 Yes, you gotta make sure you have stuff. I mean, I know that we're gonna be using screencast ematic. Yeah, you had I mean, I've got that voice memo. Well, we set up the blog of course We were we pretty much could display all all things that we were doing through various platforms And you know on there we had links to you know the Google Docs. Yeah. Yeah You used audacity to trade some MP3s with us Of course, we used garage band to throw some MP3s back to you guys Really, I mean is blogger is that too obvious or which I mean we should talk about that though Yeah, I think I think maybe that's where we start we start with blogger There was our you've got the you've got the screen cap for the Skype, right? Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so Yeah, let's let's start there with blogger. So we set up this blog right for for three schools Green Hill Hockaday and Oak Ridge to get together and share demonstrations of student learning. It's Jared I guess we have to be honest. That's not really where it began, right? Well Should we go back further? Introduce yourself. Okay. All right. Hi. I'm Jared Colley chair the English department Oak Ridge school Arlington, Texas My name is whole well Garza. I'm in the upper school at Green Hill in Addison, Texas So I guess to really tell the real story We've got to go back to a totally different idea an idea that I was cooking up Isolated over at Oak Ridge hadn't met you yet hadn't met really anybody in the community. I just moved down from New York And so I had this idea. I think we could probably call it a traditional idea. I think so Yeah, I was thinking about the fact that I go to these sports games I see these athletic teams from various schools They get together and they demonstrate their talents and they challenge each other and as a result everybody rises to a higher occasion and I kind of realized that's Collaboration between departments at different schools and why don't English classes do that? And so it got me thinking What about Establishing a conference or planning a conference where students could get together Students who perhaps maybe read the same book at different campuses could share papers Have workshops exchange their ideas challenge each other and as a result we could have a really fruitful Collaboration in our community and so I figured why not send out an email to various English departments and see what kind of feedback I get and so I guess we begin there, right? That was certainly the way that I heard about it was through an email that you sent now How did you come to? construct The call for papers well So the first thing I did is I kind of obnoxiously data-mined a bunch of emails of various English Departments to get different English teachers emails and without their permission without them even knowing me I was just going to you know send them a message and say hey Let's get together and plan a conference and honestly. I didn't really know what to expect from that But I think I framed it in some way like this. I haven't got a call for papers yet Just seeing what the interest is what if we organize an inter-institutional paper colloquium for high school students one? We could model higher academic scholarship to we could provide an opportunity practice public speaking and three We could provide real audiences for student writing and of course getting back to the original idea This facilitates collaboration among different English departments at different campuses if I remember correctly I gave you the tercest of replies Let me know when you get something more But I offered you no help at that point Did you get help from other people? Well? Yeah, you know a shout out to Deborah Moreland actually over at the hockey day school Who is not here with us today, but she was awesome I get a response from Deborah and boy was it a response. She asked me well What would these prompts look like what would be the point of these papers? Are we gonna have them do research or are these just gonna be close readings and before I knew it? I had all these questions deep questions about pedagogy sitting in my lap, and I really didn't know what to do with them And so before you knew it Deborah and I were in an email tennis match back and forth Discussing pedagogy it went well beyond the idea of planning a conference and one thing that struck me there Not out of look back is we started collaborating at that moment. Did you feel like at that point you were? Losing control of it in any way. I mean here's this person. I mean granted you datamined her email address, right? But here's this person who's making all sorts of rigorous philosophical Critiques of your plan right right. How did you feel working through that? Yeah, you know I mean it definitely was dialectical and in one aspect of dialectics is is is it's it's threatening, right? You know someone's challenging you to think even better, right? Someone's challenging you to think differently than you normally think so you arrive at this Traditional call for papers, right? So it's fueled by this dialogue with Deborah and What was born out of that was a call for papers. It was so much better and at this level here You can see the call for papers. It looks very traditional It looks like something that you might see posted up in a department on any college or university campus at this point Still a very traditional idea Well, I think at this point we would get back to your email, right and Perhaps we talk a little more about that that that so-called terse email you sent me Let me tell you this collaboration from my part. I did not know about the Collaboration that Jared had already set up with Deborah So you didn't know that we were emailing like this? No idea and I don't even know if you would have thought of it as a collaboration at that point, but for me I entered Because of my professional jealousy, right? So I see this call for papers and I think Dubliners is a great text. This is framed in an interesting way Now I don't know that the framing involved multiple people, but it was framed in an interesting way And that was a product of collaboration. Absolutely. This would get my students to stop writing in a Stagy weird awkward way. They would have an authentic audience and they wouldn't be budding heads with I Hate this Jared colleague. That's what I'm thinking right when I thought of I wish I had thought of the idea first So I tucked that email of yours away into this monster appointment, and I thought you were ignoring me Yeah, well, I'm sorry. Yeah, it was only because I envied and hated you this professional Envy Got me to think a lot and dream a lot for the entire spring of that year But I kept it all to myself and I got to tell you this tucking away this emotional Envy was a really