On Saturday I decided to work on ECI 832, but block 4 was not posted yet. It all worked out, because I took the opportunity to start my on-line professional development. One of my favorite things to is surf the web and stop wherever something catches my eye. I rarely get time to do this, as I am sure many of you can relate to. I ended up at the K-12 Online Conference 2009 site waiting for a video to load, and was led to a presentation by Michael Wesch titled, “A Portal to Media Literacy”, that he presented at the University of Manitoba in 2008. It is about an hour long, but it was well worth the time I spent. I am very familiar with Michael Wesch’s work and am a bit of a groupie of his. He said that his classes at Kansas State University are always full and can be hard to get in to, and I am not at all surprised.
One of the topics that I visit often in my thoughts and rants is our seeming, inability to embrace technology use and welcome it into our classrooms. I have stated before that I think most teachers have the desire to do so, but many do not feel like they have the time, support or expertise to do so. As Mr. Wesch described the typical classroom at the Kansas State University, that was set up to house 200+ students, all seated in rows with the professor feeding them lectures from the front, I couldn’t help but think about many of our public school classrooms today. Were they so different? Of course, thankfully, we do not have 200+ students in front of us at one time, but, often, they are seated in desks, placed in rows and we are delivering a message to them in our traditional fashion. We may use computers to word process and research an assigned topic and we may even use a projector and Smart Board in our classroom to help us deliver our intended message. Our students have learned to accept that we are the authority on many topics and it is their job to trust our authority and travel along to whatever destination we have pre-planned into their travel documents.
I have heard Mr. Wesch speak of moving our students from just having knowledge-memorizing, knowing and recalling – to the point where they are knowledge-able- which would include such things such as sorting, analyzing, sharing, discussing, critiquing and creating with knowledge.
I have also been involved in many conversations about today’s students… they want to be entertained, they play too many video games, they spend hours on face book and texting, they can’t concentrate, they are not motivated to learn, etc., etc., etc. All of these things are probably true, but they do not give us an excuse as educators to stay inside our classroom boxes and ignore our responsibility to help them find things that are real and relevant to them. Many students struggle to make any connections between their real lives and what they are learning in the classroom. Now, I know we were saying the same thing when we were in school…”when am I ever going to use this in the real world?” It is our job to help students find things that are real and relevant to them. We need to give them reasons to turn off their technologies and focus on their learning. Do you think that we may be afraid to let some of the technologies in, because we know that we can’t compete with them without changing what we are doing and how we are doing it?
Mr. Wesch has a post called,” The vision of students today (and what teachers must do)”, at the Encyclopedia Britannica Blog Site. He was prompted to make huge changes in his classroom delivery, after doing a project with his students that culminated in a short video that most of you are probably familiar with called, “A vision of students today”. He feels that texting, web-surfing and ipods are new versions of passing notes in class. Having them in the classroom will not prevent students from being distracted by them. “Welcome technologies not as distractions, but as powerful learning technologies.”
When I started my masters program, I had the idea, rightfully or not, that the course work would not be relevant to what I was doing on a daily basis. I thought that the reason I was taking my masters degree was to move me forward in my career and perhaps open up jobs in the future. I have been pleasantly shocked and surprised by the level of relevance of all the courses I have taken so far. It struck me, as I was listening to Mr. Wesch speak, that I have learned so much from my course work because it was relevant to my daily life, but most of all, because I was sent out to explore and discover things on my own. The questions and answers are not given to me- I need to ask my own questions and work at finding my own answers, so I am able to be in charge of my own learning, for the most part.
Isn’t that the difference between aquiring information and learning?
Mr. Wesch described three ways to create significance for our students:
1. Provide relevance and context for learning- provide the big picture.
2. Create a learning environment that values and leverages the learners themselves-give personal meaning.
3. Do both in a way that realizes/leverages existing media environment in the same way our students do.
“We don’t have to tear the walls down, we just need to stop pretending the walls separate us from the world.”
There are many teachers who already do a fantastic job of looking beyond the walls, for the rest of us-let’s take a chance on powering up, I think we might be pleasantly surprised by what we discover…
Great informative post. I’ve enjoyed watching and listening to Michael Wesch present his ideas in the past few years. I like how he challenges the status quo and also challenges our pre-conceived notions about today’s students. It’s so easy to complain about our students and the way they want to learn. Our students are not satisfied with us as information givers and want to be full participants in their learning if we would let them.
Good for you Michelle for finding meaning in these classes. I to feel refreshed by the ideas and discussions that are taking place.
I face a bit of resistance within my core sometimes because I am an advocate for using technology in the classroom and I voice my interests but the ideas fall flat on deaf ears by others who have taught math a certain way for how ever many years and don’t seem to hear the messages that one: technology can make learning more engaging for both students and teachers, two: we need to parallel our teachings with what goes on in the lives of our students to foster a life long learning attitude.
I realize that some teachers feel technologically inept and feel that too much time would have to be spent learning how to use the technology but what some don’t get is the creativity and flavour it adds to a lesson which can rejuvenate the teaching practice.
More and more beginner teachers are using technology in their daily doings and the next wave of young teachers will be entering the profession. With this I find refuge knowing that we can continue to match curriculum restraints with real life needs of our students by incorporating technology into our schools on a global level.
You are absolutely right. I taught in a high school for many years and sometimes change can be most difficult in that forum. Of course that is a general statement and not fair to all. I am now in a K-8 school and I am thrilled by the progress made by some of my fellow teachers. I have to remind myself that everything can’t happen at once and try to step back and celebrate the small successes.
It is so important to acknowledge and use the technology that our student use so easily. They are instantly engaged and and you are right about it adding so much to a lesson.
I think that some teachers are reluctant because they feel their students know more than they do. We have the opportunity to learn so much from each other because even though they are comfortable with the medium for the purposes that they use it for, they do not always see the other opportunities that might be available.
Thanks for the comment.
Michelle