An Educator’s Guide to Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom The Survey of Students’ Perspective Taking Skills Michelle Dionne, Silvia Diazgranados Ferrans, Tracy Elizabeth, and Robert L. Selman, Harvard University May 1, 2014 Copyright: All rights reserved Funded, in part, by the U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences Grant #R305F1000026 to the Strategic Education Research Project’s Institute for the Catalyzing Comprehension through Discussion and Debate (CCDD) project. Introduction Perspective taking is a very broad psychological term that captures a skill set your students will use to explore their worlds, to understand and to connect with their peers and families, and to improve upon their academic performances. The most important idea to hold on to in using this concept is that perspective taking is not a skill one either has or does not have; it is a cluster of skills that develop with age. Further, while it is important to know which of these skills students may have access to as part of their social competence and their mental capacity, knowing how and when students use them is equally important. To some extent perspective taking simply develops “naturally” with social experience; as children grow, they are better able to predict what may upset parents and friends, and, likewise, what might bring happiness to those same people. In addition, as they move through the grades, society puts greater and greater demands (press) on young people to use these perspective taking skills. As we grow up, we are expected to be more considerate of others -­‐ this requires us to take, or at least try to understand, their points of view. Society, through parents and schools, also provides support for the nurturance and promotion of these skills. In schools, as classrooms focus increasingly on skills relevant to oral language and listening, discussion and communication, and debate and argumentation, perspective taking, as an fundamental set of skills to perform each of these operations well, has become increasingly important to academic excellence, and to our understanding that academic excellence requires social competence and a prosocial motivation. While this guide has been developed with teachers in mind as the main audience,1 we believe it can also be used by other professionals, as well as parents, to promote child development. Counselors and youth leaders can use the ideas and materials in this guide to promote conversation among youth, enhancing their ability to construct an area of discussion, to critique the ideas of others, and to clarify their own thinking. For instance, media clubs, sports activities, and other group work are ideal places to enhance perspective taking. Parents can also use the ideas, the theories, and the 1 This work has been supported by a large research and demonstration project funded by the federal department of education. For detailed information on the project, it’s aims and progress, see appendix A. This appendix also will point the interested reader to even more extensive information on curricular, instructional and evaluation material. 2 evidence in this guide to facilitate their own conversations with their children. But primarily, the first section of this guide is directed at a target audience of teachers who are charged with helping students to read and write better as young people learn important disciplinary information. 3 SECTION ONE: Perspective Taking and Text Comprehension2 When it comes to reading comprehension, in particular what is often called deep comprehension, e.g. making inferences about materials in a text, interpreting the meaning of arguments in a text, understanding why a particular text or actor in the text has taken a particular stance, or considering why the author of a text has made a particular argument, once again, this very basic social skill, perspective taking, is implicated in how deeply a student is comprehending the text. For instance, students in the late elementary and middle school years are asked to consider the world through the eyes of people (characters in, or referred to in, the text) who they read about but with whom they are unfamiliar: people who lived in different times (encountered in social studies and history classes), or characters in novels and biographies who live in circumstances that are very different from the students’ own (who students meet in ‘English’ Language Arts). Even when young people are able to read the words of texts fluently, students with weak perspective taking skills may have trouble comprehending the intended meaning of texts about circumstances or people with whom they have limited or no experience. As with any skill set, perspective taking is made up of different components, and each one can be developed through practice. This guide describes various dimensions of perspective taking, and how you can develop students’ use of them in your classrooms. Each dimension is valuable independent of the others, but their true strength can be seen when taken together. As each skill builds upon the others, young people gain the power to better navigate complex social ideas: academically, personally, and as members of society. Ultimately, those of us who developed this work would like students to be able: 1) to read about and thoughtfully discuss a given situation that has social implications (e.g. in history, social studies, or language arts); 2) to identify how various stakeholders are likely to feel, think and react, both in relation to context as well as to other players or characters, whether they are explicitly in the story or implicitly in the societal wings: 3) to generate solutions, or consider the existing solutions in the story: and 4) to ask, in a 2 Based, in part, on a document first created for the CCDD Summer Institute 2012 (Boston, Massachusetts). 