Dr. Hargrave posed a question this week about which theoretical frameworks should inform our work today and tomorrow and then asked if it should or shouldn't be reconstructionism. I think that some technology has already started to do some of the things that reconstructionism focuses upon such as: curriculum develops internationalism (Skype and work with other schools around the world and bringing people into the classroom), curriculum examines current social issues (I think that there could be more of this in our current education system and this piece is missing but some educators are moving in this direction, I think it should be taught even more), technology should be used to facilitate change (I think that we are seeing this happening because we are discussing things such as the digital divide, globalization, and equity vs. equality). I think that pieces of the reconstructionism theory are vitally important and should be used in our teaching of the students of tomorrow. The pieces I think are missing and we should put more of a focus upon are: emphasize social change, I think that it is very disheartening the things that are taking place within society and if we put more of an emphasis on who and what our society looks and feels like our next generations can turn things around and not have the horrific current event tragedies we are having today, and the focus upon questioning the status quo. I think that we teach students how things are now, not to think critically and go out and change the world, but we plug them with content and don't give them enough opportunity to find things in our world that they want to change. I am thinking of Angela Maiers specifically here with her quote "You are a genius and the world needs your contribution." I have that quote on my computer as the background so that my students see it everyday when they come into class on the projector. I would like to see the U.S. education system move into a mix of the constructivist philosophy with touches of the reconstructionism theory because of the critical thinking involved in both and get away from the plug content into our students and have them regurgitate it to us on standardized tests.
Another question that I pondered throughout this week was about my role in addressing unintended consequences of technology. When thinking about unintended consequences of technology, at first I only thought about the negatives such as: texting and driving, lack of focus, eye strains, obesity, etc. Then I began to think about the example that Dr. Hargave gave about boys having problem solving skills from gaming and I began to think about other unintended consequences that aren't necessarily negative such as students having access to the entire world via the internet, being able to share work with the world, and more individualized instruction for students. My role in tackling these unintended consequences as a current 6th grade teacher is to make sure that my students understand their digital footprint and the idea that what is online stays online, I think that this is a very difficult concept for students to understand because forever is so abstract. I also must take the time to show and model for students ways to be responsible online, not just with profiles on Twitter and Facebook, but in their lives with their cell phones, their games, their creations and sharing online, etc. I think that the main way to resolve uintended consequences of technology is to teach our students how to be responsible just as we have in every generation before, but not with technology, real life situations. The technology is embedded into our students lives just like driving a car, walking alone, buying groceries, etc. that we teach students how to do, the different that I see and that I will have more of a role within is because parents and families are unfamiliar with the technology and that's where I come in because it is my job to know about the technology that my students are using and model responsibility within those situations where their parents might not be as comfortable.
One piece of learning this week that I was surprise by was my connection to critical theory in the article by Steve Talbott, Global Village. Last week I was having a hard time connecting to critical theory because I am an optimist and I have a hard time picking out the discrepancies within a system, but I agreed with most of what Talbott discussed in the article. One part of a Global Village that I disagree with is that the opportunity to pass messages around might lead to an era of peace. I am speaking about this from my own knowledge and viewings of the world currently and from what I see happening in the world, being able to pass messages and communicate freely has not led to peace, but has caused more turmoil. Connecting to that turmoil is the growing dominance of American forms, which we are seeing in Afganistan and Iraq, which are causing more and more turmoil and not peace. Globalization is a topic that I look through the lens of critical theory when discussing and thinking about. I am skeptical about globalization and the global village but I want to open my students eyes up to the world that is out there and I think that it is critical to do this, especially for my students that hardly ever get to leave Leon, Iowa, but at the same time I don't feel that globalization is a solve-all solution to societal problems, nor will is solve our problems we deal with. Yes, are we more globalized with technology, I think it would be hard to argue against that fact, has it made it better for everyone, I have my doubts. "Bridging the gap between technology does not change social interaction," Talbott. I agree with this statement completely and I think it sums up what I stated above.
