Instructions:
1. Watch the following two videos and SPEAK OUT YOUR MIND!!!
2. Tell us what was hot in your mind after watching the videos!!
2. Comment and then RESPOND to comments made. At least 4 participation plus your first personal comment, for a total of five comments!!
Opening date: November 8th to November 14th. Participation have to be done at least five to three days before Nov. 14.
HAVE FUN!!
Video 1: Changing Paradigms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z78aaeJR8no
Video 2: The Future of Learning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoSJ3_dZcm8
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ReplyDeleteThe future of learning models must be personalized, learner-driven, applied, cost effective and tech-enabled. Who can we apply this in Costa Rican reality? How can we match this model with a condition of succeeding? Students need to explore all their opportunities for learning from school to beyond. The state is not only the responsible for giving life-long learning to students, but at least a motor to provide challenges and opportunities to make them improve in life and society. As teachers we can think about some common characteristics or interests students have to modify or redesign the teaching based on what they want and like. Designing a class based on tools given from students resembles a new way of learning where students feel they may be taken into account to build they future they want, such as learning how to learn without being forced to learn in a imposed education system. Instead of having students walking to a classroom they do not enjoy to learn at, we can make them feel engage giving them skills, tools and basis they may feel identified with. So the whats, hows, wheres, whens and how much help them to move forward addressing all learning elements to make them go beyond their perspectives. We can teach fitting each learner, let them create their own learning y doing through technologies which resemble success at a cost which works for both personal and social interests.
DeleteHi everybody!
ReplyDeleteI loved the first video, Changing Paradigms; because I think the information explained and the drawings displayed show to a great extend how education is conceived nowadays, and the implications, the assumptions and conceptions teachers and professors have worldwide, which certainly demonstrates the reality of what is going on in the educational system. I totally agree with the video regarding the change that needs to be made to the conception of the human capacities, and to the importance of providing students with opportunities to develop their innate abilities and skills, and to help them target areas of improvement. Also, creating environments and teaching activities or techniques for promoting collaborative work is essential, as pointed out in the video, since that is the natural way in which learning takes place, and establishing social relationships is how individuals perform in their nuclear families as well as in society. Finally, it is extremely relevant to take into account the cultural habits established in the institution teachers and professors work at; the institutional culture usually influences the practices instructors carry out and sometimes limit their performance a lot, which leads to following policies and to leaving aside personal teaching and learning beliefs for helping students.
It really called my attention the part where he explained that cheating in the exams is prohibited inside the school even though in outer scenarios, collaboration is essential for not just communicating, but also for learning. Definitively, this current education system is not feasible at all for addressing students´needs, skills, challenges and interests.
DeleteYou are totally right! I think the big mistake lies on standarized tests, my question is: What do we need them for? Actually, when individuals work they just apply what has been learned, it is all about applying, so what do we need to test students with quizzes and exams rather than making them apply their knowledge in projects or tasks in which they work together and help each other.
DeleteI do not really understand how we got to this fragmented view of life, humans and learning experiences. There is the need to look within our beings and plan from there in order to provide life-learning experiences where learning is represented as a reality transformation tool more than as an isolated-death piece of information.
DeletePau and Priscilla:
DeleteThis happens because human beings have been reduced to numbers instead of being conceived as a real person with feelings, background knowledge, skills, etc.
This quantitative practice not just embaraces standarized tests, it also includes for instances conductivist practices such as Likert Scales which try to categorize a person in a specific "place". However, some people just do not fit, and that is not wrong because we are just different.
I agree. Humans are perceived in isolated pieces more than as a whole. Test minimizes humans potential since the primary needed skill is memory. When I take some of my son´s test, it really surprises me how some teachers still ask mere memory questions instead of asking students to break down the given information in order to apply it into a contextualized situation. Most of the time learning is reduced to the mere act of memorizing information instead of promoting high thinking skills. Memory is stated as a learning strategy, but it should not be used as the ultimately goal of the learning and teaching experience.
DeleteI agree with both of you, and I think there is a light of hope at the end of this on-going situation in regards to learning. I know that in some institutions there are programs that embrace and promote learning from a more humanistic perspective, and which try to see students as complex humans beings, who are essential in the learning and teaching process, which is also part of the job aware teachers try to do daily.
