Final Reflection

I believe that the important learning from my apartheid unit project will come when it is implemented in the classroom. I think that much of the eighth grade humanities learning is, in a sense, “confined” to the classroom. That is, while students read texts, view videos, listen to audio, blog with other students and create wikis with other students, there is no live contact or feedback from people outside our classroom. The work that Julie Lindsay and her colleagues have done serves as a model for creating networks of our students along with other students, teachers and adults from around the world.

 Another missing element in our learning is live contact with people who live in the place that the unit is based on. If we are studying apartheid in South Africa, it is highly productive to link up in a learning network with students and teachers from other parts of the world. However, if our learning network contains no one who actually lived in South Africa during apartheid, then a vital element –authenticity - is missing from the learning.

 Finally, given the inclusion of the above two elements in our student learning, it is also necessary to include the element of students taking some action based on their learning. This is the major headline in Clay Shirkey’s book, Here Comes Everybody: that networks of informed and committed people working outside of established organizations can effect enormous social change. To have our students create a global learning network using the latest tech tools but without the action piece is narcissistic at best.

 

 

 

 

Course Reflection

I really appreciate the chance to have taken this course. Our teachers, Kim Cofino and Jeff Utecht, have done a tremendous job of launching and guiding us on our journey into the future. Such a varied group we are in terms of life experiences and interests!

 Personally, this course has allowed me to crystallize my understanding of a cosmological vision that I initially acquired from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s magnum opus, The Phenomenon of Man (1952). In this book, de Chardin envisions the creation of the Noosphere or “collective consciousness” of human beings that is emerging from the interaction of human minds. Way back in the 1940’s, did de Chardin really foresee the creation of the World Wide Web?

 One writer has described the Noosphere as “the globe clothing itself with a brain.” Cyber bard, John Perry Barlow, wrote of de Chardin, "Teilhard's work is about creating a consciousness so profound it will make good company for God itself." My favorite quote from de Chardin, “The day will come when, after harnessing space, the winds, the tides and gravitation, we shall harness for God the energies of love. And, on that day, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.”

 As hauntingly beautiful as de Chardin’s vision of the Noosphere is, Ray Kurzweil’s vision of the future is even more breathtaking.  In The Singularity is Near, Kurzweil gives what he understands to be the raison d’etre for Homo sapiens: “to infuse the universe with intelligence and order.” I like to think of this infusion of intelligence as our evolutionary imperative. Kurzweil relates how Homo sapiens will soon utilize most of the matter and energy on our planet in one enormous network of artificial intelligence. He sees this vast network of intelligence expanding to include most of the matter and energy in our solar system and then on to the rest of the universe.

 One of the most indelible experiences that I have had was to sit in the night at the top of a dune in the Great Sand Sea in Egypt. There, in absolute silence, perched on the edge of the universe, I caught a glimpse of its incomprehensible immensity and splendor. Just imagine this ineffable vastness infused with a deep intelligence and order!

 At times when we question the value of some of our tech tools, it helps to keep the big picture in mind. For me, Clay Shirkey’s book, Here Comes Everybody, illuminates the bridge from the tech tools to the big picture visions of de Chardin and Kurzweil. Here Comes Everybody is a masterly account of how people outside of established organizations have formed networks utilizing cutting-edge technology and accomplished results of great importance. Echoing one of de Chardin’s themes, Shirkey notes that some of these results have been accomplished not for profit but for love. I suspect this is what Kurzweil really means when he writes about infusing the universe with intelligence and order.

 If we can believe one of the more startling headlines from Kurzweil’s Singularity is Near, some of us in this course will cross the “first bridge” and go on to live to be 1,000 years old. Long before then, some of us will, to borrow a line from poet Stanley Kunitz, “go roaring down the stormtracks of the Milky Way.”

 A special thanks to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Ray Kurzweil for their thrilling cosmological visions, and to Clay Shirkey for putting so many of the pieces in place. Also, a heartfelt thanks to Kim Cofino, Jeff Utecht, Clarence Fisher, Chris Betcher and Julie Lindsay for inspiring us teachers and guiding us on our voyage to the edge of the universe. Finally, all the honor to my colleagues at the International School Bangkok, Thailand for infusing with intelligence and order the minds of so many young people, most of whom will one day go roaring down the stormtracks of the Milky Way.

 

 

 

Collaborative Project

 

See Apartheid Unit in the Project Pages

What I have learned

Messing Around

This article emphasizes the three components of differentiated learning: differentiation for interest, learning profile and for readiness. 

Students learning about the new media are learning from and collaborating with others in social exchanges. (learning profile)

Messing around with the new media requires an interest-driven orientation… (interest) Messing around is largely self-directed. (interest)

 Youth often seek support from their local friendship network. (learning profile)

 We can conclude that messing around thus provides valuable learning that incorporates material that meets each student’s readiness level, interest area and learning profiles.

