Saturday, April 3, 2010
Hot Topic
I had a very interesting conversation with some friends last night about technology. It began with how conversations have changed with the use of technology. We discussed how people will use their phones to search the internet when a question comes up in conversation. For example, you may be trying to remember the name of an actor from a particular movie when someone pulls out a cellphone and looks up the information. This conversation evolved into one about technology in the classroom. Everyone seemed to have an opinion about this, especially the concept of teaching students factual information they can access on the internet. It was fun discussing this with people who are not teachers.
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So was there consensus about teaching facts that can be looked up? I have been trying to teach my Freshmen how to think for themselves about deeper matters than just plot points that they can look up in any summary, and it seems to be working. They just today started asking questions of a moral nature about The Peal. I think this technology can open us up to get into more deep conversations, within certain disciplines, of course. There is still stuff that needs rote-memorization as a basis for understanding later (I'm thinking vocabulary and spelling).
ReplyDelete*** I meant The Pearl ***
ReplyDeleteActually, everyone seemed to have his or her own idea about teaching facts. I definitely agree that we should be pushing our students how to think for themselves. Everyone agreed with this. I'm glad that your students are moving in this direction.
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