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An Explanation of Shipka's History Day

Introduction
I am writing this narrative eigth years two months after this event occurred so my memory will be hazy in describing this event. As we discussed in Blackboard Post #5 "The Formation of a Narrative," I am NOT going to act as another historian and try to account for you all the things that went on that day in class or should I say outside of class because the "Shipka History Day" was yet another field trip. I am going to weave a narrative for you as a consumer on this website that brings you into and explains what you have seen or will see when you clicked on the "Bauhaus, Chewning, and Kibler" link, as these people were the designers of the "Shipka History Day."

Goals and Choices
If you have been reading through the "Shipka Spaces" I am sure you read enough of these to understand what this is. Here I am going to quickly explain my goals and choices in re-contextualizing the "Shipka History Day" this particular way.

Choice 1:
I could have written my explanation of "Shipka History Day," which I have not yet explained, but will, on the previous page. My opinion and choice as a designer is that would have "shitted up" the entire previous page for my 15 classmates/peers who remember "Shipka History Day" and only care to reminisce over that day should they ever find this website and this webpage. It was NOT my presentation/activity, but Ms. Bauhaus, Mr. Chewning, and Ms. Kibler's presentation/activity and my peers experience. As the narrator of "this" story, I want the focus to be on them and also myself and my peers so we may all savor what is probably a "lost history" that know one has seen again or remembers since we all parted our ways from the "Shipka spaces." Therefore, to my comrades, this is a tribute to all of them and I want the focus to be on them. I must say that when I received this .wmv file, I got very emotional and almost cried because I knew, that most of us will never meet again and being in the "Shipka Spaces" getting to know you all and the experiences we shared were very dear to me as you all were and are. enough said to my peers as I have described why I did NOT make this choice.

Choice 2: The Narrative
This section is to all the consumers of this website and this page who will read this and were NOT within the "Shipka Spaces" that day or any other day as a matter or fact, Jack! As I have said, I am not going to be 100% faithful in describing what went on that day. I can't be because memory fails with as time marches on. so here we go!

The day before the "Shipka History Day," we were given instructions to dress professionally. We weren't told why. We were NEVER told why on anything in these matters because it would ruin the social experiment. We just dutiful did as we were told, or at least most of us did, for a class participation grade and as we quickly figured out that we were being to cooperate with the designers requests because our day would also come and if we wanted the same cooperation on our presentation/actives or histories... well, if you have watched the "Prisoner" you will understand what can happen if one decides to be a "lone wolf and chooses not conform and participate with the Community," (Yes, in the "Shipka Spaces," we could be considered a "Community" as we were studying social aspects of communication and without cooperation we would have learned quickly how communication breaks down in a social community.) as we see in the episode, "Change of Mind." Number 6 is declared, reactionary, disharmonious, and un-mutual. Number 6 undergoes "Total Social Conversion Therapy," or so the community believes. Number 6 hypnotizes his therapist/psychiatrist (Number 42) and plants a seed in her mind so that Number 42 to comes forward with some falsified information about Number 2 on Number 6's prompt. Number 42 comes forward at Number 2's prompt in a public forum and declares Number 2 to be "Un-mutual," turning the entire community against Number 2, who proceed to run him out of The Village. My point is were were all groomed as Communication Specialists, Communication Designers, Communication Analysts, and most of all, Communications Methodologists.

On "Shipka History Day" we met at our regular class room (I think), were given "blue books" and instructed to record" when we met our destination. We then took a walk with Shipka to a classroom over in ACIV4 and were asked to crowd into a class that was already in session. The class was a Teaching Seminar class, both undergraduate and graduate students in the class who were being trained to shortly emerge into the workplace as aspiring K12 teachers. I think there were 15 students in the class.

The class was discussing the methodology of designing a lesson plan. Again I am vague on this but I think one of the students designed a plan for teaching money: what's a penny, what's a nickle, what's a dime, what's a quarter, and how each one is related to the other, and how to manipulate the denominations. She was going to give the children plastic coins and go through the age old routine of five pennies equals a nickle, ten pennies or two nickles equal a dime... bla, bla, bla and then the real treat! Let them handle the coins and demonstrate the counts. In the video you see a graphic of a crank turning a wheel. That was something that I drew in my "blue book" that was re-contextualized by the designers. As participants we all understand what that graphic meant. These aspiring teachers were going to be released into the wild being lead to think that this "teaching money" lesson plan was active learning. My fellow methodologists and designers would agree that "this" was passive learning.

To put active learning in practice, our plan would have been different. We would have taught them the equivalencies and values one day. The next day, we would have created a little store at the back of the room, complete with little trinkets for sale, given the kinds play money, had one kid play shopkeeper, and let the children go back the the shopkeeper to make a purchase or purchases. Also, we would have made items uneven numbers, had an accumulation of items that would never add up to as much as they had to spend, and also add the complexity of having things there that were priced higher than the amount of money they were given. Through this activity the kids would learn a lot more about money such as how to make change, you can't always have what you want, and what does it mean to have change in your pocket after a purchase, provided that you chose to spend the money. Afterward, the teacher would conduct a discussion with the kids about their purchases and the decisions they had made further enforcing the lessons of the activity. The kids would be learning by "doing it."

Passively watching this I could hear the thoughts in my peers heads as we were seeing right before our eyes what the hell is wrong with the entire educational system and what was wrong with our own K12 experiences. i always "lived" for science lab or auto lab or shop because there not only was I passively taught something, I was let loose to actually demonstrate what I learned by doing rather than repeating back information like a God Damn Parrot. Noting against parrots, because many of the species are intelligent enough to be taught the meaning of language for the use of communication when and only when the right mode of knowledge transference is used. Dr. Pepperburg uses the model/rival technique of instruction involving two trainers, one to give instructions, and one to model correct and incorrect responses and to act as the student's rival for the trainer's attention; the model and trainer also exchange roles so that the student sees that the process is fully interactive. The parrot, in the role of student, tries to reproduce the correct behavior. If you don't know what I am talking about google "Alex" and "Dr. Pepperburg"

We stayed, observed, and took notes for about 20 minutes, thanked the professors and the students for their time and went to our next destination. We were escorted to the Fine Art building where we took in an exhibit designed by the Visual Communications students. Here we ran amok moving from room to room as individuals making sense of these students' communications. For us as active learners and communication specialists this exhibit was a playground asking each other "what do YOU make of this? What does "this" mean? Oh Man, this is what I'm talking about!" After twenty minutes of taking it all in and writing notes (this was difficult because these communications were in dimly lit rooms because of the video production accompanied by sound. After twenty minutes our instructions were to return to the entrance. We were now led to a conference room in the University Center building. We sat down on the floor in chillin' mode. Brittany Bauhaus broke out her acoustic guitar and sang and played a composition she had created in commemoration of Shipka History Day. Little did we know that much was recorded to be re-contextualized into the .wmv file you observed. At the end our "blue books" were collected and later colorful comments were extracted and placed into the video montage.

As I said, this was not my history, I was a participant in this presentation/activity/field trip/history communication montage and also a consumer of it. I must say after reading all the stuff I captured from everyone in the "Shipka Spaces," I do miss you all, including Shipka, and I wish there was a way we could all meet again some other time and some other place to reminisce over our time spent, but sadly, I know "we will never pass this way again."

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