DeleteWe are lucky we can identify these weaknesses in our educative system, so we can do our best to change this reality. I remember my boss telling me that I was so soft and flexible with students because I allowed them to hand-in assignments later and allow them to even keep a child quiet in class because this student-father did not have money to pay a babysitter; he said I was supposed to take the student out of the class and tell him that he had lost the course. Sorry but I work with human beings who want to make an effort and be someone in life, and it is not their complete fault to have different needs in class. I do not treat students as money accounts or numbers, I tottaly understand they want to have an opportunity to succeed, but if we teachers do not know how to play the cards in class ad explain them the limits, the balance between flexibility, understanding and teaching could be broken. I understood my boss' point of view but at the end I only explained the situation to the student and shared my point of view.
Deleteyes I agree with you, but I do not understand sometime, according to your comment you mentioned that we as teacher have to promote learning according to life experiences and I agree, but in public institutions this is not possible because when you do that you are not following the system rules and that means you are completely wrong. Sometimes the system does not help teachers nor students in the learning process.
DeleteIs it really successful our current educational system taking into account economic, social and political factors in the world? The current education system was established based on an industrial model which was aimed to become a labor force for industrialization. In fact, many students view education as a means of enslavement in which they are locked into an educational model whose single purpose does not match to their interests and realities.
ReplyDeleteIn another of his speeches, Ken Robinson explains that the current education system is anachronistic; he states that education is suppressing the talents and skills of many students; it is killing their motivation to learn. For this reason, there is no real learning because it does not take into account the actual skills of students. Indeed, in today's society it is essential to train creative, innovative and motivated professionals. For example, ADHD is not an epidemic. Children are medicated routinely even though they are living in the most intensive stimulative period of attention. The learners get distracted because learning is boring compared to the exciting world of information and entertainment to which they are currently exposed. That is why even if they get “drugged “with substances to increase their concentration, they cannot improve and increase their motivation and level of care. That is why the educational system is limited and obsolete because it responds to the needs of the past and not of the present.
Actually, kids cannot see the purpose of going to the school and getting prepared for the future because nowadays it is not completely true that going to the university and getting a degree guarantees success. The current educational system was designed for the Intellectual Culture of the Enlightenment under the economic conception of the Industrial Revolution; it was developed under the assumptions of Social Structure Capacity where human beings just could become academic or no academic. The problem is that this system makes people think that the ones who cannot get an academic degree are not just excluded from the system, but also they considered themselves not smart.
The challenge is to address the following objectives. First, economics because education before being promoted to improve labor aspiration and benefit the economy, it demands not to respond to this production-based industry perspective. Second, culture because students must understand the world and the cultural identity of each person, that is, our place in the world by considering that the world is interdependent, complex and intolerant. Third, staff because education is a way of becoming a better version of ourselves, and discovering talents and abilities. However, education has failed because many people do not find their talents, purposes and roles in society. For this reason, learning should also encourage social and emotional passion, creativity, energy and talents for facing future new challenges which must be solved by a variety of people`s skills.
Finally, economy and culture does not respond to current needs due to the divergence between differences and attempted homogenization. In fact, each country tries to understand how to educate our children to have a sense of cultural identity for passing our genes to the cultural community as it is part of the globalization process. This can be done through an Integrative Design that conceives learning as a process of selecting and integrating many different parts to create the foundation of a new model where kids need to learn how to learn to tackle the challenges that they cannot anticipate in the future.
Hi Karla! I really enjoyed reading your comment, and actually two aspects really called my attention because I totally agree with them. It is totally true students do not see any purpose on going to school since for most of them, that is extremely abstract, and they conceive learning as a boring activity, which makes me feel very sad because learning should be a natural process based on our previous knowledge and experiences, and it should be meaningful for every single learner.
DeleteAlso, culture and economy, as you pointed out, nowadays, are not responding to the needs society has. Individualization has been reinforced rather than collaborative work, and links between nations are not strong enough to keep up with the hard work of recognizing differences and reinforcing team work and collaboration among students in the national as well as in international contexts.
