Long before what we know as the maker movement became common in libraries and schools, educators were finding creative ways to empower young people with STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) through hands-on experiences. One of those educators was my grandfather, Joseph D. Hersey Sr. Though his background was in engineering and not education, I believe he found a hidden passion and a knack for teaching and inspiring young people in the years he spent volunteer teaching at a local middle school after retirement.
I had lived with my grandparents while I was in art school, and I often dropped by their house during my adult years in New England, but, other than playing with some of the gadgets that Grandpa had set up for kids, I never paid much attention to the amazing work he was doing. I knew the students loved him and had no doubt that what he was doing was important. Unfortunately, during my own school years, I had started to lose interest in science when I realized how much math it required--somewhere around the time I realized that numbers in higher math made a habit of co-mingling with letters. So, in protest to math that I struggled to understand and see interesting applications for, I stuck to letters alone and went the path of the arts and humanities.
It was only years later, living here in São José, that I discovered how creative expression and STEM are beautifully woven together by adding an A for arts to make STEAM. And STEAM is even more powerful when paired with the collaborative power of the maker movement, as it invites anyone to be a maker and learn new skills to explore passions and find new ways to express them.
Grandpa definitely would have approved of this, and I know he had already considered the powerful combination of art and STEM. Many years ago, he wrote a text book about math and science, which he had self-published. I remember visiting once when I was in high school, and he had me draw a bunch of penguins illustrating various science concepts. I didn't know what the drawings were for then, but I remember him giving me one drawing challenge after another. As I managed to transform each of his ideas into visual form, he showed his delight with the exaggerated goofiness that he was known for. Years later, after his death, I find myself flipping through his book Fizicks Is Phun But Math Is Phunnier, looking at my illustrations paired with dynamic lessons that seek to get young people excited about math and science, wishing I had taken the time to ask questions and learn more. I guess it's not too late to learn.
It was Grandpa who first introduced me to Rube Goldberg machines, and last semester I wrote them into an English language project for kids. While tinkering, I also discovered hands-on how chain reactions can build community and even lead into a writing lesson. Though he might not have liked the music in this stunning video, he would have loved how I used it to inspire young people to consider cause and effect while discovering my own fascination with physics.
Grandpa dabbled in art and wrote poetry, too, and he taught me how to write poems with meter. It was his influence that helped me develop an ear for rhythm and perfect rhymes. These technical considerations had a great influence on my own poetry, as I carefully crafted words to say what was on my heart. And yet, just as Grandpa's science classes were not stiff with theory, I never let my writing become rigid. As a teacher, Grandpa encouraged hands-on experiences, just as the maker movement encourages tinkering. In the same way, though writing is at times technical, it involves tinkering as I play with words and clauses like building blocks, until they become what I want. Through tinkering, I've discovered that writing not only pairs well with art, but also with circuits and coding. I wish Grandpa could see my blackout poem that I set up with circuits and programmed to play when touched.
Though it's sad that I can no longer exchange ideas with my grandfather or get advice for my current projects, I am honored to carry on some of his work in my own way, and I know his influence plays a role in what I do. I definitely inherited a lot of Grandpa's goofy personality, which, combined with my own creativity, makes me a better teacher, writer, and artist. And yet I also know that I am not limited to being an English teacher or an artist only. There are many things I am capable of, and the same is true for my students. We shouldn't let anyone decide that they are "not good at" a particular subject, but, instead, help struggling learners find ways of approaching a challenging subject differently so they can discover how this it intersects with other fields and interests.
Last year, in a training about CLIL (content and language integrated learning, preparing me and other teachers to teach high school courses in English as a foreign language), I learned that the brain makes more connections through a multidisciplinary approach. So why not teach math with drawings and things you can touch? Why not make grammar physical? Why not teach coding and writing together? Why not have phun with fizicks while learning to speak (and maybe to spell) a foreign language? Thanks to Grandpa's passion and sense of humor, I am equipped with unique tools that I am glad to share with others. Thanks to a growth mindset, which I am learning to develop in myself as well as in my students, I know that the possibilities are endless.
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