The school is dead…long live the school.

While blogging as a means of personal learning is still very new to me, the reading and writing I’ve done in the last few days authenticates the value of this format for me. Participating in this type of learning means assembling a personal learning network (PLN) and my network, while still small, contributed to my learning coming full circle in very big ways.

 The progression went something like this:

A few days ago I read a thought provoking post called “Letting Go” by Alec Couros which contained this…

What if you know deep down that schools need to change drastically or cease to exist at all before there will ever be any significant change? What if you feel you are just prolonging the inevitable, and simply giving temporary life to a model that is clearly in its death throes?

This theme of our model of education needing a monumental shift in order to serve 21C learners is very prevalent in the edublogosphere. Almost everyone writes about it in some way and some even suggest abandoning schools altogether . I wanted to develop my own thoughts here at Tools of Engagement but didn’t have the time to devote so I commented:

… while I believe that what goes on inside our schools MUST change, we need to use technology to engage students and help each of them to grow a large web of flat world relationships, we must also see our schools as social places, as communities, where we come together to learn rather than teach.

Now that I’m taking the time to expand on my thinking I’ve revisited some experiences from 2007 that I learned a great deal from. There were two key events I attended last year (both sponsored by the NB Department of Education) that convinced me that while our schools must change there is a place for them in future learning models.

The first event was Let Children be Children (slides) presented by John Abbott of the 21st Century Learning Initiative.  This lecture provided much insight into how we can move from teaching to learning, from the factory school to the community school,  and from teacher directed learning to self directed learning. The vision of 21st Century Learning Initiative is:

New understandings about the brain; about how people learn; about the potential of information and communication technologies;about radical changes in patterns of work as well as deep fears about social divisions in society, necessitate a profound rethinking of the structures of education.

Developing schools that integrate the home, the school and the community and that employ emerging technologies to engage all partners in a learning community are essential.  

The second learning event was Literacy & Learning in the 21st Century with keynote by David Warlick. David delivered his message that it is not about the technology but about how we redefine and integrate literacy in the new digital landscape. Literacy in the 21C is “exposing truth” (reading), “expressing ideas” (writing) “employing information” (’rithmatic) AND tying it all together “ethics”.  At this conference David implored teachers to “let them see you learn“. It’s a phrase I’ve quoted in a few speeches and advice I’ve taken with my own children.

To come full circle - a link recently tweeted by Cindy Siebel led me to Innovative Learning Service (ILS) part of the Calgary Board of Education.  I spent several hours soaking up information and finished with a determination to encourage a similar approach to innovation and 21C learning here at home.

One of the items explored at the site is the OECD’s six scenarios for the future of schooling.  I particularly liked #4 Schools as Social Centres as it brings the ideas of Abbott and Warlick together: 

• Digital technologies will enable schooling to become a far more shared endeavor.
• Schools and other community organizations, (family, libraries, the work place, churches etc…) will assume a shared responsibility for the education of the young.   Expertise is activated from wherever it is located.  
• Teacher professionals will be defined more around understanding the nature of learning and of brain research rather than around a comprehensive understanding of the disciplines.
• Teachers will recognize that continuous professional development both around digital technologies and learning theory will be essential. Schools will recognize the necessity and desirability for constant interaction with the community.
• Schools and teachers are seen as leaders in this endeavour and are elevated to a position of influence and esteem in the communities they serve.  
• Here digital technologies will emphasize communication among and by all stakeholders in the equation - learners, educators, community members and parents.
• Networking is what it is all about.

So “the school is dead” as a factory, as kill and drill, as talk and chalk, and as institutionalized curriculum with little regard for digital literacy.

And “long live the school” as a student centred, community supported, collaborative, connected place to for all of us to learn.

Special thanks to Cindy for tweeting the ILS nugget and to Lorna and Jeff for convincing me that Twitter can be a valuable tool in a developing a personal learning network.

Passion Based Learning

Today I read an old post by Konrad Glogowski on passion based learning (found via Remote Access) that stopped me in my tracks.  The following passage says so much about what we need to be considering:

Today, however, we tend to think that using online tools that appeal to young people will automatically ensure their engagement. Genuine passion cannot be ignited with a podcast or a blog. Instead, we need to give our students the freedom to learn and engage with ideas that they find relevant and important.

My interest in blogging comes from wanting to learn more about engagement of parents and students. Coming into this I knew ”it’s not the tools, it’s what you do with them“, but I was thinking in terms of having parents and students take greater interest in education because they were participating in it. Now I hope we can go even further - all the way to schools that ignite passion.   

I think the idea of giving a student the freedom to find his/her passion resonates with me because my son has the opportunity to pick a subject or topic for a project that he can work on independently when he has completed his regular class work, and he will have access to a computer (not sure what that means in terms of web tools yet). 

Problem - our discussion of passion revealed he didn’t really understand what I was getting at. (So I had him look up the meaning of the word online without thinking of how else the word is used - I had to think quickly to get out of that jam). We finally made some progress when we discussed what he was interested in learning about. 

In the absence of knowing ones passions can we substitute interests?  Perhaps as a child explores interests they will become passions over time. So far we have determined his interests are figuring things out, puzzles, mazes, codes and making things.

As he would like to use the computer for this learning we’ve looked for some possible resources, but so far much of what I’ve found would amount to him “playing” online.  He doesn’t really want to do a “history of” research piece - he wants to make something.

So, I’d welcome any suggestions you may have (other than Scratch which he uses a lot at home)…