There was such a response to Gary Stager that I thought I would post something a little lighter but to the point. As we discuss our faculty and students it is critical to keep in mind the questions about the “getting there.” We still talk about collaboration and empowering students but we still call their work “assignments”. Gary calls them learning adventures. It sets the stage for a learning community within our schools.
In many of the articles in this blog I discuss the ability for students to create their own content, be active participants in learning, drive what they need to know. This is a life long skill that should be instilled everywhere so our students leave our schools with actual skills to learn not just rote memorization. If we give them too much they won’t know what to do when we aren’t there.
Have you seen the amount of organized sports our kids are in. They aren’t even given the freedom to make their own decisions.
We need to let go and we aren’t! What are we afraid of????
I am constantly struggling with what I actually do in education and what we can all do. I sometimes feel very isolated in feelings of worth and contribution when it comes to the very expensive resource of technology. As you listen to Gary listen carefully to hear his message. It is not about technology, it is about everything we are to our children.
Have we made much progress? Why do we constantly hear quotes and keynotes from educators that quote those that are from the early part of the century or even the 1970’s to tell us we are stifling our students imagination and not providing them with the spaces and opportunities to reach their full potential. Do we think we “have it” when a new gadget or piece of technology arrives that might change it all. Is it the same as another sweeping initiative, like open classrooms, that will get us there? I think we need to think deeply about our practices and leave the tools aside. We have to believe.
On Saturday I spent the day with my nephews and my own “older” kids in Boston for Halloween. During the day we carved pumpkins and at night passed out candy while the kids did their trick or treat thing. We sat on the porch with a couple of beers but of course had to spend a little time hiding in leaves to scare the kids when they came up to the house. I helped my 7 year old nephew carve his pumpkin. He, of course, had a sharp knife. I was so excited about the whole process and how well they were doing I had to take pictures and immediately upload them to flickr, facebook, and of course text them to my son in law who could not come. Well I had just updated my Blackberry so the applications were not installed. So I had to install them so I could get those pictures up asap. I didn’t stop there – I had to have video. I couldn’t wait – the moment was right and it needed to be then. My daughter (26 years old) kept reminding me “Mom, Daniel is going to cut off his finger. You need to stop.” But I just kept saying one more minute.
So what made me think that it had to be immediate? I wanted to share the moment. I got distracted from the real intent of that day and got caught up in “I have to let my network know.” Interesting but a little scarey at the same time. As I write about multi-tasking (driving while texting!) and what we need to do for our kids, I realize as we become a part of this big paradigm shift of life that we also at the mercy of being overwhelmed.
Well I got the pictures up there and had a lot of responses. I couldn’t do the video and by the time I got to my computer at home I lost interest!
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