The last topic that I want to reflect upon for this course is that of distance education. I think it is interesting discussing and thinking about distance education because I very much enjoy online courses and I am thankful that I have the opportunity to have distance education, but when I think about it for my students I have a different opinion and I don't know if its because I think about all of my colleagues and peers that don't do well with distance education and are afraid of it or if I think that a more traditional face to face method is best for younger students, again I am thinking about elementary. When I think about high school students, I know that they could learn and handle distance education, its really all about the effectiveness of the instructor and the content. My fear is that distance education will become the norm for students and all the courses will be focused on piping students full of content, which is what we need to get away from currently. It will take a lot of change within teacher preparation programs in order to create teachers who understand how to teach at a distance and keep the rigor and relevance at its peak for students.
I would love to use a flipped classroom method of teaching in order to have more in class time for discussions, debates, etc. but I, myself need more training and instruction on how to implement flipped teaching and how to manage it. I think that is all goes back to what we, as educators, grew up with learning from and that influences how we teach, again connecting back to the theories and philosophies that we have as educators. Our students today that are in flipped classroom and distance learning situations could be great flipped classroom teachers and distance learning teachers because it is what they have experienced. The verdict is still out for me on distance education, but within the next 5, 10, 15 years I think that it will become more prevalent within our education system and more opportunities will be provided to students to participate in distance learning. I stated one fead above, another fear is how to we as a society handle that social interaction and keep that in our youth's lives when they sit at home and the teacher comes to them through a computer screen and they participate in Google Hangouts with their classmates, will we have major societal issues because of it, bringing us back full circle to the unintended consequences of technology.
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
Monday, July 8, 2013
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Week 3: TPACK, Moral/Ethical Philosophy with IT, and Critical Theory
I was excited this week to be learning and reading about TPACK because I have quite a bit of background knowledge within this model. Denise Schmidt-Crawford taught us about TPACK in CI 201 and my reading endorsement technology course. Last semester I utilized TPACK in a school board presentation that I completed about the use of SMART boards in the classroom and with our readings this week about moral and ethics within instructional technology had be thinking about the importance of IT and what it "ought" to be not what is it, as Pojman kept referring to in his article, but anyway, back to TPACK, I am happy to have had so many professors cover this model and I am happy that I was introduced to it as early as I was because if this was the first time learning or seeing TPACK, I would feel extremely overwhelmed because of breadth of information and everything that we know as educators put into one Venn Diagram with multiple pieces. In Dr. Nadolny's class we examined TPACK and we evaluated where we are, currently, as educators within the TPACK model. I feel pretty comfortable with individual pieces of the model, but combining them is a special task as an educator. I am by no means an expert on TPACK but the model makes sense to me and helps me to reflect upon which aspects I feel comfortable with and which parts of my job, the same as parts of the model, I need to learn more about and strategies I can use in the classroom. I think that TPACK connects with the paradigm shift with IT because of the technological pedagogy piece of the puzzle that was missing before TPACK.
When reading, listening and watching information about the paradigm shift within IT I began to think about how technology has influenced and created major paradigm shifts within communist countries and countries who, before technology, were informed through their government and were shielded from things happening outside their country and in the world. The internet has created a paradigm shift in countries such as Egypt, especially within the last year, with the riots and turmoil because of Facebook and information that they have received. Because of the internet, the world has been brought into countries that before were shielded from information that the governments deemed unnecessary and that has caused changes in thinking and many revolutions throughout the world.
I felt as though the topics this week were all intertwined together, leading into moral philosophy and ethics within IT a the paradigm shift with technology in education. In my school district the paradigm shift of incorporating more technology into the classrooms has been a revolution that some educators have not come on board with, as I have heard of many schools having the same type of situation. I think that the educators who are not on board with the technology have moral and ethical reasons, within their educational philosophy to disagree with technology in the classroom. The article by Pojman had me thinking about the gray area the lies with morals and ethics. For example, morally speeding is acceptable if an emergency is taking place, so someone might not be given a ticket because of the emergency, or people who say that are going to keep a promise and then don't because it endagers someone. This gray area is everywhere throughout our lives and in education. We make exceptions for students based upon their background, behavior and needs. After thinking about this gray area I began to think about technology and how it is currently used and then what Pojman keeps saying, how it ought to be. We are constantly having conversations in my school district about how technology "ought" to be used in classroom, but that is definitely not what "is" happening in my district. I have had a lot of discussions with peers about technology still being a consequence and taken away from students when they misbehave, but if we are using technology to enhance instruction in ways that it cannot happen without the technology, why in the world would we take it away. I always like to show fellow educators the viral video comparing pencils and computers. It makes so much sense to me, but again it goes back to how we ought to be using IT and how we are using IT. My opinion just from the surface learning and thinking about moral and ethical philosophy for IT is that IT ought to be used for more than a Google search or a huge encyclopedia and a source of knowledge, it ought to be used to provide students with learning that could not happen without the technology. I think that what "ought" be happening with IT is a common conversation throughout the world in many, many schools. Questions like What is best for our students? How does IT enhance students achievement, or does it? We don't know the consequences completely of the recent changes to IT with students, which leads into the learning that took place with Critical Theory, which I had a difficult time keeping an open mind about, but I did learn about Critical Theory and how it can be important in thinking morally and ethically about IT.
