The Line has been drawn on Linear: Revisiting Linear vs. Nonlinear

I got a chance not too long ago to read the comments on one of my earlier blog posts, How Nonlinear is too Nonlinear, where I talked about the idea of assigning chapters of a novel to a group of students, but all out of order. Then trying to get students to use deduction and inference to put the pieces of the story together: back to their chronological order. Well, I want to give props to Kyle J. for the ideas he had. They are most certainly blog-worthy. He suggests that instead of assigning the whole book to students, you could try assigning a different chapter, or grouping of chapters, to each student. Then, the teacher allows the student to figure out the plot of the story by working together as a class to arrange themselves in the correct order.

Kyle goes on to bring to light a couple of key benefits about this idea that are in need of mentioning. By having students figure out the order of the plot by discussing their selection of chapters and how theirs fits amongst those of their peers'. To do this effectively they have to communicate details about the plot, characters, settings, themes, etc. It can be difficult to build community and foster thoughtful discussions, all of us are aware of this. But it's obvious that an activity like this really challenges student to work together, and requires the use of several functions found much higher on Blooms Taxonomy than the typical memorize and recall assignments we see in many classrooms.

The other great point that is raised is the fact that you could cover a lengthy text in a much shorter time. Going along with Kyle's point, I figure that if you've got a text that even you as the teacher can't stand - this would be a great way to make the unit a little quicker to get through; and more enjoyable for the students.

Props to you again Kyle. I hope you don't mind that I discussed your comment post, but you brought a great idea to the table with some great points backing it. I feel that it is definitely an idea worth putting out there for others to see and use!

And until next time, stay classy San Diego.

-Sam Pearch