Here it is---the final response opportunity of the Curriculum 21 book study for the spring group. I hope it has been a meaningful learning experience for you and that it will help you lead your staff to consider the possibilities. I encourage you to continue visiting the blog because the summer study group will begin posting comments soon. By the time we get to the leadership retreat in August, everyone will have had opportunity to read and learn from each other. We will use all the comments to continue our learning at the retreat and throughout next year. Here are the final set of questions.
Chapter 12
1. As a classroom teacher, how does the author's changing perceptions about the savvy student match your faculty's perceptions?
2. How might we help our faculty have "the light go on" through the use of a salient use of a piece of hardware (video podcasting camera) to a Web 2.0 site?
3. How can our professional staff revise its instructional style and approach to match the digital child arriving each day?
4. How might we use social networks for our own professional growth? How might we use social networks to stimulate the growth and knowledge of our learners?
Chapter 13
1. Which specific 21st century curriculum and instruction transitions will take "some getting used to" for faculty, administrators, and students?
2. Are there specific Habits of Minds (from the list of 16 habits, pp. 212-213) that need cultivation in your school community to make the transition into the 21st century?
3. How can you support these habits of mind? What will use and support look like in practice?
4. What do the authors mean by changing our "mental model" in terms of planning communicating in schools? What mental model is dominant now?
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
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3 comments:
I have enjoyed reading this book, but I find that I struggle because I want the right answer and I just don't have it yet. In the section about Curriculum Mind Shifts she states that we have to start valuing knowledge production instead of knowledge acquisition. If I am being honest, this is where I see the greatest disconnect between state standards and state assessment and the 21st Century Skills. Although I can agree that if you teach students to be learners they will do well on any test situation, the honest truth is that our accountability system is set up not to do this. There are only definitive answers on the TAKS test, and even though they are changing this, I doubt it will be much different. I feel that the reason why teachers get stuck teaching to the test is because at the end of the day, the test is their assessment and they operate on a daily basis out of fear. There is a fear of calling a parent to tell them their child did not pass the test, a fear of the administration being unhappy about their scores, and a fear of what others will think of them. I would love for us to judge success on socially organized activities and the development of their identities, but it is difficult to do that in the world of high stakes testing. I think teachers are searching for something that says, here are your standards and here is how to do something amazing within the framework that you can't change. I am hoping that combining the ITs and the Curriculum department will help move them in this direction. I think this is where we have to start.
While reading the final 2 chapters I just kept thinking, this this the way I managed my kindergarten class and curriculum. Project-based, thematic teaching where multiple disciplines (and objectives/standards) are addressed using problem-solving and discovery learning strategies. When children come to school at age 5 the previously described scenario is the world they come from, and within 2-3 years we shift their thinking to write and wrong answers at the knowledge level of Blooms. Shame on us.... As stated in chapter 13, "Our students are in the 21st century, and they are waiting for the teachers and curriculum to catch up."
As the Nike' slogan suggests, "Just Do It!" Commit to implementing one tool/strategy at a time to reform your curriculum and teaching, and then phase in new strategies each month to six weeks and by the end of the 2010-11 school year the level of student engagement and productivity will be evident. We are 10 years into the 21st century and the cautious baby steps are not enough. Purposeful planning and implementation, and replacing old lessons with new, upgraded lessons are the only way we are going to truly make strides in redesigning teaching and learning.
uh, yes, that would be RIGHT and wrong answers but sometimes we do "write" them.... (you should always preview before publishing...)
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