Comprehensive Reflection
Ideas Shine Through
I now can put names to many things that just used to make sense to me as an educator. Several ideas I have studied in the COMET Masters program stand out as the reasons I love my job of integrating technology in student work. I did not always know the official names for such theories and concepts, but I recognized them when the textbooks and professors mentioned them. What are these "aha!" ideas for me?
Learner Motivation
Keller's ARCS Model (Attention, Relevance, Confidence, Satisfaction) of motivation helped me get a better grasp of what I knew made the classes I teach enjoyable for both me and my students. Fortunately for us, a computer lab setting is attention-getting enough as it is. I also employ many strategies for getting and keeping attention -- and these methods vary for the eight different grade levels I teach. I frequently remind my students that the skills and concepts they're mastering with me have great relevance to their lives, in the present, the near future, and the distant future. Each student works at his or her own computer, and can ask others nearby for help. This means that varying levels of confidence can be addressed with each student immediately. And each student gets the time and practice necessary to build more confidence with my subject matter. Finally, printing out a project or presenting it to the class -- or even seeing the finished product posted online -- delivers a strong sense of satisfaction for my learners. Most of these elements exist in all the projects and activities I do with my students, but the ARCS model serves as a quick reminder to revisit these criteria frequently. Everything else that really stood out to me in this program all relates in some way to learner motivation.
Cognitive Load Theory
The quickest way to de-motivate students is to overwhelm them. I know this is true for me as an adult, so it's likely also true for the children I teach. I knew my students (and I) could only process so much information at once. Reading about Cognitive Load Theory gave me research to back up my assertions about what we were doing right and wrong in classes at my school. For my younger students, we proceed in stages through a project. I know they can only handle so much at one time, and I have to carefully craft my delivery so as not to be overwhelming. With my older students, there are a lot of materials (available to them in PDF format) covering directions, tutorials, and samples. Instead of pulling these all together in one giant document the students are forced to wade through, I break them down into pieces so that students can often go get just what they need for a specific task. I'm not saying I get it right every time, but just having an awareness of Cognitive Load Theory makes me more confident in telling my students, "Just wait, we're not quite there yet." Sometimes it sounds more like, "Whoa! Slow down there; you're not really ready for that yet." I am now able to foresee when students can overwhelm themselves by diving in to more than they can handle.
Design Principles
One thing that overwhelms students, which interferes with their motivation, is to encounter materials that are inconsistent, confusing, or just plain hard to look at. By the same token, my students need to create products that don't overwhelm or "turn off" their intended audiences. When I start my students on PowerPoint projects, I put them through a sample "Dos and Don'ts" presentation in which I show and tell them what produces the famous "Death by PowerPoint" for audiences. Being able to refer to CARP (or CRAP) -- which reminds us to pay attention to contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity -- in their slideshows and other visual materials has helped me keep them on track. This has also helped me when I design instructional materials. The end user or audience should not be left wondering how to get through the content. Excellent design may go unnoticed for the simple fact that it is seamless. If a user has to figure out how to proceed because this stage is not like the previous one (or a similar situation arises), then the design is flawed. I have even been able to help my youngest students grasp the idea that contrast is important. If something is impossible to read because the colors are too similar to each other to distinguish what the text says, then alignment, repetition, and proximity become non-issues because the work is unreadable.
Clear Goals and Objectives
We've all heard the familiar refrains, "Is this going to be on the test?" and "Why do we have to learn this anyway?" Students feel motivated by seeing the bigger picture to which a learning experience belongs. What standards are we trying to address? What are our specific objectives? Do these objectives help us meet our goals for the students and for ourselves? I was amazed at how often the answer, after some digging and searching, could turn into "no, actually, they don't." When we want students to learn how to find the area and perimeter of an irregular shape, for example, do we have them keep doing problems over and over -- perhaps incorrectly -- because the book provides worksheet after worksheet? Can we combine these math objectives with some technology objectives and have students work effectively through just ONE problem, using a PowerPoint to explain the entire procedure? We achieved many goals, and there was enough evaluation throughout the project to make sure each student was learning the math concepts correctly, instead of practicing them incorrectly in the form of "busy work." Figuring out what we want students to be able to do, and to what degree of accuracy, can really transform the way we approach teaching them. And it can open doors to letting them teach each other.
