Blog Post #8

Richard Miller: This is How We Dream

In his video This Is How We Dream Part 1, Richard Miller talks about how teachers and scholars today can use multimedia to change the way we write.  He begins the video by talking about how he loves and appreciates books.  He has made a career with writing.  However, he realizes that in order to stay current, we must use more than the pen and paper that we are used to.  There is an entire world of images and video that we can use to write with.   Mr.  Miller doesn't say in his lecture that we should abandon the traditional writing.  He instead suggests that we use multimedia tools to enhance the writings that we create.

  In the video Part 1 he uses the example of research on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  He shows how much better the project is when videos of Dr.  King's speeches and footage of his life are used in addition to the information written.  Mr.  Miller also talks about how beneficial writing with multimedia can be for documenting the present.  He uses the last presidential election as an example.  On election night, multimedia was used to gauge the reaction of people as election results came in.  These tools give a much more powerful view of the information provided than if there had only been a traditionally written report.

Richard Miller's This is How We Dream Part 2 is a lecture in which he talks about how to use multimedia writing in our education systems.  He talks about how we have to change the way we view the humanities and sciences.  We have to find away to make them work together.  He has a very inspiring vision of what education should become.  I know that it will take a lot of work and a very fundamental change in the way education is today to make that happen.  I don't know how long  a shift like that could take.  I do believe that as a teacher I can help by taking small steps toward Mr.  Miller's goal within my classroom.  Dr.  Strange asked the question, "Are you prepared to write with multimedia?"  Honestly, I would have to say, not yet.  But videos like Dr.  Miller's and the other things I am learning in EDM310 are helping me to realize how important using multimedia is.  I think my students will be multimedia writers.  I am going to try my best to help them become that.   


Carly Pugh:  Blog Post 12
I found Carly Pugh's blog post to be one of my favorite things that I have read and watched this semester.  I thought her idea for an assignment was really good.  Even though it is time consuming to search for and bookmark all of those resources, what a treasure of knowledge are!  I thought her videos for inclusion and students with disabilities were awesome choices.  I am going to create tiles for those on my Symbaloo.  I think that I would start every term out with a character lesson using those videos and others that could go along with them.  The ideas for students in English class are also great.  I love literature, and tools like that to help students relate to and appreciate classic literature are amazing.  I know that Dr.  Strange didn't ask us to build a new assignment for EDM310, but Carly's got me thinking.  I think a  good assignment would be to create a sort of "emergency" list for teachers.  Imagine if you had a teacher who had no idea about multimedia or education technology and was suddenly unable to teach traditionally. Create a list of "must see" videos and links to help that teacher survive until they could learn to teach with multimedia.  That was just a thought.  But to answer Dr.  Strange's question of how close Carly comes to Dr.  Miller's idea of multimedia writing, I think Dr.  Miller would be very pleased with Carly's post. 

The Chipper Series
The Chipper Series was very funny.  Chipper and her cavalier attitude toward learning is a really good was to demonstrate what Dr.  Strange calls "burp back" learning.  The things that Chipper does (or doesn't do) in the video are quick ways to fail at EDM310.  However, until I took EDM310, I have to say I had never thought about education in any other way myself.  EDM310 is really an eye opener.  Honestly, I think there should be a version of it that's required for every undergraduate student, not just education majors.  What we learn about independent learning should not just apply to our future students, but to our own education as well.

EDM310 for Dummies                
EDM310 for Dummies is a funny way to get across the secret to success in EDM310.  The first part of the video actually sounds like someone recorded me the first couple of weeks of my EDM310 experience.  I was completely overwhelmed, and often frustrated.  But like the students in the video, once I grasped the concept of using the resources provided to us, not just once or twice, but as may times as it took to understand, EDM310 completely changed.  Now instead of panic or dread at a new assignment, I can always be confident that if I don't understand what I'm doing, there is a resource or tool available for me to figure it out.  I think the main lesson of EDM310 for Dummies is HOLD ON!  It gets better!

Learn To Change, Change to Learn

When I watched the video Learn to Change, Change to Learn, I thought they made some very valid points.  I don't know if it was so much an "attack" on education, as it was just a really matter of fact discussion on the parts that aren't relevant any more.  I believe that students would be much more engaged in their education if the tools that they use everywhere else in their lives was utilized in the classroom.  I absolutely agree that standardized tests are a horrible way to teach children.  I personally think they are a really poor indicator of student success.  Children are so much more than the dots that they can fill in on a piece of scantron paper.    How much would their view of themselves and the possibilities for their life change if they were taught using the multimedia tools that allowed them to connect with the whole world every day?  To see that outside of the walls of their classroom is an endless field of possibilities, and they have the tools to reach them.  Although the video is critical of the education system, I think it needs to be said.