4 particular story, the degree to which the author, or the actors in the events of the day, consider a variety of points of view. In order to promote the perspective taking skill set in your classroom, we suggest asking students to answer the following questions about texts, media, or personal experiences that involve social situations or scenarios: ! Who is/was/might or will be involved in the scenario? ! How do/did they think or feel about the situation? ! Why do/did they think or feel this way? These questions, and their significance, will be discussed in further depth through the case studies in the following parts of this section. Part 1: A Case Study of Reading and Discussion in a Classroom This case study is drawn from a program of curriculum and instruction identified as Word Generation described in Appendix A . The theoretical model of the Word Generation approach posits that perspective taking is a developmental skill, one of three basic skills students need to develop in order to improve their capacity for “deep comprehension” of texts and of the world around them. The primary outcome on which Word Generation hopes to have a positive educational impact is the reading comprehension skills of students in the program. (The other two educationally malleable factors emphasized in Word Generation are academic language skills, and reflective judgment skills.) The Word Generation pedagogical model places a strong emphasis on focused classroom discussion and debate as the instructional method best suited to facilitate these three necessary core developmental skills. The combination of the curriculum, designed to promote literacy in disciplinary subject matter such as social studies and history, and the discourse oriented instruction makes double use of perspective taking skills, first as a skill to comprehend texts, media, or other socially-­‐based stories, and second, as a skill to facilitate good discussion about such scenarios. Word Generation provides six-­‐week long units for curriculum in social studies and science, beginning in the fourth grade and proceeding through to the eighth grade. (30 units in all for each subject matter discipline across the 5 grades.) Each unit in the sixth grade comprises 5 lesson plans, each about an hour in length. The first section of each unit, actually the first day or block of each unit, is called a “launch.” The traditional launch activity for each Word Generation Social Studies or History unit, across grades 4 to 8, is an activity called a Readers Theater. The opening Readers Theater provides a dramatic presentation in the form of a written script. Typically students read aloud the parts of different actors, as in the rehearsal of a play. The curriculum follows this format for several reasons: 1) The text of the curriculum provides an opportunity for students to read material that is engaging and accessible, as well as connected to the topical content of the unit. The topic aligns with the curriculum framework of the local educational agency. For example, as demonstrated below, a sixth grade social studies unit on ancient history in the schools where Word Generation is being evaluated focuses on Egypt, and its form of governance; 2) As a launch, Readers Theater allows for the exploration of abstract (and often complex) social themes, like power or oppression, in concrete terms and with familiar examples. In other words, students are reading the roles of characters with perspectives and sharing their opinions of the text with other students in their class. Below, the launch raises a topic similar to one about the powers the Pharaohs of Egypt had over their people and slaves, e.g. the powers of parents over their children; and 3) The Word Generation curricula are also using the Readers Theater as a vehicle for introducing the key selected “academic language” vocabulary that is so important to the Word Generation approach. In order to explore the types of perspective taking opportunities provided by the Word Generation curricula, we will use a Readers Theater from a sixth grade Word Generation Social Studies Unit. Note that the Readers Theater “launch” we provide below portrays students of the same age as the members of the class, and focuses on the kinds of situations, dilemmas and problems that many middle school students either face themselves or with which they are familiar. Additionally, the launch topic bears important analogies with the content of the unit – for example, power dynamics in Ancient Egypt. The title of this particular unit is: “The Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt: Were they oppressors, or great leaders whose harsh actions were justified?” The launch for this unit explores family power dynamics in the present that provide opportunities for comparison to the power dynamics as practiced in Egypt 4,000 years ago. (See the appendix for ways to access the full week-­‐long [6 hour long blocks] curriculum). 