My Loves
What I love is the earth. I love looking at maps and globes, traveling, and taking pictures. I love seeing how my family's little segment of human history meshes with the greater story of humanity. I love getting outdoors and finding little boxes hidden in the woods or along a trail. I have hobbies and interests, and I love to share them with my son, with my friends, and with my students.
But what does this have to do with educational technology? The things in our studies that most appealed to me dealt with learner motivation, cognitive load theory, design principles, and goals and objectives. I am a person who thinks and expresses herself in analogies. I use comparisons and imagery and imagination to convey a point. When I explain to my students why we don't just use ANY picture on the web in our work (but rather look for Creative Commons shared work), I tell them a story in which they have to imagine themselves as grown-ups who work in the creative arts to make a living. I can't just make a connection from one thing to another without telling a story.
So here's my story.
As a teacher, I can't separate who I am and what I love from the work I do with students. I love maps and globes, so I've developed Google Earth projects where students work in teams using wikis to collaboratively plan, research, and create placemarks of historic or scientific information. I'm really into genealogy, so I have my second grade students create family trees in a word processing program. I am an avid geocacher, so I secured grant funding to buy GPS units and I take my technology students outdoors on little treasure hunts related to literature they're reading or history or science they've studied. I want to become a better photographer, so I created a digital photography curriculum, borrowing from friends' materials, and I combined it with my love of making movies so that now my students have to make their own movies of their photography.
And you know what I've learned? I have discovered that if I am excited and enthusiastic, my students will enjoy the learning more. They get to be more hands-on. They're motivated. They're creating new things and conducting research and helping each other find solutions. They're learning how to design something for an audience, and they never ask me "why do we have to learn this stuff, anyway?"
I feel as though, by opening my students' eyes to the things I love, and by sharing my eagerness to explore and know and protect the earth, I am nurturing in them a desire to discover what they love. They don't have to love the same things I love, but they all love something. If I can model for them how I include what I love in everything I do, they may never have to struggle with motivation. At least not with the projects they do for me. And when they feel that sense of "buy-in" with their work in my class, that satisfaction can't help but spill over into the rest of their academics.
Learner Motivation
Do I have their attention? It's the earth! They live here. What's not to love about it?
Is this relevant to their lives? Only if they breathe air and drink water.
Can they feel confident? Everyone has at least some comfort level with our home planet. Everyone brings something to the table, and the broad range of experiences only serves to make the entire learning opportunity that much richer.
Will they derive satisfaction? When they know that they truly put the effort in and solved a problem or created something brilliant, they may just decide that hard work is the only way to achieve true satisfaction.
Cognitive Load Theory
But might they become overwhelmed? Sure, with the sheer beauty and wonder of it all. But according to research conducted by Richard Louv for his book Last Child in the Woods, exposure to the outdoors helps alleviate stress and attention deficit and actually makes us clearer thinkers. Maybe instead of being snowballed by how giant and amazing and huge the world is, they will instead achieve a feeling of peace at knowing their place in it all.
Design Principles
My personal belief is that there is evidence of deliberate design all around us. I also believe that if they spend enough time gazing upon natural beauty, my students can't help but pick up a few pointers and turn that influence loose on their own creations. Witnessing the beauty, order, and balance of our world has to have a positive effect on even the shortest PowerPoint. I just have to believe that.
Goals and Objectives
My overarching goal, for all eight grade levels that I teach, is that my students will go from our school into the world as not just productive members of society, but as responsible citizens of Planet Earth. Do my objectives strive toward that goal? I like to think so. Whether they're citing a source of information or charting the course of Lewis and Clark, they're catching a glimpse of how they can respect someone's work in the present and someone's accomplishments in the past. Whether they're filling in the boxes of their own family tree or trying to find a camouflaged box in the boughs of a redwood tree, they're connecting to their families, the friends on their teams, and the place everyone holds in our human story.
