An open-letter to one Mr. John Dewey.
We talked about you in class yesterday and I’d like to get to know you better. Perhaps we can gchat? Friend eachother on Facebook? Do you Tweet? If so, I will dig out my Twitter password. Oh, you’d rather meet in person? I might have time on Sunday morning to grab a coffee, is that what you were thinking?
Can you even imagine what that experience would be like? I have SO. MANY. QUESTIONS. He would sneak out the bathroom window.
Post-class reflections:
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| Scribbles from class 7/8/2013 |
I couldn't stop thinking about this idea that the overuse of technology could be deadening students’ sense of discovery by making information SO ACCESSIBLE. My friends started this joke where they asked, “if only there were a WAY we could find out the answer” as they lit up their smartphones and found the answer. I have since made it part of my quip collection and even used it in class last week (looking back, how obnoxious of me!). In class we shared stories of being annoyed by smartphones surfacing to answer questions at dinner and the idea that quick access to information can sometimes be a buzzkill. How many conversations have ended abruptly when the internet answers the question for you? Think back to the pre-smartphone era or perhaps a little earlier. Do you remember saying, “I’m going to look that up when I get home,” and fall down some rabbit hole of discovery? I do. I also remember conversations meandering down a leisurely path that sometimes even included the discovery of a new opinion (or the affirmation of an old opinion), the discovery of a friend’s passion, or nothing more than a nice, simple conversation.
In the context of my future classroom I am curious about the effect that overuse of technology (or screen time) could have on the experiential component of discovery.
That feeling you get when you are able to see the connection between two ideas that seem worlds apart - I want my students to know that and I want it to be through their own discovery, not via the press of a button. What about the experiential aspect of learning that were important to Dewey (and Steiner and Montessori to name a few). Learning by DOING. This is perhaps the antithesis of Googling something, no? High schoolers at the Chicago Waldorf School rebuilt a motorcycle as part of a physics block. They learned the practical application of specific knowledge by DOING, not by reading and regurgitating but by watching, thinking, touching, and DOING.
How will I promote the freedom of discovery and the liberation of experience while guiding these kids to LEARN how to LEARN both with and without technology in my classroom? Where is that balance and will I ever find it?
I also have SO MANY QUESTIONS!!! I find it so interesting and amazing that Dewey's beliefs in education have held true for so many years! For such an ever changing field it amazes me that so many (pretty much all but absolutes make me nervous) still apply to schools today.
ReplyDeleteI also really resonate with your discussion of the tension between making important deep connections and technology. I agree with your points that it is very different making connections in the modern classroom. But I think that our challenge as 21st century teacher is help student cultivate these deep connections through technologies. I don't know how to do this yet but I am starting to learn about some new tools and perspectives to help me allow students to create deep connections through technology.
Eliza, your comments here also make me think of a point that I had hoped to frame with the 20 questions activity yesterday, which is the potential power of the "wrong" answer, or even more particularly, the question to which we don't have an answer. THAT gets our brains going, right? Perhaps, as an English educator, one permutation of this question would pertain to authorial intent--what did the author really mean? The desire to ask and answer that question can block out the more resonant question in which the reader has to articulate the meaning that she gives to the passage, and the reasons why she feels as she does. The fact that, in one sense, we could potentially discover that the reader's interpretation is "wrong" (she meant *this* not *that*) is both narrow and almost beside the point, and what a shame it would be if this search for authorial intent kept us from engaging in and fully developing this process of thought and analysis.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, ask great questions and I would suggest that you take comfort in the fact that the challenge you lay before yourself is both an honorable and a daunting one, worthy of a career's worth of practice. As my mentor was fond of saying "learning by doing is easier said than done!"
Eliza,
ReplyDeleteI so appreciate you putting words around a phenomenon that has bothered me for a long time. The moments when I'm sitting with my 12-year old brother and talking about how he imagines natural processes to work or about the easiest to fix something are exciting and enlivening! Why? Because we're wondering about something together and we're trying to piece together logical solutions based on our experiences. Then enters the smart phone, Wikipedia is quickly consulted and boom. Wonder moment is over and we're both left with this feeling like we just hit a wall that we weren't interested in hitting... at least not yet.
I appreciate too your desire to be a facilitator of that sense of wondering in your students' learning and of that journey of figuring out a solution themselves! I look forward to reading more of what you have to say about tech in the classroom as the year goes on!
Laura
I had an experience this evening that made me think of your comments, Laura. I decided to take a break from school for a couple hours and went on an adventure with my husband to find the old Willow Run Bomber plant where Rosie the Riveter worked - there is a little museum there and I wanted to see what there was to be seen! While we are there my husband asks if Ford & GM stopped producing cars while they were building airplanes for war (Willow Run was built as a Ford plant before they started building B-24 Liberators there). I did a quick search for the answer on my phone and read him a couple lines while were were driving and when he parked, he did a deeper search on HIS phone and then proceeded to sit and read the entire article. Silently. For what felt like and hour (probably 5 minutes). I could not stop thinking about whether or not the "wonder" or "discovery" would be halted for him or if his curiosity about the subject matter would make it a null point. In the two hours since he read that article, he's asked two different people (one a German historian, so that makes sense) if they knew the details about the relationship both Ford and GM had with the nazi regime. So now I'm wondering if this was a negative or positive interaction with a digital distraction?
ReplyDeleteI like how you reflected upon the actual educational and learning experience of DISCOVERING something new and exciting vs. looking up a fact on your phone and forgetting about it a couples days later. I took a different approach when reflecting upon this particular discussion. I was really thinking about all of the ways that looking up something on your cellphone in the middle of the conversation detracts from other aspects of the conversation itself. Is it really so important to know the right answer all of the time? Isn't it important to learn debate skills, learn how to be open to other opinions, or know how to solve conflict without having to look up the answer on your phone? These were the questions I was thinking about during that particular conversation in class. Did you think of similar things? I love your approach, looking at the issue as an opportunity to learn and discover new things as opposed to just simply looking up a fact. Interesting perspective!
ReplyDelete