There has been an astonishing and healthy conversation going on about the blog entry I wrote the other day about that NYTimes laptops piece. The entry is entitled, What’s good about the May 4 NY Times Article about Laptops in Schools. Last night, in his signature prickliness, Gary Stager (not his first comment on this blog post) lamented that we have had computers in classrooms for 25 years, and that some teachers still resist them indicates “…a conscious effort to be non-learners.”
I’ve claimed my own frustration at teachers who ask, “But who’s going to teach me how to do that?” Sadly, we are a generation who was taught how to be taught — not how to teach ourselves. It’s one of the many reasons why the experiences that our children have in the classroom must become much more self-directed, relevant, and rich. They/we need to learn to teach ourselves. Teachers shouldn’t need professional development. They should be saying, hey, I’m going to teach myself how to do that this weekend. It’s about life long learning. Not about a life of being taught.
More to the point of this post, Gary sayed,
We can hire people to keynote professional development days or run two-hour workshops on Web 2.0 and it won’t matter a bit.
To some, I suspect that this is true. The highly skeptical scholar, like Stager, is likely impervious to motivational demonstrations and counter-intuitive connections made by the likes of Ian Jukes, David Thornburg, Alan November, Jamie McKenzie, Marc Prenski, Will Richardson, …. or even — me! I’ve not seen him present, but I’m told that Gary, himself, can whip up a rousing “Amen!” from a pulsing crowd of eager educators.
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| This image is not a slight to Cory Doctorow. The empty chairs just seemed fitting somehow |
But does it really matter? I think it does. While teachers should be able to teach themselves, inspiration to want to grow and change to adapt, for must of us, comes from outside. It doesn’t happen very often, but every once in a while, a teacher comes up to me and says, “You know that session that you and Will Richardson did at the NCAECT conference a few weeks ago. I just wanted you to know that it changed how I teach. My students are blogging and we have a classroom podcast now…”
She didn’t say that her students were learning better. But this teacher, who was now attending a MEGA conference after school in Raleigh, seemed genuinely satisfied with her teaching and with her classroom — and surprised in her satisfaction.
So, although I agree with most everything that Gary says, here, I’m going to take just a bit of exception.
Sorry, Gary. I know you must be crushed! 😉
2¢ Worth!
Image Citation:
Fiander, David. “Cory Doctorow’s Opening Plenary.” Djfiander’s Photostream. 2 Feb 2007. 9 May 2007 <http://flickr.com/photos/bookgeek/377766999/>.
“Sadly, we are a generation who was taught how to be taught — not how to teach ourselves. It’s one of the many reasons why the experiences that our children have in the classroom must become much more self-directed, relevant, and rich. They/we need to learn to teach ourselves. Teachers shouldn’t need professional development. They should be saying, hey, I’m going to teach myself how to do that this weekend. It’s about life long learning. Not about a life of being taught.”
Yes, yes and YES! It is beyond sad to me that the people in charge of education are some of the worst learners I’ve ever met.
To your point that teachers need outside professional development to light the fire of inspiration–I agree that to some extent this is true. At the same time, though, I have to agree with Gary that this should be unnecessary. Part of lifelong learning is being curious, seeking out new information and being on top of your game re: changes in the field. All you have to do is run a Google search to start at least noticing that there are new and interesting things going on in people’s classrooms. Are teachers incapable of even asking the questions?
I find that there’s a fundamental lack of curiosity (also killed by school) that feeds into this passive approach to professional development. When you’re used to being spoon-fed everything, you begin to operate in a world where you don’t even realize you need to learn something new until someone tells you. That’s just a shame.
“Sadly, we are a generation who was taught how to be taught — not how to teach ourselves.”
I would add to that.
Parents, fellow teachers, administrators, and government officials(!) think that teachers must be taught, so the system reinforces dependent behavior. Some schools have started to allow individualized goal-setting for professional development, but the lack of trust in teachers that they will follow through on these goals is still evident in some of the procedural hurdles they must leap to be “allowed” to learn about the new ideas that intrigue them most and seem most promising for their classroom situations.