Change
As I look ahead to the future, I can't help but see it from the perspective of both a parent and a teacher. My son is six as I write this, and he is approaching the end of kindergarten. Most of what is exciting and fantastic about learning today wasn't even invented yet when I was in kindergarten. And who am I kidding? The best, most amazing stuff that my son will use as a student over the next decade and a half hasn't yet been dreamed up. Theirs is the generation of the gadget.
With all the change that has already begun to take place, we must be most concerned with attention, or its polar opposite: distraction. I have heard it said several times recently that kids today have to "unplug" to go to school and suffer through that all day and then come home, plug back in, and really start learning. They are teaching themselves what we, in traditional schools, don't teach them: what interests them. And they are using all the tools we ban from most schools: cell phones, smart phones, YouTube, Facebook, and many more that I probably don't know about.
If, when we focus on learner motivation, we concern ourselves with attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction, we MUST recognize that we could be on the brink of a revolution in America's schools. Even among my best students -- the most motivated, hard-working, diligent learners -- I constantly sense shades of their dissatisfaction in comments made on Facebook. How do we get their attention? How do we make our content relevant? How can we instill confidence when so many teachers have to ask their students to help them figure out the computer in the classroom? How can our students feel satisfied when their entire educational life is distilled down to a few test scores? And how can we ignore all these tools, most of which can be found in every student's pocket or backpack as they sit in our classrooms? What needs to change here is that we need to include students as the most important stakeholders and decision makers in their own futures. Do we let them decide what they learn? Not necessarily. They won't be rewriting the curriculum standards. But maybe we could ask them to tell us what they think would better motivate them to learn the content we're pushing.
It's funny how students can be overwhelmed in a quiet classroom, yet totally in the flow in a noisy bedroom with text, chat, music, and Facebook all vying for their attention while they do homework. I don't believe these are the most ideal circumstances for learning, by any means, but I have to confess that many students do just fine with all the distractions that would defeat me in a minute. As we consider cognitive load theory, it might be helpful to conduct studies on young people and multitasking. I, for one, eagerly await the results of such research. What really worries me is the sheer volume of information available today. I bet that more new data was created in the world while I drafted this reflection than during my entire senior year of high school.
Along those lines, despite how much more stimulating our electronic lives have become, I think that design principles are one thing that should NOT change. As they say, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." With all the extraneous information and stimuli, it's more important than ever that we stick to the basics of what works in presenting information. Whether we're writing or publishing, on paper or on screens, we need to keep to these concepts of contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity when we pull all our content together to present to our audiences. I don't believe that will change, no matter how much the media or the methods do.
As for aligning goals with objectives, I believe we need a complete system overhaul here. Our current system of schooling developed when we were, for the most part, a society based on agriculture. Summer vacation start and end dates vary across the country by what used to grow in a region and how much help would be needed on the farms. Now, our great unifier, that thing which affects our school year calendars the most, is the standardized test. We need more time to prepare for it and more time to figure out who passed and, therefore, can graduate on time. I am no advocate of doing away with summer vacations, but I believe that we need to reconsider why we do what we do in schools. We also need to re-evaluate how we measure learning. And what about people who simply don't test well? Instead of finding out each person's strengths and preparing him or her for a productive role within our society, we currently classify people into those who "do school" well and those who don't. This part IS "broke," and we do need to fix it. The goals of education need to change. Once we know what our goals are, we can write new objectives to help our students meet them.
