Over on twitter, there has been a bit of a discussion going on about e-learning. You know, just for a change. This post is not about that, or, at least, only tangentially. I will try to have a thoughtful and well-reasoned critique of the pressures of NCEA vs institutional stagnation vs teacher effort at some point. This is not that critique.
Instead, this is based on the extremely unscientific poll I took with my Y13 class today. I asked, "Would you like it if we spent less time doing book work and talking and more time using online resources and making exciting things online?"
I left it nice and vague, thinking that there would be a fair bit off discussion. I was not wrong. There was a lot of discussion, and it was quite interesting. Here are some responses:
"No. When the hell am I ever going to have to make a podcast or whatever those thingies were that you wanted to make?"
"I like it best when we talk in class and you explain things and we all write on the board together."
"Online is not interactive enough."
"Is this worth credits?"
"You like computers. We don't."
"Can we do some physics now?"
I was intrigued. Also, just in case you were worried by the last one, we had just spent a mentally exhausting 50 minutes exploring the Bohr model of the atom and relating it to atomic line spectra. There had already been plenty of physics.
I dug a little deeper. You see, this class is curious about things. They want to know what the speed of light is doing in the mass-energy equivalence equation. They want to know about why Nicola Tesla was eccentric, and why Lise Meitner is a classic example of women getting shafted in the sciences. Here is the rub, though. They want to get through the NCEA standards more than they want to know all this other interesting, exciting, fascinating stuff.
Personally, I can't say I blame them. I'd be concerned about my NCEA level 3 exams too, if I was in their shoes. So, I think the reason they said 'no' to my original question comes down to a couple of big things:
1. They have NCEA level 3 exams soon. We really don't have time to do anything time-consuming. If they have to master a new skill to do it (like learn to use Googlesites), then they're not interested
2. They have NCEA level 3 exams soon. If it's not contributing to their credits, they're not interested.
3. They don't use computers and online resources the way I do. These particular students use computers for some very specific things: writing word documents, and checking facebook so that they can keep up with the lives of other people that they know
It took me a long time to figure out what they meant by that last one. Then I realised that, for this class, social media is about strengthening connections with people they already know. That's what the response about online 'not being interactive enough' was about.
So, I am going to take a while to think about this. As I see it, I have a couple of future directions that I need to reflect on. First, how do I make enough wriggle room in what I do so that we have time to learn about interesting things like Tesla's thing for pigeons? Second, how do I learn more about what students are interested in doing with e-learning, and how do I find time to make that work?
The two questions are related. But tomorrow, when I see these guys, we're going to take a moment to learn a little more about Lise Meitner. It's important.
No comments:
Post a Comment