Canadian Mac Forums at ehMac banner

Education - doing it differently

1K views 14 replies 9 participants last post by  Dr.G. 
#1 · (Edited)
Can These Simple Cartoons Help Redesign Education?

Were you bored in school? Guess what, so was Einstein! Does that make you a genius, too? Not likely, but according to a new project called Born to Learn, it does suggest that our educational practices might need a rethink. The project’s main thrust is a series of short, simple animations aimed at raising awareness about how the minds of young humans are "born to learn"--but not necessarily "be taught." Here’s their intro:
+ YouTube Video
ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.


(Fast Company)
 
#3 ·
Cartoons form an integral part of how I teach and even how students reflect/respond in their learning. For example, rather than give students questions on a test or in a reading response task, I give them blank cartoons with limited number of caption bubbles (including different types of caption fields) to give me a main or core idea. Just one small example.

Cartoons are awesome and a powerful way to teach inferencing and literary skills. It's amazing to learn what students bring to proverbial table when given a political cartoon or even a video of the old WB toons. Bugs was a master of juxtaposition!
 
#5 ·
Great minds think alike, iLabAn. I had to model some of the ways a student might go about these sorts of captions. Sadly, it took a great deal of time to convince my students that there was not just one correct answer. These were high school students who were taught to find the right answer rather than to consider answers that made sense. :(
 
#6 ·
My parents are among the handful of people who've been trying to move education in these directions since the 1960's. The educational system (especially at the university level) is extremely resistant to change - any modifications are met with "this is the way we've always done it" and efforts to promote even the most infinitesimal evolutionary changes are entombed in bureaucratic processes almost immediately. It's very frustrating.
 
#13 ·
I agree our whole education system needs to be rethought. Through high school I found that it was mostly self taught as class time was never spent on learning anything. We were either taking up homework or talking about hockey, it got to a point where I would just sign myself out so I can do the work instead of sitting through an hour of nothing. Personally the most interesting and intriguing classes were the hands on, art, graphic design, auto shop and television arts. Although I did have friends hellbent on getting 100/100 in every academic class. I guess there needs to be a balance between the two, even though the hands on has helped my life and career more.

The "quantifiable mark" is absolutely laughable in any post secondary art program. Art is largely subjective, most marks I found were based on how much the professor liked or disliked you. Also for some reason the highest mark most if not all professors gave out was an 80% a 90% was given out once in a blue moon. Not that I really cared but seeing that most scholarships are based on grades having a 20% deficit to start automatically disqualifies you for any when competing against students in academic programs.

Can't complain about the quality of my post secondary education though, a longer apprenticeship program at the end would have been nice. If I did have one complaint about post-secondary though it would be the churning out of so many students in programs that have no jobs. They need to adapt, refocus and project what will be needed in the future instead of being focussed on maximizing the amount of students and dollars it brings in.
 
#14 ·
I'm not a teacher, but I was for a long time a professional student, and a grad student, so I have taught many, many classes. I excel at lecture style classes, but that's because I'm a funny person and entertaining enough so that people generally don't get bored.

HOWEVER, over the years I've come to the conclusion that the Socratic method -- one of "guided discussion" and open debate -- is the best method for teaching young people above the age of seven or so, ie when the abstract brain begins forming. Kids **LOVE** learning things when they believe they have figured it out for themselves, and guided discussion forced them to reason, to construct logical arguments, and generally engages exactly the same brain areas that make puzzle video games so popular.

In a nutshell, teach people HOW to think, to reason, to articulate their rationale -- and then give them some space to play, travel, discover -- and I think you have all the makings of a successful student for a lifetime for most people. There are obviously some exceptions but I'm talking about typical students here.

Or as I used to say "show me a person who can read well, who can write well, who can listen and who can think, and I'll show you a king among men."
 
#15 ·
Amen, chas. This is how I taught when I was in an actual classroom, and this is how I teach in my various online courses. Some students rebel against the notion that there is not one right answer, or that I don't directly give them the info, but most come to see this as a more authentic manner of learning.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top