But these perspectives on change do not address my loves. When I was a kid, we worried about nuclear war. We knew that if one side pushed the button, we'd all be dead really fast, and it would not be pretty. Eventually, we learned to get past that horrific fear and move on with our lives. Today's kids have been desensitized, in much the same way, to the plight of our environment. They've heard so much about global climate change and how scary the future can be if we don't clean up after ourselves, I fear they have just begun to ignore the message. It doesn't help that they can stay indoors, in climate-controlled homes, and play video games or text their friends, or spend countless hours on Facebook instead of coming into direct contact with the actual living world outside their windows. Who wants to think about taking care of the earth when it's always presented in a message of gloom and doom? If I can't save the entire world, why bother? I know that's how I felt as a kid wondering how I could get the leaders of the US and Russia to understand that I didn't want my life to end up like that movie "The Day After."
We can -- and should -- start smaller with today's youth. Let's just get them outdoors. Instead of having over-scheduled lives full of practice, lessons, and meetings, why not schedule in some structure-free outdoor time. Start with a park or creek clean-up and just leave an hour or two of hanging out afterward. Go for a hike with no set goal. Just see where the trail leads you. Hand a kid a camera, teach him or her how to take great pictures outdoors, and then talk about how the picture can never do the sunset justice. Give them a chance to see real value in the natural world.
If we can do these things, and then revisit the ideas I shared above, won't we be amazed at what students teach us about what they WANT to learn? They'll put down their gadgets, or use them as tools in their new explorations, or design new applications that assist them in achieving their new goals. And instead of "doing school" for the sake of finishing and being allowed to get on with their lives, our students might just redesign schools to meet their needs and prepare them to take over stewardship of our planet.
Recommended Reading:
Clark, R.C., Nguyen, F., & Sweller, J. (2006). Efficiency in learning: Evidence-based guidelines to manage cognitive load. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.
Dweck, C.S. (2008). Mindset: The new psychology of success. New York, NY: Ballantine Books.
Louv, R. (2006). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books.
Mager, R.F. (1997). Preparing instructional objectives. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
Medina, J. (2008). Brain rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school. Seattle, WA: Pear Press.
Robbins, A. (2007). The Overachievers: The secret lives of driven kids. New York, NY: Hyperion.
Williams, R. (2008). The Non-designer's design book. Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press.
I now can put names to many things that just used to make sense to me as an educator. Several ideas I have studied in the COMET Masters program stand out as the reasons I love my job of integrating technology in student work. I did not always know the official names for such theories and concepts, but I recognized them when the textbooks and professors mentioned them. What are these "aha!" ideas for me?
Learner Motivation
Keller's ARCS Model (Attention, Relevance, Confidence, Satisfaction) of motivation helped me get a better grasp of what I knew made the classes I teach enjoyable for both me and my students. Fortunately for us, a computer lab setting is attention-getting enough as it is. I also employ many strategies for getting and keeping attention -- and these methods vary for the eight different grade levels I teach. I frequently remind my students that the skills and concepts they're mastering with me have great relevance to their lives, in the present, the near future, and the distant future. Each student works at his or her own computer, and can ask others nearby for help. This means that varying levels of confidence can be addressed with each student immediately. And each student gets the time and practice necessary to build more confidence with my subject matter. Finally, printing out a project or presenting it to the class -- or even seeing the finished product posted online -- delivers a strong sense of satisfaction for my learners. Most of these elements exist in all the projects and activities I do with my students, but the ARCS model serves as a quick reminder to revisit these criteria frequently. Everything else that really stood out to me in this program all relates in some way to learner motivation.
Cognitive Load Theory
The quickest way to de-motivate students is to overwhelm them. I know this is true for me as an adult, so it's likely also true for the children I teach. I knew my students (and I) could only process so much information at once. Reading about Cognitive Load Theory gave me research to back up my assertions about what we were doing right and wrong in classes at my school. For my younger students, we proceed in stages through a project. I know they can only handle so much at one time, and I have to carefully craft my delivery so as not to be overwhelming. With my older students, there are a lot of materials (available to them in PDF format) covering directions, tutorials, and samples. Instead of pulling these all together in one giant document the students are forced to wade through, I break them down into pieces so that students can often go get just what they need for a specific task. I'm not saying I get it right every time, but just having an awareness of Cognitive Load Theory makes me more confident in telling my students, "Just wait, we're not quite there yet." Sometimes it sounds more like, "Whoa! Slow down there; you're not really ready for that yet." I am now able to foresee when students can overwhelm themselves by diving in to more than they can handle.
