A Reflection.... plus

I distinctly remember 3 subjects I took at school in yr 10. Classical ballet, Jazz ballet, [with Peter Gunn as the favourite movement piece], and science. I loved the first two because I loved to dance and move and push my body to do things it couldn’t do “just last week”… there was a sense of freedom and achievement in that, and freedom and achievement was a rare outcome from any lesson when I went to school.
Reminds me of high school science classes. The teacher was a nice guy, and there were definately moments when science could be interesting, those times always had a practical componant to the lesson. He seemed to like his students, and in hindsight, I would say he really loved his subject but { the inevitable but! } he had a deep, monotone voice which would have all but the most fearful students, head down on the hard surface of those large lab benches, gratefully dozing away within 5 minutes of his lesson beginning. Generally he would allow us to drift in and out of consciousness for the double period, the gentle monotone hypnotic as it chased one syllable after another around the large, lifeless room. In my brief moments of consciousness, how I longed for him to raise his voice and tell us that, “together we would now prepare to….. dissect something! blow something up!! take a field trip to explore the wonderful forest right beside the school!!!”

I went back to sleep.

Textbook syllabus document regurgitated to a comatosed audience in a learning environment so inert it was pronounced D.O.A.

It seems that the world as we know it, now changes daily. Today’s new computer, mobile phone etc, will be obsolete tomorrow. We have a wealth of information, animation, images, games, creative tools etc. all potentially cognitive tools, at our fingertips with an instructivist learning environment and mindset which is unprepared to move into the schema of the 21stC learning revolution. Most classrooms around the world have undergone very little change in the last 50yrs.




Of course there are those that have put rather large and successful cracks in the education system and have done so since the early 20thC. People such as Rudolf Steiner and Maria Montessori have pioneered changes in the implementation of providing and facilitating a learning environment that acknowledges the innate developmental capacity, the sleeping potential of each human being.
Leaders in the revolutionising of understanding how we learn and the cognitive processes of the mind are Jean Piaget –[1896-1980] , Lev Vygotsky [1896-1934.] and Jerome Bruner [e 1915-]. Theories were postulated and received by the scientific community on the modes of learning with Piaget and Bruner demonstrating how thought processes had 3 different modes of reasoning, each relating to a specific period in the child’s development. The child then assimilates this new information transforming pre-existing constructs to create a new position of understanding of their environment. Vygotsky’s understanding was that development and learning occurred throughout our life rather than in stages and added the use of “ scaffolding” to assist the movement from the place of prior knowledge or understanding, along a framework and within a distributed learning environment to arrive at a place of being able to integrate and apply the learning to a new situation.

Regardless of age, we now find ourselves surrounded by the ubiquitous technology of information communication. Children / students have taken on the role of educators for those who were not issued with a” floppy disc” sophisticated enough to keep pace with digital innovation and its multi faceted interfacing potential. The opportunity for teachers to adopt a facilitator / learner role alongside their students is here. Excellent cognitive tools are readily available on the internet ,eg. Web Quests. They offer the potential for teachers / facilitators to provide stimulating and relevant tasks which can incorporate higher order thinking skills ie. problem solving and reflection, and socio-cultural interaction. Working with an eclectic resource base could potentially enhance student interaction and involvement as strengths are shared within the group to achieve a common goal.

The ongoing work of Howard Gardner [1943-] and his theory of Multiple Intelligences has provided another perspective on the way children learn. Gardner proposes that we have at least nine different intelligences. These predetermine our learning styles and offer the potential for every student to succeed with given tasks and foster good self esteem. As these learning styles are acknowledged and developed, Gardner has discovered that by "teaching each child according to their orientation to the world” they are then able to go on to use previously less predominant learning styles and develop all their talents.

So, as teachers our role is shifting to incorporate more flexibility in the classroom! We often have students with the capacity to multi task on the plethora of gadgets that they have access to and they can do this with silence, speed and ease. Information communication technology is being used in and out of schools in a multitude of ways, and some uses are very questionable creating new avenues for vulnerability, trespass, bullying etc and I am left wondering if the simple, gracious and humane morality that



Albert Einstein –[1879-1955] spoke of
is the thread that weaves it's way
into the "mind" of this technological revolution
and binds itself firmly to the heart and soul
of each human that interfaces with it?

Multiple Intelligences

Follow this link to some other multiple intelligence images to add to your blog.

Atomic Learning

Click here to see what is on Atomic Learning