Schools Should Model Learning for Students

   The comment that I made was on the post entitled 10+ Ways to Promote a Learning Culture in Your School on the blog 2 Cents Worth by David Warlick.  I found this list of tips to be extremely useful and relatively easy to implement in the daily classroom routine with an optimum result.  They are little tips that give you a "big bang for your buck", which as busy teachers, support staff, and administrators is crucial. 

   Although I am not teaching this semester, I could see myself implementing many of these techniques into my classroom in the future.  I hope everyone will be motivated to promote a learning culture in your own school after reading this post.  I am sure this post will get you thinking of tons of other tips to add to the list and hopefully you will share these on your blogs or with your colleagues.

Ning Sites

I am not new to Ning because last year I took a culture course which was not an online course but required us to utilize Ning to submit assignments and comments on classmates' work.  However, I stuck to our private class Ning page; never venturing out to search for other useful ones to join.  I did just that today and was amazed!  I found a bunch of sites that I look forward to using for professional ideas regarding foreign language teaching and learning (sites where you can practice Spanish , others where you can see how a Spanish teacher utilizes it in a real classroom situation, and sites where educators get together to converse about technology).  In a preliminary glance at these sites, I have found wonderful applications for the classroom and I am excited to have time to really investigate them in the future.  One example that I found to use in the future is the site Go Animate that I have been looking for in years past.  I always wanted to find a way to use the computer to allow students to make cartoons in the target language.  I am so excited!!!

A Learner Today is Like a Tree...

 

 

A learner today is like a tree which can come in any variety of sizes, shapes, and colors.  So too, do our learners today.  Trees can live alone or in groups like students who prefer to work collaboratively and others solitarily.  Trees can live in various climates – some prefer the tropics, others the desert, still others are suited for the cold.  Students thrive in various environments, they have strengths and weaknesses that are exacerbated by the context that they are in.   In the article Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age by George Siemens the connection is made between a tree and a learner flourishing in their respective environments.  "Connectivism provides insight into learning skills and tasks needed for learners to flourish in a digital era."  The climate is crucial for the growth of the tree.  Certain trees can only grow in particular climates.  As teachers, we must remember that our students are very individual, just like a tree.  By getting to know our students, we come to better understand their individuality and use it to assist them in learning to the best of their ability. 

Trees adapt to their climate for survival, deciding to store water in the desert where water is scarce.  Learners today are most successful when they do the same thing.  They are most effective when they learn their learning style and how to capitalize on it in their context.  The classroom is a place where the students should have an opportunity to utilize their strengths to succeed if they are provided instances where they can be individualized.  However, if students are not given the freedom to do so, if they are expected to all learn the same way, some will fail to grow.  This works in the same way that a palm tree should not be planted in the desert with the intent that it will grow.  In the video The Changing Nature of Knowledge, another correlation can be made between learners and trees regarding their unique needs,"A dramatically different need for knowledge," just as trees have dramatically different needs for their survival in various environments.

Trees also have extensive root systems that firmly connect them with the earth, providing a network of connections with the ground.  Learners, too have prior knowledge and experience that makes them unique, rooting them in the ground.  Most importantly, trees absorb carbon dioxide from the air and release it as oxygen which fuels life.  Branches and leaves grow uniquely in each tree based on its vitality.  Learners who are able to glean the important parts from an unending influx of information (carbon dioxide), can process it and turn it into something spectacular (oxygen) that fuels life and makes contributions to the earth just as a tree gives us oxygen that is essential for human life.  A learner who captures and internalizes the input, working on his/her prior experience and using his/her system of tools to apply this knowledge can release a wondrous product.  It could be a solution to a problem that results from this process.  

The Profession of Teaching: Stuck in a Rut?

  

Educational Change Challenge Video- 
“We already live in a time of disconnect - where the classroom has stopped reflecting the world outside its walls”

            Although one would be hard pressed to find a school where all teachers lecture at students who are expected to keep silent, not required to investigate, explore,  discover, create and connect with the material, there are some “stragglers” who have not moved ahead with the times.  It is these individuals that stick out from our own experiences in schools (either as a student, parent, or staff member) and hold the public opinion of the teachers as irrelevant.  But this is at the expense of acknowledging of all those teachers that are already using wikis, podcasts, blogs, etc. effectively in their classrooms. 

They always say “it takes one bad apple to ruin a bunch.” We can finger-point at those that are not on board with using technology in the classroom or we can show them its relevance, connect the world inside the classroom and out.  It has been my experience that a good number of these “stragglers” are in fact stuck in the mud; they have never received or sought out the training that is essential for mastering technology use in the classroom.  Some of them are scared of what will be lost if all classrooms move away from the pencil –paper, lecture style because that is what was “successful” for them in the past (as either students themselves or as teachers).  It has been said that it is human nature to avoid change and not all that difficult to find yourself “stuck in a rut.”

“I have to ask myself, do I create lifelong learners?  Am I preparing students for my age or for theirs?”

However, I know that taking the time to demonstrate the ways that technology can greatly enhance the classroom experience is one way that administrators, staff members, and even parents can raise awareness and pique interest in the “stragglers.”  Teachers are usually involved in the profession because they love learning; this provides an opportunity for them to learn also, demonstrating to students the importance of being lifelong learners.  I would be shocked if a good majority of the lecture-style teachers had ever been approached by someone who wanted to teach them about using technology without a judging eye, rather than lecturing them, blaming them, and forcing them to change. 

“In Education, the use it or lose it rule may mean that if you don’t use technology for learning, you may lose relevance.  An educator, must be relevant.”

I have spent time viewing a lot of these videos and all of them were very powerful.  The proof is in the pudding; the numbers don’t lie.  The world outside of the classroom is full of facebook, youtube, and text messages.  Pioneers of the profession who work on technology advocacy can and should positively impact the current situation.  As the number of technology users continues to sky-rocket, technology will be even more avoidable by the staunchest educational critics.  We must work to engage our students, melding the world outside and inside the classroom, working together harmoniously towards student engagement and achievement.  Classes like this one help to do just that; as young educators we must stay abreast of the times and do our part to assist others in adopting it in their classrooms, too.  After all, our main goal is preparing students for the world, and in this day and age it looks more and more “digitized.”