The phases of the design process have certainly clarified the vision of my end product. It’s taken a shape in my head, with room for improvement and the door still wide open for creativity and inspiration. One question still lurks in the back of my mind and I pondered it this week as I mapped my project. Is my project innovative? Does it have the hallmarks of what students will need to meet the demands that the nefariously unpredictable future will make upon them? Am I simply holding onto old pedagogies and perceiving a need that is no longer relevant and dressing it up with fancy tech tools? Will reading ever be obsolete? Is it still necessary for people to be literate with words? In his introduction to the TPACK model (https://youtu.be/eXLdqO0fY3w) Punya Mishra makes a provocative statement. He says that technology has not only changed how we teach (pedagogy), but also what we teach (content). He points out that information no longer comes in a drip, it comes in a deluge. We don’t teach knowledge, per se, of a content area anymore, we teach how to access and filter information. I would add that information and knowledge are not synonymous. Knowledge is constructed and becomes part of a person’s mind. It is usable. It is information put to action by a whole host of other skills, character qualities, and choices. So I asked myself this about reading - is it information? Is reading in danger of becoming obsolete through that lens? No, it certainly provides information. It is the skill and process by which we access information. Certainly reading will change with the times. Already the physically bound book is making its way into the annals of the past. Reading, writing, publishing, storing information - all of it will be digital. Those of us who love the smell and heft of a book will need to visit a museum or make our bookshelves our own museums. Probably reading will become more reliant on what we used to call textual clues - pictures, charts, photos. Now infographics and videos will BE text. It’s a matter of semantics. But I’ll maintain that reading itself will not disappear. I’ll use two of the standards for 21st century learning as a couple reasons why. Reading is intrinsically tied to two of the 21st learning skills - critical thinking and communication. Reading well - fluent enough that you can think about the ideas you read and analyze them, is also part of the filtering of the deluge of information. Reading fluently and with automaticity, a necessity for deep critical thinking, comes partly through reading much and many and with absorption. One of the most painless ways to achieve this fluency is by enjoying reading enough that you choose to do it much and many. A bit of a catch 22. Regardless, reading provides fodder, both process and content, for critical thinking skills. Another 21st century learning skill reliant on reading, in partnership with writing, is communication. Communication, especially if it will be global, crossing time zones and long distance, will need to have a written manifestation. Writing, and therefore reading, is not likely to become obsolete as long as humans strive to communicate. So now I’ve answered satisfactorily for the purpose of this project that reading itself won’t become obsolete. (Whew!) What about the innovative aspect. I got to thinking I should analyze my prototype through both the 4 C’s of 21st century skills, but also through the lens of the ISTE standards for students. In my mindmap, I labelled in purple some of the places I saw traits that demonstrate these standards: empowered learner, creative, communicator, constructing knowledge. And finally, I thought about something George Couros said in his book The Innovator’s Mindset. Couros begins his whole book by defining what innovation is and is not. Innovation is not just something new. It must be something done in a new and better way. Further, he proposes that in the context of education, innovation must also be student centered. That is to say that the needs of the student are considered. He treats the quality of empathy as crucial. Empathy is more than just seeing someone’s need. At its fullest, it is being able to feel almost the same thing as another human because your experiences are so similar. At second best, it is using imagination, sensitivity, and intelligence to try to feel what another experiences. For me, teaching a student to love to read is an empathetic outreach. I’ve spent enough years working with students of all ages to have observed the pain a kid feels when he or she doesn’t enjoy reading. I’ve heard enough people, adults and kids alike, say “I wish I liked to read” to know that the endeavor is worthwhile, perhaps even crucial for the sake of our kids heading into the next century. So back to that Catch 22. How DO you get a kid to enjoy reading so that he will choose to keep doing it, much and many, for the rest of his life? If a student gets to 6th grade and doesn’t like to read, is there a “do over” for her? We can’t erase a child’s negative experiences with reading. We can’t turn the ship overnight. But we can turn it! I can say from experience that I’ve seen reluctant readers go from dreading reading to having their noses buried in books. My prototype will attempt to create one humble model to follow.
5 Comments
7/11/2017 11:34:09 am
The idea of not teach knowledge but concept of knowledge seems to be the modern way of thinking outside the box. I do believe we are teaching knowledge that can relate to what they have in their hands. Hands on can be the ciel phone or tools to work in clay. They both are tools that has to be used right or they will not have the results/outcome that makes the modern person. Great graphics, and concepts on teaching.
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Well, we might be twins in spirit but definitely not in organizational skills. I love how thoughtful and clear-minded you are about your process. This shows powerful, deep thinking with regard to your prototype. It is impressive how deeply you are considering each aspect. I wish I had that kind of thoughtful organization!
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Patrick
7/12/2017 08:20:59 pm
I appreciate your acknowledgement of the "final problem" as it were. How do we cause lifelong change? How do we get things to stick? I'm sure everyone in our cohort all wants the results of their capstones to be long lasting, not just forgotten when the bell rings. It is a challenging question because, in a way, these digital capstones are very hands off. We will rarely interact with our audiences via the capstone. Maybe via comments or e-mails, in person if we are lucky. So, how do we make a digital product that can stand alone with a user and give them the tools and motivation to enact long lasting change? It is definitely a conundrum. Motivation is a tough nut to crack.
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Dan
7/13/2017 09:16:44 am
Nancy,
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James
7/24/2017 08:30:07 pm
Nancy,
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