Read the NY Times article “More Pupils Are Learning

Online, Fueling Debate on Quality” on the Moodle site.

Discuss the implications for education, for your school

community, and for your own teaching.

Copy-and-paste does not an education make.  

A drop-out factory does not become a reputable school by allowing students to google their way to a diploma.  I find it very disheartening that this method of education has replaced student learning.  A student cannot fully grasp the literary genius of the greats by reading excerpts of novels.  

I believe use of technology should help facilitate learning -- a la moodle discussions, etc -- but NOT be the be all end all of what is required of students.  This year, all teachers at my school are required to use moodle for each of their classes.  I predict there will be some growing pains associated with this change, but I also believe that students (and parents) will benefit from the use of an online classroom.  However, I strongly believe that online learning will never replace the outcomes gained from effective classroom instruction.  Since most of how we communicate with each other is non-verbal, then in-person learning will always be better than learning behind a computer screen.  Moreover, as reading continues to become less and less of a requirement for learning, learning outcomes will continue to slip and we will see more corners cut in order to show statistical gains (like the featured school in Memphis aiming to curb dropout rates).  

I will be utilizing moodle (and equivalent) in my future teaching to allow students constant access to information.  However, this will never replace my classroom instruction.

  

Review the “Technology Resources for the Teacher”

document on Moodle. Explore a minimum of four links

with which you are unfamiliar and discuss how each

can support student learning in your classroom—now

or in the future.

http://citationmachine.net 

This will help my students with their citations.  Citations are a very cumbersome thing to teach and learn.  However, the use of this website will allow for an easier way to create the polished product without taking time and energy away from the actual research and writing.  

http://teachertube.com

I can use this website to search for relevant video that supports curriculum as it is focused on teaching.  Showing documentaries or full-length feature films are great but they also have a tendency to spread the subject too thin across irrelevant topics.  Effective use of this website can result in a more efficient use of classtime.

http://titanpad.com/ 

I can use this for group writing projects and/or peer editing.  Our students live within a 60 mile radius so in-person meeting outside of school hours is difficult.  This website can provide a platform for group written work so that assignments do not have to be limited to in-person meetings.

http://prezi.com

This is a great media tool geared to the digital-minded students.  Constantly moving text and visuals facilitate learning in a way that makes powerpoint obsolete.  I think students will really enjoy using this for their presentations which will make learning more fun.

Interdisciplinary Teaching & Learning

I always enjoy teaching about WWI.  This topic tends to engage
a majority of students due to the proximity to the modern era, the violent
nature and wide scope and scale of the event.  I believe effective utilization
of literature and art from this era could enlarge, broaden, and enrich
understanding of the subject.  There are two examples that I will summarize
below with the benefits and challenges of each:

1.  Dulce et Decorum est, the poem by Wilfred Owen, is known for the
horrific imagery and condemnation of war.  With sufficient scaffolding, this can
really provide students with a solid understanding of the issues that
helped cause the war: nationalism and militarism.

http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/collections/item/3303

2.  Gassed, the painting by John Singer Sargent.  As you can see in the link,
the painting is a depiction of the aftermath of a mustard gas attack.  This
painting can help enrich students' understanding of the damage of the
new technologies of war as well as a view of the Western Front and the
dreary nature of "no man's land".
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/33/Gassed.jpg

I responded to Jerry's blog.

"MIND THE GAP": Session 2

1.   "Over the years, I have consistently warned against the lure of 'the royal road to learning', the notion that some savant or organization has found an easy solution to the problems of American education."

I agree with Ravitch and I believe that this statement is applicable to many facets of our nation -- not just education.  For example, a quick fix solution is typically sought out during election campaigns for budget reform, health care reform, etc.  However, the problems with education, health care, etc. are complex.  Therefore, the solutions to fix the problems will also be complex.  In education in particular, the politicization of curriculum and content has spun a messy web of consequences in which the quality of instruction suffers for American children. 

"Over time, my doubts about accountability and choice deepened as I saw the negative consequences of their implementation."

I look forward to Ravitch further unpacking this later in the book.  What exactly did these consequences look like?  What would happen if education policy headed full-steam down that path?  What are some counter-arguments to accountability and choice?

2.  I agree with Ravitch's definition of a well-educated person.  I try to think of examples of what this looks like today in our nation and I come up short with a concrete example.  A well-educated person should know how to think critically about their world around them.  This is a blanket statement to be sure, but the immeasurability is what makes this difficult.  To put some hypothetical questions around this - why did you vote for candidate x? how does that vote affect you?  what do you want your children to learn? why? how? why spend money on this?   There should be reasonable answers to questions like these that benefit the individual and society as a whole.

3.  I appreciated the opportunity to engage in a discussion with the class.  I speculate more about Ravitch herself.  I wanted to stir it up a little bit.  Basically, who is she?  Why did she decide to become a historian of education? What created her biases?  I wanted to try to legitimize her, or perhaps un-legitimize her as 'windy rhetoric'. 

4.  standard 10.10.3  Students analyze instances of nation-building in the contemporary world in at least two of the following regions or countries: the Middle East, Africa, Mexico and other parts of Latin America, and China. -- Discuss the important trends in the regions today and whether they appear to serve the cause of individual freedom and democracy.


Website: http://www.globalissues.org/issue/103/middle-east
Article:http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/07/09/120709fa_fact_filkins?mbid=gnep&google_editors_picks=true
Book: http://www.amazon.com/Power-Faith-Fantasy-Michael-Oren/dp/1605146730


I read this book recently to bridge my gap and I found fascinating, albeit biased, history of the United States in the Middle East.  One of the first things I learned is the various definitions of what is included in the Middle East.  There are many different interpretations.  I also discovered that the very young and sovereign United States back at the end of the 18th century created a navy at great expense and great risk in order to avoid paying "bribes" to Barbary pirates serving various North African states.  The U.S. presence in this region has always been very complicated by the big two topics that are no-no's around the dinner table -- religion and politics.

5.  One of the articles I am reading for my research is "Narratives of Nation -State, Historical Knowledge, and School History Education", by Bruce VanSledright.  In it, he discusses how history education is shaped and what might happen if educators pursued different visions of education by exploring alternative views of history (non-textbook narratives).  This could lead to other questions about how to engage students in artifact analysis, primary source analysis, and recognize bias.  This author was convincing enough for me to use some of his references to build more knowledge about alternative views of history education, as this will be central to my project, which is to engage the reluctant history learner.

6.  Meg, what are some creative educational experiences you have facilitated as a high school social studies teacher?  What do you think might be a good way to wrap some pedagogy around my content questions?