6 Summary: The Readers Theater puts into effect the Word Generation theory that those skills students most need in order to comprehend social studies (and science) materials are the academic vocabularies, the ability to use complex reasoning to help them with their ability to provide a coherent argument for a position, and the ability to develop their perspective taking skills. Taken together, this cluster of malleable, developmental skills (language, cognitive, and social) provides skills for text comprehension and group discussion, argumentation, and debate, so called 21st Century academic skills. To begin our focus on the promotion of perspective taking skills, let’s take a closer look at the “Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt” Readers Theater to consider how these skills are being represented by the different characters and could be engaged with by the readers. Word Generation Sixth Grade Social Studies, Unit 2: The Readers Theater Launch: Raul: I swear! My parents are like…oppressors! Tiana: What? Raul: My parents – they act like those people we’ve been studying in social studies – pharaohs in Ancient Egypt. They’re oppressive! Tiana: So you’re saying that your parents collect taxes from you and force you to build pyramids? Right. Okay. Raul: No! But they cancelled our family cell phone plan so they can save money for some dumb family vacation to Disneyworld. I can’t call or text my friends anymore! My life is practically over. Tiana: Sounds rough. Glad my parents didn’t do that. They’re pro-­‐democracy. Raul: Stop messing with me. Can’t you see I’m in pain here? Tiana: Well, how do your brother and sister feel about all of this? If you all feel wronged, maybe you can stage a revolution and get your parents to give your cell phones back. Raul: They both could care less! My older brother has a job after school so he can pay for his own cell phone plan. My nerdy baby sister is anti-­‐social and 7 never calls or texts anyone. I’m the only victim in this whole deal and it’s just plain wrong. Tray: Look, man, think about it from your parents’ perspective. They probably feel awful about not being able to pay for vacations and cell phones at the same time. They had to make a hard choice and they decided to go with a vacation that’s going to give you great family memories for a long, long time. Raul: Tray, I’m not saying I don’t value time with my family. Of course, I do! They have my back. But my friends are important to me too and I need my cell phone to have their backs! Losing touch with my friends doesn’t seem worth going on a vacation to hang out with my family. I’m with them all the time. Ingrid: Raul, sometimes you have to take a hit for the team. Think of your baby sister! Disneyworld may be nothing to you, but I bet going there is like a dream come true for her. Doesn’t her happiness seem worth sacrificing your cell phone? Tiana: Hey, I’m all for making baby sisters happy, no matter what pains they can be, but I also don’t think it’s right to destroy Raul’s happiness for an overpriced, and overrated, trip to see a bunch of grown people dressed up as mice and ducks. Raul, why don’t you propose to your parents a cheaper and less commercial vacation destination, one that won’t force them to cut off your cell phones? Raul: I’m way ahead of you, Tiana. I did suggest going somewhere more affordable and my parents said, “No!” So they really are like the pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. They make all the decisions without listening to anyone or caring how people feel. Tray: Yeah, some pharaohs did do some pretty harsh things and the people didn’t have much of a say, but pharaohs did provide order to the civilization, which benefited everyone overall. Ingrid: Exactly! Like the pharaohs, your parents are making sure that you and your brother and sister have stability in your lives. Even though they don’t have much money, they want to make sure you can still go on the fun family vacations that everyone else does. 8 Tiana: I see your points, but Raul not being able to text his friends is causing some major instability in his life. His social life is over without a cell. His parents can keep everything in their children’s lives in order by keeping the phones and vacationing in some place other than the magnificently expensive “Magic Kingdom.” Raul: Ugh! I hope you guys don’t mind getting emails from me. Tray: What’s email? Raul: Right. Well, I guess going to Disneyworld works out since the only people who will be my friends from now on are mice and ducks. The promotion of simple and deep comprehension: After a Readers Theater performance, you can use follow-­‐up activities to improve students’ comprehension of the text. Some activities promote simple comprehension and can help your students to better follow a story. One such activity in simple reading comprehension might ask students to match perspectives based in the Readers Theater text with the character most likely to make the statement, such as in the following exercise. Note that in this case, the term “perspective” can imply or stand for a number of ideas, including an opinion, an attitude, a point of view, an argument, or a reason. The act of inferring from a text any of these ideas suggests at the least a simple kind of perspectival act, such as in the following: Match the student with the comment: Ingrid Raul Tray Tiana 9 “The pharaohs made hard decisions for the good of everyone in their society.” “My friends are important to me – I wish my parents knew that.” “Sometimes you have to think about how your family feels.” “A less expensive vacation might mean everyone can be happy. An increasingly perspectival activity, promoting deeper comprehension, might be to ask the following question of your students: After his conversation with his friends, Raul goes home and has dinner with his family. What do you think he might discuss with each of the following members of his family to try to convince them that he needs to keep his cell phone? For each member of Raul’s family below, write down what Raul’s argument might be and why the reasons you provide might convince that particular person. Then, write down how each person might respond. ! Raul’s mom and dad ! Raul’s younger sister ! Raul’s older brother Part 2: