I teach a course on educational technology at Colorado State University within the teacher licensure program. We are eight weeks into the semester and it has been a very interesting ride so far. I must admit that I entered the class somewhat naively, thinking that my students, being “digital aboriginals” would embrace technology, embrace a more collaborative approach to teaching, how wrong I was…
Here are some of my reflections so far…
Entering the class I believed that “digital aboriginals” were students that were creating their own connections and building knowledge, but what I find is that the majority of my students are “digital facebook users” connecting to friends for social engagement. When I created a Ning site for the class they were more than capable of building a profile but getting them to engage in a community (either in Ning or in class) to build knowledge collectively has been a challenge.
I have spent many hours reflecting on how pervasive our current education system is and how difficult it will be to change the course of that system. I love Sir Ken Robinson’s TED presentation; he talked about how our education system models the university, placing university professors, many that don’t work well with others, at the top. This model runs all the way through our education system, as teachers leave their university preparation programs and model “expert” behavior, they act as experts of their classrooms. And why not, for the last 16 years they have been rewarded by a system that is built on “experts” and their existence and sense of self is based on these rewards.
Obviously, the importance placed on standardized testing only fuels this system. Students are rewarded for obtaining the correct answer, and these are the students that end up in my class. For the majority, when I give them an assignment that requires a solution (with no correct answer) they become uncomfortable. In fact, many get mad. I know I am writing this dialog to colleagues but everyone knows that we can’t produce another student that only feels comfortable spitting out correct answers. The “correct answer” skills are outsourced or automated. The system must change.
I am having my students respond by producing “reaction videos" to Karl Fisch’s “Did you know.” I also had my students watch the video “A vision of students today” produced by Kansas State University students within the Digital Ethnography program.
Little or no reaction! What is going on? I think I know…
It is like pulling teeth to get them to feel, to get them to react! It is like they are void of feelings or original thought. And, many of them revert back to what they know and where they are comfortable… their content area “expertise.” Those that get most agitated, “push back” in class and have said things like, ‘I would never use video in my classroom’, and ‘most of us are experts in our content area’ (indicating that changing their model of classroom delivery is not something they are contemplating)… they say these things with distain… I have touched a nerve… I am upsetting their system… a system that has rewarded them for years.
Furthermore, many appear to be afraid to create anything that is original, afraid to share their original ideas.
Wow, I am getting a great education out of this class.
More to follow…
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5 comments:
We're facing many of the same issues. I think it's because we've trained them to be this way. For us, we're facing 9+ years of training - for you, you're facing 13+ years of training. It's going to take awhile before we can change their thinking
But it's vital that we do. And the more folks that are talking about this, the more we keep asking those essential questions, the more likely they will start to ask those same questions themselves.
I am a student in your class, and I have to say that I agree. For the past 10 years of schooling we have been trained in finding a "right" answer, seeming to pick some correct response out of a sea of them. It is only natural that as we progress into our college careers we continue to search for "correct" answers in a total fear of failing. We have to play the game of grade worrying and pleasing our professors. For my major I have to maintain a 2.75 GPA, for me to take that risk, to break out of that box and search for my own answers could put my future at risk. We as students can not take that sort of risk, if there is to be any change it has to come for the professors, from the administration, from the very establishment we wish to please with out "right" answers. As future teachers, hopefully we can begin this shift and get students looking for their answers, get them to search for their own way in life and not become text books of random information but thinkers and connectors of the future. As for the reactions, I think you have to remember that we deal with this stuff daily. We are the ones that purchase hundred dollar textbooks and never open them, we spend hours online, and basically put 26 hours into 24 hour days. You have to remember that this is not new to us. Our generation is on the cusp. Where students today have access to the Internet before they are born, I didn't have access until middle school. We are stuck between the way our parents went to school and the way we can now go to school. The Internet is a growing, expanding tool, that we have only come into contact with in the past ten years. A carpenter, a writer, take decades to become proficient with their tools, and yet we are asked to accept the world in the blink of an eye. The reactions are there, we see, we understand, but we deal with it daily and we don't know what to do with it. If I cant get my own life in order why should I worry about someone else. I have to cram 26 hours into 24, what do I care if someone else complains about it, I'm doing it. Even now I'm afraid I must play the good student and tell you that your thoughts are right on professor. Amazing insight, but I ask that you be patient with us and realize that we are trying to deal with the out-flux of textbooks and the influx of databases. The flood of information has forced us to fall back on what we know. We have been backed into a corner and forced to accept the Internet in all its glory and stupidity. It is only natural for us to become defensive and use our content knowledge to try to build a wall of protection. Should we jump into the Internet, should we break out of the mould the University has placed us in, then we may not have the future we want, we may fail in our success. Thanks for allowing me the opportunity to respond. Again, you are right on professor, we just need the time to process and accept the changes that we could not control.
Nick,
Thank you so much for your response... I agree with everything you said. We are all facing this major change and I for one agree with you that it is uncomfortable. We need to break out of our old ways and that is difficult. My goal is to move you off center... to force you to push your boundaries and to get you to respond. Thank you for your response and thank you for paying attention.
Dr. Folkestad
I'm thinking the best way to encourage the collaborative creation of knowledge is sub-consciously. Engage them in activities they don't know they are doing.
The prime example I'm thinking of is Image Labeler where the users play a game adding tags to images.
I think education should start acknowledging the game industry and take some pointers from them. Games like Spore are great examples where users are creatively generating unique objects and sharing them.
Education should be an act of exploration and discovery. As information technology becomes more ubiquitous it becomes utterly unnecessary to force people to memorize state capitals. Maybe if a game forced an entire class to manage a state of their own and compete with other students in non-zero-sum setting they would learn and discover concepts that textbooks and lectures are unable to convey.
Just a thought... girlfriend overheard you talking in Gifford and pointed me here.
I'm sorry I'm not a very elaborate speaker and can't write a half page responce to your post as elloquent as others have. I just wanted to let you know that I feel that your class is on the cusp of being very beneficial and important but you just didn't make it there. Talking with other students in the class we are for the most part very dissatisfied with our experience in your class. With your lack of feed back, being too busy to even really teach us, and then writing a blog practically insulting every one of us, you're making it very hard for any of us to want to try in your class. You play sound bites that are difficult to understand, so why does it surprise you when we don't get any information out of them. As for us lacking in emotion, I greatly disagree with this from the influx of emotion I saw this morning when we discussed how frustrated we were with your class. If you want your students to accept technology better you are going to have to help us along a little, not just throw it at us and tell us to teach ourselves. If that's how you want it, then why are we paying you to be in the classroom with us?
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