Design Principles
One thing that overwhelms students, which interferes with their motivation, is to encounter materials that are inconsistent, confusing, or just plain hard to look at. By the same token, my students need to create products that don't overwhelm or "turn off" their intended audiences. When I start my students on PowerPoint projects, I put them through a sample "Dos and Don'ts" presentation in which I show and tell them what produces the famous "Death by PowerPoint" for audiences. Being able to refer to CARP (or CRAP) -- which reminds us to pay attention to contrast, alignment, repetition, and proximity -- in their slideshows and other visual materials has helped me keep them on track. This has also helped me when I design instructional materials. The end user or audience should not be left wondering how to get through the content. Excellent design may go unnoticed for the simple fact that it is seamless. If a user has to figure out how to proceed because this stage is not like the previous one (or a similar situation arises), then the design is flawed. I have even been able to help my youngest students grasp the idea that contrast is important. If something is impossible to read because the colors are too similar to each other to distinguish what the text says, then alignment, repetition, and proximity become non-issues because the work is unreadable.
Clear Goals and Objectives
We've all heard the familiar refrains, "Is this going to be on the test?" and "Why do we have to learn this anyway?" Students feel motivated by seeing the bigger picture to which a learning experience belongs. What standards are we trying to address? What are our specific objectives? Do these objectives help us meet our goals for the students and for ourselves? I was amazed at how often the answer, after some digging and searching, could turn into "no, actually, they don't." When we want students to learn how to find the area and perimeter of an irregular shape, for example, do we have them keep doing problems over and over -- perhaps incorrectly -- because the book provides worksheet after worksheet? Can we combine these math objectives with some technology objectives and have students work effectively through just ONE problem, using a PowerPoint to explain the entire procedure? We achieved many goals, and there was enough evaluation throughout the project to make sure each student was learning the math concepts correctly, instead of practicing them incorrectly in the form of "busy work." Figuring out what we want students to be able to do, and to what degree of accuracy, can really transform the way we approach teaching them. And it can open doors to letting them teach each other.
My Loves
What I love is the earth. I love looking at maps and globes, traveling, and taking pictures. I love seeing how my family's little segment of human history meshes with the greater story of humanity. I love getting outdoors and finding little boxes hidden in the woods or along a trail. I have hobbies and interests, and I love to share them with my son, with my friends, and with my students.
But what does this have to do with educational technology? The things in our studies that most appealed to me dealt with learner motivation, cognitive load theory, design principles, and goals and objectives. I am a person who thinks and expresses herself in analogies. I use comparisons and imagery and imagination to convey a point. When I explain to my students why we don't just use ANY picture on the web in our work (but rather look for Creative Commons shared work), I tell them a story in which they have to imagine themselves as grown-ups who work in the creative arts to make a living. I can't just make a connection from one thing to another without telling a story.
So here's my story.
As a teacher, I can't separate who I am and what I love from the work I do with students. I love maps and globes, so I've developed Google Earth projects where students work in teams using wikis to collaboratively plan, research, and create placemarks of historic or scientific information. I'm really into genealogy, so I have my second grade students create family trees in a word processing program. I am an avid geocacher, so I secured grant funding to buy GPS units and I take my technology students outdoors on little treasure hunts related to literature they're reading or history or science they've studied. I want to become a better photographer, so I created a digital photography curriculum, borrowing from friends' materials, and I combined it with my love of making movies so that now my students have to make their own movies of their photography.
And you know what I've learned? I have discovered that if I am excited and enthusiastic, my students will enjoy the learning more. They get to be more hands-on. They're motivated. They're creating new things and conducting research and helping each other find solutions. They're learning how to design something for an audience, and they never ask me "why do we have to learn this stuff, anyway?"
