There have been many articles referring to the need to have students participate, collaborate, and distribute. We have spent hours talking and teaching but it really requires a full paradigm shift to really accomplish. Think in these terms – our students need to be equipped with the tools early on to create their own content, find resources for anything they need, and research what they want to know about. I say this with a note of caution as I make sure it is well understood. Our students lack experiential learning and the wherewithall to know how to connect outside of what they see and know allday. Their world revolves around the teacher in the classroom, peers and their homelife. They are only surrounded by those factors. As research tells us students will have at least 15 jobs in their lifetimes preparing them to seek out others worldwide is critical. They need the confidence and skill to network, change careers, find opportunities that might be out of their comfort area, and to prepare for those opportunities. We are quick to deny students cellphones, ipods, and other wireless devices. In our attempts to keep schools “secure” we are stripping our students of the tools they use on a daily basis and not giving our students the opportunites to grow with these new technologies. Read the Day in the Life of a Web 2.0 Student. I am suggesting we educate, educate, educate, embrace, and embellish. We don’t want to drive our decision making by fear and the unknown.
As I watched this great video I was reminded of what we do to our students as educators on a daily basis. (Do a search for Jaywalking with Jay Leno and there are quite a few videos) I laughed as I heard the crazy answers people gave but also realized the information they were being asked for was part of a textbook in MS or HS. Was it on some state assessment. Did I care when I learned it or did I have any connection to the material at all when it was learned so I would have a need to remember it. The first person was unable to make a connection between the leading questions by Jay between China and Panama. Was it really the information or not making connections.? Is Louis Armstrong the first thing to come to mind because of his fame, marketing, rhythm? Why did she remember that? The young man that made the comment about the “founding fathers of what” was a perfect example of thinking within his world and his immediate surroundings because that is where he is at. He is not a “global” thinker and why should he be. He is probably working long hours to make ends meet and none of any info beyond his daily grind is really going to benefit him. The young lady who actually finished the “4 score” with “who are in heaven was a result of constant drill in catholic masses where the words just roll off her tongue with no meaning just memorization. Think about the connection the young man made between the acorn and the squirrel. Was that incorrect? It was based on the question but he was definitely interpreting this in his own way. No comment on BYOB.
It has been time and will continue to be time to give what we want students to know and be able to do when they leave our system a hard look. It isn’t just looking anymore though it requires action. Learning should be meaningful and purposeful, students should develop and define their own content and the structure of education should pave the way to a challenged based environment full of a need to know. It is not an idea but a need.
In this months eschool news in an article called Teach 21st Century skills or the US will fail the author discusses what we need to think about as educators to better prepare our students for the world of work. Quotes like “It has become aparent that this isn’t a lack of employees being technically proficient, but a lack of employees who can adequately communicate and collaborate, innovate and think critically” or “All Americans need 21st century skills that will increase their marketability, employability and readiness for citizenship.” I hope you aren’t hearing this for the first time. And c’mon let’s look within ourselves and evaluate whether our classrooms reflect these principles. I don’t think so. As I continue to walk down hallways I am inundated with desks in rows, teachers teaching, and students just looking disinterested. Those that are interested are those that have a vision for themselves so they see why they need to learn. Those in poverty or perhaps in a situation that does not value your future this does not occur. What are we going to do about it? In the graduate course that I teach I asked teachers what is the role of technology. Even though I prompted them to no end the answers were still what their parents might have said. To improve learning or augment instruction or something like that. Nowhere was there a differentiated look at what it can do for our children. It isn’t just the skills we are developing but the customized support that only technology can provide, a way to break down walls, bring the community and everyone inside our buildings to create that global atmosphere to really educate. What would that mean?? Teachers would have to collaborate themselves with the community not just the person next door to make this happen. Isn’t this what this article is saying? How can we expect our teachers to provide this learning environment if they don’t embrace it themselves. I have become impatient with the rhetoric and hope people take a long hard look at what they are doing and providing as teaching is one of the largest responsibilities there is.
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