This is the two-minute, video version of my educational philosophy:
Many thanks to everyone who helped.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Article review: Orchestrating the Media Collage
Article Title: Orchestrating the Media Collage
Author: Jason Ohler
I. Essential questions:
• Why is media literacy important?
• How can teachers be effective in teaching media literacy?
II. Summary:
- Literacy has become a simple concept, but whenever it is hyphenated it re-acquires its original mystical chasm that could be summed up as the “scribe vs. illiterate peon” relationship.
- In fact, there is no need to fear the hyphenated literacies – especially the technological ones, as their transition from the educated elite to the masses is astonishingly smooth, affordable, and rapid.
- Understanding media is the key to controlling one’s interactions with the economic and political spheres.
- Authoring media turns students into stakeholders, actors, and producers. It demystifies other peoples’ media.
- Teachers should be proactive and forward-looking when exposing their students to the read/write web.
- Assignments that involve the use, creation, and analysis of media should be as focused and rigorous as any “core” assignments.
III. Some key ideas:
Cross-platform applications that require flexibility and technical skill are now commonplace.
New media-producing technologies are not subject to the normal risk/benefit and supply chain constraints. Therefore, they can spread virally in an ultra-democratic way.
Teachers need not be afraid of including new media in their curricula.
The teaching of media literacy should be geared toward the understanding of important ideas, just as the teaching of traditional literacy always has been.
Literacy is fine, but fluency is effective.
IV. My twist on it:
My students play Halo3. They post videos on the web. They maintain Facebook pages. However, their media literacy is rudimentary at best.
It is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of government before they can be effective citizens.
It is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of economics so they can make rational choices when consuming and producing.
Just as importantly, it is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of media before they can truly understand or broadcast information.
Thus a lack of media fluency is just as profound an “educational gap” as any other. On the other hand, media fluency is just as teachable as any other kind of fluency, whether it be political, economic, mathematical, musical, or linguistic.
I agree with the importance of demystifying new media. In my understanding, the dramatically lower cost of first access to new media technologies trumps many of the old arguments for not jumping on board with unproven technologies.
I have heard lots of horror stories about technologies that were adopted by school districts, only to result in piles of incompatible, outdated, overpriced, irrelevant gadgets that gather dust in storerooms between a mimeograph and a stack of electric typewriters. However, the following is new:
• Cross-platform applications and open-source software help prevent incompatibility.
• Downloadable patches and updates help extend the lifespan of technologies.
• A shift of emphasis from hardware to software has diminished the cost of technologies. Distribution costs are only a fraction of what they once were.
• Technologies are becoming more and more alike, which helps increase the relevancy of training students on any particular platform.
Author: Jason Ohler
I. Essential questions:
• Why is media literacy important?
• How can teachers be effective in teaching media literacy?
II. Summary:
- Literacy has become a simple concept, but whenever it is hyphenated it re-acquires its original mystical chasm that could be summed up as the “scribe vs. illiterate peon” relationship.
- In fact, there is no need to fear the hyphenated literacies – especially the technological ones, as their transition from the educated elite to the masses is astonishingly smooth, affordable, and rapid.
- Understanding media is the key to controlling one’s interactions with the economic and political spheres.
- Authoring media turns students into stakeholders, actors, and producers. It demystifies other peoples’ media.
- Teachers should be proactive and forward-looking when exposing their students to the read/write web.
- Assignments that involve the use, creation, and analysis of media should be as focused and rigorous as any “core” assignments.
III. Some key ideas:
Cross-platform applications that require flexibility and technical skill are now commonplace.
New media-producing technologies are not subject to the normal risk/benefit and supply chain constraints. Therefore, they can spread virally in an ultra-democratic way.
Teachers need not be afraid of including new media in their curricula.
The teaching of media literacy should be geared toward the understanding of important ideas, just as the teaching of traditional literacy always has been.
Literacy is fine, but fluency is effective.
IV. My twist on it:
My students play Halo3. They post videos on the web. They maintain Facebook pages. However, their media literacy is rudimentary at best.
It is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of government before they can be effective citizens.
It is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of economics so they can make rational choices when consuming and producing.
Just as importantly, it is necessary for people to learn the fundamentals of media before they can truly understand or broadcast information.
Thus a lack of media fluency is just as profound an “educational gap” as any other. On the other hand, media fluency is just as teachable as any other kind of fluency, whether it be political, economic, mathematical, musical, or linguistic.
I agree with the importance of demystifying new media. In my understanding, the dramatically lower cost of first access to new media technologies trumps many of the old arguments for not jumping on board with unproven technologies.
I have heard lots of horror stories about technologies that were adopted by school districts, only to result in piles of incompatible, outdated, overpriced, irrelevant gadgets that gather dust in storerooms between a mimeograph and a stack of electric typewriters. However, the following is new:
• Cross-platform applications and open-source software help prevent incompatibility.
• Downloadable patches and updates help extend the lifespan of technologies.
• A shift of emphasis from hardware to software has diminished the cost of technologies. Distribution costs are only a fraction of what they once were.
• Technologies are becoming more and more alike, which helps increase the relevancy of training students on any particular platform.
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Energy conservation project 2.0!
I re-did my energy conservation project. You can watch the PowerPoint presentation if you have a Slideshare account and a propensity for self-induced pain:
I found Slideshare to be rather frustrating. You can also go see it on Google Docs. It's not as pretty, but more effective.
Or you can go to YouTube and view the presentation video.
It's always funny watching myself on video because I don't hear my accent or realize that I scratch my nose unless it is recorded and played back to me. Overall, my performance didn't seem too bad.
I kept pointing at the screen, because it is always more natural to teach with props than with words and pictures. I should try to have something to handle and demonstrate whenever I have to deliver a lecture.
Clearly, I felt frustrated by the limited available time, and I was speaking to people in the MAT program. Also, I felt more awkward talking to my camera without being able to know if it was even recording. it is much more natural to talk directly to human beings who can provide feedback through questions and nonverbal communication.
Also, I was stuck in one place, which I tend to avoid in the real classroom, so I felt rather awkward.
Almost none of the ninth grade English students in my class today knew the meaning of the word "monastery," so I'd have to define a lot of words and concepts if I were presenting the data to them.
I also learned just how drastically the school district's internet use restrictions can hamper these kinds of assignments.
Technology-wise, I expanded a little bit, but not as much as I could have. YouTube and SlideShare are new to me, and now I know how to play with the format features of my camera.
Energy Conservation
View more presentations from Paul Norwood.
I found Slideshare to be rather frustrating. You can also go see it on Google Docs. It's not as pretty, but more effective.
Or you can go to YouTube and view the presentation video.
It's always funny watching myself on video because I don't hear my accent or realize that I scratch my nose unless it is recorded and played back to me. Overall, my performance didn't seem too bad.
I kept pointing at the screen, because it is always more natural to teach with props than with words and pictures. I should try to have something to handle and demonstrate whenever I have to deliver a lecture.
Clearly, I felt frustrated by the limited available time, and I was speaking to people in the MAT program. Also, I felt more awkward talking to my camera without being able to know if it was even recording. it is much more natural to talk directly to human beings who can provide feedback through questions and nonverbal communication.
Also, I was stuck in one place, which I tend to avoid in the real classroom, so I felt rather awkward.
Almost none of the ninth grade English students in my class today knew the meaning of the word "monastery," so I'd have to define a lot of words and concepts if I were presenting the data to them.
I also learned just how drastically the school district's internet use restrictions can hamper these kinds of assignments.
Technology-wise, I expanded a little bit, but not as much as I could have. YouTube and SlideShare are new to me, and now I know how to play with the format features of my camera.
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