I feel as though, by opening my students' eyes to the things I love, and by sharing my eagerness to explore and know and protect the earth, I am nurturing in them a desire to discover what they love. They don't have to love the same things I love, but they all love something. If I can model for them how I include what I love in everything I do, they may never have to struggle with motivation. At least not with the projects they do for me. And when they feel that sense of "buy-in" with their work in my class, that satisfaction can't help but spill over into the rest of their academics.
Learner Motivation
Do I have their attention? It's the earth! They live here. What's not to love about it?
Is this relevant to their lives? Only if they breathe air and drink water.
Can they feel confident? Everyone has at least some comfort level with our home planet. Everyone brings something to the table, and the broad range of experiences only serves to make the entire learning opportunity that much richer.
Will they derive satisfaction? When they know that they truly put the effort in and solved a problem or created something brilliant, they may just decide that hard work is the only way to achieve true satisfaction.
Cognitive Load Theory
But might they become overwhelmed? Sure, with the sheer beauty and wonder of it all. But according to research conducted by Richard Louv for his book Last Child in the Woods, exposure to the outdoors helps alleviate stress and attention deficit and actually makes us clearer thinkers. Maybe instead of being snowballed by how giant and amazing and huge the world is, they will instead achieve a feeling of peace at knowing their place in it all.
Design Principles
My personal belief is that there is evidence of deliberate design all around us. I also believe that if they spend enough time gazing upon natural beauty, my students can't help but pick up a few pointers and turn that influence loose on their own creations. Witnessing the beauty, order, and balance of our world has to have a positive effect on even the shortest PowerPoint. I just have to believe that.
Goals and Objectives
My overarching goal, for all eight grade levels that I teach, is that my students will go from our school into the world as not just productive members of society, but as responsible citizens of Planet Earth. Do my objectives strive toward that goal? I like to think so. Whether they're citing a source of information or charting the course of Lewis and Clark, they're catching a glimpse of how they can respect someone's work in the present and someone's accomplishments in the past. Whether they're filling in the boxes of their own family tree or trying to find a camouflaged box in the boughs of a redwood tree, they're connecting to their families, the friends on their teams, and the place everyone holds in our human story.
Change
As I look ahead to the future, I can't help but see it from the perspective of both a parent and a teacher. My son is six as I write this, and he is approaching the end of kindergarten. Most of what is exciting and fantastic about learning today wasn't even invented yet when I was in kindergarten. And who am I kidding? The best, most amazing stuff that my son will use as a student over the next decade and a half hasn't yet been dreamed up. Theirs is the generation of the gadget.
With all the change that has already begun to take place, we must be most concerned with attention, or its polar opposite: distraction. I have heard it said several times recently that kids today have to "unplug" to go to school and suffer through that all day and then come home, plug back in, and really start learning. They are teaching themselves what we, in traditional schools, don't teach them: what interests them. And they are using all the tools we ban from most schools: cell phones, smart phones, YouTube, Facebook, and many more that I probably don't know about.
If, when we focus on learner motivation, we concern ourselves with attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction, we MUST recognize that we could be on the brink of a revolution in America's schools. Even among my best students -- the most motivated, hard-working, diligent learners -- I constantly sense shades of their dissatisfaction in comments made on Facebook. How do we get their attention? How do we make our content relevant? How can we instill confidence when so many teachers have to ask their students to help them figure out the computer in the classroom? How can our students feel satisfied when their entire educational life is distilled down to a few test scores? And how can we ignore all these tools, most of which can be found in every student's pocket or backpack as they sit in our classrooms? What needs to change here is that we need to include students as the most important stakeholders and decision makers in their own futures. Do we let them decide what they learn? Not necessarily. They won't be rewriting the curriculum standards. But maybe we could ask them to tell us what they think would better motivate them to learn the content we're pushing.
