Although, my blog began as a course requirement,
I have grown to enjoy it. Therefore, I do not plan to discontinue my blog. From this week forward, it will be about self-discipline. Professor Padgett, has been an excellent
task master for the past nine weeks. However, looks like his work here is done,
well as far as this course. I sincerely hope to work with him throughout my graduate program. May I add Professor Padgett facilitates learning in a
way you forget you are being taught? Simply brilliant. This class has boosted
my self-confidence, rekindled my love for writing and re-awaken my passion for teaching.
Why, because I was forced to accept the challenges this class presented. It made
me open my eyes to the “Evolution of Education and the Evolution of
Communication.” At the age of__, Well, somewhere between 31 and 60, I had
become one of those adults. You know the ones who believe “You Can’t Teach an
Old Dog a New Trick". The scary part is I thought I was a
progressive thinker. Yet, by having to study and write about new
technology two things were accomplished
(1) my eyes opened to how much I did not
know (2) It forced me to admit the reason I did not know was because I had become closed minded.
So, as a result of Professor Padgett’s wonderful job, I am compelled to
introduce a new concept even though it is not a part of our final assignment.
This week we will discuss
Word Clouds. So what exactly is a Word Cloud?
A word cloud is a popular visualization of
words typically associated with Internet keywords and text data. They are most
commonly used to highlight popular or trending terms based on frequency of use
and prominence. A word cloud is a beautiful, informative image
that communicates much in a single glance. In other words, it an amazing
visual leaning tool. One of the requirements
of this class was to watch several Ted Talks weekly. One of my favorite talks
was given by Sugata Mitra
on the state of education. He made a bold Ted Prize
wish:"Help me build a place where children can explore and learn on their
own-and teach one another using resources from the world wide cloud” So, what
does his wish mean? In my opinion, it means to allow learning to take as a natural
process using all of the technology we have available today.
As I have mentioned in previous
blogs, my son has Autism on the Spectrum. From the moment my son became old enough to
attend school, I have had to take on the role of a “Parent Advocate”. Yes, this
is the nice label which has been assigned to parents in similar situations.
However, the truth is we are “Disbelieving Parents Forced to Fight”. What
is the dis-belief? Every single day when my son comes home with several sheets
of math problems and hand-outs I am in dis-belief. It is difficult to believe
that regardless of the extensive amount of literature and videos and reports
and online information, his teachers are not willing to embrace the truth. (1)
Children with Autism are visual learners (2) Children with Autism do better if
taught using technology (3) Children with Autism, just like “Regular” children
learn better in environments which foster creativity and individual growth.
To help you see this I developed a Word Cloud of the twenty best ways to
educate children with Autism
By looking at the Word
Cloud you can see the key words which stand out regarding the education of
children with Autism: Teach Thought, Learning, IPad, Educational, Apps,
Children, Play, Games, and Comments. So, what can we take from this? Children with Autism learn better from educational apps, using IPads, playing games and being encourage to use their thoughts. Back
to my original frustration, why is my son still coming home with outdated math and
reading handouts? Sugata Mitra answers my question perfectly " It quite fashionable to say that the
education systems are broken- it’s not broken, it’s wonderfully constructed. It’s
just that we don’t need it anymore. It’s outdated." My wish is that every educator would
have to watch this Ted Talk. This is a powerful revolution. I too have been
guilty of believing the system was broken. He went on to say “The Victorians were great
engineers. They engineered a (schooling) system that was so robust that it’s
still with us today, continuously producing identical people for a machine that
no longer exists?” Powerful; yet disturbing, because he speaks the truth.
The word cloud below includes quotes made by Sugata Mitra over time. I would like to demonstrate how easily it would be to use his cloud as a learning tool. So, let do a simple assignment using this cloud. Please write one sentence using the largest words, one sentence using the middle sized words and one sentence using the smaller words? What? It is just that simply? We can use creativity and technology to educate children. Oh, believe me I plan to share this assignment with my son’s teacher. It would be so much fun to help him develop a word cloud as a homework assignment. Please allow me to express my concerns for the teachers who are FORCED to operate in these well organized school systems. They have a very difficult job, especially since the only changes which have been made over the years are designed to rate them on how well they us an outdated system on modern day children. My hats off to those who have accepted to task.
The word cloud below includes quotes made by Sugata Mitra over time. I would like to demonstrate how easily it would be to use his cloud as a learning tool. So, let do a simple assignment using this cloud. Please write one sentence using the largest words, one sentence using the middle sized words and one sentence using the smaller words? What? It is just that simply? We can use creativity and technology to educate children. Oh, believe me I plan to share this assignment with my son’s teacher. It would be so much fun to help him develop a word cloud as a homework assignment. Please allow me to express my concerns for the teachers who are FORCED to operate in these well organized school systems. They have a very difficult job, especially since the only changes which have been made over the years are designed to rate them on how well they us an outdated system on modern day children. My hats off to those who have accepted to task.
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| http://www.ted.com/speakers/sugata_mitra.htmltion |
As I have learned in this
class, technology is not going anywhere. Regardless of how much we want to
believe the old ways of doing things were better. So, to answer the question in the title of this blog, Can I have My Home Phone Back? Yes, you can
certainly have it back. However, it needs to come with a warning: Although it
is perfectly fine for you to continue using this form of communication, please
be warned that stagnation of this form my cause the following: limited information,
isolation, disconnectiveness and a feeling of being left behind by the times. So,
please consider yourself warned. Again, this has been a wonderful journey. I have one final Word Cloud to share. It was
created from the contents of my weekly blog.
Take care and see you next week. Yes, I was going to take a break.
However, for me it would be like a person who stop running in a marathon, it is
always harder to start again. Thank for following my blog.
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| www.melondyneal.blogspot.com |
1 comment:
very valid points melody.I also love the point Mitra made about the education system not being broken but outdated and that is so true. We continue to educate are young men and women using outdated methods. It's like trying to build a state-of-the-art plane with just a screwdriver and a hammer.it sounds like you are shipping your gears to become an educator. I think that you would make an awesome teacher.
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