An excellent physics capstone project

Greetings

Please watch the attached video - this was one of the better capstone projects.  It is also no surprise that these students did well on the physics exam.

Thanks for the extra and fine effort

Physics Capstone Video

Matt

Laruen's Post on Creative Disobedience

Lauren brings up a good point about the important role of family in kids' education.  It can be quite a barrier!

Have a read

Lauren's post

This is from Cody Minimum

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Ideas on Child Driven Education

After watching the video today about the child driven education I was pleased to find that the things we are learning in my education psychology class are ideas that are expressed all over the world.  The idea that these children can teach themselves complex ideas like dna and pythagorean theorem with only a computer and not only that but a computer in another language shows that children want to learn.  Adults are trying to control and edit the learning systems with much worse results then letting the children teach themselves.  I believe that teachers are a necessitie but we do need to change the way we think about learning and teaching.  This seems to be related to Ken Robinsons idea that schools are killing creativity.  I agree that schools are trying to mold children into what society believes is a well educated kid.  The problem is we are taking away their imagination and making them turn off the idea that they can learn what they want and the way they want.

Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education

Greetings -

I hope everyone is well.

As part of our science education and learning science SBG I would like to start a blog discussion on another TED talk that focuses on education.  Here is the link:

Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education

Here are some of my thoughts:  first, I found it a bit disturbing.  Is he saying that we can effectively eliminate teachers and students will learn on their own?  That what seems to be happening in some of the poor slums of New Delhi?  That kind of bodes poorly for us as educators!

Or can we look at it another way - given the correct guidance, mixture of direct and discovery instruction and access to technology students (even young ones who don't speak the language!) can learn (and remember) high-level content.  But can they learn the other non-cognitive skills that are required for learning - determination, stubbornness, grit - in this environment?

I liked the idea of "the granny cloud" - this brings in community involvement in the learning process, which I think is an important missing component in our educational models.  What do you think?

Another response I had was more positive.  In some ways I am trying to promote this methodology in our class.  Provide tasks, time, community and resources to investigate science content without a lot of direct instruction.  This is hard, right?  Is it effective? It certainly can be stressful at times.

Like many things - I believe that the true road lies somewhere in the middle.  I liked two quotes from the blog by Arthur C. Clarke:

A teacher that can be replaced by a machine – should be.

If children have interest, education happens.

Especially the second one resonates with me - kids want to learn and in some cases teachers need to step out of the way and let it happen.

So, to "score" for this SBG you need to post a thoughtful and detailed blog (2 would be even better).  I would like for this to be a conversation rather then a reporting.  But certainly do include some details from the video to support your statements.  This should be done by October 21st.

Thanks!  And Enjoy.

Matt

Discussion about ADHD

Greetings again

This is a discussion about the higher then usual identification of ADHD in the US as compared to other countries.  If found this interesting, shocking, stimulating, etc.  I would be interested to hear you take on it.  This is not for a grade but is something to keep an eye on, especially for the educators in the bunch (and future parents).  Remember, there is always two sides of stories!  Here is the link

Are Americans More Prone to A.D.H.D.?


Be well

Matt

Using kids' literture to teach science

Greetings

I came by an article about using children's' literature to teach science concepts.  The bottom line to the three things I read was that reading can be a great instructional strategy to introduce both content and process skills. This is vital in these days of emphasis on teaching only reading and math.  So, here it he blog

Having a great science conversation with a kid

I have also downloaded a couple of the articles and put them in Google docs as well as sharing them with everyone.

I hope these articles will be helpful for those of you headed for teaching.

Be well

Matt

You are doing great

Hey

This is for section 002 but may be applicable to section 004 as well - we just haven't started class yet.

Today's class was intense - we are confronted by several obstacles in doing this work.  New content.  New skills. Overcoming previous discomfort with science concepts and skills.  Perhaps some confusion on the specifics of the assignment.  This is all bound to create some anxiety and discomfort.  Understandable.  I would strongly suggest doing some reflecting on both the content and the skills that we are working on.  I will read these if you write them.  The writing will help you to identify areas of knowledge and areas of uncertainty for both of us.

If you are uncomfortable with blogging - send me an email.

Thanks for all your hard work, enthusiasm and good humor.

See you on Tuesday.  I will send a later email or blog to tell you what we are going to be doing.

Matt