Observing a Fischbowl

Last week I had the privilege to attend and observe two large groups of students at Arapahoe High School Live Blogging within a FischBowl with author Daniel Pink. The FischBowl is a teaching methods that is a wonderful example of how excellent teachers (Karl Fisch, Anne Smith, and Maura Moritz) are attempting to connect with students in the 21st Century. These teachers are tapping into young peoples' desires to use technology, to parallel process multiple sources of information, express themselves, and be at the center of their learning.

The FischBowl consist of an inner circle (a smaller round table) and an outer circle of interconnected straight tables that surrounds the inner circle. Students enter the room and occupy both the inter circle seats and the outer circle seats. Those in the inner circle have a conversation about a topic while those in the outer circle use a "live blogging" process to create a text-based discussion on the topic. The blog posts are projected live through a projector onto a screen for all to read and contemplate.

In addition, for this FischBowl activity, Daniel Pink (author of the book "A whole new mind" - the focus of the discussion) was connected to the class via the "live blogging" process and a two way video feed website known as MeBeam.

Observing I found the following to be of interest:

1. The students were truly at the center of the discussion. Almost all of the conversation was initiated and continued by the students.
   
2. The teacher was a facilitator, keeping things moving if they slowed down or got off track.
3. The teachers had worked very hard to feed the students multiple sources of information. For example, the students in the outer circle were listening to the inner circle discussion, they were also following the blog posts of the other students, and the posts of Daniel Pink and they were quietly talking to each other.
   
4. Daniel Pink was a minor part of the conversation. The notion of "expert" seemed to be less than overwhelming. They didn't turn to him, but turned to their understanding and reasoning first (I think this is good).
   

It was obvious that the students were engaged, they loved it. There is evidence that students desire this type of multichannel processing and that they learn when they are in these types of environments. The observations that I made led me to believe that students can do more than handle this type of multichannel processing, they find it challenging and it is that challenge that pushes them further.