The Research
Unlike previous generations, this generation has grown up in the digital age. Today’s students have the ability to effectively multitask: surf the internet, instant message, Facebook, text, watch the most recent video on YouTube, listen to their iPod, and have the television on in the background. All the while their school-work sits unfinished.
All of this technology is a natural part of their environment. As Don Tapscott, author of “Grown Up Digital” and lead researcher of “The Net Generation: A Strategic Investigation”, suggests “The teachers are no longer the foundation of knowledge; The internet is” (Tapscott, 2009, p126). Being simultaneously connected to the world and being familiar with and using technology is as natural as breathing for the Net Generation (Tapscott, 2009). He goes on to say that technology is becoming more and more a part of our popular culture, which is driven by the needs of our youth. This is why it is so vital to incorporate technology into our classrooms; our students are bored with our slow pace and with our traditional delivery methods (Tapscott, 2009). Furthermore, he suggests that the current model of education, which was designed for the Industrial Age was effective for the mass production economy that existed, but not for the digital economy that exists today. Our students are no longer empty vessels to be filled with knowledge. They come to our classrooms already having a foundation from which to build upon. Tapscott suggests that a gap exists between how the Net Generation thinks and how most teachers teach. Today’s technology is different than that of our parents; it is interactive. “They’ve grown up in an era of constant innovation and change, and want the [classroom] to be equally innovative and creative” (Tapscott, 2009, p96). The ability to discover new things, receive immediate feedback, and collaborate/interact with others captures their attention. This explains why their school-work sits unfinished; worksheets and traditional homework does not capture their attention. The key to engaging our students is through elements of popular culture and technology. It captures students’ attention and allows them to build upon their foundation.
In an article presented in The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Jeffrey M. R. Duncan-Andrade discussed the potential of utilizing youth popular culture to engage students. He suggests that the intimidation factor of youth popular culture prevents educators from seeing the potential of youth culture as a pedagogical scaffold. (Duncan-Andrade, 2004). As mentioned by Tapscott, Duncan-Andrade also advocates the improbability of capturing the attention of our students with the “growing pervasiveness and persuasiveness of twenty-first-century youth culture” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p317). In addition, he suggests building upon the notion of “culture as an additive”, meaning that educators should use a student’s culture to build upon and engage the student (Duncan-Andrade, 2004). In the past, multicultural education was a way for educators to incorporate elements from various cultures into the classroom, Native American or Hispanic cultures for example. Today, however, the definition of multicultural education should be broader. “This will mean developing curriculum, as well as pedagogy, that empowers students to critically engage in the electronic media and other forms of youth popular culture (i.e., music, style, sport)” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p331). Using these elements from pop culture will allow the information to scaffold in such as way that the students can relate to and build upon it. Duncan-Andrade, himself a high school English teacher, created lessons which pop culture was the foundation and then used student interviews to determine the lesson’s effectiveness. His conclusion was that educators “would do well to listen to young people and make better use of youth [culture] in their pedagogy and curriculum” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p334).
Similar to Duncan-Andrade, Lisa Patel Stevens, a middle school literary specialist and author, also presented case studies that demonstrated how to incorporate elements from popular culture into specific content area classes. In order to help teachers bring students’ popular culture into their curriculum, Stevens sent out a flyer and received three responses. Her first response was from a Physical Science teacher, Traci. After extensive collaboration and planning, Traci delivered her lesson on the laws of physics by incorporating two video clips with action sequences, Jumanji and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Traci and Stevens concluded that “students’ demeanors were visibly transformed as the movie clips were introduced… [and]… a high level of engagement was maintained through the lesson” (Stevens, 2001, p551). This builds upon Duncan-Andrade’s idea of “cultural as additive”. Stevens’ second response was from a seventh grade language arts teacher Shelley. The lesson she delivered incorporated popular song lyrics as a way to identify universal themes in poetry. Author of Sum of Songs: Making Mathematics Less Monotone!, Lawrence Mark Lesser suggests that “Songs in the mathematics classroom can be fun and functional; they can supply motivation and mnemonics” (Lesser, 2000, pg372). Like Traci, Shelley and Lesser experienced a high level of engagement and excitement from her students. Stevens’ final response was from a seventh grade social studies teacher, Craig. Craig found it difficult to balance covering the required material in a short amount of time with engaging his students. The solution that Craig and Stevens came up with was to use radio, TV, and movie clips to highlight culture from the 1960s, 1970s and the 1980s. After Craig demonstrated how to critically examine popular culture, his students were required to work in collaborative groups to critically examine the 1990s using elements from popular culture. All three of Stevens’ respondents felt that their lesson was rewarding on the part of both the students and themselves. Not only could the students relate to the elements from pop culture, but they, as educators, found that they better understood their students. In her study, Stevens found that “educators need support in finding the way to match popular culture studies with their overriding curricula… [and]… also need support in framing these lessons” (Stevens, 2001, p554).