It really called my attention how outrageously we are medicating our children. The only aim is to domesticate them so they become part of what is thought and accepted as normal behavior. ADHD may be a brain disorder, but it does not always mean students have to take drugs to minimize its effect. We should also be trained to tackle this issue in our daily teaching practice. Stillness and memorization seems to guarantee the reputation of a well-behaved kid which does not necessarily translate into a socially and intellectual successful kid.
DeleteI totally agree with you, I do not consider necessary to medicate kids unless there is no other way to help them behave as it is expected. I believe there are some other techniques to help individuals behave properly and which can be used in the class to assist them in the process. Sometimes kids just need some attention and a little bit of structured patterns so that they know what to do in the classroom.
DeleteIt is a shame that our government thinks about the country's education system as free and mandatory without paying attention to students' needs and preferences. Students spend most of their childhood and teenage years in a classroom memorizing information to write it on a piece of paper called exam and which is going to be forgotten later, only with the purpose of getting a good grade which in many cases, a high score is associated to skillful and intelligent students, and this is not true. There is a great amount of students with awesome and creative abilities that ate never taken into account, and students who get bored of the system because they feel they are being forced to do something that they do not like and it is true. For example, there are many stereotypes that parents and teachers give on students because maybe their needs or learning preferences are different, and this happens because we never pay attention to them. It would be nice to implement cooperative work where the students get together and create knowledge, their own knowledge and talent which may be effective and successful in society.
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ReplyDeleteHi professor and classmates!
ReplyDeleteThis comment is in regards to the second video:
Nowadays, there are teachers, professors, counselors and principals working on school policies and programs to provide students with the necessary input and opportunities to help them develop and perform in an appropriate and knowledgeable way in a variety of contexts. Many private institutions (mainly) are trying to make the learning process effective, meaningful and useful for students, it is a process in which understanding learning comprises the importance of being able to use what is learned at school in some other contexts in the community, and integrating critical thinking abilities along with language skills. I think that learning must be conceived as a life-long process in which Learning Integrated by Design, as pointed out in the video, is the key for success. Also, I really liked the description of the future of learning models in which this process must be: personalized, learner-driven (learner centered), applied, cost-effective and tech-enabled, since I totally agree with those aspects, and I consider that an appropriate balance among them can be effective.
I loved the model, so I would like to share with you this screenshot from the video:
It seems that most human failure is blamed at education. It may carried some of this responsibility to a certain extend. The question that rises is what is understood as education. One of its concepts is understood to be hold in a four-wall building or classroom setting. Education then is restrained to one single setting full of concepts restrained in single subjects, single teachers, single syllabus, and a single idea to define human beings. Standardization then seems to horizontally permeate and define the concept of education that is hold at educational institutions which have been called as schools. Based on the videos watched, this value was founded on the industrialization era for it was needed to train humans to develop a specialized knowledge in order to carry out mechanical and specify duties. Education aimed at training humans for production more than for knowledge construction. Habits, drills, and a mechanical sense of knowledge was everything that was required to guarantee the kind of success needed at that time.
ReplyDeleteNevertheless, humans’ settings, contexts, values, and the perspective of what, when, where, how and to what extend knowledge is required has substantially shifted. Humans have evolved along with time and the needs and reality is not the same as it was four centuries ago. In contrast, education seems to be lagged for it did not mutate along with humans´ reality. Likewise, what meant to be intelligent and skillful four decades ago does not longer apply nowadays. As a consequence, instead of exposing humans to learning experiences, the system is submitting humans to a fragmented instructional system where the truly beings is being marginalized.
There is the need then not to simply become aware of it, but to practically reconsider an integrating learning approach where education is understood as the sum of all life-learning experiences. The aim will be then to provide an education where knowledge is integrated as one single-convergent, dynamic and applied experience that provides humans with the required tools to understand, interact, make decisions and transform their reality and their surroundings, and where its content responds to a realistic and current need more than to a mechanical isolated concept of knowledge
Pau:
DeleteYou are right. The key aspect is the definition of what education is. It is a shame "the system" conceives education as a four-wall setting in which the institution must "form" human beings. Just the verb "to form" is seemed from the ethymologist perception of thinking that students are incomplete human beings who need to be "built" by the teacher and under the institution's principles. This conception responds to the industrialized model created in the past which is completely useless nowadays. Students do not need to be formed; they need to be guided in a context that must respect differences and uniqueness.