The ideal is to have the guru visit (or– maybe even a peer from within who has a big voice) to spark that extrinsic excitement/motivation/curiosity and then promote and facilitate ways for teachers to follow through on the impetus as it becomes intrinsic. Sometimes it’s as simple as allowing teachers to work in small groups on projects/learning of their own design during an inservice day. For the more intrepid, it may mean working with a colleague you trust not to make you “feel dumb” about technology.
Poof- now you have the next motivational speaker for the next round. (Sorry, Dave, but not everyone can book you for their schools…not enough Dave to go around!)
Yes, I think that’s why so much “professional development” feels so insulting to teachers. If we can get district officials to trust teachers to do the kind of professional growth you’re talking about (teaching ourselves) we would see improvement in student performance and teacher morale. Like our students, teachers want genuine collaboration and conversation rather than the “sit and listen” approach to professional development or the even deadlier “trainings.”
I don’t hear teachers complain about a good keynote speaker as long as it isn’t too long in duration. Inspiration can give us the energy to pursue the act of “teaching ourselves.”
I had the unfortunate experience of having the “not how to teach ourselves” reinforced. I sent a link to this blog marked as a link to a BLOG, with a reference to teachers as role models of learning. One of my colleagues wrote back, “It will take me all week to read that stuff.” She wanted me to digest it for her. She also didn’t understand that blogs are composed of separate entries. Now I get to provide training on how to read a blog.
David,
Of course I agree with you about the value of inspirational talks, but even then we have an obligation to give the audience a beginning, middle and end. We need to inspire them to see possibilities, imagine the big picture and be motivated to continue learning at home after the event.
However, I prefer to do what I am enagegd in today, yet funders find less valuable than an hour of schtick. I’m in a school for at-risk kids teaching them “in-residence” for several straight days (I’ve done as long as three months). The work, with teachers as my apprentices is within the context of where they do their jobs. This allows me to create compelling models that others may observe, consider or even reject if they have a sound rationale for doing so.
When I am invited to do such work I ask that the same group of students work with me everyday for at least half a day. I also request that the classes be hetergeneous and multiage. This is not only consistent with what I believe about teaching, but allows even a casual observer – a teacher who passes by the classroom – to notice that there are kids of different heights working together for long periods of time (like when they play video games, but here they are constructing something).
Working with unsuccessful students allows me to demonstrate how computers may be intellectual laboratories and vehicles for self-expression. They amplify the ability of kids who school does not serve very well.
My work in the school allows me to be an anthropologist who collects informal data and observations that may be shared with school officials. This information may be about tips for protecting laptop screens to recommendations for major curriculum reform or the need for books to be available in classrooms.
I’ve given each kid my email address in case they would like to continue working with me. I also suggested how they might craft an email asking for help.
***********
My larger concern is that you and I spend an increasing amount of our time speaking at “boat shows.” Remember when you couldn’t speak at a conference without a refereed paper? Now you can’t speak without a corporate sponsor.
These “boat shows” are more concerned with the exhibit hall than the exchange of ideas. Too many keynote speakers are shot via pneumatic tube from the airport to behind the podium and then back again, without having to defend any of what they said. I request that conferences provide a scheduled Q&A session following my keynotes so I may clarify, extend and justify what I said. This also benefits attendees who would like to spend more informal time with “experts.” This is incredibly powerful for learners of all ages and neither kids nor teachers have enough access to expertise.
I’ve also asked countless conferences to offer sessions in which serious dialogue is possible. A format like the Charlie Rose Show is a great metaphor for this. I’ve been given every conceivable reason why this is impossible. One conference told me that discussion is impossible since chairs can’t be moved. Others allow panels, but there are too many panelists to support substantive debate. On the rare occasion that two speakers are paired, the conference organizers want a food fight.
I have disagree profoundly with some of the work and beliefs of the colleagues you mentioned in your original post. I would love to discuss both the subtle and extreme points of disagreement with any of them in a public setting. The audience would certainly benefit from watching smart people discuss serious issues.
So, consider this a challenge to conference organizers. I would be delighted to share a stage with David or any of our other colleagues for a sustained substantive debate about the nature of learning, the role of technology or the future of learning. Just tell me when and where to show up!
Gotta get back to the kids….
-=Gary
PS: I agree with Candace. Kids are hooked on teachers. We’ve built a system based on codependency and what John Taylor Gatto calls, “childishness vs. child-likeness.”
