Blog Post 8

"This is How We Dreams" Parts 1 & 2 -Richard Miller

During this presentation, Richard E. Miller uses multimedia to show, "what can be done to change from a reading/writing culture to a listening/watching culture and still have our students contribute to the products being listened to and watched."

I love books, so I can definnitely relate to Dr. Miller and I think they are wonderful tools for teaching. I do not entirely agree with his thoughts on becoming what seems to be a paperless world. It seems like a good idea in theory. For example, he says that even when you take something from the web, it's still there for others to access, unlike when you check out a book from the library. That is an excellent point! What I don't agree with is, we shouldn't steer completely away from real books and writing on paper. There are skills kids learn from doing those things. When writing a paper, there is no spell or grammer checks. Kids also improve their handwriting by writing on paper. I know I have become entirely too dependent on things such as spell and grammer checks, and hitting they "synonym" button. I believe it is an injustice to students to have them do all of their writing on computers.

Overall, I like the concept. Being able to access all kinds of information is completely awesome. I do believe; however, that we just need to be careful to not let it take over. Books, in my opinion, are important. Many may not agree with me, but I don't think we should steer away from making kids learn skills like writing properly.


"The Chipper Series" and "EDM310 for Dummies"
Both of these videos were very informative. I think "The Chipper Series" captivates the minds of many college students. I rarely procrastinate and always like to stay ahead; however, I do like to work on my own time frame. I do think some students believe the "present is the future" and like to procrastinate or let the time get away from them. I have to disagree with Chipper that Dr. Strange is not doing his job because I believe we do get taught in this class, possibly more so than others. I don't think it's completely the teacher's responsibility to do ALL of the teaching; I believe they should be there for guidance. Teaching yourself forces you to learn (if you want to learn). To me...sitting on Facebook while tuning out a lecture is not exactly a quality education and you definitely aren't taking anything away from it besides knowing Jane Doe just ate lunch, your mom misses you, and Billy just went to the restroom. (I love Facebook, just think it should be used outside of class.) Sometimes we students think we know best, and a lot of students want an easy way out and don't want to learn. EDM310 takes commitment and responsibilty to get the weekly assignments complete and submitted on time! If you have questions, it is also your responsibilty to get those answered. It is a fun class if you like to learn and are good at teaching yourself, but there is no "easy" way out.

"EDM310 for Dummies" was a very cute video. I also love the way it was set up as a commercial. I guess when you put it into perspective, it's a lot easier than we think. To begin with, I thought I was in over my head and was confused beyond belief. Now, it is a fun and very interesting class. I am constantly learning new things and expanding my PLN. All students should see this video at the beginning of the semester and hopefully know, there is no reason to "go crazy."

I think someone should make a "Google Docs for Dummies." I know there are tutorials everywhere for it, but I think it could be better explained and learned from students who have encountered the same problems. Google Docs essentially isn't hard to use, the different buttons and tools just are not exactly the same as Word. It is also complicated to figure out how to get the summaries from the forms posted to our blogs. The video that was referenced in the blog instructions no longer works.


"Learning to Change, Changing to Learn"
This video "fundamentally attacks much of 'schooling' as we know it today." I agree with this video that kids have a more stimulating environment outside of school than inside the classrooms. Schools are just one of the many places students learn. A lot of their learning comes from online resources, people in the community...etc. Sadly, most of the tools students use to communicate and collaborate and learn from are banned from schools. I believe the classrooms should change from classroom systems to community systems, where students come to school to work on joint projects while using social collaboration and their resources from the community and possibly world-wide. Technology is needed to better prepare our students for college and life. Our world is a technological world and our students do not need facts crammed down their throats to "burp" up on test. They need skills to: find information, validate that information, synthesize the information, communicate the information, collaborate with others, and develop the skills to solve problems. I totally agree it is "foolish" to teach toward Standardized Tests that essentially will not benefit the students' lives.


"The Secret Powers of Time" -Philip Zamardo
In this video, Philip states there are 6 times zones people live in:

Past- 1. People who focus on the good times (past positive).

         2. People who focus on the bad times (past negative).

Present- 1. Hedonistic people who live for pleasure and avoid pain.

              2. Believers of "fate".

Future- 1. People who work rather than play, hoping for success.

            2. Believers that true life begins after their life here on Earth ends.

Mr. Zamardo demonstrated how time perspective characterizes nations. Here in the United States, cities who have a higher pace of life also contain more men with coronary problems. I believe this is possibly because they do not take the time out of their busy, daily schedules to exercise or eat proper meals. "Waiting is a waste of time." Mr. Zamardo also makes a very interesting illustration concerning boys in todays' society. In the United States, a child drops out of school every 9 seconds. Yes, every 9. This problem occurs more amongst males. Mr. Zamardo believes this is because males spend oodles of time playing video games and their brains become rewired. After this happens, they no longer fit into traditional classrooms that is sadly mostly analogue. Because of this rewiring, school is boring and does not keep their attention. This is another reason why schools should embrace the time revolution and start incorporating more technology into their classrooms. If classrooms are more engaging, I think students are more apt to come to class!


"Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us." -David Pink

This video is also very interesting. Mr. Pink states, "We are not as endlessly manipulabe and predictable as you would think!" He told about a study and has shocking results. He believed (as most all do) that, if you reward something you get more behaviour you want. If you punish something, you get less behaviour you want. They carried out studies all over the world where people were given incentives such as bonuses and more pay for better performance. The shocking results were, they found larger rewards led to poorer performance. For task such as, "If this...then that" outcomes were great. For task that took more cognitive ability such as using algorithms, performance suffered. Mr. Pink list 3 factors that lead to better performace:

1. Atonomy- I totally agree with this because people like to be self-directed.

2. Mastery- People also like to master skills and things they are interested in.

3. Purpose

I wouldn't have guessed that incentives like higher pay would result in poorer performance....interesting stuff!

"Education is what remains after one has

 forgotten what one has learned in school." 

-Albert Einstein