interesting part of Collaboration and you know for me what what was really shocking Was that it awakened an uncertainty and a vulnerability that I didn't know was there Right, I wasn't sure that I was as good a teacher as this Jared Colley person I wasn't sure that my students were ready to exchange arguments With their classmates across the independent school world in our Metroplex So in looking back, this was one really interesting Discovery that I had not just about myself But about any time that I was frustrated at a colleague for not working with me Standing in the way of successful collaboration in my experience is a tremendous amount of Ungrounded fear and anxiety that we don't even want to name So for that reason I didn't reach out to any of my other colleagues that you would email I didn't order the book for my students and it took me months To offer you the reply that you deserved Can I walk through that reply real quick go for it? Yeah, I love this email. Yeah, so September 17th Six months later. Yeah. Hello. This is Hoel Garnes and thanks again for hosting this colloquium I'm beginning a short story unit with my AP students right now for which they'll read several stories from Dubliners So up until this point, you don't know that Greenhill is involved And I guess I guess I should say the colloquium we were planning was on James Joyce's Dubliners I'm not sure we've said that I don't think so and and so again back to your email We will be reading several stories from Dubliners Would you or any of your colleagues be interested in the Skype conversation or trading of mp3s on the subject of these stories? I thought such an exchange might give students the hint of the kind of fun a colloquium might be Hopefully, I'll throw you a few submissions your way. Thanks exclamation point lowercase Jay Holy cow light bulb moment. I was thinking of this Collaboration that we're gonna be having and you know the near future months once we finally get these papers in and the kids get To meet on this on the Oak Ridge campus and exchange their ideas But for the next six months, I'm just gonna twiddle my thumbs and a giddy state of anticipation But we'll get to collaborate one day. Well, but that's the way that these Colloquia work. I know how to call for papers and you just gotta wait and sometimes it's a year I mean when you especially on the professional level, right? It's in a proposal and it's not happening for a year. And so when you sent that email, it was just like Light bulb. It was like a brick hit me in the head and I woke up and I was like, why aren't we collaborating now and Looking back at the email. So you're excited looking back at the email again I recognize all sorts of cute little stylistic tips where I'm trying to build some sort of intimacy or friendship with you Right, so for me, I moved from professional envy to within a single email Collaborator right we had we had bridged some sort of let me back up. I had gotten over that envy Realizing This could be fun Well, and this is that moment for me where I came out of the Luddite cave of traditional academia and realize Exactly as you're describing We had made the first step necessary to collaborate now. We had built trust we fueled each other's energy, I remember numerous emails within a couple of days and I guess for me what To speak emotionally again. I became worried that I was Steamrolling over you. I kept having you know idea after idea. How about we do this? How about we do this and let me say This is the second stage of my professional envy moment, which was You were envious. Well, yeah. Yeah. Well, let me let me explain because then you send an email, right? Asking hey, how do you feel if I contact some of the other teachers that you've reached out to about this conference? Do you remember this? Yes, and I think I think of course shout out to Debra over at hockey day one more time Debra responds to your query About Skyping and collaborating now and I think the reason that you reached out to other English teachers at the time Our classes didn't quite match up. Yes with the same schedules, and we were still thinking real-time Skyping And so we kind of put the idea on hold and you reached out to other teachers. And so yeah, Debra got back to me our Schedules did not align either, but I realized She's down the street, right? I can go and meet you in person in your car, right? My visit to hockey day Was not Jared's idea. It was not her idea. It was my idea. I invited myself Yeah, so let me read another email. I get from you. Is that okay? Please? Okay, so this is September 20th Hey, Jared. Hope your Thursday has been good to you. I just wanted you to know about a cool development Hockey days Debra Moreland shared my Google Doc with her class and that energized them so much that we exchanged some emails Here's what we decided on. She will host me in person Explanation point in her class on Tuesday the 25th on that morning I'm bringing to her students two questions designed by my students the previous day at the end of that Tuesday class I will bring from her students two questions designed for my students We will answer those questions on Thursday the 27th record our responses at the sound file and email the file to both Hockey day and you maybe we can figure out more visits in person I'll let you know how it goes dot dot dot dash, but well now The jealousy That I felt when I read that email Yes, maybe this was the moment where I felt the uncomfortable loss of control because I had this idea And I had taken the risk to send it out and you know, I had this energized dialogue with Debra We've made this call for papers and now I'm being left out This was the moment in my Envy in my moment of jealousy where we really embrace the digital sphere because I realized wait I want to eavesdrop on these visits. I want to know what how well does over at hockey day And I can't wait for this mp3 file. He's gonna be mailing us at some point, right? So at that point, I think I send out an email to both of you saying how do you guys feel if I set up a blog spot? We'll call it Dubliners 213 Dot blog spot calm and so we set this up. Had you ever set up a blog before? And we we used it for all sorts of things I think at the beginning and I love the if you go look at the blog You'll notice It starts off teachers posting. Yes, right. So like hey, here's a great resource. Here's a free version of Dubliners Here's a mp3 of James Joyce reading Finnegan's wake or you know, we were exchanging all these links If teacherly links it began more of it began as more of a bulletin board, right, right? And you blogged about your visit to Debra's class Debra blogged about her perspective of the visit But at some point the students really took the reins. Let's talk