While reading the articles by Nichols, I found myself literally saying out loud "hmmm". I understand Critical Theory on the surface, but there were a lot of ideas that Nichols discussed that were hard for me to read because I am very optimistic and I don't like to think of the negative, but I do understand the importance of the theory and people that bring up points such as the ones presented in the readings. One that I appreciated from Thursday's article was in the last paragraph of the article, "...there is nothing wrong with liking or advocating ed tech, it is good to find better ways to do things. Nevertheless it is important that better should include qualities of being ethical and more humanizing." I like this statement and I agree with it but I am the advocate for ed tech, but I appreciate the people on the other side, because we need each other to make sure that IT is morally and ethically affecting our students in appropriate ways.
My final thoughts for the week are about my favorite and most influential thinking that took place this week in the"The Gods Must Be Crazy" video. My takeaway from this video was the statement about how civilized men adapted the world to them and the natives adapted to the elements of the desert. I made a connection the previous statement with technology. Education has adapted technology to to fit into the education world and its daily happenings and in other situations, technology has adapted education. For example, with iPads, Apple didn't forsee them being so popular within education but the educational world adapted the iPad in order to make it IT and in other situations technology has changed the school day from making things simpler like attendance and sharing information and also teaching and learning looks very different because of technology. Again, connecting back to Pojman, I am not sure if teaching and learning "ought" to adapt to technology, I think that it should be the other way around where technology is having to adapt in order to fit into education and provide students with additional learning. Technology has impacted society, but technology is different based on culture and experience. The Coke bottle was the technology to the natives but civilized people had technologies such as computers, alarms, vehicles etc. and the two worlds were very different. In our global society the cultures, moral and ethics are being blended due to technology because in many situations people have access to similar information and learning, which wasn't possible without technology. I think that generations are changing faster and faster and are more different because of technology and what we are exposed to. One more connection that I have to share about the impact technology has on society just came to me. At the Iowa 1:1 Conference in April I had the opportunity to attend a Keynote presented by Angela Maiers and Kevin Honeycutt was a surprise guest speaker and Angela's keynote address was about literacy for today's world involving symbols that are very different and if you don't know how to read them you can be illiterate. For example, tweets are new reading for some people, but not for our students and a lot of people in the room couldn't read the tweet she presented and some could, so within one room we had illiterate people and literate people, based upon the tweet presented. This is a major way that technology has impacted society in the way that we read and get information.
This week had a lot of connections weaving among the topics and I learned new things as well as added to some background knowledge all resulting in some great reflection and ideas that I have about technology and instructional technology with the moral philosophy, paradigm shifts, critical theory and TPACK.
When reading, listening and watching information about the paradigm shift within IT I began to think about how technology has influenced and created major paradigm shifts within communist countries and countries who, before technology, were informed through their government and were shielded from things happening outside their country and in the world. The internet has created a paradigm shift in countries such as Egypt, especially within the last year, with the riots and turmoil because of Facebook and information that they have received. Because of the internet, the world has been brought into countries that before were shielded from information that the governments deemed unnecessary and that has caused changes in thinking and many revolutions throughout the world.
