My mind is on fire. I am in the flow. I can’t stop thinking. My body tingles with learning. I am awash in artistic and intellectual juices. A bit much? Sure, but I am loving this feeling. I am drunk with the excitement generated by my mind and its connection to so many things, ideas, places, and people. Let me quickly walk you through my morning. Warning there will be many links. Do not be lazy, take a second and at least open them and skim around.
I woke up around 5:45 am as I do everyday and took a quick inventory of my online life. Checked some Tweet, read some emails, and followed up on comments and links to my posts and of course checked to see if anything exciting is happening on Facebook. (Not really by the way. Why is Facebook always the dullest part of my online life? Facebook friends, one of you, if you are here by some fluke leave a comment, join the conversation. Jump in please I beg of you!)
I was so excited to see a few Tweets and links to this post by Brian Lamb, in which he and a few other members of #ds106 had taken the poem I had written using Gardner Campbell’s talk and turned it into a song. Read the comment thread for my thoughts on that.
I then moved on to a few blog posts by Alan Levine and D’Arcy Norman that had me in a fog of thought for most of the day. Again follow the comment threads for my attempts to articulate my ideas.
Finally, once in school, I got into a nice little discussion about the usefulness of PowerPoint as a tool, the philosophical differences between telling stories and sharing information, and the general state of the perpetuated stench of habitual teaching.
And that’s all before lunch. I have already taught a class, pushed into another, and tried to wrestle about ten different ideas into this post. It is exhausting, but also very exciting. I would give my left foot if I could ever generate this kind of enthusiasm about learning with my students!
That’s it huh? The big question: How do we get learners excited about learning? Rather than pontificate or pull up research, let me just share some stories about how and why I am so excited today:
Sorry about the audio. Apparently photobooth not only doesn’t play nice with Blogger, but Youtube as well. Lesson learned.
As I was saying, I am also excited by the fact that I am actively involved in a differentiated environment. And by being so, I am able to understand better what it feels like for my students….
Sorry about the audio. Apparently photobooth not only doesn’t play nice with Blogger, but Youtube as well. Lesson learned.
Whoo! I think I got most of it out. I needed to jettison that intellectual weight; I feel much better. So what do you think about anything I said. Jump in, let’s keep the flow going.
**waves a hand from the Facebook peanut gallery**
Question: are all the participants in the course you’re taking adult participants?
You don’t count as Facebook gallery! We have never met. You were Twitter first. I mean friends i have had for years who rarely do “this” kind of thing.
And yes they are all adults, though some are undergrads from Jim’s school. Why do you ask?
Oh, the pain! I’ve been relegated to the “You’re only a Web 2.0 friend” category.
Harumph.
My Q about whether the learners were adults is because the unstructured, self-guided, open learning you talk about here… well… I think it’s sometimes easier to do and feel those things as an adult learner who has come to that course for a purpose than as a child. I’m not sure there is a realistic transfer of all that you’re feeling to all that our students endure and feel, for (obvious) reasons related to psychological development.
… not to mention that you’re an educator, who loves learning. Not all learners are both — or even one — of those.
You know what I mean; the Facebook people who are friends from different walks of life, but rarely venture past the confines of Facebook for sociability. Anyway, don’t to hijak the thred in that direction.
As for being an adult, you are absolutely right that it is easier to get excited about a side project when my “future” and college and all that jazz doesn’t ride on what I get in AP history but having said that why not?
We talk a big game about ed reform and life long learning, but when push comes to shove we revert back to what is familiar and realistic. We’ve all had this talk a millions times all over the web, but school doesn’t have to be the way it is.
We can experiment with giving kids alternative ways to express learning, direct learning, or what not, but it is messy and unquantifiable, so we choose not to.
I think we, as educators, need to experience different ways of expression and learning, so we have fresh ideas to bring to kids. Children love to learn and are imaginative and open to new ideas when they start school, but lose that under the weight of academics usually by six grade.
It is not “realistic to transfer all that I’m feeling to all that our students endure and feel,” but sometimes we may need to move beyond reality and dream big.
I hear your point and agree with you, but I am thinking out loud and the voice says that perhaps we don’t change all schools and universities into open ended courses that allow students to learn what hey want, how they want, but we can take baby steps. Every teacher can at least “assign” open ended assessments and see how they go. I for one, plan to do just that soon.
That’s awesome you’re so stoked about this class! I love that feeling. I’m someone who could take classes and go to school forever. I love learning. And damn am I happy to live in a world where I can connect with amazingly intelligent people all across the world, learn whenever I want, and rarely pay a cent for it. If I could sum up my teaching philosophy or teaching goal really, it would be to somehow get my students to this place – a place where they love to learn just because it’s so fulfilling and not for a grade, certificate, or points of some kind. Keep sharing about this class. I’m jealous I’m not taking it!
You could join in, it is not too late.
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Those of us taking the class without credit are obviously somewhat self-motivated to participate from the get go, or else we wouldn’t be here. Getting all these self-motivated, enthusiastic people together is a recipe for awesome sauce. I think in some way, despite all our differences of viewpoints, backgrounds, and philosophies there is still something underlying that we have in common that is making for a magic community. How do we create an environment in which the students come together in the right combination to make their own awesome sauce?
I think that is the million dollar question Brad: “How do we create an environment in which the students come together in the right combination to make their own awesome sauce?”
I think we all know the answer, or at least some of the answers and we seem to echo them about these tiny chambers we have created, the next question is how do we move beyond talking and reform to actually dynamic changes in structure? Like any revolution, the gears of reform must become so tedious and ineffectual that action is inevitable.
How long before we are there? What do we do in the meantime? Great ideas. Thanks
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