While teaching kids to program in MicroWorlds they’ll encounter bugs. Bugs are terrific because they require you to think about thinking. Kids almost always want to yell for help before attempting any debugging of their own.
When they do ask for help, they often say, “I need help,” but no more. They frequently lack the ability to construct a sentence explaining the symptoms of their problem.
This should be a MINIMUM expectation for students.
I have resisted jumping into the conversation only because I was afraid my passion would cause me to run on and on…
I agree with a lot of what is said here, even the fact that we tend to need to be taught. I have found that to encourage participation in all things 2.0 that the motivational issue has roots in what we often call the story. Our mission statement says we educate our students to be productive citizens of the 21 century. In August I asked the teachers…”What does it mean to educate students for the 21st century? Is it different than educating students for the 20th century?. We had a good discussion and those who got it were much more willing to try …As the year is winding down I am finding that the conversation must be revisited often. Today we are going to talk about defining literacy. The staff will do the defining…I will give some facts and figures …they will revise….etc…the point is once they have constructed definitions and meaning for literacy and 21st century skills I think they will be ready to become learners. Change requires a new vision and new values and I see my job as helping the staff to construct those new outlooks. Most people will learn something new if they see value or necessity in the learning.
I have been working with teachers in my district,(I’m a classroom teacher.) I have found that teachers need to move along a continuum of personal use, integrated lesson, instructing students and open activity.
Teachers are afraid of not being the expert. They will not try an activity until they are sure they know all the answers.I am ok learning from students or trying different ways to do something.
Until we make them feel comfortable using technology they won’t use it. We have to move them along the continuum step by step.
I agree with Barbara that our teachers need to see the necessity and then have time to learn and create lesson plans.
We also have to convince administrators that they need to push teachers into learning also as well as learning themselves.
Re: “Sadly, we are a generation who was taught how to be taught — not how to teach ourselves.”
Which generation are you speaking for? There are practicing teachers from multiple generations within our schools. Furthermore, it is my contention that some of the statements are a gross generalization of teachers. What good does belittling teachers do?
Re: “The highly skeptical scholar, like Stager, is likely impervious to motivational demonstrations and counter-intuitive connections made by…”
Dave, even Dewey says, “Skepticism is the mark and even the pose of the educated mind.” I applaud Gary for his skepticism and working with teachers and students in the classroom.
Mechelle
I am new to actually finding interesting things on the web and new to blogging, but I am glad that I stumbled onto this one. I think it’s hard to not generalize about teaching when you’re used to working with teachers as large groups. And, unfortunately, as large groups go, in teaching change can be like trying to push a whale by yourself. But, I think it was Barbara who said that often people will learn something if they see the value in it. That’s also how memory works. It’s great to learn something that you know will help your students learn, even something that will help you learn or make your life easier, but how much do you remember about it when others (i.e. those who plan professional development) are lining up so many other topics to compete…and what about those who know that they won’t be able to use it without filling out some justification in triplicate before they can even try….
We also need to accommodate some of the learning styles of our teachers – many people, not just teachers, need to DO something in order to learn it well and THEN what they are learning needs to have some MEANING to them personally AND professionally before they can truly start to commit it to memory or become invested in it. One of my theories (yes, I have no solid evidence to back this up) is that for many, the investment part is hard to come by because they are so used to being told what they have to do, that they have stopped becoming invested in things they believe in. They just don’t always have the freedom with their curriculum to feel they can do this, or they might be so new, they don’t know how they would fit in one more thing to learn; and all information needs to get through the emotional “filters” before it gets even close to memory, so, for some, it’s good luck….
Anyway, I don’t know that there is one answer, or even less than ten, but continuing to get the info out there, continuing to fire up even just a few a day, is an awesome start.. and I don’t know Gary or Dave, but I think I would love to attend a conference where the “discussion” was headlining (or even side lining):
“So, consider this a challenge to conference organizers. I would be delighted to share a stage with David or any of our other colleagues for a sustained substantive debate about the nature of learning, the role of technology or the future of learning. Just tell me when and where to show up!” [I don’t know how to insert the quote right from, etc…]
Readerdiane,
I have found that there is no hiearchy of tech skills and that focusing the use of a new technology on doing chores that teachers already find unpleasant to be a formula for disaster.
