studying the lorax with feedback loops - Creative Learning Exchange

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PROCEDURE1. READ THE STORYThe teacher should decide the bestmethod appropriate to his or herclass—read aloud, shared reading, etc.2. PREPARE THE CONNECTIONCIRCLEIf students have never used connectioncircles before, go over the rulesfor finding the elements of the story aslisted on the template at the end of thislesson plan. Each student can use acopy of the template or they can drawtheir own circles. We suggest workingin teams to encourage sharing of ideas.(For a full explanation, see The Shapeof Change, by Rob Quaden and AlanTicotsky, Creative Learning Exchange,2004, available on the CLE website.)3. CHOOSE THE ELEMENTSWithout too much prompting,students should identify the importantelements that change in the story.Encourage them to talk in teams whileeach student in the team creates his orher own connection circle. Possibleelements include truffula trees,thneeds, pollution, Once-ler’s greed,Once-ler’s profits, the Lorax’s anger,factory size, and other things thatchange quantitatively during the story.It may help to bundle the animals affected by the habitat degradation into oneelement rather than listing them individually. After students have worked inteams for a short time, lead a whole class session, allowing students to share theelements they have chosen. The teacher can build a composite circle on theoverhead or a chart pad. Each team may have a different interpretation, so thecircle produced by the whole class may have more elements than individual teamcircles. Building connection circles can help represent and clarify divergentthinking.Trees cutProfitsFactory sizeTruffulatreesThe Lorax’sangerOnce-ler’sgreedEnvironmentalqualityThneedsproducedAnimalpopulation“I believe we should givestudents a more effective wayof interpreting the worldaround them. They shouldgain a greater and wellfoundedconfidence formanaging their lives and thesituations they encounter.”Sample of elements around a connection circleDr. Jay Forrester,1994Page 2
4. Next, ask students to identify anelement around the circle that changesquantitatively in the story and causesanother element to change. Draw anarrow from the cause to the effect. Youmay label the direction of the changeby putting a + or – sign near the arrowhead. Use a + sign when the change isin the same direction and a – signwhen the change is in the oppositedirection.In the example below, the link from“Thneeds produced” to “Profits” is +because producing thneeds adds toprofits. The link from “Trees cut” to“Truffula trees” is – because cuttingtrees reduces the number of trees.TreescutProfitsFactorysize+Truffula Trees–The Lorax’sangerStudents may be confused at first when using + and – because thesigns do not always mean more and less. In the link between“thneeds produced” and “profits,” when production goes down,profits go down also. That’s still a positive (+) causal relationshipbecause the elements move in the same direction. When the elementsmove in opposite directions, the causal relationship is negative (–).A trickier example is births and population. Even when the number ofbirths decreases, “births” to “population” is a positive (+) causalrelationship, since any birth increases the population. Both elementsmove in the same direction.One or two examples should beenough to get students started. Havethem work in teams as each studentdraws his or her own connections.EnvironmentalqualityOnce-ler’sgreedSample of elements around a connection circle, with a few arrowsfrom cause to effectPage 3ThneedsproducedAnimalpopulation5. After students have had a short timeto work in teams, bring the classtogether to share some of the connections.The circles may look clutteredwith arrows at this point. (See PartialDiagram on next page.) Ask if studentscan trace a path so that they canstart at one element, travel along thearrows to at least one other element,and return to the starting point.6. Instruct students to trace over thepathways using highlighting pens orcolored pencils.7. Have them copy the pathways theyhave traced onto a separate page,drawing them as loops. Chooserepresentatives to draw these loops onthe board or on overhead transparenciesin order to share them with theclass. Name the loops for reference.Students should gain insight as theylook at loops and find leverage pointswithin the story.Elements around the circle witharrows in only one direction (comingin only or going out only) indicate thatstudents have not identified feedbackloops containing that element. Insome cases, the element is not centralto the story, or the informationavailable doesn’t tell us enough tomake another connection. Sometimesstudents need to add an element to thecircle to complete a loop.
Page 1: STUDYING THE LORAX WITH FEEDBACK LO
Page 5 and 6: ?Lorax’sangerLorax’sanger--Once
Page 7 and 8: The element “Thneed Production”
Page 9 and 10: Connection to Characteristics of Co

studying the lorax with feedback loops - Creative Learning Exchange

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