It's funny how students can be overwhelmed in a quiet classroom, yet totally in the flow in a noisy bedroom with text, chat, music, and Facebook all vying for their attention while they do homework. I don't believe these are the most ideal circumstances for learning, by any means, but I have to confess that many students do just fine with all the distractions that would defeat me in a minute. As we consider cognitive load theory, it might be helpful to conduct studies on young people and multitasking. I, for one, eagerly await the results of such research. What really worries me is the sheer volume of information available today. I bet that more new data was created in the world while I drafted this reflection than during my entire senior year of high school.
Along those lines, despite how much more stimulating our electronic lives have become, I think that design principles are one thing that should NOT change. As they say, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." With all the extraneous information and stimuli, it's more important than ever that we stick to the basics of what works in presenting information. Whether we're writing or publishing, on paper or on screens, we need to keep to these concepts of contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity when we pull all our content together to present to our audiences. I don't believe that will change, no matter how much the media or the methods do.
As for aligning goals with objectives, I believe we need a complete system overhaul here. Our current system of schooling developed when we were, for the most part, a society based on agriculture. Summer vacation start and end dates vary across the country by what used to grow in a region and how much help would be needed on the farms. Now, our great unifier, that thing which affects our school year calendars the most, is the standardized test. We need more time to prepare for it and more time to figure out who passed and, therefore, can graduate on time. I am no advocate of doing away with summer vacations, but I believe that we need to reconsider why we do what we do in schools. We also need to re-evaluate how we measure learning. And what about people who simply don't test well? Instead of finding out each person's strengths and preparing him or her for a productive role within our society, we currently classify people into those who "do school" well and those who don't. This part IS "broke," and we do need to fix it. The goals of education need to change. Once we know what our goals are, we can write new objectives to help our students meet them.
But these perspectives on change do not address my loves. When I was a kid, we worried about nuclear war. We knew that if one side pushed the button, we'd all be dead really fast, and it would not be pretty. Eventually, we learned to get past that horrific fear and move on with our lives. Today's kids have been desensitized, in much the same way, to the plight of our environment. They've heard so much about global climate change and how scary the future can be if we don't clean up after ourselves, I fear they have just begun to ignore the message. It doesn't help that they can stay indoors, in climate-controlled homes, and play video games or text their friends, or spend countless hours on Facebook instead of coming into direct contact with the actual living world outside their windows. Who wants to think about taking care of the earth when it's always presented in a message of gloom and doom? If I can't save the entire world, why bother? I know that's how I felt as a kid wondering how I could get the leaders of the US and Russia to understand that I didn't want my life to end up like that movie "The Day After."
We can -- and should -- start smaller with today's youth. Let's just get them outdoors. Instead of having over-scheduled lives full of practice, lessons, and meetings, why not schedule in some structure-free outdoor time. Start with a park or creek clean-up and just leave an hour or two of hanging out afterward. Go for a hike with no set goal. Just see where the trail leads you. Hand a kid a camera, teach him or her how to take great pictures outdoors, and then talk about how the picture can never do the sunset justice. Give them a chance to see real value in the natural world.
If we can do these things, and then revisit the ideas I shared above, won't we be amazed at what students teach us about what they WANT to learn? They'll put down their gadgets, or use them as tools in their new explorations, or design new applications that assist them in achieving their new goals. And instead of "doing school" for the sake of finishing and being allowed to get on with their lives, our students might just redesign schools to meet their needs and prepare them to take over stewardship of our planet.
Recommended Reading:
Clark, R.C., Nguyen, F., & Sweller, J. (2006). Efficiency in learning: Evidence-based guidelines to manage cognitive load. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.
Dweck, C.S. (2008). Mindset: The new psychology of success. New York, NY: Ballantine Books.
Louv, R. (2006). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books.
Mager, R.F. (1997). Preparing instructional objectives. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
Medina, J. (2008). Brain rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school. Seattle, WA: Pear Press.
Robbins, A. (2007). The Overachievers: The secret lives of driven kids. New York, NY: Hyperion.
Williams, R. (2008). The Non-designer's design book. Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press.
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Copyright ©2010 Diane Main. All rights reserved.
Created for the Educational Technology Department San Diego State University |
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