According to a Science Friday, Talk of the Nation program titled “Math in Popular Culture” on National Public Radio (NPR), pop culture is bringing to light mathematics and mathematicians. From Numb3rs to The Simpsons, Good Will Hunting to A Beautiful Mind, there has been an explosion in the last ten years of all things mathematical. Dr. Greenwald of Appalachian State University and author of “Engaging Students with Significant Mathematical Content from The Simpsons””, suggests that “Capitalizing on student enjoyment of pop culture can alleviate math anxiety, energize shy and quiet students, and provide a creative introduction to an in-depth study of related mathematics” (Flatow, 2005). Greenwald, in her interview on NPR, discussed how she incorporates various elements from pop culture into the classroom, mainly using video clips from The Simpsons and Futurama. She said that her students often start out laughing at the video clips. It is this laughter that helps them overcome their math anxiety and begin to engage into the mathematics behind the video clip. In his article for The Mathematics Teacher (2000), Lesser also mentioned that negative attitudes towards mathematics, which are so prevalent in our students, need to be counteracted with songs that have a positive message. Lesser suggests a variety of ways to incorporate music into the mathematics classroom, including using common melodies for students to create their own songs. “When their teachers model creative risk-taking by bringing songs or even songwriting into mathematics class, students may give themselves permission to strive for broader and higher levels of mathematics achievement” (Lesser, 2000, pg372). This increased public awareness of mathematics via popular culture has caused a decrease in the negative attitude of what is “mathematics”.
‘Mathematics as a source of entertainment’ is a new concept in popular culture is now finding itself very profitable, in and outside the classroom. Gary Lorden, the mathematics department chair at Caltech and the math technical consultant for Numb3rs, proposes that the purpose of such shows and movies is to “wet your appetite; and bring to light the idea that math can be “cool” and that using it and understanding it can give you entry into a wide range of careers and opportunities. This idea that “image is what counts” is grabbing the attention of educators and students (Flatow, 2005). Parallel with Stevens suggestion that there should no longer be a separation between student’s pop culture and school activities, Dr. Greenwald advocates that pop culture can help people relate more with mathematics and mathematicians. (Stevens, 2001 & Flatow, 2005). Thus, reiterating the significance of using pop culture elements to engage students.
All of this technology is a natural part of their environment. As Don Tapscott, author of “Grown Up Digital” and lead researcher of “The Net Generation: A Strategic Investigation”, suggests “The teachers are no longer the foundation of knowledge; The internet is” (Tapscott, 2009, p126). Being simultaneously connected to the world and being familiar with and using technology is as natural as breathing for the Net Generation (Tapscott, 2009). He goes on to say that technology is becoming more and more a part of our popular culture, which is driven by the needs of our youth. This is why it is so vital to incorporate technology into our classrooms; our students are bored with our slow pace and with our traditional delivery methods (Tapscott, 2009). Furthermore, he suggests that the current model of education, which was designed for the Industrial Age was effective for the mass production economy that existed, but not for the digital economy that exists today. Our students are no longer empty vessels to be filled with knowledge. They come to our classrooms already having a foundation from which to build upon. Tapscott suggests that a gap exists between how the Net Generation thinks and how most teachers teach. Today’s technology is different than that of our parents; it is interactive. “They’ve grown up in an era of constant innovation and change, and want the [classroom] to be equally innovative and creative” (Tapscott, 2009, p96). The ability to discover new things, receive immediate feedback, and collaborate/interact with others captures their attention. This explains why their school-work sits unfinished; worksheets and traditional homework does not capture their attention. The key to engaging our students is through elements of popular culture and technology. It captures students’ attention and allows them to build upon their foundation.
In an article presented in The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Jeffrey M. R. Duncan-Andrade discussed the potential of utilizing youth popular culture to engage students. He suggests that the intimidation factor of youth popular culture prevents educators from seeing the potential of youth culture as a pedagogical scaffold. (Duncan-Andrade, 2004). As mentioned by Tapscott, Duncan-Andrade also advocates the improbability of capturing the attention of our students with the “growing pervasiveness and persuasiveness of twenty-first-century youth culture” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p317). In addition, he suggests building upon the notion of “culture as an additive”, meaning that educators should use a student’s culture to build upon and engage the student (Duncan-Andrade, 2004). In the past, multicultural education was a way for educators to incorporate elements from various cultures into the classroom, Native American or Hispanic cultures for example. Today, however, the definition of multicultural education should be broader. “This will mean developing curriculum, as well as pedagogy, that empowers students to critically engage in the electronic media and other forms of youth popular culture (i.e., music, style, sport)” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p331). Using these elements from pop culture will allow the information to scaffold in such as way that the students can relate to and build upon it. Duncan-Andrade, himself a high school English teacher, created lessons which pop culture was the foundation and then used student interviews to determine the lesson’s effectiveness. His conclusion was that educators “would do well to listen to young people and make better use of youth [culture] in their pedagogy and curriculum” (Duncan-Andrade, 2004, p334).
