Quotation-"In a sense, Doug had indeed taught the students nothing. They, however, had taught him a great deal about what the new culture of learning might look like and how powerful it can be when students see each other as resources and figure out how to learn form each other" (Thomas & Brown 25). This quotation speaks to me because it helps me to understand the EDSS520 course a little better and help give words to what I would like my students classroom experience to become.
Question- What can I do to create a culture that in my classroom?
Connection- I spent some time recently with the people over at #Collabed who struck me as a group of people who are living by the principles shown in this chapter. They are creating learning communities with each other in order to share their learning and by inspired by others. If you haven't looked at my Storify of the twitterchat with these amazing educators, please take the time.
Epiphany- I think that my big epiphany occurred as I read all of the different stories in this chapter and with each one I found a part of myself resonating with the experiences that were shared. This is what I want to help my students learn to create. This is what I want to create for myself!
Quotation- "Education has been seen as a process of transferring information from a higher authority (the teacher) down to the student" (Thomas & Brown 34). I think that this quote from the text speaks very well to the huge paradigm shifts in education that are starting to take place. Speaking for myself, I would love to be able to transfer all of the hard-earned lessons that I have learned from years of learning into the heads of my students over the course of our 185 days together. Except it won't work. It probably doesn't even need to. Much of the information that I have earned through these years of learning can be accessed faster and more reliably using technology than they ever could be accessed through our biological circuits.
Question- How do I create a new 21st century culture in my classroom if the school or department remains tied to the norms of the old one?
Connection- I kept thinking back as I read this chapter to the ideas that came up in some of the videos that I blogged about a few weeks ago having to do with questions and knowledge. We need to start putting more effort into training students about asking the right questions more than knowing the right answers.
Epiphany- As I read this chapter I kept thinking about what my role as an educator really should be. I need to give students access to the material, even guide students so that they are interacting with some of the right stuff at the right times to guide their learning. But the process of learning is a deeply personal one that I can't meddle in too much without killing it.
Chapter Three - Embracing Change Quotation- "Embracing change and seeing information as a resource can help us stop thinking of learning as an isolated process of information absorption and start thinking of it as a cultural and social process of engaging with the world around us" (Thomas & Brown 47). This passage from the chapter spoke to me because it shows to me the shifts that we need to experience as we move towards embracing the cultural shifts encouraged by this text. I am really enjoying the text and I find myself nodding along with many of the authors' points. Question- Do I just like these ideas or am I willing to do what it takes to become part of this change? Epiphany- It is amazing to me to think about the new set of tools that students need to develop now to draw information out of the overwhelming excess that is available today. Some of the tools they need I'm not even sure that I possess. | Connection- The concepts of embracing the changes around us recalls a lot of the ideas shared in the "Anthropological Introduction to YouTube" (the video above). One of the most amazing parts of Michael Wesch's video is not the information that he shares but how he, and his students, are living the changes that he describes. I have been learning throughout the past year, at least partly through osmosis, about how differently knowledge is maintained and shared in our generation compared to the past. |