The Avant Gardist

March 29, 2010

---Lindsey Chang

7th grade Team, 7th grade English

Interdisciplinary Learning at MBTA

In an effort to prepare our seventh graders for the 21^st century, we created a course with 21^st century learning skills in mind. We produced an interdisciplinary course between language arts and social studies which allowed the students to achieve a deep understanding of the subjects as well as work on essential learning skills. In the first term, Hawaiian Literature was fully integrated with Modern Hawaiian History, and in the second term, Pacific Island literature was taught in conjunction with Pacific Island Studies.

Interdisciplinary learning is thought to address one of the recurring problems in education, which is fragmentation and isolated skill instruction. In the real world people must use knowledge from all disciplines to solve problems and come up with creative solutions. With this in mind, we created a course which allowed students to progressively build on their knowledge throughout the term, and incorporate ideas they learned from the social studies class into English and vice versa. We encouraged the students make connections between related ideas, and analyze how parts of the whole interact and affect each other. For example, in Hawaiian History, students learned important dates and facts about the arrival of the missionaries to Hawaii. They attained a good understanding of the numbers of missionaries, where they came from, where they settled, and how they gained political and economic power. In English class, the students were able to read deeply personal primary documents written by missionaries themselves. This gave the students an opportunity to really get into daily living for the missionaries and understand their thoughts and intentions intimately. In this way students were able to process the events which occurred in Hawaii on a deeper level and understand how events, personalities, politics, and economic interests created the Hawaii we know today.

Based on the feedback we received from the students, the interdisciplinary approach to learning was an overwhelmingly positive experience for the students. The sum of this integrated class truly was greater than its parts, and the students proved this. At the end of just 10 short weeks the students had proven to be well versed on Hawaiian History and Literature and well on their way to mastering 21^st century skills.

The Avant Gardist

March 22, 2010


Sharon Abrigo - Curriculum Director
Myron B. Thompson Academy



Thompson Academy is making a concerted effort to stretch student thinking beyond the simple recall of facts. While there are important dates in history, verb conjugations and math formulas that should be etched in the minds of all students, simply being able to recite these doesn’t necessarily indicate an ability to think. For example, naming all 50 states with their capitals is quite a feat of memorization, and while important, it basically represents a recall task. Being able to explain how the Southern states differ from those on the Eastern seaboard politically, economically and socially requires a person to process information. Devising a plan to attract tourists to a particular state or region requires a person to recall the facts, process them and finally create something new with the information.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. wrote the following poem in the mid-1800s.
The Three Story Intellect
There are one-story intellects, two-story intellects, and three-story intellects with skylights.
All fact collectors who have no aim beyond their facts are one-story men.
Two-story men compare, reason, generalize, using the labor of fact collectors as their own.
Three-story men idealize, imagine, predict–their best illumination comes from above the skylight.
This poem served as the inspiration for the simple design of a house with 3 floors, created by educator/author Robin Fogarty in 1997. Each floor represents a different level of thinking. Teachers are expected to move students up and down all floors during the course of a lesson or unit. Thompson Academy uses this model along with Bloom’s Taxonomy, which breaks thinking into 6 levels, as they plan instruction and assessment. The idea is that students should not stay on the first floor (Bloom’s recall level). They also need opportunities to process, analyze and apply.
While there are still quizzes and exams, which require the recall of facts, there are also written and oral assignments that require students to show an understanding of the facts. Additionally, there are projects that ask students to create products and original work.


Encourage your children to explain how they arrived at an answer to a question. This gives great insight into their thinking. See if you can determine which level of the house some of their assignments target.