I’m reading a new book about today’s students and how they learn as well as how schools need to change in order to prepare students for the future. While it’s an exciting time, I wonder if it is truly possible for us to make such extensive changes in our existing school settings.
For example, Kelly, McCain, and Jukes advocate greater usage of online collaboration among students. While many teachers try to do this, popular online sites that encourage collaboration (Facebook, Twitter, for example) are blocked by most school systems because we want to protect students from inappropriate or even dangerous material or online predators. When we incorporate the use of approved websites, however, students must spend more of their time learning a new online platform instead of investigating the topic we have assigned.
In the opening chapter of the book, the authors propose changes in instructional techniques that schools must take to help prepare students.
- Shift from lecture formats to discovery learning.
- Shift from text materials to more visual sources (photos, videos, etc).
- Include use of hyperlinked sources students access randomly.
- Allow students more time to colloborate and network, including with experts and individuals outside the school
As with any needed changes in education, most of us probably start worrying as soon as we see lists of things we need to do and worry that we need to revamp our programs overnight. Long standing and effective changes, however, usually happen gradually. As I look at this list of changes, I realize that in the past few years I have included these shifts if my instruction, but I probably just need to do more. At the same time, I think the changes we make also depend on the subjects we teach. For example, as an English teacher, I believe all of these shifts are important, but I will never shift totally away from written texts, and I don’t think anyone would suggest that I should.
If you want a good book to read, I would strongly recommend Teaching the Digital Generation. If you want a rationale for reading such a book and making changes in education, take a look at this popular video.