 

Connectivism

I like the recap in this article of the three learning theories  Behaviorism, Cognitivism and Constructivism.  However, I think the article goes overboard when it states, “These theories do not address learning that occurs outside of people (i.e. learning that is stored and manipulated by technology). They also fail to describe how learning happens within organizations. “

 Any teacher knows that students learning within the Constructivist umbrella are learning in groups of two, three and other small configurations. They are also accessing information that is stored in books, magazines, and on the Internet. (technology)

 The powerful advantage of Connectivism is that is allows the learner in a network to readily access the knowledge of all the members of the network. When individual networks are connected other networks then the amount of learning available is greatly magnified. 

 

Bloom’s Taxonomy

 I love the reformulation of Bloom’s Taxonomy done by Lorin Anderson: Remembering, Understanding, Applying, Analysing, Evaluating, Creating. The new terms make the process more readily applicable in the classroom. The digital translations of each of the levels in the taxonomy are also valuable. For example, in the digital arena Creating becomes: designing, constructing, planning, producing, inventing, devising, making, programming, filming, animating, blogging, video blogging, mixing, re-mixing, wiki-ing, publishing, video-casting, podcasting, directing/producing.

 Overall, this article is a great summary of how using digital materials can take student learning to the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.

  

 

Here Comes Everybody

Clay Shirkey

The most important reading that I have done these past few weeks is Clay Shirkey’s, Here Comes Everybody: The power of Organizing Without Organizations.

 This book gives real life examples of how groups of people working outside established organizations have accomplished tremendously important goals. Creating an all-volunteer online encyclopedia and bringing down the government of East Germany are two stellar examples.

 When learning about new technology applications it is easy to get lost in the excitement of their newness without understanding the big picture. Shirkey’s book lets us understand how networks of people outside organizations have used the latest technology applications.The important point is really what powerful things  networked people can do with technological tools. The book is  an invaluable big picture look at networks and the technology that facilitates their connectivity and effectiveness.

The World is Spiky

Many of us are firm believers in networks and in the power of technology to bring us closer to the members of our networks. This belief underlies one of the big ideas of Thomas Friedman’s book, the World is Flat: the exponential technology innovations of the digital revolution have made it possible to do business or otherwise collaborate instantaneously with billions of people around the globe. Moreover, the effect of these technology innovations is to level the global playing field thereby making everyone a player.

 In his Atlantic Monthly article (October 2005) urban theorist Richard Florida argues that a more accurate description of our globe would be, “the world is spiky.” Florida has this perception of the world because he evaluates it in terms of the cutting-edge innovation that drives economic production.

 In Florida’s world view there are three kinds of places that make up the modern economic landscape: the “tallest peaks” (cities that generate innovation); economic hills (“places that manufacture the world’s established goods, take its calls, and support its innovation engines”) and finally there are what Florida calls the “vast valleys” – “places with little connection to the global economy and few immediate prospects.”

 To illustrate his worldview, Florida has generated a map that shows Tokyo, Seoul, New York and San Francisco as spikes in terms of the number of patents registered worldwide. Another map shows the residence of the 1,200 most heavily cited scientists in leading fields. These leading scientific researchers overwhelmingly live in the same handful of US and European cities that are again represented as spikes.

 Florida’s point is that, “Innovation remains difficult without a critical mass of financiers, entrepreneurs, and scientists, often nourished by world-class universities and flexible corporations.” He also argues that key cities where innovation flourishes provide the necessary population density and velocity of ideas to drive that innovation. So, if our world is becoming “spikier” as Florida asserts, what does that mean for the hundreds of millions across the globe who live in the “vast valleys?” Can we still put our faith in the notion that exponential technological innovation lifts all boats?

Freedom Unit Sketch

             Standards Met

 1.   Creativity and Innovation  2.   Communication and Collaboration  3.  Research and Information Fluency  4.  Critical thinking, Problem Solving and Decision Making  5.   Digital Citizenship

 Students will be introduced to the concept of freedom by reading and discussing the book, The Big Box, by Toni Morrison. From the reading and discussion the students will generate an initial class definition of freedom. (This definition will be enlarged and refined as students develop their understanding of the concept of freedom.) The class will have a text set (books, magazines and internet resources) that closely matches the various reading levels, areas of interest, and learning profiles of the students in the class. (differentiated instruction a la Carol Ann Tomlinson)

 Students will then spend a few days “wandering and wondering” through the text set. Student findings and learning will periodically be shared with the whole class. (See blogs/videos.) As this process continues, students will be expected to develop a special area of interest within the concept of freedom. Some examples could be freedom fighters, child labor, slavery, economics and freedom. Students will also be expected to complete a project on a particular area of freedom that will include taking action on behalf of a group that is being denied a basic freedom.

Students will blog regularly about their learning and will also respond to a blog written by the group or advocates of the group that they are taking action for. In addition, the class will create an online hypertext resource on the concept of freedom. Students working either alone or with a small group will make a short video (to be posted on YouTube) about their project and the action that they are taking.