Blog Post 2 - "Teaching" in the 21st Century

Mr. Dancealot
The Mr. Dancealot video was, in my opinion, created to prove the point that so many teachers are teaching from behind podiums and in a boring manner and it isn't appealing to students. The way Mr. Dancealot taught was by explaining dance moves to his students, but by never effectively teaching them these dance moves. In his mind, he was teaching them everything they would need to know to pass their final exam, but to the students, they were being forced to sit through lecture after lecture where they weren't learning anything. In the end, he told them to prepare for a final exam that would be open book and open notes...but failed to mention that they would need to show off their newly acquired dance moves. I am worried that when I go out into the field to teach, I will be faced with these types of issues. In our school system now, teachers are being told they need to do more interactive activities by means of technology and I agree, but I think we need to go back to our roots and teach the old fashioned, hands-on, personal way. Our students will appreciate the interaction so much more and they will retain the material easier if they have a fun memory or a specific example that sticks out in their mind.

Teaching in the 21st Century
In this video, Kevin Roberts discusses the ways that social media, the internet and the use of smart devices are transforming our children into beings that have no need for teaching from a human being. He talks about how soon enough teaching will be obsolete, the fact that students are able to get whatever they need whenever they need it in a very short amount of time, and that with these devices, the possibilities are limitless. I agree with the fact that teaching is slowly becoming a thing of the past because children are so developed intellectually at such a young age now, that they can access most things on their own. I have a 4 year-old nephew who has been able to unlock my brother's phone, find the games he likes, and make higher scores than all of the adults in our family, for about two years now. How on earth did he learn how to do all of that? And how does he remember it without flaws in the way he operates the device? I LOVE how prominent technology is in schools now, but I think in some cases, it has gone a little overboard. I am worried about being an educator in this environment because it gives me that worry in the back of my mind that my teaching may never be as flawless or effective as a computer would be. I really enjoyed the way this video was made, as well; the highlights of specific concepts was really helpful in getting Roberts' point across.

The Networked Student
The Networked Student was made to show that social networking can be a really easy and resourceful way for students to learn. Before this course, I was never asked to create a Twitter, or to have a YouTube account, or to download Picasa (used for photo editing), but I am pretty interested to see if these means of media will be used in the same ways discussed in the video. I never thought of listening to podcasts on an iPod or looking up blogs about interests for a course before now, but I can honestly say, I can see how those things would be helpful. This generation depends so much on social media for entertainment and knowledge that, if we are asked to learn without it, we almost have no clue what to do. I believe that learning by using the tools at your disposal on a daily basis is a really ingenius idea.

Harness Your Students Digital Smarts
Vicki Davis is a genius! I, personally, am not a huge fan of teaching strictly by means of technology, simply because I always do better with face-to-face interaction, BUT I loved this video! I thought it was incredible how she was able to give her students the opportunity to collaborate with other people around the world and how she used an avatar-based program to teach them something new on the internet. Her statement about brainstorming will stick with me forever, because she said that, basically, students have got to learn to think for themselves. That sounds silly when we're talking about them having anything they want at their fingertips, but she meant that they need to learn that they do always have the resources to know whatever they need to know. Google was created to help with everything and so many times, students (myself included) get lazy and don't care about learning, but they forget that all they have to do is pick up their smart phone or get on their iPad and they can learn something new in 5 minutes. This video was eye-opening for me because I have been getting pretty fed up with how much technology is taking over the education world, but this...this was awesome.

Flipping the Classroom
Flipping? What the flip is that? Flipping is when students are previously exposed to the information they are being taught in class. For example, if a student was going to learn about the Civil War in class on a Tuesday, a video would be assigned either the weekend before or the Monday night before class and the student would be expected to watch the video and remember the key elements of it. Flipping can be very effective and helpful in a classroom because it allows the teacher to be able to spend more time reviewing concepts to make sure the students KNOW the material, instead of spending half the class time teaching new concepts. I would love to do this in my classroom because it would make the environment so much more fun for my students, because we could play games and have fun discussions about what their video taught them. This concept would also be great for teaching students how useful the internet can be for learning things that will stick with them for a long time. If given the opportunity, I will most definitely be flipping in my classroom!