I felt as though the topics this week were all intertwined together, leading into moral philosophy and ethics within IT a the paradigm shift with technology in education. In my school district the paradigm shift of incorporating more technology into the classrooms has been a revolution that some educators have not come on board with, as I have heard of many schools having the same type of situation. I think that the educators who are not on board with the technology have moral and ethical reasons, within their educational philosophy to disagree with technology in the classroom. The article by Pojman had me thinking about the gray area the lies with morals and ethics. For example, morally speeding is acceptable if an emergency is taking place, so someone might not be given a ticket because of the emergency, or people who say that are going to keep a promise and then don't because it endagers someone. This gray area is everywhere throughout our lives and in education. We make exceptions for students based upon their background, behavior and needs. After thinking about this gray area I began to think about technology and how it is currently used and then what Pojman keeps saying, how it ought to be. We are constantly having conversations in my school district about how technology "ought" to be used in classroom, but that is definitely not what "is" happening in my district. I have had a lot of discussions with peers about technology still being a consequence and taken away from students when they misbehave, but if we are using technology to enhance instruction in ways that it cannot happen without the technology, why in the world would we take it away. I always like to show fellow educators the viral video comparing pencils and computers. It makes so much sense to me, but again it goes back to how we ought to be using IT and how we are using IT. My opinion just from the surface learning and thinking about moral and ethical philosophy for IT is that IT ought to be used for more than a Google search or a huge encyclopedia and a source of knowledge, it ought to be used to provide students with learning that could not happen without the technology. I think that what "ought" be happening with IT is a common conversation throughout the world in many, many schools. Questions like What is best for our students? How does IT enhance students achievement, or does it? We don't know the consequences completely of the recent changes to IT with students, which leads into the learning that took place with Critical Theory, which I had a difficult time keeping an open mind about, but I did learn about Critical Theory and how it can be important in thinking morally and ethically about IT.
While reading the articles by Nichols, I found myself literally saying out loud "hmmm". I understand Critical Theory on the surface, but there were a lot of ideas that Nichols discussed that were hard for me to read because I am very optimistic and I don't like to think of the negative, but I do understand the importance of the theory and people that bring up points such as the ones presented in the readings. One that I appreciated from Thursday's article was in the last paragraph of the article, "...there is nothing wrong with liking or advocating ed tech, it is good to find better ways to do things. Nevertheless it is important that better should include qualities of being ethical and more humanizing." I like this statement and I agree with it but I am the advocate for ed tech, but I appreciate the people on the other side, because we need each other to make sure that IT is morally and ethically affecting our students in appropriate ways.
My final thoughts for the week are about my favorite and most influential thinking that took place this week in the"The Gods Must Be Crazy" video. My takeaway from this video was the statement about how civilized men adapted the world to them and the natives adapted to the elements of the desert. I made a connection the previous statement with technology. Education has adapted technology to to fit into the education world and its daily happenings and in other situations, technology has adapted education. For example, with iPads, Apple didn't forsee them being so popular within education but the educational world adapted the iPad in order to make it IT and in other situations technology has changed the school day from making things simpler like attendance and sharing information and also teaching and learning looks very different because of technology. Again, connecting back to Pojman, I am not sure if teaching and learning "ought" to adapt to technology, I think that it should be the other way around where technology is having to adapt in order to fit into education and provide students with additional learning. Technology has impacted society, but technology is different based on culture and experience. The Coke bottle was the technology to the natives but civilized people had technologies such as computers, alarms, vehicles etc. and the two worlds were very different. In our global society the cultures, moral and ethics are being blended due to technology because in many situations people have access to similar information and learning, which wasn't possible without technology. I think that generations are changing faster and faster and are more different because of technology and what we are exposed to. One more connection that I have to share about the impact technology has on society just came to me. At the Iowa 1:1 Conference in April I had the opportunity to attend a Keynote presented by Angela Maiers and Kevin Honeycutt was a surprise guest speaker and Angela's keynote address was about literacy for today's world involving symbols that are very different and if you don't know how to read them you can be illiterate. For example, tweets are new reading for some people, but not for our students and a lot of people in the room couldn't read the tweet she presented and some could, so within one room we had illiterate people and literate people, based upon the tweet presented. This is a major way that technology has impacted society in the way that we read and get information.
