As a Teaching Artist, I get to attend some great workshops to keep me learning and on my toes.  I traveled to the NJPSA folks for William Richardson’s presentation -Bye, Bye Blackboard.

 

Amongst the relevations and thoughts…

Treat the web as an opportunity and not a threat for kids.  They use the net with new skills, and the learning process gains from creative (and therefore, self-motivated) investigation and presentation skills.  Kids can connect, collectively collaborate, and create on the computer.  It’s a ‘techtonic’ shift in education in that learning experiences are no longer tied to a time and a place – you can partake at any time, with any one in the world, with video, blogs, etc. and form groups of kids, adults, experts with similar passions.  Again, passionate learning works the best.

 

William also stressed that teachers have to break from being ‘content providers’ to become ‘learners’, too, modelling the network capabilities for the kids, guiding them in the use of the web, from 1st grade through 12th grade.  Teach the kids ethical and safe ways to explore and learn. 

 

Thoughts: 

 

RockRoots:  I could use WIKI to put U-tubes of the RockRoots references.  Imagine hearing about Muddy Waters, and then checking out the power of seeing him play.  Wow.  I’ll be working on that.

 

My residency work:  Imagine writing a song, recording the song (which I do now), and then publishing the work (sound, lyrics, art work, etc.) onto the web.  Get feedback from the world (CRITICAL SKILLS) , find out where people are listening from (yes, world-wide web) (GLOBAL AWARENESS, and GEOGRAPHY), math (HOW MANY HITS TODAY?), etc. In the residency, I (and the kids and teachers) have been been able to share on a school-wide basis, but why limit your horizons in the 21st Century?