Comments on: Building Something Interesting, Engaging and Ingenious http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/ Learning with the Read/Write Web Tue, 19 Jul 2011 20:36:16 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Weekly Roundup (10 September 2006) at teaching.mrbelshaw.co.uk http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5899 Weekly Roundup (10 September 2006) at teaching.mrbelshaw.co.uk Sun, 10 Sep 2006 18:43:21 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5899 [...] Chris Sessums - ALT-C 2006 — Transforming Learning: Evolution or Revolution (commented upon by Will Richardson and George Siemens) [...] [...] Chris Sessums – ALT-C 2006 — Transforming Learning: Evolution or Revolution (commented upon by Will Richardson and George Siemens) [...]

]]> By: Andrew Pass http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5898 Andrew Pass Sun, 10 Sep 2006 17:13:04 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5898 Will, I don't think that we need college campuses for higher academic education, anymore. But college campuses provide something else. They provide an opportnity for social development and growth. They provide an opportunity for maturation. As the human race we will never be able to eliminate face-to-face social interaction. I, for one, wouldn't want to do so. Andrew Pass http://www.Pass-Ed.com/blogger.html Will, I don’t think that we need college campuses for higher academic education, anymore. But college campuses provide something else. They provide an opportnity for social development and growth. They provide an opportunity for maturation. As the human race we will never be able to eliminate face-to-face social interaction. I, for one, wouldn’t want to do so.

Andrew Pass
http://www.Pass-Ed.com/blogger.html

]]> By: Karen http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5897 Karen Sun, 10 Sep 2006 16:44:12 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5897 I would love to have any and all of you comment on our SUNY Cortland course blog for a grad. class in tech. apps for ELA classrooms. http://alexreid.typepad.com/eng506 The 9/10 post is asking many of the same questions you are here including some discussion of Friedman's notion of idea-based knowledge workers and references to the attention economy Lankshear/Knobel cite in their chapter in Donna Alvermann's edited collection: "Adolescents and Literacies in a Digital Age" which we read in this class. Higher ed is moving way too slowly. Would anyone agree this is a transition period and we have one foot in the old paradigm of what college classrooms and student work in them should look like and one foot in the 3.0 world? Karen I would love to have any and all of you comment on our SUNY Cortland course blog for a grad. class in tech. apps for ELA classrooms.

http://alexreid.typepad.com/eng506

The 9/10 post is asking many of the same questions you are here including some discussion of Friedman’s notion of idea-based knowledge workers and references to the attention economy Lankshear/Knobel cite in their chapter in Donna Alvermann’s edited collection: “Adolescents and Literacies in a Digital Age” which we read in this class.

Higher ed is moving way too slowly. Would anyone agree this is a transition period and we have one foot in the old paradigm of what college classrooms and student work in them should look like and one foot in the 3.0 world?

Karen

]]> By: Learning Is Messy - Blog » Blog Archive » Society May Be Willing To Invest In Children If They Are Seen As An Immediate Value To Society http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5886 Learning Is Messy - Blog » Blog Archive » Society May Be Willing To Invest In Children If They Are Seen As An Immediate Value To Society Sun, 10 Sep 2006 04:46:43 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5886 [...] We of the edbloggosphere have bemoaned the snail’s pace progress in educational change. One of the issues I believe is that kids are perceived by society as only having the potential to contribute to society sometime in the future. If kids were appreciated for what they can contribute now, and that “contribution” was valued by society, perhaps society would be more willing to “invest” more substantially in them at an earlier age. One of the transformative aspects of technology is that it allows students to produce finished products that others have access to and can use: Other students, other members of the local community and members of the global community. [...] [...] We of the edbloggosphere have bemoaned the snail’s pace progress in educational change. One of the issues I believe is that kids are perceived by society as only having the potential to contribute to society sometime in the future. If kids were appreciated for what they can contribute now, and that “contribution” was valued by society, perhaps society would be more willing to “invest” more substantially in them at an earlier age. One of the transformative aspects of technology is that it allows students to produce finished products that others have access to and can use: Other students, other members of the local community and members of the global community. [...]

]]> By: Tracy Fowler http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5885 Tracy Fowler Sun, 10 Sep 2006 04:43:21 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5885 In response to Karen's post... Higher education is taking notice, but I think their thinking is far behind what is likely to happen. Your post made me do a quick Google to see what people are saying. Norma Scagnoli, Program Coordinator for online programs at University of Illinois, writing about the Impact of Online Education on Traditional Campus-Based Education concludes: "The use of Web technologies has had an impact on classroom teaching, but this influence is not as extensive or widespread as it is in communications and entertainment. Higher education institutions have invested in hardware, software, and wired classrooms, but not as much in resources for research, or in training, and support. Therefore, the center of knowledge creation—teaching and learning—still remains very much unchanged. Both the impact and the implications of online learning for classroom education need to be seriously addressed. Online education entails a new educational paradigm, closer to the transformative mindset that is ongoing in the twenty-first-century world outside the classroom." My husband is always fond of saying, "he never let school get in the way of his education (a quote from Mark Twain)." I wonder how many people will take on this attitude as the amount of high quality, interactive information appears on the web? In response to Karen’s post…
Higher education is taking notice, but I think their thinking is far behind what is likely to happen. Your post made me do a quick Google to see what people are saying. Norma Scagnoli, Program Coordinator for online programs at University of Illinois, writing about the Impact of Online Education on Traditional Campus-Based Education concludes: “The use of Web technologies has had an impact on classroom teaching, but this influence is not as extensive or widespread as it is in communications and entertainment. Higher education institutions have invested in hardware, software, and wired classrooms, but not as much in resources for research, or in training, and support. Therefore, the center of knowledge creation—teaching and learning—still remains very much unchanged. Both the impact and the implications of online learning for classroom education need to be seriously addressed. Online education entails a new educational paradigm, closer to the transformative mindset that is ongoing in the twenty-first-century world outside the classroom.”