Further Classroom Application: Perspective Taking as Comprehension Now let’s suppose you are running a discussion group with your own students and you are interested in teaching about “stance,” as an aspect of reading comprehension. You pose the question to the class, or to a small group, “What do you think Raul’s older brother, who has a job after school, would recommend that Raul do?” There are three main areas of inquiry for exploring different perspectives, or differing points of view, such as those of Raul’s brother: ! Who is involved in the situation? ! How do they feel or think about the situation? ! Why do they think or feel this way? These three questions may be used as tools to navigate the points of view represented within a social context like Readers Theater, a classroom debate, or any number of situations where evidence is beneficial. You can remember these questions as who, how, and why. Step 1: Who is involved? The first step in the use of perspective taking is to identify the actors involved in a situation. In the Readers Theater above, some of the characters are obvious because they are directly involved in the story, like Raul, Tiana, Tray and Ingrid. There are also actors indirectly involved in this passage and their points of view can be considered, as well. In order of appearance, these include Raul’s parents, Raul’s friends, Tiana’s parents, and Raul’s brother and sister. This inventory of characters allows the reader to imagine whose points of view are available for consideration. Some readers may go deeper into the comprehension of the text based conversations within a Readers Theater to consider other individuals (or groups) not even indirectly mentioned. For example, a young person might contemplate the point of view of parents at large, or of the culture of youth, or even of an economic sector such as the mobile phone company. Background knowledge in the written text of this Readers Theater suggests that not having a family subsidized cell phone is no big issue for Raul’s brother. But do your students think Raul’s brother will nevertheless be sensitive to Raul’s feelings? *** Classroom Tip: Some students have difficulty naming characters and might prefer to rely on pronouns instead. Ask the members of your classroom to be specific; with practice, relating names to specific characters becomes easier and is invaluable in lending clarity to their own opinions. *** Activity: In order to help your students remember which character is which, work together as a class to construct a character map about a text or scenario, where the group works together to identify all the characters in a story and then diagrams how they are related to each other. Step 2: How do they feel or what do they think? Now that we’ve established a list of everyone directly involved or mentioned in the Readers Theater passage, we can consider how they feel (or what they think, or how they might react) about the situation, including what these characters value. Let’s first think about the main character, Raul. How does he feel about his situation? Is he happy? Upset? Does he desire a different outcome? What about his little sister – what might she think about the problem? Does have a cell phone matter to her? And how do his sister’s feelings influence Raul’s thoughts or feelings? The most important part of this step is to remember that it can be complicated. People often have complex feelings and a character’s thoughts may change over the course of a passage, a story, or over time. The feelings of one character can also be impacted (or possibly changed) by the feelings of another character. For this reason, it is important to consider the feelings of Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 11 not just a main character, but those around this individual, as well. This will help to create a more accurate portrayal how each individual feels or thinks. *** Classroom Tip: Develop in your class a teaching move that can be called, “In another’s shoes.” For students who have trouble articulating how a character or historical figure might feel, ask those students to put themselves in the shoes of the character and discuss how they themselves might feel in a similar situation. Follow up with a discussion about whether the character in question might feel the same way as your student feels, or differently, and why these differences or similarities exist. *** Activity: Using the character map that the class developed in Step 1, choose specific characters and ask students to discuss (as a group) how each character thinks or feels. The thoughts and feelings can be written next to a character on the map. Remember, a single character may have many thoughts and feelings, or values. Step 3: Why do they think or feel this way? Knowing that Raul is unhappy with his family’s plan is a strong step toward comprehension via perspective taking. Being able to describe the reasons for his feelings will add depth to your students’ discussion, debate or written reflection. Such a move can provide evidence for an argument justifying the cause of someone’s feelings. This context can include reasoning about relationships (like friendship), status (like being popular), and power (like being a teacher or parent), or the lack of any of these. For example, the text suggests (through the words she uses) that Tiana is Raul’s friend; will this make a difference in the kind of advice she offers to him? What if they were not friends? One way to justify or explain a character’s feelings is by describing how the characters are related to each other. Where a character is situated in relation to others in a story or situation can offer insight about his or her point