When I was a child I was an avid reader. I read everything I could find, even as a first grader. It wasn’t until I moved to Fort Hood, Texas in 3rd grade, that I learned phonics, which really opened up the world of reading. At that point, I could then read newspaper articles, my mom’s nursing books, etc. I didn’t always understand what I read, but I could read the words, and as I read more, then asked questions of what I read, I then understood more and more. By 4th grade, I tested out at 12th grade reading level, and by 6th grade, I was tested at college graduate level. I feel that was the beginning of my learning that learning is all about being able to learn as you experiment, try things, ask questions, get answers, ask more questions and really learn. If I had just read the little reading books in class, I would have been in the top level, but I don’t believe I would have excelled in reading the way I did. When I was in 8th grade, they tested my reading comprehension with speed, and it showed that I could read between 750 – 1000 words per minute with 100% comprehension. Books like Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys were read in an evening. My reading teacher was mad at me because I was reading the John Steinbeck book, the Grapes of Wrath at age 13. My mother stood up for me, saying the parts I didn’t understand were not a problem, as I always went to her for explanations. Not only did I learn about that time period, I found out my mom was born in 1930 and my father was 10 years old. I learned my grandparents were sharecroppers, both sets of grandparents. As I read this book, I began to learn real live history, as I called it, about my parents and grandparents. I began to learn that many things happening to this family that moved to California, actually happened to my family too, in various ways. I feel that was part of my PLE. (no source, personal experience)
Of course, parents who play with babies and toddlers, should be teaching their children with experiences. That should really be the first PLE. I have begun teaching a free, one night class, once or twice a year, for parents, to learn to play musically with their babies and young children. It includes music, fingerplays, riding horsie, bouncing, jumping, moving, singing, poems, and many more things. It allows children to learn to play and learn, and have fun with Mommy and Daddy. I am now teaching some of those babies in Kindergarten and know I did the right thing to begin this class. All the above was with no real technology going on. (no source, personal experience)
What about PLEs and Web 2.0 tools? Is technology itself enough?
As for PLS’s. With technology, it really opens up the world to us. When I wanted to learn a really great clarinet solo, I went to You tube and typed it in and saw and heard adults and children (WoW!), playing it. I can find almost any performance I want or need to see. I can find how to do things, good singing, bad singing, instruments demonstrated from all over the world! It is amazing. Being able to see and hear good musicians right in my own living room is so wonderful. (Web 2.0 for Schools; Davies;Merchant, p. 5)
When I learned to use email it was so fast. So wonderful. Now, I am learning new and better ways to talk with people, to work with people. I didn’t figure out email was the wrong way to communicate; I just thought I was being slow. Now, I am learning such better ways to communicate for different reasons. There is NOTHING wrong with email. It still has it’s purpose. It just isn’t for group projects and group communications.
I still need to learn more about some things to see are they different or just one company’s program vs. another company’s program. An example is Flickr and Picasa. Are they the same, or different? Is one better, are there more advantages with one over the other. Not only do we have technology, but it is improving and expanding almost by the day.
Some of us are older and don’t even realize it’s out there. But when we do see it, learn of it, it sounds great, but then, as we then begin to see and use it for the advantages it offers, THAT is when we really begin to understand just how great it is.
I definitely understand how important PLE’s and Web 2.0 tools are. By themselves, they really aren’t much. It is just a new “trick”. When you add it to a situation in teaching, or bill paying, or communicating, that is when it becomes something outstanding. I sometimes don’t see the way it can be used and that is part of my journey that still needs to be made better. (Davies, Merchant, p. 7-9).
What are the key components you would include in new schools?
As for key components in new schools, there must be wireless access to internet with chances to leave the firewalls with teacher permission, more of the tools, with microphones, speakers, and so many things I still am not aware of.
If you make the assumption that the educational systems as we know them do not work for the vast majority of the students moving through them, what would work?
Exploring, hands on, inquisitive minds wanting to know, to learn something. I know that my reading started by looking at books, frustrated I couldn’t read. My knowledge of astronauts started when I watched Glenn go into space, and come right back down. I began searching for answers. I even wrote Gus Grissom, who wrote me back. Of course, this was before the tragic fire that took his life.
Our son, Nathan, was reading, adding, subtracting and multiplying at the early age of 2 and 3 months. He was spelling words forwards and backwards, multiplying numbers, although he never explained it too us until he was almost 4 years old. We don’t know how he processed all this, but at age 18 months, he would walk around with a big dictionary and ask what is this word. I would tell him and 20 minutes later, or so, he was back, asking a different word. After a few months of this, he began reading little readers to his big brothers. We just know he was interested in words and numbers, and later, he was using them correctly in books and his own drawings.
Are virtual learning environments with course management systems the answer? (no source, personal experience)
They are partially the answer. We need to remember that children need social interaction and skills that will help them in the world. I see tha virtual learning environments are very god and have their place in education. According to Web 2.0, there are many ways to use them. Although I am still learning, I do believe that is true, just as long as children also have interaction with other people as they learn, group projects and more, I think it is a good thing.
What are the key components for 21st century schools and “learning beyond the test?
In what I have read so far, I see there are many components to the newer schools, and education. Some of the things I have read in Web 2.0 are things I am not sure I agree with. Some, I do. I am concerned by some statements, such as the fact that encylopedias are always outdated. In a way, I understand that, but I also see them as history. They are a statement of life at that moment. The countries no longer exist, true, but here are facts from a certain date and time of a country that did exist and the facts of that country at that time.
I have tried to find old maps of Africa in the 1950’s and although they do exist, do you know how difficult it is to find them? I have looked many times for them and not been successful. But, at my mom’s house, I can take down the first globe ever given my brother and there the countries are. What a neat article. Also, people who are not writers, with being concise, players of words, working on the plot with such exactness, that not all of us can be an author like them. That is why a good author is worth what they do. It is fine that any of us can write and tell our stories, but we may need help to make it a better story.
The expression, Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater is a good expression as we shouldn’t get rid of the good non technology just to put technology in it’s place. Technology is here to stay. There is enough good technology that we don’t need to get rid of good old ways just to say we have technology.
I have an eBook. I like it. The words on it are by published authors. Sometimes I miss being able to flip through and find passages I read already, without having to lose my place for a minute.
I am a bit old fashioned, but I love new, too. I am ready for the new, but let’s keep some of the good old.
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