This week had a lot of connections weaving among the topics and I learned new things as well as added to some background knowledge all resulting in some great reflection and ideas that I have about technology and instructional technology with the moral philosophy, paradigm shifts, critical theory and TPACK.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Week 2: Instructional Design
This week was a whole new world for me as a professional and as an educator. Never before had I heard of Instructional Design, yes after listening to the lecture I began to put it together and apply it to what I have witnessed or use, but this week was a struggle. It took me a very long time to grasp the concepts that were being discussed in the articles but after finishing the week I believe that I have somewhat of an understanding of instructional design and all of its facets, which seems to be ever changing, which is the way the world works.
The article this week that I made most of my connections to was the article titled A Hard Look at ISD by Zemke and Rossett. I appreciated the quote on page 6 by Rosenburg, "We've created a religion around it. We've tried, for instance, building these great binders of directions on the assumption that a PhD. in instructional design and a monkey, both following the same step, would produce the same instruction, well they won't. But they will produce the same documentation. I think we've put the process before the people who actually do the process, and that's led us astray." I agree completely with Rosenburg in the sense that as teachers, effectiveness is the key. I have read a lot of the research conducted by Michael Fullan and I made the connection between texts of when Fullan discusses the disadvantages to having ineffective teachers and having an ineffective teacher 3 years in a row puts those students far behind students who have had ineffective teachers. I think that some many times we focus on the documentation, the test scores, the application, the appropriate grade, etc. and we lose sight of the learning and skills that are progressing within our youth in school or if we take instructional design outside of education, the work and learning that takes place in the military, at Google when teaching interns or new employees, or with someone new into a research environment. I think today more than ever, through the help of technology and the globalization of our world and daily lives, the linear, one size fits all does not apply to most of the work or learning taking place. The old adage "There's more than one way to skin a cat," is one that I taught my 6th graders this year in math. Some of my students were teaching and helping me learn strategies that they had created to solve a problem, whereas when I was taking math there was one and only one way to attack a problem and I am happy to see this progression within education.
One of the questions I pondered this week came about while reading the article by Zemke and Rossett as I referred to earlier. In the article they discuss the idea of routine in learning. I know from my undergraduate studies, methods courses, and student teaching experience routine has been a major focus and then this article talked about it as something not necessarily needed. Is routine important for learning of just for a well maintained classroom, business, system, organization, etc.? Do people have to have a routine in order to learn? I had always thought that routine was so important within the classroom and have worked many part-time jobs where we did the same things when we came to work, during work and leaving work, not that a lot of learning happened in those jobs other than life and social skills, which are necessary as well. As I pondered this question I began to think about some of the best learning environments that I have had or some of the times where I have learned the most and there aren't many routines that took place for my learning to occur. A lot of my learning has come through conversations or watching others in their skill or craft or having someone model for me how to do something and then I would try. In a lot of my learning as an adult, outside of classes, there hasn't been much a routine, so are they referring to the ways in which I learn as an individual, like Garner's multiple intelligences? Within instructional design, no matter traditional, R2D2, rapid prototyping, ISD, or all the other systems is routine part of the design? I don't see it listed in most but there is a specific template or design structure that most traditional models follow and even within my studies of rapid prototyping they had a step by step procedure to follow in order to use the design, although it is altered along the way based upon feedback and samples.
I started the week off feeling very overwhelmed with a brand new concept, with so many avenues and definitions and the discussion groups helped me to close the gaps and hone in on the specifics of Instructional Design, whether it be ISD, traditional or a new approach. I appreciated sharing my understandings and also reading others' to help me fill in gaps that I had. It truly is amazing when multiple brains are put together how much more learning can take place and this week has proved that once again.
The article this week that I made most of my connections to was the article titled A Hard Look at ISD by Zemke and Rossett. I appreciated the quote on page 6 by Rosenburg, "We've created a religion around it. We've tried, for instance, building these great binders of directions on the assumption that a PhD. in instructional design and a monkey, both following the same step, would produce the same instruction, well they won't. But they will produce the same documentation. I think we've put the process before the people who actually do the process, and that's led us astray." I agree completely with Rosenburg in the sense that as teachers, effectiveness is the key. I have read a lot of the research conducted by Michael Fullan and I made the connection between texts of when Fullan discusses the disadvantages to having ineffective teachers and having an ineffective teacher 3 years in a row puts those students far behind students who have had ineffective teachers. I think that some many times we focus on the documentation, the test scores, the application, the appropriate grade, etc. and we lose sight of the learning and skills that are progressing within our youth in school or if we take instructional design outside of education, the work and learning that takes place in the military, at Google when teaching interns or new employees, or with someone new into a research environment. I think today more than ever, through the help of technology and the globalization of our world and daily lives, the linear, one size fits all does not apply to most of the work or learning taking place. The old adage "There's more than one way to skin a cat," is one that I taught my 6th graders this year in math. Some of my students were teaching and helping me learn strategies that they had created to solve a problem, whereas when I was taking math there was one and only one way to attack a problem and I am happy to see this progression within education.
