Chapter+03+-+School+-+Change+&+Resistance+to+Change

This chapter predicts/hopes that technology would improve teaching by... • This chapter ends with the thought, "In education, change will come by using technical means to shuck off the technical nature of School learning" (p.56). I think Papert means that when we embrace the freedoms that learning with computers can provide, we will walk away from the more mechanized approach to learning (No Child Left Behind - tee, hee). • Papert begins by looking at whether technology has changed schools and he seems to be saying that we don't really know because so many classrooms have so few resources. Papert also complains that technology has been stuffed into becoming another "department" at school with all the inherit restrictions that implies.

Even though this book was written 20+ years ago, its application in this chapter relates to today by... • Our school are still divided into disciplines (English, science, history, etc....) and Papert would like to see a different approach. Perhaps in Papert's school you have adults with varying areas of expertise to act as aids to students who are relentlessly pursuing subject of their own choosing. It is hard to imagine how that type of education would look like after ten years. Is education like eating? After dining on chocolate-chip cookies for most of the day, my body starts to ask for something else. Would my mind also work that way? I suppose that is the way I work when I am outside of school.

This chapter ties into the TPCK model by... • Papert would argue with the TPCK approach. I don't think Papert wants technology to become co-opted by a traditional academic approach. Papert is more interested in rethinking how we can use technology to reconfigure education so that it is more student centered and less one-size-fits-all.

Practical uses for the info presented in this chapter for my classroom include... • Papert writes about change in schools being "developmental". He goes on to quote Piaget and say that change can be "assimilated" or "accommodation". Papert argues that schools have assimilated technology, but they have not changed education to accommodate the powers that new technologies posses. I think he is arguing that one of the most important aspects of technology is its capacity to excite learners to pursue their areas of interest. • On page 53 Papert writes about the power of computers and technology to provide learning experiences that are across disciplinary lines. For example, a project involving computers might be part art, part mathematics, part logic, etc...Papert sees this as a strength of technology and a weakness of our current system where everything is so compartmentalized.

byron

I'm going to address this chapter as a whole, not by broken down questions. I'm having a hard time doing that by the way -- do you guys think it's the best format, or should we just blog what we think? I'm finding it tedious busy work myself. I know it was my idea, but I don't like it, I admit it!

So, I'll be the first to stray from what we set out to accomplish. I am having such torn feelings reading this book. Ironically, I'm reading another book called, "Driven by Data" -- that was Diana and I talked a little bit about tonight -- so you guys didn't miss much because a good chunk of the conversation revolved around my personal situation. I am a Q-comp peer leader (isn't that an oxymoron!) at my school this year (and next). It is part of my responsibility to read this book and (with my Q-comp partner) train our entire teaching staff in data driven assessments and instruction. Over the summer, I was all for it, there's data, there's proof, there are schools with 90 percent diversity, 90 percent free and reduced lunch and 90 percent success rates -- it seemed so black and white. And maybe that's my problem with it now -- it's too black and white and it's going to suck the life out of our kids! But I don't have the answer.

I keep blogging about authentic assessment and how important I think it is -- I'm not sure data is an authentic way to portray one's self. Diana and I talked a little bit about her school and how they do all project based learning, and I've always been more of a believer in project-based work, but have never been in an administrative position to be able to carry it out across a staff. As a classroom teacher, I always weaved my curriculum together though -- anything we talked about in one subject, we carried over into the next. They were not neatly placed boxes on a shelf -- it was one big, fat learning experience.

In this chapter, Papert talks about the "computer lab" as a bad thing - that the computer should be interwoven throughout the curriculum and being used with all teachers in all classrooms, not in a canned computer lab. I couldn't agree more and this is what I've been trying to push for at my school, but "we don't have the funds", etc., etc. The worst part is... I'm the "computer teacher" and I'm stuck doing this job that I don't believe in because I don't think it's the best way for the students to learn. It's not authentic. I do my best to follow the teacher's curriculum maps (which they JUST started providing -- our school's really behind). If I had something like Breck's curriculum continuum map (Byron's school), I could accomplish a whole lot more by at least infusing the curriculum from the classroom into the computer lab -- I think it should be the opposite, but it's a start.

