Learning about connectivism has been an eye opening experience for me. To be honest, I was very resistant at the beginning of the course. My skepticism grew from my dislike of youth constantly being glued to devices in a public setting. It has become one of my biggest pet peeves. (Insert young couple on a date, both of them nose deep in their cell phone.) From this class I have learned that that is something different, entirely social. A revolutionary idea for me was the amount of ways in which we can use technology to actually enhance education. I never knew the depth to which this idea could go.
Wearable technology, 3D printing, maker spaces, BYOD, Twitter, Instagram just to name a few. Today's classroom needs to be geared towards connecting with people and thinking outside of the classroom. We need to be able to equip our students with the tools that they actually need to be successful in our ever changing technology world. In the connectivism article that we read, I loved the analogy of the oil pipeline. Instead of telling our kids what information they need to know for a brighter future, we need to teach them how to know and learn through technology. We need to help them to build the pipeline that any knowledge can flow through.
We need to remember what technology does more than anything is connect us as people. If you stop and reflect.....how much time when you are using technology are you using it to connect to someone else? Email, text, facebook, phone calls, etc. I find that greater than 80% of the time we spend on technology is spent on connecting people to people. How do we use that power in our classrooms? Find ways to connect students with others. Two things to look up.
ReplyDelete1. Skype an Author
2. Mystery Skype
Google those and see how teachers are using the power of connection in really cool ways. Of course there is always #comments4kids as well. ;)
Like you, I was a bit resistant to connectivism at the beginning of this course. However, after I investigated a bit more about 3D printing, my perspective changed as I was struck by connectivism's essential place in the advancement of medicine. Below is a TED talk by Lee Cronin who discusses his idea for a 3D printer that prints medicine.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.ted.com/talks/lee_cronin_print_your_own_medicine?language=en
I totally agree that we need to educate students on how to learn and using technology is a large piece of that. I love technology and am an advocate for it being used in classrooms and students becoming as proficient with it as possible. I do think, however, that there is something to be said for a clearly defined framework or curriculum of what a student should know. I don't believe it should be as rigid as it is now and i think that students should have options as to how they want to absorb the information presented, but I really believe that there are some things that all students should know and that we as teachers should expect that they will comprehend and understand.
ReplyDeleteJeff- I will definitely be utilizing Skype in my classroom. I think that it is a wonderful and simple way to bring connectivism into a 2nd grade classroom! Thank you for that idea! Being connected to people is important, and through your class I can now see how an teacher can utilize being connected with the world in a positive and educational light. Having students connected to the world can enhance their abilities tenfold.
ReplyDeleteSavanna- Thank you for sharing that TED talk, it is absolutely mind blowing where technology is taking us. I would have never thought to use 3D printers to print medicine.
Also here is a great link on "How to Skype and Author", just a good stepping stone to this concept. http://www.slideshare.net/gcrussell4/skype-an-author-ira14
Nicole,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that we need to truly prepare our students for the future and that includes not teaching just facts and knowledge, but more importantly teaching them how to find the knowledge they need via technology. I read that most of the careers our students will have when they are grown up are jobs that don't exist right now!!! So teaching them factual knowledge is going to be pointless in preparing them. We need to help students find ways to learn what they need to know right when they need to know it. We need to give up some of our long held skill sets that are not going to apply to this next generation!