The issue relies not just on what to teach but on HOW to address teaching.
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DeleteI agree with you, and I think that sometimes the problem raises from how people conceive teaching, learning and from the policies created many years ago, which worked to some extend before, but which are not effective anymore.
DeleteRegarding the first video, what shocks me is that we are still reproducing this educational system conceived on the industrial revolution era. Curricula continue pleasing economic interest and the educational system standardizes students and takes out those that do not fit the norm. We offer an education that internalize in students the values and ideologies of a dominant society. Just take a look to the findings of the twentieth report of the “Estado de la Nacion”, the big among of unemployment lays on young people; perhaps, students that were excluded from the system for being “non smart people” or as the video says because nowadays there is not a guarantee that an educational degree will give you a job. For me, this is the real Costa Rican panorama. The system and curriculum are not focusing on the learner instead they are focusing on what to teach to keep the cycle and professors are governed by superior forces.
ReplyDeleteThe second video complements the first one and brings up the idea of an educational system that integrates diversity and be respectful toward cultural identity; moreover, an educational system that acknowledges the social, cultural and economic dimensions of today’s families. As the video says, "it is not a matter of dreaming or dreading", it is a matter of seeking for the balance between social needs and human fulfillment. Of course it might sound utopic, but for me, it is just doing what is at hand and gives the people that surround you a better treat and hope because beyond that it is not up to you.
It really called my attention when you mentioned “non-smart people” for this concept or definition of what it means to be smart is also addressed in one of the videos. We are to belief intelligence relies on encyclopedic information. That is, the more information a human is able to store in the brain, the more intelligence this person is assume to be. Nevertheless, today´s societies require more than encyclopedic knowledge for there is the need to be able to translate data into practical knowledge in order to perform a job where there is the need to make decisions, to think with others to work with others, and to apply concepts into practical situations. I once had an amazing brilliant student who always got a 100 in every subject. He could talk about almost any topic: history, science, technology. His storage-memory capacity was amazing; nevertheless, he did not have the social skills to work with other for he was a very selfish kid who thought working with others would only interfere with the flow of his thoughts. The workflow challenges have shifted for now many companies look for people who have social skills in order to work with others and to be able to lead processes instead of people with encyclopedic brains who only manage a specialized subject matter. There is the need then to expose students to the development of some other skills, such as collaborative and cooperative learning, decision making, thinking out of the box, among others.
DeleteYes, Paula, you are right. Your capacity to store information doesn't make you more or less intelligence. The problem is that our Educational System is still conceived under that pervert assumption and many of us inhereted along the years while some other gave up because didn't reach the standards. For me, get rid of that idea was such a satisfaction that took me to get my first job to understand that good grades and a honor roll were not a guarantee of my performance. And you and I know that companies nowadays dig so much on interpersonal skills; that what we can do as teachers is to teach students that there are 7 more intelligences and that deductive reasoning is not the cherry of the cake.
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DeleteThat's right sometimes the word "intelligence" is just linked to being able to memorize tons of information or to use numbers accurately and fast, which reduces the concept a lot making some people feel unable to perform properly; however, I think that an essential part of our job is to teach students that intelligence conveys a deeper meaning and comprises thousands of aspects.
DeleteLook at this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfN5SSiRoPs
DeleteI have always being against memorization. I was forced during my six year of school to memorize every single word after completing summaries (questionnaires) and I remember this school teacher making jokes about who wrote more memorized words as possible in this long tests, and she screamed and got mad when you gave your point of view. It is clear that I do not want to be like her. I like to have dynamic classes with active participation and experience sharing. This doesn't mean that students are more intelligent than others only because they can answer better than others (paraphrasing or copying others' ideas) making students feel they cannot do their best at school. We all have opportunities to learn and we all do it differently. It is fact as it is mentioned in the second video there are those who get lost in the way, others who succeed and those who change their ways for certain purposes, such as finishing faster, learning more, being hired faster than others all with the purpose of answering society's needs, but where are students' needs? they have the answer once we pay attention to what they have to say and show us in class.
