Consolidation
Over the past three years I have come to understand that changes to our educational system are not only needed, they have become a moral imperative. Within this Portfolio site I have highlighted the changes we must make, both major and minor, but we must also begin to understand that change itself must become a part of our system. On my Homepage I referred to the analogy of Rip Van Winkle and the lack of change within our classrooms over the past century. The call for educational reform and a change to how and what we teach is nothing new. John Dewey argued for educational reform with a focus on student-centered, experiential learning in his 1938 book, Experience and Education. We as human beings are creatures of habit, perhaps more so as educators, but we must break free of this mold and embrace change and risk taking within our professional practice. Futurists predict that today's youth will have many different jobs with many different companies over the course of their career and the only way that we as educators can prepare students for this professional mobility is to model adaptability and demonstrate how we can manage a change process.
Some of the major changes I have indicated as necessary are rewrites to our curriculum, the development of a clear and focussed Vision statement, nurturing and developing authentic leadership, and aligning our teaching to 21st Century skills. While these are large-scale changes that will take time and a populist movement to get started, there are simple things that teachers could begin today that would have a huge impact on moving the revolution forward. These actions could vastly improve our education system today. Prensky (2012) neatly summarizes these changes to include:
Some of the major changes I have indicated as necessary are rewrites to our curriculum, the development of a clear and focussed Vision statement, nurturing and developing authentic leadership, and aligning our teaching to 21st Century skills. While these are large-scale changes that will take time and a populist movement to get started, there are simple things that teachers could begin today that would have a huge impact on moving the revolution forward. These actions could vastly improve our education system today. Prensky (2012) neatly summarizes these changes to include:
- Less talking by teachers and more "Partnering"
- Connect concepts with real-world outcomes
- Embrace technology tools used by students
- Encourage student reflection and peer-to-peer collaboration on assignments
- Offer more choice within assignments and projects
- Use technology to post and share successes and student work
Future Learning
Through my learning I have come to understand that the way I began teaching was ineffective. My vision of good teaching was me lecturing the class on what they needed to know (often from a textbook) and then testing their absorption of the material through a prescribed test or presentation, usually in a individually written format. And the worst part was that I thought this was good teaching. Now, at the end of my Master of Education journey (but the beginning of a new one!), my teaching has undergone a remarkable transformation.
I now try to make real-world connections with the concepts I teach, offer as much choice as possible on projects and assignments, integrate technology as a foundation for our learning, and try to use a variety of assessment that involves conferencing and self-reflection by the student. Of all the concepts and ideas from my course work that I have put into practice, I found the most difficult step was the first one. Taking a risk and changing the way I taught, even slightly, was difficult because I felt as though I was giving up control of my class and was in danger of inciting chaos in my classroom. What I found was quite the opposite.
Once I began to focus on student interests and gave them choice over their learning, I found that the students became more focussed and independent. They worked together to solve technical problems and explain concepts, were genuinely interested in the concepts, and perhaps most importantly, they were very proud of the work they had accomplished and the technology tools they had mastered to produce their artefacts. I found my assessment much easier to manage because I was no longer taking home piles of marking. It became a more gradual activity where I could offer suggestions and feedback, formally and informally, throughout the process. The Master of Education program has changed not only how I teach, but the way I view education as a whole. We must change how and what we teach. It is time for a change. It is time for a revolution.
I now try to make real-world connections with the concepts I teach, offer as much choice as possible on projects and assignments, integrate technology as a foundation for our learning, and try to use a variety of assessment that involves conferencing and self-reflection by the student. Of all the concepts and ideas from my course work that I have put into practice, I found the most difficult step was the first one. Taking a risk and changing the way I taught, even slightly, was difficult because I felt as though I was giving up control of my class and was in danger of inciting chaos in my classroom. What I found was quite the opposite.
Once I began to focus on student interests and gave them choice over their learning, I found that the students became more focussed and independent. They worked together to solve technical problems and explain concepts, were genuinely interested in the concepts, and perhaps most importantly, they were very proud of the work they had accomplished and the technology tools they had mastered to produce their artefacts. I found my assessment much easier to manage because I was no longer taking home piles of marking. It became a more gradual activity where I could offer suggestions and feedback, formally and informally, throughout the process. The Master of Education program has changed not only how I teach, but the way I view education as a whole. We must change how and what we teach. It is time for a change. It is time for a revolution.
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Game designer and author Jane McGonigal, states in her video Gaming Can Make a Better World (2013), that students will have completed 10,080 hours of education from Grade 5 to Grade 12, assuming perfect attendance. At the same time, the average 21 year old in a country with a strong gaming culture will have completed 10,000 hours of video game play. This statistic demonstrates that students in many countries are already investing as much time in video games (not including Internet use, emails, texts, and social media) as they are at school. As it relates to Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers: The Story of Success (2008), 10,000 hours is significant because it demonstrates mastery learning. The faster a person can complete 10,000 hours in any given task the faster they can master it and are more likely to become successful using their skills. So our students are investing as much time in learning to master video
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games as they are learning to master core educational concepts like Math, Science and Language. A disturbing statistic, until you consider all the positive learning outcomes from playing video games online, such as games that fall under the category of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG). Video games are perfectly tailored to an individuals level of achievement (Zone of Proximal Development), gamers are working collaboratively online to solve problems, think critically, be creative, and persevere through obstacles (21st Century Skills). Feedback is immediate, failure is used as a learning opportunity, and successes are celebrated. Sound like the ideal classroom? As educators there is much we can learn from the structure of video game play and the opportunities for learning that are being explored without our guidance.
Technology is ubiquitous in our lives. Almost everything we do involves interacting with technology. Social media has opened the door to every corner of the globe and allowed people unprecedented access to each other regardless of geography. Our future is tied to the use of technology and those that speak the language of technology, particularly those who are able to code, will have an advantage. The video above from code.org encourages young people to learn to code and is part of a larger movement to include coding as a teachable subject in schools. Whether or not we can unequivocally prove through empirical research that technology use in the classroom improves student achievement seems extraneous to the fact that students are using technology regardless of whether or not we embrace it in the classroom. If we are to follow constructivist learning theory and engage students by relating their learning to the real world and connecting to their prior knowledge, then it seems apparent that technology use in the classroom is something we must accept. Perhaps the most compelling argument is that students today will need technology skills to succeed in the workforce.
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