One of the questions I pondered this week came about while reading the article by Zemke and Rossett as I referred to earlier. In the article they discuss the idea of routine in learning. I know from my undergraduate studies, methods courses, and student teaching experience routine has been a major focus and then this article talked about it as something not necessarily needed. Is routine important for learning of just for a well maintained classroom, business, system, organization, etc.? Do people have to have a routine in order to learn? I had always thought that routine was so important within the classroom and have worked many part-time jobs where we did the same things when we came to work, during work and leaving work, not that a lot of learning happened in those jobs other than life and social skills, which are necessary as well. As I pondered this question I began to think about some of the best learning environments that I have had or some of the times where I have learned the most and there aren't many routines that took place for my learning to occur. A lot of my learning has come through conversations or watching others in their skill or craft or having someone model for me how to do something and then I would try. In a lot of my learning as an adult, outside of classes, there hasn't been much a routine, so are they referring to the ways in which I learn as an individual, like Garner's multiple intelligences? Within instructional design, no matter traditional, R2D2, rapid prototyping, ISD, or all the other systems is routine part of the design? I don't see it listed in most but there is a specific template or design structure that most traditional models follow and even within my studies of rapid prototyping they had a step by step procedure to follow in order to use the design, although it is altered along the way based upon feedback and samples.
I started the week off feeling very overwhelmed with a brand new concept, with so many avenues and definitions and the discussion groups helped me to close the gaps and hone in on the specifics of Instructional Design, whether it be ISD, traditional or a new approach. I appreciated sharing my understandings and also reading others' to help me fill in gaps that I had. It truly is amazing when multiple brains are put together how much more learning can take place and this week has proved that once again.
Friday, June 14, 2013
Week 1: Philosophies and Theories of Education, Theories of Instruction Technology and Visual Literacy
As we discussed this week the different theories/philosophies of education, my mind swirled with questions about my own philosophy and theories of education. I think of myself as a decisive person, but on issues of education I have a hard time nailing my theory or philosophy down to any one specific. I think that is because within education there are so many variables that are uncontrollable and also so many different facets of learning and people that are involved with the education system from the educators, to the students, to the parents, to the school board, and out through the community. After pondering all week and reading others' posts on the Moodle discussion board I didn't find myself any closer to determining my own philosophy or theory of ed that I follow in my classroom, but I was reassured that some great educators are in the same boat as me, they too are a little bit of each philosophy, or at least have a few qualities from each theory that they take into their classroom. Being reassured that I wasn't the only one pondering questions about my own philosophy of education, after being an educator for 5 years it feels like I should have figured out exactly how and what I think about education, but that definitely is not the case and I am proud of that because that means that I am willing to change my thinking, philosophy and theories with the changing of our society as a whole and my students as individuals throughout the school year and from year to year.
One question that Dr. Hargrave posed in Monday's lecture was whether there is an educational approach or system that adheres with each of the four theories of education that we have discussed. My answer to this question might be one of bias because of my existence within the public education system within the United States, but this is what I have discovered through my reflection of this question. Our education system today is largely still within the Essentialism theory. I say this because as educators we do how we were taught and I believe that the U.S. education system has been within the Essentialism theory for many, many generations, therefore, the teachers within the system where all taught using this manner, again this from my public education stand point. I think that as an education system and as pre-service teachers are taught different theories of education, most common recently being Progressivism or Reconstructionism, our system as a whole will change to look more as these theories explain. STEM, for example, is a huge push right now for all schools and the new assessments PARCC and SMARTER BALANCE both rely heavily on the process of thinking rather than the regurgitation of information, as has been in the past with standardized bubble tests, leading back to the Essentialism theory. All of the work with Skype in the Classroom and opening the doors of classrooms, using technology, also leads to the Reconstructionm theory. The only theory that I cannot match an educational system to is Perennialism and I blame that on my lack of knowledge of different types of school systems outside of the public education system.