about the student engagement. Sure. Yeah, you know It kind of described one method that was employed where Greenhill students posed questions for Hockaday students Hockaday students posed questions back that were born out of those questions posed by the Greenhill students you guys sent us your responses doing an mp3 We posed questions back through our mp3 and so I saw students doing the exact same thing We as teachers had started to do where they were framing things differently for each other On an even more subtle level, let me tell you one thing that happened In my class it was something very simple There was a student in my class who made a point about Diction in Dubliners a little cloud. Right. There was a word of choice that one of my students pointed out and one of your students So politely so directly so simply Mentioned that student by name and said Thank you. I agree about the effect of that word choice Right, you should have seen the Greenhill students light up proudly. That's looking over at her And we served that excitement For days knowing That each of us in the room had an authentic audience off campus I even thought about after this experience how when students only write for their teacher You're writing for this single person and they're they're the only one that's going to read it Why make it great? You know why spend too much time on it? Why think too much on it, you know But if you know you're writing for others a community, right and they're going to appreciate it like that student expressed Boy, it's empowering Now I think might be a good time to give you all a look At what the Dubliners colloquium looked like when we all actually got right same room. Let's check it out Guys and said Shall we do another text? Yeah, and uh, you know, I think that's around the time that all that news The news story is about Richard the third's body. I suggested. Let's let's do Shakespeare's history play Let's let's all read Richard the third We knew at least that the three of us wanted to work together again, right? We knew that there would be A blog that could host everything for Richard the third We had instead of an ad hoc collaboration We decided from the beginning Let's model different schools of thought Each one of us so when I came to This collaboration that we had set up I said, let me be the Shakespearean performance guy. So when I come to your classes I am going to construct A project for each of your students Cut 25 lines from this speech such a cool project by the way I remember when you came in and you pushed my kids to think this way One thing I saw that was born out of that is they really Understood the importance of each character's role all the better once they had to discuss The pros and cons of cutting a character's lines to see them on the blog disagree with one another, right? You can't cut those lines from Buckingham Those are essential, you know cut the you know cut cut the queen some more And then somebody would speak up and say no you can't do that How dare right? She's one of the few female characters in this thing Sidelined the whole time. How are we going to sideline them more? We knew from the beginning Okay, Hoela is going to be the Shakespearean performance guy. I think I was maybe the history guy. Yes And my students knew if they had a historical question Let's pitch that to mr. Collie right we got to act one original third and starting this play We taught Debra's notes. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean right right. She just sent over her notes and and it was Really cool for my students to see How transparent I was with it right? No, I would say this is Debra's question for us I noticed she was kind of the moral questions person, right? Like she had a lot of ethical and moral questions She wanted us to wrestle with we every now and then in the room Your names would come up right what would mr. Collie say about that? What would the Hockaday students? What do you think they're making with this passage right here? Well and same over at Oak Ridge. We taught your notes for act two and I think everybody taught my notes for act three And that gave fruit To something that we did not expect to happen in the papers right They began to take very seriously In the writing process right the opinions of their classmates on other campuses. Well, check out your student's paper I think his name was sam. I mean bam He just starts dr. Moreland noted in our discussion of richard the third that richard has trouble understanding women He just drops her name right there. I mean this is evidence of students who know their audience They're connecting word to audience. It's meaningful real writing You know in another thing that I thought was really cool. Not only were the students addressing the other teachers Using their ideas. They were using other students ideas They were referencing each other. I mean I have a student's paper right here Where she's citing a student over at Hockaday one of my Oak Ridge students Is citing a Hockaday student from her blog posting Not only are these students connecting their word to real audience and empowering each other in the process by doing so They were learning digital literacy Like how to legitimately cite a blog and how to incorporate that into a so-called traditional formal paper And as a result those formal papers were all the better and students knew how to Back to the emotional level that we as adults had such trouble with in the beginning, right? They understood that there was nothing more Compassionate than to demonstrate that I have listened to you I have thought and I respect you enough to ask you this clarifying question So for me this whole thing starts with this private simmering envy And it winds up as this bit of shared fun So I think as an English teacher in terms of these narrative arcs, right? So for me, here's the educational arc From isolation and anxiety To community and joy Right. I mean that Perhaps for you also that's an ideal emotional arc. Absolutely Absolutely, I can't think of a better way to state it And I gotta say it shouldn't end here We have to keep doing these. I mean just like that light bulb moment when you just hit me with that email Why aren't we collaborating now? Like the trust has been established and we're sharing this story with other people because we want to collaborate with other people We want to keep seeing these things happen. Thank you very much for listening This is our contact info. Once again, I'm Hoel Garza upper school English instructor at Green Hill school I'm Jared Colley chair of the English department over at the Oak Ridge school There's our URLs for the blogs that we employed Surf around check them out get in touch. We'd like to collaborate more. Peace. Thank you