Where did teachers get the idea that:
1) They need to know anything, or
2) That they are experts?
Why are they so fragile? Should this be encouraged?
I agree with ldtchr who said that teachers need to do something. All learners need to do something. Knowledge is the consequence of experience. This is why I recommend teaching teachers to use technology in exactly the same context in which they are employed to benefit kids. They cannot choose from options that they don’t understand and it is not our job to help teachers perform clerical tasks more efficiently. Perhaps we should eliminate such chores.
What is the expertise of the teachers you are working with?
To answer Mechelle De Craene’s question about which generation are we talking about, I find young teachers to be the scariest, both in their lack of technological fluency and in their lack of imagination. Their “training” is increasingly vocational, script-based and conservative. They were taught to be compliant in school and few of the big ideas of progressive education have appeared on their radar screen.
I can pick teachers who taught during open education out of a lineup, regardless of how they currently teach (I student taught with a woman who had the kids in rows and was very traditional, but she was incredibly flexible and self-confident.)
Show me one of these teachers and they’ll get Logo (MicroWorlds) instantly. Go back to their classroom a few weeks later and great things will be happening with the open-ended constructionist software. I’ve witnessed this with my own eyes. Teachers willing to subject precious students to Open Court will NEVER get what I’m talking about.
Many young teachers figured out that teaching is the only career that doesn’t require electricity. Perhaps we should start recruiting in Amish country.
I feel it necessary to ask questions here: Why do we as educational leaders continue to enable all of this? Why does leadership continue to offer PD in the form of a drive by shooting? Why do teachers walk out like trade labor at 2:17 as the fumes of the buses can still be seen in the air? Why do educators try to control all possible parameters out of fear or lack of understanding? If we consider the concept that society created educational institutions to educate people to be functional members within, then what is the current state of schools saying about what is valued in society? Why are communities allowing this all to go on? I hope to approach every day as if I do not have all of the answers, but I do know people read here in places like this to find them.
Gary,
That’s interesting…not sure its based in reality though.
Mechelle
This has been an exceptional chatter — thanks David and thanks Gary and all the other posters……..I am still absorbing it all. The comment about “Boat Shows” truly made me speechless and then cracked me up — In NO way have I ever considered any of the conferences OR sessions I have been to be “boat shows” – we are so much deeper and go away much more enlightened than that.
Gentle reminder, Dave —
look at your list — Ian Jukes, David Thornburg, Alan November, Jamie McKenzie, Marc Prenski, Will Richardson, …. or even — me!
Surely — you could list even ONE woman there who has made a impact in the realm of teched.
Thanks for an EXCELLENT blog entry today!
Jen
Re: “Sadly, we are a generation who was taught how to be taught — not how to teach ourselves.â€
This is true! And this will continue as long as leaders continue to force teachers to reinvent what they do in the classroom with every passing trend.. Educational leaders should be embracing new things without forcing all to conform! No wonder teachers are uninspired! The ability to be different and innovative has been stripped away from us! Teachers spend hours relearning how to teach according to some “expert” instead of searching for new and innovative things that they would LOVE to do in their classrooms!
Pam,
You are completely correct about the gender imbalance. Look around at an edtech conference for racial diversity and you’ll be really upset.
I’ve been engaged in discussions about these equity and representation issues since Leroy Finkel was alive. When he passed away, we created a scholarship to send teachers of color to the California CUE Conference. I think the diversity goal of even that small charity has long been forgotten.
NECC IS a trade show. TCEA is a trade show. FETC (just got purchased by a for-profit company) is a trade show. The program is what Wal-mart might call a loss leader.
Mechelle,
I’m glad you thought what I wrote was interesting. However, I’m confused by what part of it you think is divorced from reality?
I merely shared an observation that good teachers are good regardless of the materials or medium.
Gary,
I think I have to disagree with you about the youngest teachers being the least good at teaching with Web 2.0 tools and teaching in an “open” (not scripted) way. I’m a younger teacher, and I learned the “Internet” and many of the tech tools the way our students do today–through learning and playing, not being directly taught. I think most of the teachers I graduated with can say the same thing. It’s the best way to learn! Most of my generation has myspace accounts so I personally can understand how it’s not 100% evil (as most of the older teachers at my school would have you believe) and that collaboration is an important (and truly GOOD) part of it.