In moving throughout our week of learning, the next topic covered Theories of Instruction Technology. I was brought back to my sophomore days at ISU in Psych 231 and methods courses, the many conversations about behaviorism and constructivism. In thinking about the best fit between theories of education and theories of instructional technology I interpreted that question in 2 different ways: Which theories of education match up with theories of instructional technology and What is the best fit between theories of education and theories of instructional technology for our current system and students? As far as which theories match up together, I think that Behaviorism and Essentialism are very similar in their obvious and measurable outcomes, the instruction being based on clear goals and objectives, and a mastery of learning. Constructivism matches up will with Progressivism and Reconstructionism, and in thinking about Constructivism, when I was in my teacher prep program at ISU we discussed Constructivism frequently and that is the theory that I decided I wanted to follow in my classroom, how much have I learned since then :), but I still believe that constructivism is a very powerful theory in the classroom, but also believe that it cannot be used at every stage of a student learning because their is a specific time where direct instruction must take place in order to master the skills necessary to learn in a constructivism environment. Do I have a classroom deeply rooted in constructivism, no I don't think that I have mastered that theory, but I do believe that I have pieces of the constructivism theory within my classroom. Going back to my second interpretation of the reflection question, the best fit for students, I would say again, and this is an on the fence answer, but it must be a little of each, leaving out Perennialism. Depending on the age of students, their background, their culture, language, learning ability, different theories are needed, but I would like to see our education system go into a more Constructivism/Reconstructionism/Progressivism theory which I think is the push currently within education due to STEM, technology resources, breaking down classroom walls (figuratively speaking), assessments such as PARCC and SMARTER Balanced, etc. My hope is that teacher prep programs are creating teachers to have theories and philosophies deeply rooted in these theories and teaching them ways in which to create a classroom environment where students can thrive while utilizing the latter 3 theories.
Visual Literacy was the final topic of discussion this week. I connected with the political ads and enjoyed watching the difference in ads from today's campaigns back to the 1950's. One of my favorite ads was the black and white commercial for Dwight D. Eisenhower with all of the elephants marching and the theme song playing throughout and the button "Vote for Ike" symbol that popped up many, many times throughout the ad, which is an example of emphasis. The ad also had unity because of the elephants, the buttons, the theme song and the chant that I'm sure was heard often throughout conversations during election time, bringing everything together with solid unity. I compared this ad to the most recent ad on the page of the Barack vs. Romney election where the writer put segments of Romney singing American the Beautiful and the showing "facts" about Romney's job distribution to China, Mexico, India, etc. Again unity because the song went against what the facts were saying, but it was an interesting tie to the goal of the ad, also each fact was presented using the same font, the same signage, the same white background. Media literacy has changed drastically because of our ability to enhance advertising with technology, even just moving from black and white T.V. to color, but there are many, many for examples.
I don't know if my parents used to critique ads with us a kids when we would watch T.V. but somewhere along the lines I critique almost every ad that I see, especially political ones because of the keen use of quotes and language to draw in voters. Just the other day my husband and I were watching TV and an ad came on about the new CW23 morning show and how they have had the most growth in ratings this year compared to every other morning news radio. We looked at each other and said, "Duh, they have to, they are new, so the only way their ratings can go is up." It is amazing to me how particular language is used in media literacy to make it sound one way and I think that a lot of people don't read into ads, they just take it for what it says, believe whatever is given to them and never stop to think, is this true or reliable. Most of the time it just takes a second to think about a statement heard or read in an ad or commercial to see the ways the producer/writer has twisted the line to work in their favor, which after all it is advertising.