of view, even if their thoughts or feelings are not directly mentioned. Students who use context to provide evidence of how others might feel will often use a phrase like, “as a friend,” or, “as a teacher.” Such phrases serve to articulate a role or a position. In the case of our question about what Raul’s brother would recommend, we do not hear directly from his brother; we only have Raul’s take on his Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 12 brother’s position vis a vis his own, and yet students can deduce what the brother may recommend. This is an example of a more complex perspective taking skill being used by students, both in their reading and interpretation of the text, and in their discussions with each other. *** Classroom Tip: Have students reflecting back on the character map and the relationships between characters in order to elaborate on how characters are connected to each other and how these relationships might impact character opinions. Use questions like, “How does the fact that Raul is a big brother shape what he thinks about the situation?”. Evidence about why a character thinks a certain way can be brought forth from the passage (such as when Raul said, “I need my cell phone”), or your students can use personal information and empathy in their arguments. For example, a student might say, “Raul says he’s in pain, and I understand because my cell is how I stay connected to friends.” We invite you to ask students for more details about their own feelings or thoughts about a given situation – get them to describe the “why” behind their own feelings, too. And, in connection to academic language skills, ask them to consider the meaning of words like ‘pain’ in this context. Why does Raul say he is pain, and what kind of pain might he be in? Summary: In this part of the Educators Guide to Promoting Perspective Taking, we have described three related kinds of perspective taking skills that help readers better comprehend and communicate, who is involved in a text, what each involved individual is experiencing, and why a particular individual might have the particular set of thoughts and feelings that they do. The Word Generation material includes ways to promote perspective taking in both the comprehension of texts and in communication with others. In either case, students’ knowledge grows and the emphasis is on literacy skills, particularly the ability for students to improve their reading skills and comprehension abilities in a range of disciplines. Part 3: The Triple E approach: Case Studies of Educational Achievement, Ethical Reflection, and Entertainment Engagement 3 3 For more information on The Triple E initiative, see appendix B. Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 13 The Triple E approach focuses on similar elements of knowledge, but goes one step further. Here the outcome emphasized is not only academic understanding and reading comprehension but also the promotion of social awareness, a fundamental skill, which forms the foundation of ethical reflection, empathic responsiveness, and constructive engagement in society. This approach identifies and develops resource guides for high quality, humane, and challenging stories. Triple E media asks students to engage these stories in three ways, through written text, through observation of the stories enacted by others, in film, in plays, etc., and the actual student involvement in their own experience of the story as a participant in the dramatic art of the stories theater production. There are two case studies that we have developed within the Triple E framework, that exemplify this approach. Each case study began with a book and the two books have been adapted for the screen with the spirit of the original story preserved. Both are stories written with adolescents in mind. The Watsons Go to Birmingham, 1963, was written by Christopher Paul Curtis in 1993, and adapted for a television audience in 2013 by Tonya Lewis Lee. The Giver, written by Lois Lowry in 1995, will be distributed internationally as a major motion picture by The Weinstein Company in the late summer of 2013. Both of these stories can be experienced on the page, on the screen (the script), and on the stage, performed by theater groups. Probably insert some material from both scripts, draw connection between Readers Theater and Readers Movie Theater, i.e, actual script. In common, Word Generation and Triple E Media actively bridge research and practice. Currently Word Generation is in the fourth year of a rigorous evaluation of its impact on students’ learning and reading abilities. The Triple E media framework is currently being studied in conjunction with both the educator’s resources it has recently developed. Both these initiatives are complex, ambitious, and theoretically designed and implemented. To determine whether either actually has an impact requires the validation of instruments to assess the impact of these programs on the student outcomes that have already been shown to be important components of academic and social competencies. That is why we have been working to develop and refine methods that can evaluate and assess the perspective taking skills we have described earlier. The next section of this resource describes our approach to the assessment of social perspective taking. Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 14 Part 4: How We Assess Perspective Taking in Schools We developed a thirty-­‐minute survey to assess students’ perspective taking skills. Rather than use a questionnaire that either asks students to reflect on their own every day use of these skills, or a “social I.Q. test” that assesses the very best a student can do, we have developed a method of assessment that lines up with the very abilities the curriculum is aiming to promote. This means focusing on the ways the students use their perspective taking skills in action (their “performance”), rather than upon how good they might be at doing so (their “competence”). Unlike in teaching, we do not scaffold the material to aid the student to do her best. We simply provide the opportunity for students to demonstrate the skills they are using. For this reason, we say that our assessment focuses on observable acts of the various perspective taking skills the measure allows the students to demonstrate. There are several ways to think about the “measurement” of perspective taking. For the practitioner, with an interest in an individual, measurement is often considered as a “diagnostic” -­‐ What this individual’s perspective taking strengths and deficits are. Such an interest is most often best achieved using a battery of approaches, including interviews, questionnaires, and other techniques. We do not deal with this kind of measurement here, but the reader can nevertheless get some ideas for how to develop a diagnostic approach from some of the methods we do use. Another kind of measurement of social perspective taking constructs assessment tools specifically designed to assess the impact of a large scale program such as Word Generation or the early formative stages of program development, such as the case with Triple E. For our purposes here, we will describe an approach designed for the individual teacher (or group counselor) who asks the question, how are my students doing with respect to their development and use of their perspective taking skills. In our assessment procedure, we use a shorter version of material that is akin to the text used in the Readers Theater and Readers Movie Theater (actual script) we described earlier that is not scripted as a dialogue, but is summarized in a narrative. See pages 20-­‐21 for all narratives. For example, Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 15 here is a narrative we use to assess how well a student is using perspective taking skills to think through a social situation focused on teasing. Jariah’s Weird Sense of Style You have lots of friends in your class this year and you are enjoying school. In January, your teacher introduces a new student to the class, Jariah, whose family arrived from a different far away city very recently. Jariah’s hairstyle is really strange. Also, no one in the class likes the music Jariah listens to. Some students are teasing Jariah because they think Jariah is weird. Casey is a student who has many friends and gets along with most classmates. Casey has been observing the situation and does not know what to do. Casey is asking different people for advice. In order to assess perspective taking performance, we ask students the following questions related the brief social narrative, in an attempt to illicit student use of the perspective taking skills examined in Part 2– acknowledging who is involved, articulating how they might feel, and inferring why they might feel this way, given their context: What would a specific character recommend to another character? Why would this character make the recommendation s/he made? What might go wrong with this recommendation? We connect the themes of who is involved, how they feel or think, and why they feel or think this way to the variation in student use of perspective taking skills in response to each of the prompt questions. We do this by using a counting system to determine how socially complex responses to each question are, in terms of the number of characters whose feelings or thoughts are being considered and whether the response includes any text-­‐based or empathy-­‐based evidence for these claims. Text-­‐based means the information is provided or alluded to in the very brief narrative. Empathy-­‐based means the response is founded on the experience of the student creating a response. We are looking for the performance of “perspectival complexity.” The emphasis is not so much on whether the response is fully and exactly accurate; we prefer to focus more on the degree to which the student participant is able to put him/herself in the shoes of the various actors in the situation. The more thoroughly the questions “who?”, “how?”, and “why?” are Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 16 considered, the higher the perspective taking score. That is, scoring is based on how well, how thoroughly, and how deeply the student’s response demonstrates an effort to take perspectives into account. The more use of inference about human behavior and deduction of motivation, the more interpretation of the forces that influence human conduct, the more credit is given to the response.4 This means that a student gets credit for each actor who s/he is able to include in the response, including themselves as a writer. Additional points are awarded for naming how each character feels or thinks. Students earn even more points for providing evidence about why people in the story feel or think the ways that they do. This evidence can be based on the writer’s own experience, or on details provided in the narrative, such as by identifying the relationships of the actors, or what they care about. Part 5: Using Perspective Taking for Academic Purposes Perspective taking skills are crucial to two aspects of classroom life: the ability to discuss instructional materials with others, regardless of the content of the material, and the ability to interpret materials for comprehension, particularly in the humanities (language arts, social studies, history, etc.) The first area of competency