full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Christopher Emdin: Teach teachers how to create magic

Unscramble the Blue Letters


Now polpee oftentimes say, "Well, magic is just magic." There are teachers who, despite all their challenges, who have those sklils, get into those schools and are able to engage an audience, and the administrator wkals by and says, "Wow, he's so good, I wish all my tcreahes could be that good." And when they try to describe what that is, they just say, "He has that magic."

But I'm here to tell you that magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Now, how do you teach it? You teach it by allowing people to go into those spaces where the magic is happening. If you want to be an aspiring teacher in urban education, you've got to leave the connfeis of that uvsrtieniy and go into the hood. You've got to go in there and hang out at the barbershop, you've got to attend that bclak church, and you've got to view those folks that have the power to egange and just take notes on what they do. At our teacher education classes at my university, I've started a project where every single student that comes in there sits and watches rap ccrotnes. They watch the way that the rappers move and talk with their hands. They study the way that he walks proudly across that stage. They listen to his metaphors and analogies, and they start learning these little things that if they practice enough becomes the key to magic. They learn that if you just stare at a student and raise your eyebrow about a quarter of an inch, you don't have to say a word because they know that that means that you want more. And if we could tsranfrom teacher education to focus on teaching teachers how to create that maigc then poof! we could make dead classes come alive, we could reignite imaginations, and we can change eudtcioan.

Open Cloze


Now ______ oftentimes say, "Well, magic is just magic." There are teachers who, despite all their challenges, who have those ______, get into those schools and are able to engage an audience, and the administrator _____ by and says, "Wow, he's so good, I wish all my ________ could be that good." And when they try to describe what that is, they just say, "He has that magic."

But I'm here to tell you that magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Now, how do you teach it? You teach it by allowing people to go into those spaces where the magic is happening. If you want to be an aspiring teacher in urban education, you've got to leave the ________ of that __________ and go into the hood. You've got to go in there and hang out at the barbershop, you've got to attend that _____ church, and you've got to view those folks that have the power to ______ and just take notes on what they do. At our teacher education classes at my university, I've started a project where every single student that comes in there sits and watches rap ________. They watch the way that the rappers move and talk with their hands. They study the way that he walks proudly across that stage. They listen to his metaphors and analogies, and they start learning these little things that if they practice enough becomes the key to magic. They learn that if you just stare at a student and raise your eyebrow about a quarter of an inch, you don't have to say a word because they know that that means that you want more. And if we could _________ teacher education to focus on teaching teachers how to create that _____ then poof! we could make dead classes come alive, we could reignite imaginations, and we can change _________.

Solution


  1. black
  2. confines
  3. people
  4. transform
  5. magic
  6. teachers
  7. engage
  8. skills
  9. university
  10. walks
  11. education
  12. concerts

Original Text


Now people oftentimes say, "Well, magic is just magic." There are teachers who, despite all their challenges, who have those skills, get into those schools and are able to engage an audience, and the administrator walks by and says, "Wow, he's so good, I wish all my teachers could be that good." And when they try to describe what that is, they just say, "He has that magic."

But I'm here to tell you that magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Magic can be taught. Now, how do you teach it? You teach it by allowing people to go into those spaces where the magic is happening. If you want to be an aspiring teacher in urban education, you've got to leave the confines of that university and go into the hood. You've got to go in there and hang out at the barbershop, you've got to attend that black church, and you've got to view those folks that have the power to engage and just take notes on what they do. At our teacher education classes at my university, I've started a project where every single student that comes in there sits and watches rap concerts. They watch the way that the rappers move and talk with their hands. They study the way that he walks proudly across that stage. They listen to his metaphors and analogies, and they start learning these little things that if they practice enough becomes the key to magic. They learn that if you just stare at a student and raise your eyebrow about a quarter of an inch, you don't have to say a word because they know that that means that you want more. And if we could transform teacher education to focus on teaching teachers how to create that magic then poof! we could make dead classes come alive, we could reignite imaginations, and we can change education.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
teacher education 4
aspiring teacher 3
mark twain 2
taught magic 2


Important Words


  1. administrator
  2. alive
  3. allowing
  4. analogies
  5. aspiring
  6. attend
  7. audience
  8. barbershop
  9. black
  10. challenges
  11. change
  12. church
  13. classes
  14. concerts
  15. confines
  16. create
  17. dead
  18. describe
  19. education
  20. engage
  21. eyebrow
  22. focus
  23. folks
  24. good
  25. hands
  26. hang
  27. happening
  28. hood
  29. imaginations
  30. inch
  31. key
  32. learn
  33. learning
  34. leave
  35. listen
  36. magic
  37. means
  38. metaphors
  39. move
  40. notes
  41. oftentimes
  42. people
  43. power
  44. practice
  45. project
  46. proudly
  47. quarter
  48. raise
  49. rap
  50. rappers
  51. reignite
  52. schools
  53. single
  54. sits
  55. skills
  56. spaces
  57. stage
  58. stare
  59. start
  60. started
  61. student
  62. study
  63. talk
  64. taught
  65. teach
  66. teacher
  67. teachers
  68. teaching
  69. transform
  70. university
  71. urban
  72. view
  73. walks
  74. watch
  75. watches
  76. word