Friday, August 3, 2012

Guest Speakers

Having Mac alum talk to us today about their schools and their experiences with technology was an interesting experience. It's so different hearing about people's actual experiences with technology in context as opposed to listening to professors lecture about it. When we sit in class and hear lectures it's so easy to brush them off. Hearing people talk about it is so...real. I feel like I learned so much about teaching with technology in the hour and a half with guest speakers--I didn't think I would be this interested.

One of the speakers was a history teacher, so it was interesting to hear her perspectives on technology. She said that in contrast to many of her colleagues, she lets students use their cell phones during class to look things up. Interestingly enough, she said that doing so takes some pressure off of her--she doesn't need to know everything because students aren't relying on getting all the information/questions answered by her. I really liked this reference because this is something I'm nervous about. With technology I will feel more comfortable admitting that I don't know something. Plus, my students will gain a sense of agency when they can look up facts and teach things to ME.

This speaker also mentioned that she likes to incorporate technology into her lessons in the form of research. She mentioned how she demonstrated the shortcomings of wikipedia by editing a page (with something she made up) and using it in class. I love this idea! After doing this she said she showed students how easy it was to edit pages in wikipedia. I think this would really drive the point home. I have always thought of teaching students to distinguish between reliable and non-reliable sources as a straightforward, boring (albeit necessary) requirement as a history teacher, but today's discussion displayed to me that I can make these traditionally boring things innovative and engaging.

I also really liked how she discussed the way that history education needs to change. I agree with her that the standard lecture, exam, paper format is not conducive to higher order thinking or high leverage practice. On a similar note, I enjoyed hearing this speaker discuss the value she places (or doesn't place) on the learning of dates. During our discussion she said that she wanted to help her students learn the chronology involved in history, rather than forcing rote memorization of dates. I couldn't agree with this more. Someone in our class questioned this, but I definitely side with the guest speaker. History is not about memorizing a list of dates. History is about learning about cause and effect, consequences of actions, and making connections between history and current events. I think in terms of history, students should learn about developing critical thinking skills, rather than rote memorization. What good is remembering a date if you don't know the implications of that date or what it means in context?

Basically....I really liked this teacher's philosophy on teaching history and on incorporating technology into her curriculum. Today was empowering :)

3 comments:

  1. So glad that the morning had resonance for you. There was a very special interplay between you guys and the panelists -- the vibe felt great.

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  2. I am glad to read in your post that the class was so worthwhile. I myself came away from it thinking that the learning experience had been so rich and real and down-to-earth that I would have difficulty blogging about it.
    I also found the discussion of history very engrossing. I do not disagree with an iota of what you write in your wonderful post, nor with a single breath of what Caroline Speer said. At the same time, I cannot let go of the importance of dates. When Caroline said she had a terrible memory, it reminded my of the endless number of students and pundits who have told me they cannot learn foreign languages. We *all* think we have have poor memory, because we all suffer from the same deficits and we all imagine we are alone. I heard a long interview with an author on memory loss on NPR and was amazed and terrifically relieved to hear that my own private issues with memory are common to everyone.
    What I do find, however, is that knowing dates helps me situate events and conceive of history as development. It is useful to know that French Symbolism took place mainly in the 1870s and that Charles Baudelaire (who inspired the movement) was a generation (33 years) older than the movement's rockstar, Arthur Rimbaud. Otherwise, I would conflate the two as contemporaries because they are both Symbolists.

    It is important for me to know that Germanic literacy began in in fourth century A.D. when Wulfila translated the Bible into Gothic and that the first Germanic king of Italy Odoacer conquered Rome in 476--the year of its "Fall".
    Otherwise, I don't know what happened when, or what happened first, and I am unable to undergo the cognitive process of reasoning by cause and effect because I do not know what happened when. Attila invaded Europe in 434 A.D. *causing* German inroads into Italy and Odoacer's rise to power in Italy and the 476 juncture in Rome's fate. Rimbaud would never have written so beautifully without the model of Baudelaire. Nor would Baudelaire have been anything without a poet twelve years his senior: Edgar Allen Poe.

    In the end, though, because we have the Internet, and cell phones, we have this knowledge secured. Interest in history takes care of itself. If one loves history, as I do, and as I know you do, and Caroline does, then it's all good, and the consciousness of the impossibility of being encyclopedic is merely a sign of scientific integrity. What really informs and sustains historians, I feel, is a love of humanity. And a resultant desire to understand our story. The exact configuration of one's knowledge of history will accord with one's spirit. The issue, fundamentally, is that the true subject of history--the human being--is itself unquantifiable. By mere dates or otherwise.

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  3. mmm...jimmy johns, lol

    I found the perspectives interesting as well. I was taken with the idea of using smart phones in class and think that is something I would like to take advantage of once I am teaching. I like all the new technologies and I can hardly wait to include as many as I can into my classroom! I have always thought dates are not what is most important about history but what happened and how it influenced our move forward. The student I was working with at Scarlett had an interesting set of books that intrigued me..they were based on history but depending on what choices you made, influenced how the final historical record turned out...the date did not matter at all, what did matter was the choices...

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