Blog Post #2

Did You Know? 3.0
In the video Did You Know? 3.0, Karl Fisch and Scott Mcleod give some mind blowing statistics about technology and the way it is increasing.  In this video, Mr.  Fisch and Mcleod reveal that the United States is really not the leader in technology in the world.  They say in Did you Know? 3.0 that, "China will soon become the number one English speaking country in the world."  They also reveal that, "The 25% of India's population with the highest IQ's...is greater than the total population of the United States."   This video goes on to talk about how students today are learning for jobs that don't even exist yet.

The next part of the video talks about how rapidly technology is changing.  The online world is growing at a breathtaking pace.  More and more people are using the internet, and social media is common. It's really disconcerting to think about how quickly the world has changed in the last few decades.  We have no idea yet what it will look like in the next few years.  This is mostly due to advances in technology.

Mr.  Winkle Wakes
In Mr. Winkle Wakes, Mr.  Winkle has just woken up from being asleep for a hundred years.  He goes out into the world and everything has changed.  He goes to office buildings and computers are making sounds and doing things that he never imagined.  He goes to a hospital and there are machines there that are saving peoples lives.  These are things that Mr.  Winkle has never experienced, and they frighten him.  He goes into a school, and everything there is exactly like Mr.  Winkle remembers.  Children are sitting in classrooms.  There is quiet.  It seems to Mr.  Winkle that of all the changes that have happened in the world, the school is one place he is at home.  That is the one place that hasn't advanced with the world.

I think Mr.  Winkle Wakes is very simple, but very powerful.  When Mr.  Winkle goes out into the world, we see all the progress that has been made in a hundred years.  There are people able to do business all around the world.  Hospitals are able to perform lifesaving procedures.  But when Mr.  Winkle gets to the school, nothing has changed.  Mr.  Winkle is completely comfortable there.  It is a scary thought that when our children leave their classrooms and go out into the world that they are going to be as unfamiliar with the technology of today as Mr.  Winkle was.  We have to make sure that when they leave our class that they are ready to enter the world as it is.  We can not keep them in Mr.  Winkle's world, we must teach them to be ready for ours.

Sir Ken Robinson:  The Importance of Creativity
In this video, Sir Ken Robinson talks about creativity, and its importance.  He begins by making the assertion  that all children are creative.  He also says that creativity should have as much value placed on it as literacy does.  He talks about how schools teach children to not be creative.  He says that schools as well as companies teach people that being wrong about something is the worst mistake that we can make.  He talks about how we don't know what the future looks like, so we must prepare students to be prepared to think differently, and that we must help them to keep the creativity that they are born with.

He also talks about the public school system today, and how it is geared toward producing the same results in everyone.  He talks about how the way our children learn today only uses the top part of their bodies, and how as they go higher in their education, it gets even more so.  He talks about how this came about in the past, in an effort to educate during the industrial revolution.  However, since the world has changed, and is changing, we must change the way we teach.  This means that we need to start allowing children to use the talents and gifts that interest them, not just the ones that fit inside a traditional academic classroom. 


Cecelia Gault Interviews Sir Ken Robinson

I thought Cecelia 's interview with Sir Ken Robinson and her article with Scholastic News was really good.  I thought she asked very thoughtful questions.  She asked a question in her article about why the United States was not ahead of smaller countries with fewer resources when it came to technology.  In her interview with Sir Ken Robinson, she questioned him about what he thought were the "three myths of creativity."  In his answer Sir Ken talked about how everyone is creative in some way.  Cecelia herself attends a performing arts schools, so she understands and agrees with Sir Ken about that.    I agree with both Cecelia and Sir Ken Robinson.  I think that every student has the ability to be creative in some way.  I think it is up to teachers and parents to help protect that quality in our children.  As a teacher I will try to make the arts integrated into the curriculum that I teach.  I will try to teach my children that it's ok to make a mistake.  When we do make a mistake we simply have to learn from it and try again.  Also, I will try to encourage children to use their talents, and if they are interested in the arts,  I will try to give them the opportunity to express that.


Vicki Davis: Harness Your Students' Digital Smarts
In this video Vicki Davis shows how she uses technology to teach students in her classroom.  She is really doing an amazing job with her class.  In this video she talks about how she is teaching her students technology and then allowing them to use the technology to learn the curriculum that they are assigned.  She allows them to blog, use wikis, and connect with students all over the world.  

I think that every teacher should learn to do what Ms.  Davis is doing.  I think that when her students leave that class, not only will they have a mastery of the technology that they have been learning, they will have  confidence in their own abilities.  They are learning to be independent learners, and as Ms.  Davis says, they are really empowered to  be in control of what they learn.  Watching what Ms.  Davis has done with her students helps me to realize the kind of teacher I want to be.