creates a classroom climate conducive to productive discussion and debate, wherein students are able to make astute, earnest assertions and respond thoughtfully to the claims of peers. The second area of competency, the capacity to read texts for deeper comprehension, is a subject of widespread concern, as evidenced in the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The CCSS have set new learning requirements that focus on integrating competencies, such as requiring attention to literacy in the content areas. Many of these required competencies are directly related to the work students will be doing with the CCDD curricula. Writing Standard 9, for example, stipulates that students must be able to write about what they read, 4 Students’ responses need not be accurate in order to earn “perspective taking credit.” However, they do need to demonstrate comprehension of the situation the actor is in, or of the context that might influence their responses. A response such as, “Casey should tease Jariah so they can be friends,” leads us to suspect something is amiss; fortunately, we have not observed this type of response. Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 17 regardless of subject. Students must also construct viable, evidence based arguments and be able to critique the arguments of others. Perspective taking exercises are an excellent tool for processing information and integrating it into a specific context. Using and improving the perspective taking skills the CCDD curriculum promotes can help your students to make powerful inferences about historical and literary texts, to understand why historical (and contemporary) figures behaved in certain ways, and to greatly improve their own persuasive writing abilities. As an example of how perspective taking skills may be fostered in an academic discussion, let’s consider further the 6th grade Social Studies unit from which the Readers Theater discussed previously was taken. This passage is about the people of Ancient Egypt and their annual interaction with the flood of the Nile River. Connecting PERSPECTIVE TAKING to Science: The Flooding of the Nile in Ancient Egypt as understood through Historical Perspective taking. A flood occurs when land that is normally above water is covered in water. From a scientific perspective, the flooding of the Nile is caused by rainfall far to the south that causes the water level in the river to rise. This water makes its way north into Egypt and spreads across the low-­‐laying land around the Nile. Even though ancient Egyptians recognized that the floods were orderly, in other words they could predict when the yearly floods would begin and could measure the height of the flood to know how much food they would be able to grow, they believed it was a god that controlled the flood. Why did they attribute the flooding to a god? Why did they think that the gods controlled how much flooding occurred each year? In terms of perspective taking, more adequate responses to the questions at the end of the above passage not only require a deep comprehension of the text, they also require the student to put herself in the shoes of the ancient Egyptians (perhaps the “average” peasant or scribe) and make an inference about what a person in each of these roles might have understood about the causes of floods, especially since a major factor was the rainfall that occurred thousands of miles away. As it is likely there was no way of gathering that Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 18 information at that time, the reader begins to understand why ancient Egyptians may have looked for other ways to explain the causes of events of such great importance to them, yet over which they had no direct control. Exploration of perspective taking in academic contexts allows students to learn and understand that across time, peoples have had not only different beliefs, but also differing access to knowledge, to evidence and to ways of getting information. Taking these circumstances into account is an important aspect of what can be called "historical perspective taking." And, from the Nile example, we can see the connection between perspective taking skills and complex reasoning abilities. *** Classroom Tip: To incorporate perspective taking into academic lessons, invite your students to small or large group discussions comparing different reasons for how characters might think, feel, or act. You can come up with the different options, or guide students in developing the choices themselves. *** Activity: Make a flash card for each different point of view represented in a text or developed by your class. Explain to students (or invite them to discuss) each perspective. Then students can work together to: ! Decide whether a point of view would change if the person who holds it had a different role in the story or events ! Compare and contrast perspectives ! Identify which are similar and which are most different ! Compare a perspective with students’ own points of view ! “Play the parts” on the cards for a short debate ! Consider what might change the mind of the person who holds each point of view Social Perspective Taking Acts Measure: The Scenarios Scenario #1, Teasing: Jariah’s Weird Sense of Style
Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 19 You have lots of friends in your class this year and you are enjoying school. In January, your
teacher introduces a new student to the class, Jariah, whose family arrived from a different far
away city very recently. Jariah’s hairstyle is really strange. Also, no one in the class likes the
music Jariah listens to. Some students are teasing Jariah because they thing Jariah is weird.