I think inexperienced teachers of ANY age will be afraid of losing control of their classroom within the first couple of years, so they’ll overcompensate by trying to be “in charge” all of the time. As they become more confident as teachers, they’ll start to put the reins of learning in the students’ hands.
Just my thoughts…
I am going to write this anonymously so to not become a “trade show” or self promoter of my thoughts
Perhaps, you are right, in your assumption (or reality) that NECC is a trade show but that does not mean that I have to be influenced by that.
At Cue or at NECC, I do see the sponsors but I see past that. Yes, there are teachers/session leaders who are 100% self-promoters but usually those are the sessions I last about 5 minutes before I move on to the “original idea” sessions.
And yes, are sponsors needed, they must be. Our registration fees cannot even begin to cover the convention costs and internet costs we demand now. (not even factoring in the fees paid to keynotes!) But, again, I see past them. That is NOT why I attend a conference.
And I also feel that your comments on teachers are showing too much generality and lumping into one arena. If you wander around Educational Blogs long enough, visit Classroom 2.0, check out Discovery Network, and more AND you will see a variety of different ages of participants. And if you walk into an ordinary school – you will see a variety of ages. And there is NOT one generality that would fit any scenario you have promoted.
And finally, I find the following comment:
I can pick teachers who taught during open education out of a lineup, regardless of how they currently teach (I student taught with a woman who had the kids in rows and was very traditional, but she was incredibly flexible and self-confident.)
to be very pompous. But I would like to put you to the test,.so prove it. Read 30 educational blogs today and then post which of those you thing were taught during open education or perhaps participate in a lineup at NECC to prove your ability in pulling certain teachers out of a lineup. I think you might be humbled that perhaps it isn’t as easy as you think to “identify” or label teachers, as you seem to state that you can do.
I enjoyed this post today but your comments are too vague and overlapping for me to give them warrant.
Is there a reason why I’m responding to an anonymous writer?
Please allow me to share a hypothesis and then respond to your challenge.
1) The exhibit hall only supports conferences as long as the conference organizers have edifice complexes. The cost of the facilities, the $8 cups of coffee, the giant archways announcing the conference you are already at are ENORMOUS. I have run more than a dozen conferences that were all in the black with fantastic programs (complete with real paid speakers unlike TCEA that shakes down teacher presenters for registration). If you don’t mortage the future for gigantic commercial venue, you can use registration fees to finance a great conference.
The boat show becomes the focus and people are employed by professional organizations with limited budgets to run the circus, not because of their programatic knowledge. Seymour Papert, the father of educational computing, NEVER keynoted NECC, but Lily Tomlin and a plethora of mediocre corporate vice presidents have. What does that say about our priorities and anti-intellectualism?
The number of computer-using educators who have keynoted NECC in the past decade may be counted on one hand. The “choose your own keynote” idea panders to our worst short attention span impulses and ensures that more sponsors can get to speak to a large audience. Isn’t a keynote speaker supposed to present a unifying vision or challenge for an event?
Allow me to share two specific cases…
a) It takes an hour to enter the parking lot at FETC where you pay $10 to park and then walk 4 miles to the session rooms. There are countless smaller venues in Orlando that would be more comfortable and less expensive. (I admit, there might be some sort of long-term incredible deal with the convention center, but the facility is still a drag).
b) I have been speaking at California CUE Conferences since they were held in a high school. Frankly, the attendance is once again small enough to return to a high school or college campus. Instead, CUE spends a fortune hiring an entire convention center in Palm Springs and features compelling keynote presentations with titles like, “MP3.” (I didn’t make that up)
*****************
2)
ANONYMOUS… You seem to confuse teaching with blogging. They are not synonymous. I can observe teacher practice and divine a good deal about their experience, confidence and expertise. Reading a blog is not the same.
The blog is a static artifact. Teaching is an active observable process. Education is screwed up by the confusion with the view of learning as a noun, indicated by test scores vs. learning as what students do.
I find it staggering that people in this discussion take issue with my suggestion that good teachers without computers make good teachers with computers. Are you arguing otherwise?
