I went to a MISA symposium at the Durham School Board on Friday and listened to Dr. Tim Tyson passionately talk about how important it is to use technology to arrive at the vision we want for our schools. We talk about 21st century learning--but we're 11 years into the 21st century! Most of our students are so tech oriented, that when they enter our classrooms, it's no wonder that they are disengaged. He talked about how students can create and revise instantaneously on the web and how we need to really tap into that.
Dr. Tyson's Website
Check it out!
Though there was nothing earth-shattering in terms of what he said, the grade 6, 7, and 8 exemplars he showed us were truly amazing. When students have a real and meaningful project to complete (in this case a film about a social issue), they will research, edit, and re-edit until it's perfect. Most often, we hear, "When will I ever use this?" or "Who cares?" At his school, students were putting in hours and hours of their own time to create the perfect video. Other examples can be found at maybryonline.org
I also really like his tagline:
Educators Using Technology to Enpower Meaningful, Global, Student Contribution
Isn't that what learning should be all about??
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