Another personal experience I'm having with authentic audiences and authentic assessment is with another online class I'm taking. The instructor is having us create documents for a fake company and have a recorded webinar trying to sell the fake company's fake stuff to a fake school. All in the name of creating Word, Excel and PPT docs and holding a webinar meeting. There are so many useful things we could be doing with a webinar that are REAL. I just feel that it's a big waste of time and we're just doing it to prove to him that we can do it -- where's the learning? Yes, I will learn how to do a webinar, but, I'd rather learn how to do a webinar while I discuss something of importance with my colleagues -- I don't see value in having a fake meeting. So, now I sit here and think... how many "fake" assignments have I given? Like my virtual vacation project -- project based? Yes, sort of. Real? Not really. Maybe that's what those "unmotivated" students were thinking.

Even though I don't love this book and I think that Papert short changes the reader by not giving us clear ideas of how to carry this out (especially w/in the educational constraints we find ourselves), I'm finding that I'm challenging my very own ideas, which I think is a great way to grow. I'm just not sure how this is going to go over at my next professional development training!

carol

HEY…. Now what color to use? I would whole heartedly agree that data is not an authentic way to portray one's self. I hope that no teacher thinks this is an accurate way to portray one’s self. Self is a concept that is explored in art. And the data I would produce to describe myself would not include any test scores or class rankings. To actually produce something is an essential part of Art. OOOOOOOHHHHH noooooo! My heart is wrenched by your story of being forced into something you do not believe is authentic and I never thought of the possibility of this for a computer teacher until now. Thank you for opening my eyes. And I would agree with you that yes, the lab of computers should not be contained. But I also see that the curriculum is segmented within the United States and that Lab idea along with funding could be one reason computers have not made it everywhere. Would you be OK with computers in an elementary art classroom? I fear my art classroom is a bunch of fakes. We are only practicing. I don’t think there will be a gallery or museum quality artwork produced in my class ever. So we are making fakes. But yes I also think the idea of a fake company, fake data etc. is… well….creeeepy. Your last paragraph spoke of change and I know that change is hard to be had and that it is near impossible without discomfort or pain. (Kevin Kumashiro has written a lot on this.) Hang in there. Believe in yourself and always be able to articulate to any challengers why you believe what you believe. So at least then they have to make up their mind as you already know.

This chapter is long. He said that computers should be the mediator between children and their ideas. He calls for more computers for students in classrooms. I wonder what % of a computer a student would have today? He said basically that the technology has been perverted from its “excited live exploration” into some curriculum that forces prescribed methods on the students (and therefore the teacher). He said the child’s mind should not be molded like clay but worked with collaboratively with the student’s developmental patterns. All this screams for smaller classrooms. I am one art teacher to about 430 students. They get 1/35th of a teacher at best and at worse 1/430. I want to work with my students, go on adventures, solving something we come up with through art. But I don’t know how to do this inside the school system. Why is this one thing proven to work not being done? Any way…

To use computers as flashcards or “drill and kill” is shameful according to Papert. He spent a lot of time going over how you can’t bank knowledge. You use it or rusts and tarnishes. When it comes to technology, you can’t stop learning because what you learn today will be outdated soon enough. I am not a technician, students are not machines. I am not a manager, this is not a business.

__Chapter 3: Schools: Change and Resistant to Change __ Does technology improve teaching? The students need more than on e computer in their classroom to be successful in using computers to learn. The students would benefit from classroom sets of computers to ensure learning and exploration on the computers. Papert also thinks computer labs and objectives in technology is not what the purpose of the computer and technology should be. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> • Even though this book was written 20+ years ago, its application relates to address on today by...   <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;">I thought this chapter was very interesting in that at most schools there is a computer lab and the students have a computer class. This class has objectives and it’s important that the students understand the different ways to use a computer and it’s programs. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;">We are still dealing with a computer lab and few computers in each classroom. This chapter mentions that although few computers in the classrooms are beneficial and better than none, in order to make computer learning as effective as you possibly can, the students need to be able to have access to learn and explore the computer with questions and comments. To do this, students need access to a computer all the time. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> • This chapter ties into the TPCK model by.. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;">TPCK model would like strongly the fact that we have a class to teach the tool that is supposed to help the students learn through exploration. Papert would be very unhappy with the curriculum part of computers in the schools. He would be unhappy with the school have a computer lab where the students go to learn. He feels the computers are supposed to facilitate and help students learn and explore not to add another structured course of certain ways to do things. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;"> • Practical uses for this site? info in my classroom...  <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;">I realize that I should have certain sites for the students to use but I shouldn’t always give them all the information of how to play or what do with the site. Half of the learning experience is to have the students explore and choose what they can and want to get out of the website. Maybe I could give a couple of websites and let the students. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 115%;">