Casey is a student who has many friends and gets along with most classmates. Casey has been
observing the situation and does not know what to do. Casey is asking different people for
advice.
Ali is a student who was recently teased by other students, but found a way to solve the problem.
Casey asks Ali, “Ali, what do you recommend?”
a. What do you think Ali would recommend to Casey?
b. Why do you think Ali would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Ali’s recommendation?
Sam is a student who often hangs out with the teasers. Casey asks Sam, “Sam, what do you
recommend?”
a. What do you think Sam would recommend to Casey?
b. Why do you think Sam would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Sam’s recommendation?
Scenario #2, Cheating: Math Exam
Rene is a student who struggles with math. He is studying for an exam in math tomorrow
afternoon. Rene is also the star of the soccer team at school. The principal has warned
students and their parents that students must not fail any class if they want to play in the
upcoming sports tournaments. Rene’s friend, Amari, is one of the best math students in the
class. The day before the exam, Rene asks Amari to let him copy the answers on the day of the
exam. Amari does not know what to do and is asking different students for advice.
First, Amari talks to Ezren. Ezren is a student who has struggled in math. Recently, Ezren has
studied hard and is doing much better on math tests. Amari asks Ezren, “What do you
recommend?”
a. What do you think Ezren would recommend to Amari?
b. Why do you think Ezren would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Ezren’s recommendation?
Then, Amari talks to Perry. Perry is a student on the soccer team who has trained hard all
semester for the big game. Amari asks Perry, “What do you recommend?”
a. What do you think Perry would recommend to Amari?
b. Why do you think Perry would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Perry’s recommendation?
Scenario #3, Civics: Graffiti (Go Team Go) on the Gymnasium Wall
The gym is a very important place in the school that students use often as part of daily events
and activities. One morning, Morgan saw Jordan and other students writing graffiti on the gym
Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 20 wall bragging about how great their basketball team was. The principal won’t let anybody use
the gym until the problem has been solved. He asks if anyone has information on the damage
done. Morgan doesn’t know what to do and is asking different people for advice.
First, Morgan asks Jun for some advice. Jun is on the team but did not take part in writing
graffiti on the walls of the gym. Morgan asks Jun, “What do you recommend?”
a. What do you think Jun would recommend to Morgan?
b. Why do you think Jun would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Jun’s recommendation?
Then, Morgan talks to Alex. Alex is a student who is working with other students to write a
discipline code for the school. Morgan asks Alex, “What do you recommend?”
a. What do you think Alex would recommend to Morgan?
b. Why do you think Alex would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Alex’s recommendation?
Scenario #4, Ostracism: The Journal
Lee is a student who often gets excluded from games on recess, because others think that Lee
doesn’t fit in the group. One day, Terry found a journal that Lee had written with lots of private
information. Terry and other students were reading it out loud, laughing, and talking about
how they were going to tell everybody about Lee’s secrets. Rene is a student who was recently
elected by other students as the classroom president, and works with other students and with
teachers to make the school a better place. Rene has been observing the situation and doesn’t
know what to do. Rene is looking for advice.
Carson is a student who is often teased by others. Rene asks Carson, “Carson, what do you
recommend?”
a. What do you think Carson would recommend to Rene?
b. Why do you think Carson would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Carson’s recommendation?
Andy is one of the students who laughed about Lee’s private journal. Rene asks Andy, “Andy,
what do you recommend?”
a. What do you think Andy would recommend to Rene?
b. Why do you think Andy would make that recommendation?
c. What might go wrong with Andy’s recommendation?
Promoting Perspective Taking Skills in the Classroom 21