see everyday life with a poet/photographer's eye. I agree that my visual senses were on "red alert" this week to find and photograph a scene with meaning. To tie this into my work life...I currently work with a wide range of high school students for the first 3 periods of the day, then I spend my afternoons with gifted/talented elementary students. The high school students tend to be very jaded and apathetic, especially when compared to the small group of super-excited, highly creative elementary students. I am trying to find doors into my high school English students' worlds so that I can help them to link the required literature/poetry/etc. to you tube videos/songs/etc. I (finally) had a successful English class last week when we analyzed the writing style of the first 3 pages of Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal as well as watching her TED talk http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world.html

Here's a quote that synthesizes McGonigal's persuasive arguments in the first 3 pages of her well-written book:
"The truth is this: in today's society, computer and video games are fulfilling genuine human needs that the real world is currently unable to satisfy. Games are providing rewards that reality is not. They are teaching and inspiring and engaging us in ways that reality is not. They are bringing us together in ways that reality is not.
And unless something dramatic happens to reverse the resulting exodus, we're fast on our way to becoming a society in which a substantial portion of our population devotes its greatest efforts to playing games, creates its best memories in game environments, and experiences its biggest successes in game worlds." (Reality is Broken, Jane McGonigal)

I am still "old school" in my world view. I am unable to devote time and energy to the virtual worlds of games. I don't spend much time on Facebook, exploring the worlds of my friends. I am well satisfied with the beauty and challenges of the real world. I live in outrageously beautiful places in Alaska...Valdez for the school year, McCarthy for the summer season. I have been fortunate enough to travel to some beautiful places on our planet: Belize, Guatemala, Hawaii, France, Greece, Mexico... I hope that this pro-gaming book by McGonigal will help me to better understand the attraction of the virtual worlds for my teenage sons and high school students. Could these teens take cameras outside and find beauty in the world around them rather than spending hours in the worlds of Skyrim or League of Legends? How will our world deal with the gamers' "exodus from reality" in the years to come?

"If I feel something strongly, I make a photograph. I do not attempt to explain the feeling." Ansel Adams

Made to Stick and Thinking Fast and Slow

These two books shifted the way that I think about presenting ideas to students. Made to Stick, written by Chip and Dan Heath, has a clear way to think about how to make ideas "sticky" so that they resonate with listeners/viewers. The six principles for sticky ideas create the acronym, SUCCESs:

• Simple--prioritizing and finding the key message or core idea
  
• Unexpected--surprising people in a variety of ways, including challenging assumptions
  
• Concrete--using real-world, sensory images to convey messages or complex ideas
  
• Credible--creating a way for people to "test drive" the message and judge for themselves
  
• Emotional--finding the right emotions to evoke in order to share an idea/ message
  
• Story--creating a "mental flight simulator" so that people can understand ideas
  

This is my first year of teaching a Sophomore English class, and I consistently find that my "aha" lessons are based on these core principles. The "zzz" lessons are when I lecture or ask them find answers to questions about the text. The students respond when I surprise them or when I create an emotionally charged way to share the material (such as comparing two movie versions of Hamlet, focusing on the ways in which the directors manipulate the text and the emotions of the audience.) They respond when I use concrete methods, such as responding to a post by student in another state using an online forum. It is a struggle to challenge myself to think of ways to teach using these principles, since I am very new to this subject area. When I get frustrated, the Made to Stick book can usually spark some new ideas to try in class.

I have just started reading the book, Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. I am now thinking about mental processes in a very different way. Kahneman describes two types of mental systems that we depend on to make judgements and decisions. "System 1 is fast, intuitive and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative and more logical." I feel like my students are operating mostly with their System 1 thinking, making snap judgments and tuning out when their emotions are not engaged. As an English major, I would love to see my students enjoy an immersion in System 2 thinking, in which they wrestle with ideas and challenge their assumptions about the world. I plan to post more thoughts about this book as I read more...I hope that this reading will help me to understand the "screenager" mentality, since I live with 2 teens who would love to spend most of their lives glued to a screen. They interact with friends and virtual friends in an online world dominated by rich fantasy games. How can they find balance between the real and virtual worlds when the online world inspires addictive behaviors? How can they use their System 2 thinking to see this addictive side of their fantasy world?