Similar to Duncan-Andrade, Lisa Patel Stevens, a middle school literary specialist and author, also presented case studies that demonstrated how to incorporate elements from popular culture into specific content area classes. In order to help teachers bring students’ popular culture into their curriculum, Stevens sent out a flyer and received three responses. Her first response was from a Physical Science teacher, Traci. After extensive collaboration and planning, Traci delivered her lesson on the laws of physics by incorporating two video clips with action sequences, Jumanji and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Traci and Stevens concluded that “students’ demeanors were visibly transformed as the movie clips were introduced… [and]… a high level of engagement was maintained through the lesson” (Stevens, 2001, p551). This builds upon Duncan-Andrade’s idea of “cultural as additive”. Stevens’ second response was from a seventh grade language arts teacher Shelley. The lesson she delivered incorporated popular song lyrics as a way to identify universal themes in poetry. Author of Sum of Songs: Making Mathematics Less Monotone!, Lawrence Mark Lesser suggests that “Songs in the mathematics classroom can be fun and functional; they can supply motivation and mnemonics” (Lesser, 2000, pg372). Like Traci, Shelley and Lesser experienced a high level of engagement and excitement from her students. Stevens’ final response was from a seventh grade social studies teacher, Craig. Craig found it difficult to balance covering the required material in a short amount of time with engaging his students. The solution that Craig and Stevens came up with was to use radio, TV, and movie clips to highlight culture from the 1960s, 1970s and the 1980s. After Craig demonstrated how to critically examine popular culture, his students were required to work in collaborative groups to critically examine the 1990s using elements from popular culture. All three of Stevens’ respondents felt that their lesson was rewarding on the part of both the students and themselves. Not only could the students relate to the elements from pop culture, but they, as educators, found that they better understood their students. In her study, Stevens found that “educators need support in finding the way to match popular culture studies with their overriding curricula… [and]… also need support in framing these lessons” (Stevens, 2001, p554).
According to a Science Friday, Talk of the Nation program titled “Math in Popular Culture” on National Public Radio (NPR), pop culture is bringing to light mathematics and mathematicians. From Numb3rs to The Simpsons, Good Will Hunting to A Beautiful Mind, there has been an explosion in the last ten years of all things mathematical. Dr. Greenwald of Appalachian State University and author of “Engaging Students with Significant Mathematical Content from The Simpsons””, suggests that “Capitalizing on student enjoyment of pop culture can alleviate math anxiety, energize shy and quiet students, and provide a creative introduction to an in-depth study of related mathematics” (Flatow, 2005). Greenwald, in her interview on NPR, discussed how she incorporates various elements from pop culture into the classroom, mainly using video clips from The Simpsons and Futurama. She said that her students often start out laughing at the video clips. It is this laughter that helps them overcome their math anxiety and begin to engage into the mathematics behind the video clip. In his article for The Mathematics Teacher (2000), Lesser also mentioned that negative attitudes towards mathematics, which are so prevalent in our students, need to be counteracted with songs that have a positive message. Lesser suggests a variety of ways to incorporate music into the mathematics classroom, including using common melodies for students to create their own songs. “When their teachers model creative risk-taking by bringing songs or even songwriting into mathematics class, students may give themselves permission to strive for broader and higher levels of mathematics achievement” (Lesser, 2000, pg372). This increased public awareness of mathematics via popular culture has caused a decrease in the negative attitude of what is “mathematics”.
‘Mathematics as a source of entertainment’ is a new concept in popular culture is now finding itself very profitable, in and outside the classroom. Gary Lorden, the mathematics department chair at Caltech and the math technical consultant for Numb3rs, proposes that the purpose of such shows and movies is to “wet your appetite; and bring to light the idea that math can be “cool” and that using it and understanding it can give you entry into a wide range of careers and opportunities. This idea that “image is what counts” is grabbing the attention of educators and students (Flatow, 2005). Parallel with Stevens suggestion that there should no longer be a separation between student’s pop culture and school activities, Dr. Greenwald advocates that pop culture can help people relate more with mathematics and mathematicians. (Stevens, 2001 & Flatow, 2005). Thus, reiterating the significance of using pop culture elements to engage students.
