21st Century Education & Learning Environments & Learning Programs & Web 2.0 and Education 15 Feb 2006 09:45 pm
Learning programs and students of the 21st Century….
Learning programs and students of the 21st Century….
Introducing the 3 e’s
It has been sometime since I wrote in the blog. Things have been busy with my new job with trips overseas and meetings to negotiate pilot schools for a new program.
Recently I was discussing the evolution of our program with a colleague from Emmanuel. I went home after our brief catch up and started thinking about what 21st Century learning programs should do in order to engage our students. I came up with a concept that I am going to do some more work with in the coming months. I call them the 3 e’s of 21st century learning programs….. I believe that 21st century learning programs should be
1) Entertaining
2) Engaging
3) Educational
The first ‘e’ may be a tad controversial for many of my readers but please allow me to explain myself. I have long felt that educators have missed a key to engaging students in the content. We all wish to have our students engaged and it has been a buzz word around education for longer than I have been involved in schools. I actually believe that this generation of students is firstly engaged by drawing on their desire to be entertained. We are teaching and attempting to educate a generation that is not just interested in being entertained by TV, movies and music but a generation that expects to be entertained by TV and movies on demand and an entire music collection accessible in their pocket. Perhaps we could conclude that if a student is entertained in a 21st century way they are then engaged.
I was interested in a colleague’s observation about a new initiative at Emmanuel College. Recently they installed a number of interactive whiteboards. He made the remark that he could see students being engaged with this tool in their classroom longer than any other form of technology he had used before. During my limited experience in teaching I found myself always looking for the ‘new’ thing in technology that would engage and benefit my students. 2005’s students were not impressed with the same technology I used to blow the minds of students in 2004. There was a search for something each year.
I now think that perhaps I missed the point of effective learning programmes. Technology enhances a quality programme that already entertains and draws on student’s interests. Yes I can use technology to entertain and draw students in but the content and concepts being taught still need to be presented in an entertaining, then engaging way, which will hopefully lead to an educational experience (learning).
Obviously there is some more work to be done on this thought. It is not even 24hours old…. But I am interested in comments and thoughts…..
on 21 Feb 2006 at 2:14 am 1.Michael said …
Think I might have sent you this link before, but it’s certainly related to ways of engaging the 21st century learner… check out Kathy Sierra’s Crash Course in Learning Theory. Has some excellent points about motivation, fun, as well as using variety and surprise…
on 07 Mar 2006 at 5:42 pm 2.bmoller said …
A great comment from graham.wegner@lnps.sa.edu.au that somehow I accidently deleted…. so here it is…. Sorry Graham
You’re dead right, it isn’t the tool that engages the student, it is the quality of
the content that is accessed via that tool. Ay my school, we are implementing an IWB
program and one of the boards was partially funded by a Science action research
grant. Our Science teacher did a bit of measurement with the upper primary students
who commented that the IWB was “alright” but if the science activities and
simulations shown were of a high quality, then that would be “excellent.” And your
use of the word entertainment does not need to imply that it can’t be important
concept and content wise. People like Adam Spencer and Dr.Karl are entertaining but
their content is science and maths. Teachers have to make the shift that maybe they
need to facilitate quality content from various sources and experts, instead of
relying on themselves as “stand up educators”.
on 07 Mar 2006 at 6:59 pm 3.Graham Wegner said …
Thanks for finding my comment. I was a bit mystified as to where it went and I was a bit disappointed as I wanted to expand on my points in my own blog but what I had written to you here had completely flown my mind. So much of what you are talking about relates to Marc Prensky’s point of view. He was here in Adelaide and while I would never subscribe to one person only’s point of view about where we are all heading, he provokes heaps of things to consider when in the business of engaging students. Check out my links at Prensky, Prensky and More Prensky as well as my notes from his seminar last Friday – Marc Prensky in Adelaide Seminar Pt 1 and Part 2.