Play Big | Hooray For Monday

Hooray for Monday is a weekly blog filled with questions, ideas, reflections, and actions we can all take to remodel the school experience for students. Prefer audio? Listen to the Hooray For Monday podcast! Available on your favorite platforms here.

October 30, 2023

By Aleta Margolis, Founder and President

I have a problem with the thesaurus.

According to the Oxford Languages thesaurus, the opposite of play is work. But consider this:

When Brittney Griner is in the middle of playing a basketball game, engaging her mind, heart, and body to contribute to her team and score on close shots, she is hard at work, and hard at play.

When virtuoso cellist Yo-Yo Ma is in the midst of playing a Brahms sonata, bringing his exceptional technique developed over decades to the complex and emotional experience of creating the sound with his instrument, he is hard at work in the midst of play.

When toddlers are playing dress up or building a city of blocks or racing around the playground on tricycles, they are hard at work, and immersed in play.

Play Big is the fourth Rule of Inspired Teaching Improv. Playing big means embracing joy and being guided by imagination. Sometimes playing big is whimsical, with no concrete goal other than to follow where your imagination leads – like a child playing dress up whose purpose may simply be to feel what it’s like to pretend to be a princess, or dinosaur, or spaceship. Other times, play is focused and goal-oriented. In an academic setting, playing big means bringing your full self to solving the math problem or understanding a historical moment or researching sources for your essay or creating your work of art.

When we play big, we jump in with both feet. We commit fully to what we are doing. When we play big, we are fully present. We aren’t checking our phones or looking for something else to do. We are all in.

When teachers come to Inspired Teaching’s Institutes, we invite them to play. We engage teachers in improvisation-based learning: building engaging strategies for teaching fractions by first dividing our group into thirds, fourths, and twelfths; or learning technical and expressive writing skills by first making up stories about issues that are important to us; or devising engaging methods of teaching science by choreographing dances about covalent versus ionic bonds; or deepening understanding of student needs by first examining our own needs.

When humans play, we learn. When we engage our imaginations – whether a three-year-old is imagining what it would feel like to be a robot, or a 16-year-old is imagining himself solving a complicated chemistry problem – we open ourselves up to possibilities for extraordinary learning and growth.

So I’d like to correct the Oxford Languages thesaurus. Play and work are not antonyms. Play and work are teammates that enable us to embrace learning with our whole hearts, minds, and bodies.

Wishing you and your students a week of playing big and learning big.

For additional insights, resources, and information on Inspired Teaching teacher and youth programming, subscribe to the Hooray For Monday newsletter!

Hooray For Monday is an award-winning weekly publication by Center for Inspired Teaching, an independent nonprofit organization that invests in and supports teachers. Inspired Teaching provides transformative, improvisation-based professional learning for teachers that is 100% engaging – intellectually, emotionally, and physically. Our mission is to create radical change in the school experience – away from compliance and toward authentic engagement.

Listen to This Issue of Hooray For Monday

InspiredTeaching · May 22, 2023: Disrupting the Egg Carton

Micaiah Anderson

Community Outreach Specialist

As a Community Outreach Specialist, Micaiah is responsible for program promotion and outreach support for Inspired Teaching events and workshops. Micaiah has a passion for collaborating with community members to build-power and connect. She is an educator with a heart for youth and has experience supporting students fight injustices within their schools and communities. She has a BA in Political Science from, the real HU, Hampton University & anticipates graduating in May 2024 with a Masters of Arts degree in Educational Policy Transformation from Georgetown University.

AUTONOMY

"I want to have a say in what happens to me."

Autonomy is the need for independence; the ability to make choices, to create, to explore, and to express oneself freely; to have sufficient space, to move around, and to feel unrestricted with opportunities to exercise free will.

Brady Maiden

Outreach Coordinator

As the Outreach Coordinator, Brady helps maintain Inspired Teaching’s social media presence and supports the organization’s mission to connect with DC community leaders, educators, and parents. Brady has her Master’s in Public Policy from George Mason University and her BS in Political Science from Northern Arizona University. She is passionate about community, equity, and coalition building recognizing that learning and growing with the community at large is how we continue to be impactful.

What brings you joy in life?

I find joy in spending time with my friends and family and meeting new people. I like going to concerts and festivals, and finding new books to read.

The Learner’s Cycle, Wonder-Experiment-Learn, and the Teacher’s Cycle, Observe-Plan-Instigate, comprise Inspired Teaching’s approach to engaging students in inquiry-based learning.

When they are engaged in the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, students are immersed in learning. They take the lead in designing authentic learning experiences around their own interests and their school’s standards of learning. Each discovery leads to a new question which in turn leads to more wondering and more learning. In the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, Learn is not a destination or an endpoint; it is a deeper understanding, leading to a deeper wondering and new possibilities that create new entry points to further exploration. The cycle continues because what students have learned generates more wonderings that require more experiments that foster more learning – and on and on.

The Observe-Plan-Instigate Cycle is the work of an Inspired Teacher. While a student is expected to follow the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, the teacher joins them on the learning journey while following their own cycle of Observe-Plan-Instigate. This cycle ultimately serves to ensure an inquiry-based atmosphere is at play in the classroom.

Jaqueta Abbey

Teaching and Learning Specialist

Jaqueta is the Teaching and Learning Specialist for Inspired Teaching. In addition to her current role with Inspired Teaching, Jaqueta is a first-grade teaching assistant. Her background features a variety of traditional and non-traditional experiences in the field of education, including working as an adjunct professor, teaching summer reading programs to children and adults, and tutoring children in the foster care system. Jaqueta earned a B.A. in Communication Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and an M.A. in Interactive Media from Elon University.

What brings you joy in life?

Creative self-expression! In addition to my passion for storytelling, I love dancing of all kinds. I've studied belly dance, bachata, and Brazilian Zouk among other styles. I also enjoy glass fusing, crocheting, photography, and cross stitching. These art forms allow me to express myself and build connections with other people at the same time. I think life would be a lot less vibrant without artists and storytellers!

Michelle Welk

Communication & Marketing Specialist

As Communications and Marketing Specialist, Michelle is responsible for finding and creating new ways to highlight Inspired Teaching and promote its programs in order to expand and deepen the organization's impact. Michelle has worked in communications in an array of settings, from creative agencies to state politics to national nonprofits. She has a BA in Journalism from Temple University in Philadelphia and is passionate about education, access, and equity.

What brings you joy in life?

My son, the beach, making a persuasive argument and good food!

Max Peterson

Real World History Assistant Teacher

Max received his Bachelor’s degree in History and African American Studies from Boston University in May 2016. He has worked in museum curation at the Museum of the White Mountains in New Hampshire and the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. Max has worked with young people of varying ages from young children to young adults transitioning to college.

Feedback and Accountability

We grow through feedback and an understanding that the quality of our work is a reflection of what we are learning, but the shift to remote learning this spring disrupted a lot of the tools teachers were used to using to evaluate student growth. How might we do things differently this fall? Participants in this workshop will explore ways to bring meaningful assessment into the virtual and/or socially-distanced classroom and approaches to student feedback that strengthen motivation, and build relationships and achievement.