My husband is always fond of saying, “he never let school get in the way of his education (a quote from Mark Twain).” I wonder how many people will take on this attitude as the amount of high quality, interactive information appears on the web?

]]> By: Karen Janowski http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5883 Karen Janowski Sun, 10 Sep 2006 01:15:29 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5883 Will, You touched upon a completely unexplored area - what does Web 2.0 do to higher education?? As you state, our kids can learn anything, anywhere, anytime. They can create content anywhere - they can explore information anywhere. What impact will this have on colleges that charge $30,000/year for four courses per semester? This will greatly impact the ivory tower and I wonder how many of those tenured academicians realize this? Why do my kids have to attend a college that doesn't even know how to teach to digital natives? Will,
You touched upon a completely unexplored area – what does Web 2.0 do to higher education?? As you state, our kids can learn anything, anywhere, anytime. They can create content anywhere – they can explore information anywhere. What impact will this have on colleges that charge $30,000/year for four courses per semester? This will greatly impact the ivory tower and I wonder how many of those tenured academicians realize this?
Why do my kids have to attend a college that doesn’t even know how to teach to digital natives?

]]> By: Bill Fitzgerald http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5882 Bill Fitzgerald Sat, 09 Sep 2006 22:45:23 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5882 Tom, RE: "A “1500 word essay” might be an assignment, but I bet there isn’t a state in the union where it is a standard" -- can I please take that bet? I'll even let you name the amount. Check the California Standards for English in Grades 9 and 10: http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/enggrades9-10.asp In the Writing section, go to: 2.0 Writing Applications (Genres and Their Characteristics) To quote the first line: "Students combine the rhetorical strategies of narration, exposition, persuasion, and description to produce texts of at least 1,500 words each." Admittedly, they do say "text" instead of "essay", but I'd say the point still holds. FWIW, the standard is repeated for grades 11-12 (http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/enggrades11-12.asp). For earlier grades, the number of words decreases. The core of Chris' argument holds together very nicely. Arbitrary standards, and their ugly cousin, high stakes testing, create an environment that interferes with innovative teaching using the latest tools. As I read Chris' text, an underlying point is that education is about people -- not standards, not tests, but about people interacting with ideas, using the best tools currently available. Standards do not need to be incompatible with that, but as long as we have standards equating word count with real learning, there will continue to be a tension between what students have to learn and what they could learn. Tom,

RE: “A “1500 word essay” might be an assignment, but I bet there isn’t a state in the union where it is a standard” — can I please take that bet? I’ll even let you name the amount.

Check the California Standards for English in Grades 9 and 10:

http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/enggrades9-10.asp

In the Writing section, go to: 2.0 Writing Applications (Genres and Their Characteristics)

To quote the first line: “Students combine the rhetorical strategies of narration, exposition, persuasion, and description to produce texts of at least 1,500 words each.”

Admittedly, they do say “text” instead of “essay”, but I’d say the point still holds.

FWIW, the standard is repeated for grades 11-12 (http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/enggrades11-12.asp).
For earlier grades, the number of words decreases.

The core of Chris’ argument holds together very nicely. Arbitrary standards, and their ugly cousin, high stakes testing, create an environment that interferes with innovative teaching using the latest tools.

As I read Chris’ text, an underlying point is that education is about people — not standards, not tests, but about people interacting with ideas, using the best tools currently available. Standards do not need to be incompatible with that, but as long as we have standards equating word count with real learning, there will continue to be a tension between what students have to learn and what they could learn.

]]> By: Tom Hoffman http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/comment-page-1/#comment-5881 Tom Hoffman Sat, 09 Sep 2006 21:54:46 +0000 http://weblogg-ed.com/2006/building-something-interesting-engaging-and-ingenious/#comment-5881 The core of Chris's argument, about standards, just isn't compelling to me as someone who has worked with contemporary K-12 standards. A "1500 word essay" might be an assignment, but I bet there isn't a state in the union where it is a standard, and the standards we used in Providence five years ago (from the <a href="http://www.ncee.org/" rel="nofollow">NCEE</a>) already promoted authentic projects like Chris mentions. The core of Chris’s argument, about standards, just isn’t compelling to me as someone who has worked with contemporary K-12 standards. A “1500 word essay” might be an assignment, but I bet there isn’t a state in the union where it is a standard, and the standards we used in Providence five years ago (from the NCEE) already promoted authentic projects like Chris mentions.

]]>