Thursday, October 1, 2015
Ch 2 Response
Kirk's experiences with schooling and his experiences outside of school were very responsive to him as an individual. His perspective on education -- that it's not so much the content as it is "knowing how to find those things you are interested in" stood out to me. It speaks to process as opposed to product. It also reminds me of a powerful comment made by Alan November at ISTE 2014. He was also talking about class culture when he explained the importance of the first 5 days of school. Focus on skills, passion, community - not the drudgery of procedures. He framed this with the role of the teacher. "It used to be a teacher's job to teach the information. Now the teacher's job is to teach how to find the information." This really stuck with me, and it speaks to the culture of innovation that we want to build for our students. While not all children will have the experience that Kirk had, as teachers, we can begin to reframe our classrooms to incorporate this type of philosophy or framework. I know I am repeating myself with this, but teachers do walk a fine line, balancing multiple constraints in the classroom. Teachers who are attempting PBL even more so. The contradictory philosophies of PBL and culture of innovation with the traditional educational institution (p.57) make for a tightrope, but one that only teachers, those on the ground, with the children, are capable of walking. While I have yet to begin implementation of my PBL, I am wondering -- what are the ways that I can begin to take small steps to build this culture of innovation in my classroom? To encourage exploration, creativity? Finding your own path and your own answers?
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Hi Elizabeth,
ReplyDeleteYou brought up some great points in your blog post connected to the balance we are working toward achieving as educators with creating a culture of inquiry and risk taking while also fostering a classroom community that provides support not just for skills but also for collaboration. The Alan November quote you referenced stood out to me, "It used to be a teacher's job to teach the information. Now it is the teacher's job to teach how to find the information." This type of empowerment and embracing of the new digital literacies that are available to us as teachers and as students promotes a new way of teaching where we are not asking for memorization or for mastery, we are asking for innovation and an application of reading, writing, and thinking because we know if a student knows how to find it, they can access information at the click of a button. I argue that if they know how to find it but they do not have any experiences using it for application in ways that create, synthesize, and produce new ways of thinking or doing what good is the access to the information? I want to encourage you to think about what you are doing in your classroom now, in little ways and in big ways to foster a culture of innovation. If you can provide some context of what your students are learning and reading and writing and thinking about in your current units of study we can provide some ways to help promote inquiry-based learning and engagement. Thanks, Dawn