As someone who works in teacher education and is in dozens of schools around the world each year, my experience is that despite the anecdotal example of a young teacher here and there who knows how to use Web 2.0 tools, there is a conservatism in their practice (NCLB – HELLO?) and teacher education IS increasingly vocational. The government demands it and cooperating schools require the local universities to teach prospective teachers what the district wants.
It’s one thing to know how to use technology in the classroom. It’s quite another to know (and be capable of articulating) why. I get the textbooks used in teacher ed programs. Seymour Papert and his 40 years of research isn’t disputed. It’s absent. Instead there are tips and tricks for using Inspiration, Powerpoint and “information literacy.”
There is a peculiar ageism that seems to accompany the discussions of Web 2.0. All of the name calling – digital immigrants, digerati, n-gen, clickerati, etc… fetishize kid culture and demean adults. It’s like the old sitcom formula of the bumbling dad.
There are undoubtedly fine young teachers, but expertise comes from experience and there are many more wonderful veteran teachers.
(I won’t bore you with the statistics about new teacher longevity)
I hope this answers your questions.
Well this is truly a wonderful conversation…. Even if some do find it hard to follow or “warrant” value. Thank you Gary for your thoughts – I first heard you speak last year out here in Australia at one of those “Trade Shows” you talk about. Wonderful sessions with titles such as “Company X tells us how Interactive whiteboards will change education.” Your presentation was great and I can see what you are saying about these events quite clearly. However, I must say that I don’t think there is much validity in comparing younger and older teachers. I don’t see the point – I see the need for young and old to work together. I reflect back a couple of years ago as someone only 3 years into the profession demonstrating at a staff meeting some video’s that my students produced on Natural Disasters. My head thought they were great and asked me to share with all staff. Once I did I had a range of responses anything from “well you are just a smart a*@se” to “that is fine for you but I can’t do that so how can I teach it.” However, it was the response from a very experience teacher that grabbed me more than anything. He approached me at the end of the meeting and offered me some of his time to talk about the pedagogy and how he thinks I could improve the learning outcomes for the kids with this exercise. I took him up on his offer and was blown away by how quickly he saw the potential in what I was doing and what his “expertise through experience” could offer it all. It was like I had started something and he was adding the finishing touches that just made it brilliant.
This is where value lies – find me a conference where I can meet and discuss issues of effective teaching – I can bring the techno gear and use it – but when someone with experience and passion for learning can help me put the final coat of paint on it all – Our students benefit. Let’s cut out the corporatisation of education and start to focus on what we are there to do….. Not just teaching – But also playing our part to build Learning and Thinking community. A conference like that could be held over at my place with a few chairs borrowed from school in the back yard – I’ll even throw a few snags and prawns on the BARBY!!!! 🙂 All invited – I have wifi at home!!!
I am now back in the classroom after a 1 year journey of…… well I don’t know…. but I am back and it has occurred to me that it is time to help our students and teachers learn to think again….. Or perhaps for the first time….
In fact it was Hitler who summed it up….. “Oh what luck for leaders that man does not think!!”
My adaptation to that – “Oh what luck for lazy teachers when students don’t think.” Or could it be “What luck for bureaucratic administrators and politicians that teachers don’t think.”
Well I have said enough…. I was going to go on…. but I will save this for later….
Thank you to Dave and Gary!! Great conversation!!
Gary —
I thank you for taking the time to respond to an “anonymous” poster.
And you are right — my challenge for you was incorrect when I suggested that you pick out some bloggers……..but I also extended that to NECC. So, I still offer that challenge. Attend some sessions and then we can chat about your success. If you do consider session leaders teachers, I certainly do.
And I have attended CUE and I am going to try not to let your thoughts and accusations jade me in anyway. Also, I don’t think there have been any titles in the last 6 years I have attended by a keynote that was called “MP3” — so please shed more light on that please.
And please also prove your comment of “The number of computer-using educators who have keynoted NECC in the past decade may be counted on one hand.” I have been there the last 3 years as well and would think that that statistic is wrong.
I have enjoyed this banter…….This has been a good conversation an kudos to David. 24 comments, is this a record??
A few points about this very interesting discussion.