One question that Dr. Hargrave posed in Monday's lecture was whether there is an educational approach or system that adheres with each of the four theories of education that we have discussed. My answer to this question might be one of bias because of my existence within the public education system within the United States, but this is what I have discovered through my reflection of this question. Our education system today is largely still within the Essentialism theory. I say this because as educators we do how we were taught and I believe that the U.S. education system has been within the Essentialism theory for many, many generations, therefore, the teachers within the system where all taught using this manner, again this from my public education stand point. I think that as an education system and as pre-service teachers are taught different theories of education, most common recently being Progressivism or Reconstructionism, our system as a whole will change to look more as these theories explain. STEM, for example, is a huge push right now for all schools and the new assessments PARCC and SMARTER BALANCE both rely heavily on the process of thinking rather than the regurgitation of information, as has been in the past with standardized bubble tests, leading back to the Essentialism theory. All of the work with Skype in the Classroom and opening the doors of classrooms, using technology, also leads to the Reconstructionm theory. The only theory that I cannot match an educational system to is Perennialism and I blame that on my lack of knowledge of different types of school systems outside of the public education system.
In moving throughout our week of learning, the next topic covered Theories of Instruction Technology. I was brought back to my sophomore days at ISU in Psych 231 and methods courses, the many conversations about behaviorism and constructivism. In thinking about the best fit between theories of education and theories of instructional technology I interpreted that question in 2 different ways: Which theories of education match up with theories of instructional technology and What is the best fit between theories of education and theories of instructional technology for our current system and students? As far as which theories match up together, I think that Behaviorism and Essentialism are very similar in their obvious and measurable outcomes, the instruction being based on clear goals and objectives, and a mastery of learning. Constructivism matches up will with Progressivism and Reconstructionism, and in thinking about Constructivism, when I was in my teacher prep program at ISU we discussed Constructivism frequently and that is the theory that I decided I wanted to follow in my classroom, how much have I learned since then :), but I still believe that constructivism is a very powerful theory in the classroom, but also believe that it cannot be used at every stage of a student learning because their is a specific time where direct instruction must take place in order to master the skills necessary to learn in a constructivism environment. Do I have a classroom deeply rooted in constructivism, no I don't think that I have mastered that theory, but I do believe that I have pieces of the constructivism theory within my classroom. Going back to my second interpretation of the reflection question, the best fit for students, I would say again, and this is an on the fence answer, but it must be a little of each, leaving out Perennialism. Depending on the age of students, their background, their culture, language, learning ability, different theories are needed, but I would like to see our education system go into a more Constructivism/Reconstructionism/Progressivism theory which I think is the push currently within education due to STEM, technology resources, breaking down classroom walls (figuratively speaking), assessments such as PARCC and SMARTER Balanced, etc. My hope is that teacher prep programs are creating teachers to have theories and philosophies deeply rooted in these theories and teaching them ways in which to create a classroom environment where students can thrive while utilizing the latter 3 theories.
Visual Literacy was the final topic of discussion this week. I connected with the political ads and enjoyed watching the difference in ads from today's campaigns back to the 1950's. One of my favorite ads was the black and white commercial for Dwight D. Eisenhower with all of the elephants marching and the theme song playing throughout and the button "Vote for Ike" symbol that popped up many, many times throughout the ad, which is an example of emphasis. The ad also had unity because of the elephants, the buttons, the theme song and the chant that I'm sure was heard often throughout conversations during election time, bringing everything together with solid unity. I compared this ad to the most recent ad on the page of the Barack vs. Romney election where the writer put segments of Romney singing American the Beautiful and the showing "facts" about Romney's job distribution to China, Mexico, India, etc. Again unity because the song went against what the facts were saying, but it was an interesting tie to the goal of the ad, also each fact was presented using the same font, the same signage, the same white background. Media literacy has changed drastically because of our ability to enhance advertising with technology, even just moving from black and white T.V. to color, but there are many, many for examples.
I don't know if my parents used to critique ads with us a kids when we would watch T.V. but somewhere along the lines I critique almost every ad that I see, especially political ones because of the keen use of quotes and language to draw in voters. Just the other day my husband and I were watching TV and an ad came on about the new CW23 morning show and how they have had the most growth in ratings this year compared to every other morning news radio. We looked at each other and said, "Duh, they have to, they are new, so the only way their ratings can go is up." It is amazing to me how particular language is used in media literacy to make it sound one way and I think that a lot of people don't read into ads, they just take it for what it says, believe whatever is given to them and never stop to think, is this true or reliable. Most of the time it just takes a second to think about a statement heard or read in an ad or commercial to see the ways the producer/writer has twisted the line to work in their favor, which after all it is advertising.
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