DeleteMemorization also afected my high school years. At that time, memorization was the only way I could learn (or at least what I conceived as learning). I have a photographic memory; that helped me to swallow information, and it worked because that was evaluation forced us to do.
DeleteWhen I started my major, everything changed. I had to learn how to learn and to be critical. But believe me that it was a difficult process because it was a mind change.
Yes Karlis, It happened to me I am good at memorization, but when I started the University (veterinary) I had to learn to be a critical person it was difficult, but not impossible. Now I try to teach my students in that way, they have to have critical thinking because they have to express themselves and it can help when they will start the university.
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ReplyDeleteThese videos made me remember about both my learning process and my teaching practice. I remember when I started learning and getting skills for life, especially dealing with English learning. I did not know what to have a computer was until I became 14 years old. My childhood was a balance between spare time and studying; studying was the heaviest time where I spent most of my time, and nothing was more important than achieving academic tasks and studying for exams. There was not internet to take advantage of, flash drives to safe information or electronic gadgets to work with. Pen, pencil and paper were the main tools for demonstrating learning. If I compare my learning process with the ones I see every day at work as a language teacher, things have really changed a lot. I worried to get good grades and get a certificate, currently students just want to accomplish their responsibility as students, and they do not care about their learning or improvement. For example, they just copy and paste information which is never read or checked to include personal points of view. Technology offers them answers they need and the only thing what matters is to finish academic processes to start working as soon as possible. Media offers huge diversity of entertainment and joyful events that catch students’ attention, more than a simple class where they get bored.
ReplyDeleteAs a teacher, for instance, a feel this pressure of bringing innovation to the class to make students feel the necessity of learning in a classroom for learning something and getting skills to improve in life. I have experience these situations in which students want to run away from class to do something catchy, funny and totally associated with their likes and interests. Although most of them pay, it is a hard competition against fashion, technology and cyber spaces that are totally unknown for me. The best way to make them reflect about their learning is taking into account their needs to learn based on what they prefer and enjoy. How can this personal perspective match with the education system the government offers? How can we deal with a system where students are just a maze quantity? How can we make students feel a class interesting in a classroom with broken chairs and just a board and a world full or work, color, music, fashion and energy? How can we avoid them feel frustration while answering tests if there is a world outside looking for their talent? One solution can be carrying out projects where they use their knowledge, talent and experience to create the theory or product they feel identified with. Create something that is printed with their creativity and perspective, where the teacher is a facilitator and not a judge, a super hero with human values and sensitivity and not a lawyer in charge of summing up numbers to relate this numeric value to life qualities and skills.
Hello Victor, I watched the video. I liked these kinds of animated drawings certainly; they are more interesting than a PPP. Therefore, I’m sure ICT’s make attractive the learning process. However, I think that first of all, our Educational System needs to overcome the problem of accessibility because there are still areas in the country that do not have computers or internet access; for example, high schools in Talamanca. So, before think on how to use ICT smartly to improve the learning, we must guarantee access to technology. After that, I would think on how to make technology visible in the curriculum and not only learn about some software but also how to be critical and selective toward the information that you find on the web.
ReplyDeleteI liked this video and some ideas come to my mind related to my reality are
ReplyDelete• develop students' observation skills
• develop students' visual literacy skills
• make connections between observations and ideas
• encourage creativity
• enhance inclusive engagement
• practice representing and communicating ideas
• reveal student understandings and misconceptions
For teachers it is a challenge and by using this can help students to get more information about the language.
I agree with you Victor, sometimes as teachers we do not take into account students likes and dislikes and the result boring classes.
ReplyDeleteAccording to my experience, when teachers ask students about what they want to learn in order to improve their knowledge, we can get excellent results.
Laura I agree with you and I know that some institutions do not have equipment, but sometimes teachers can use their own equipment in order to use technology with their students and help them to use it.