I went to high school in Central Canada in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. Wow, am I ever dating myself there! As I reflect back to that high school experience, with my knowledge of educational design today, I realize that I had some awesome educational experiences and some definitely not so great!
More and more I feel the key to great education is engagement. If educators help students to engage and become excited about they are intended to learn, everything flows so much easier. This may incorporate unique pedagogy or tools to help engagement, but this is supplemental. You can have the hottest technology, and the most fantastic teaching structures, but if you are not clear on how or able to get your students engaged, it really is all for naught.
Let me give you an example:
In high school, I learnt about electronics, or at least I tried to. Remember this was early 1980’s. Our teacher was a tiny Asian gentleman who always wore a three piece suit, and spoke, using language that most, if not all of us, simply could not understand. When he stood at the front of the class he would lecture to us concepts that would leave us baffled and confused. We quickly learned that our teacher was an electronic genius who was at the level of flying while we could not yet crawl effectively. Reflecting back, he was our electronic “Yoda” and we really were not evolved enough to understand his message. He would demonstrate concepts, at least we thought he did, as his demonstrations were put together with a skill that left us completely baffled.
Reading this you may think that this is a classic case study of what NOT to do to get students to engage and to learn, integrate and apply- WRONG!
This fellow would lecture for only about twenty percent of the class and then turn us loose. His enthusiasm for his subject was infectious and he opened up a whole new world of possibilities and magic. He allowed space for us to translate his message and teach each other – we had to. There always seemed to be one or two of us following him around the classroom interpreting what he was saying (at least trying) to the rest of the class. He somehow conveyed the reality that if we learned what he was peddling it would open up a world of magic, and mastery. He had a magical quality that drew us to him and had us ignore, and defend, his inability to communicate in simply English. Perhaps our “Yoda” was simply using a mysterious, advanced strategy to draw us in, engage us, and support us to build our own Community of Learning.
Any classes that I would be designing would have a primary focus on being engaging, utilizing my strengths and abilities to bring in tools, technological and otherwise. I would also have a strong attention to detail which in my opinion makes or breaks the strength of the interactions and learning.
As Horn and Staker mention in their book, Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools, nearly half of students drop out of school because they are bored (Horn & Staker, 2015). With advances in technology today we can do incredibly amazing things in the classroom, virtual and real. These advances can support highly engaged learning or simply provide one more way for students to “check out” and then possibly leave.
References
Horn, Michael B. & Staker, Heather (2015). Blended: using disruptive innovation to improve
schools. San Francisco Wiley.
More and more I feel the key to great education is engagement. If educators help students to engage and become excited about they are intended to learn, everything flows so much easier. This may incorporate unique pedagogy or tools to help engagement, but this is supplemental. You can have the hottest technology, and the most fantastic teaching structures, but if you are not clear on how or able to get your students engaged, it really is all for naught.
Let me give you an example:
In high school, I learnt about electronics, or at least I tried to. Remember this was early 1980’s. Our teacher was a tiny Asian gentleman who always wore a three piece suit, and spoke, using language that most, if not all of us, simply could not understand. When he stood at the front of the class he would lecture to us concepts that would leave us baffled and confused. We quickly learned that our teacher was an electronic genius who was at the level of flying while we could not yet crawl effectively. Reflecting back, he was our electronic “Yoda” and we really were not evolved enough to understand his message. He would demonstrate concepts, at least we thought he did, as his demonstrations were put together with a skill that left us completely baffled.
Reading this you may think that this is a classic case study of what NOT to do to get students to engage and to learn, integrate and apply- WRONG!
This fellow would lecture for only about twenty percent of the class and then turn us loose. His enthusiasm for his subject was infectious and he opened up a whole new world of possibilities and magic. He allowed space for us to translate his message and teach each other – we had to. There always seemed to be one or two of us following him around the classroom interpreting what he was saying (at least trying) to the rest of the class. He somehow conveyed the reality that if we learned what he was peddling it would open up a world of magic, and mastery. He had a magical quality that drew us to him and had us ignore, and defend, his inability to communicate in simply English. Perhaps our “Yoda” was simply using a mysterious, advanced strategy to draw us in, engage us, and support us to build our own Community of Learning.
Any classes that I would be designing would have a primary focus on being engaging, utilizing my strengths and abilities to bring in tools, technological and otherwise. I would also have a strong attention to detail which in my opinion makes or breaks the strength of the interactions and learning.
As Horn and Staker mention in their book, Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools, nearly half of students drop out of school because they are bored (Horn & Staker, 2015). With advances in technology today we can do incredibly amazing things in the classroom, virtual and real. These advances can support highly engaged learning or simply provide one more way for students to “check out” and then possibly leave.
References
Horn, Michael B. & Staker, Heather (2015). Blended: using disruptive innovation to improve
schools. San Francisco Wiley.