Firstly I listened to you Dave, present at a conference in New Zealand earlier this year. You certainly changed my world. I read yours and other blogs daily and have changed what I do significantly because of your work. I am trying to implement a lot of what is important around future thinking into my school. (See my blog)
Secondly I observed one of my teachers (I am a principal) a few weeks back in her class. She said to several learners gathered around her “What do I do now?” She had given over to her class (aged about twelve) the control and they were teaching her. Gary, she was older and I have found many older people more flexible and willing to embrace change even if they don’t understand it. Maybe they are not so fixated on their career as getting somewhere.
Third point. Last week I attended a discussion with other educators on what secondary education would look like in 2027. This discussion was part of the Secondary Futures project in New Zealand
When asked to describe what the inspired teacher would look like in 2027 that is in twenty years time, I drew a computer. My thoughts were that at present the dominant practice in schools is still around knowledge development and information retrieval. I have seen nothing over the last twenty years that tends to suggest a change to this. We are not as controlled in New Zealand as you people are in the US with testing etc but it still is not innovative in practice.
Sometime in the next twenty years with the advances in technology and the lowering costs it may become economic to replace the teacher with a computer if the expected outcomes are as low level as they are at present.
Are we like the Blacksmiths were at the end of the 1900s?
“These new car things won’t ever take off. You can’t pat a car.”
I do wonder if the only people listening to the importance of teachers are us educators as the world rapidly develops forward and leaves us behind.
The reasons that the meeting gave for teachers are for the social needs, the human contact, the collaboration, etc
And these people did not use Bebo, myspace, Web 2.0 and so on.
Gary,
I wrote in my blog about this conversation, which I think is terrific. Below is an excerpt that I would like to submit for consideration.
You stated, “Many young teachers figured out that teaching is the only career that doesn’t require electricity. Perhaps we should start recruiting in Amish country.”
After I chuckled, I thought about the truth of your statement. Now, while I think “the children are our future, blah, blah, blah” I believe this statement needs further review. I happen to think that it will be 10-15 years (I hope) before education communities will look at today’s “struggles” with a hearty ha-ha, and wonder why we had issues with filtering, blogs, wikis, student email accounts, etc. BUT you are making an important statement here. If our new generation of teachers are continually being denied the opportunity to use new technologies, one of two things is likely:
a) they will eventually quit trying technology, or anything different that might work (your point, I think) or
b) they will move on to a different career (like they already do before they are up for their first re-certification).
If the new teacher opts to continue teaching, they will develop habits of comfort in their teaching practice. I don’t care how many professional developments, mandates from the District Office, or new opportunities come along, once a teacher no longer needs to think on the fly, they will not change just because someone says they have to change. We need a dose of human psychology reality if we think otherwise. Sure, they may “try it for a while,” but when they don’t see reward for the new effort, the new thing will be devalued. There is a small window of time (under 5 years) to capture teachers and get them to change the way they were taught, and the the way they will teach.
Gary and David, and everyone else in the conversation – Thank you for bringing up something that really means something…beyond the ooooh, isn’t this cool.
~Ric~
Ric,
Here is another take on the situation you describe.
http://www.districtadministration.com/ViewArticle.aspx?articleid=884
-=Gary
Gary,
Thanks for the link to your article. 2002; the year our school system decided to change the filtering policy from “when you find something wrong, we’ll block it” to “almost everything is blocked unless you can give a great reason for us to have it unblocked by the company we outsource to.”
It was when my battles began. It has been a pleasure to read some of your material over the past few days.
~Ric
Enjoyed the article, but am wary of articles that attempt to oversimplify a complicated issue. Both educators and students need some instruction and guidance so that they can teach themselves. These concepts are not at odds, but interdependent upon each other.
Sometimes teachers need some training to know how to begin. New technology in particular can feel overwhelming and some guidance is helpful. Then it is up to the teacher to figure out how to use the tools in his or her own classroom in a way that fits that teacher’s individual style.
I think that sometimes teachers are hesitant to try to implement something new in the classroom, especially when they have arrived in their comfort zone. When something works, we keep it and hold onto it. However, I think given the chance to actually “try” the something new out themselves before bringing it into the classroom, the result is usually more positive and the teacher is more willing to show what they have learned.