So the day began with an interesting session by Ewan McIntosh. I found his style nice and his message? not too harsh.
Nonetheless, we at MCDS have much to ponder. Once I adjusted to his lovely Scottish accent, I was intrigued by the "power" of his "powerpoint", minimalist by ALL definitions.
His message, however, was not minimalist...the title of his talk was:
"It's Not All Native Wit! From creativity to ingenuity..."
He made me wonder about many things.
I am not sure I agree with his statement that there is no such distinction between Digital Native and Digital Immigrant. Jihad and I are surely and proven digital immigrants while our children are NATIVES in all ways. So I am not buying this one.
However, he is making me think long and hard about what I believe and what works.
In Upper School Division meetings, I have said more than once: "IT's NOT CONTENT, it's skills" so, overall, I feel we are moving in the right direction, but WHICH SKILLS? looms ridiculously large...
Here are things he is making me think about:
• the internet allows the barely motivated to become activists
• Teachers are all on Facebook and kids are all on Bebo
• We need to be learning from Their spaces
o "Saturate"
o "Incubate" leave it to settle
o "Illuminate" aha moment
(Right now I am in SATURATE!)
• Do schools encourage divergent thinking?
• Schools are about being convergent: getting everyone the same information, OUCH
We are not noticing the things right under our noses because we are too busy looking at the toilet paper
Obama: using the younger generation
Get out in front of social networking sites
Look to other countries for what they do in schools e.g. Britian, Australia
Cell phones are the wave of the future (this scares me)
Participation culture: how young people breathe
Identity 2.0
• Secret spaces
• Public spaces
• Publishing spaces
• Performance spaces
• Participation spaces
• Watching spaces
All these spaces need to be used to engage students today
What simple tools can help your learning become remarkable?
How can you create a “shared awareness”?
What changes would you make to get small passionate groups creating themselves?
"There are three sorts of people in the world:
Those who are immoveable, those who are moveable and those who move…"
That was that session...
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The next session was my own personal lovefest with KIVA; today I loaned money to two more merchants, both just starting.
I also invited every family contact I have on email to make a loan. Wahoo!
Jessica is terrific and her story is inspiring and she did a great job of explaining KIVA and its mission.
Right on!
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Session on Creative Intelligences was good and helped me sort out Twitter, TWEET, Bloglines, tagging, yelping and lots of other good stuff
(just kidding about the yelping!)
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Conversation with Artie intrigued me.
I think our students and young alums at MCDS are doing exactly what she is doing but it is all part of their online OUT OF SCHOOL life; their online IN SCHOOL life is restricted, tame and probably one dimensional to them.
This is where I see our work unfolding: undoing the taboo of bringing kids' online thoughts, ideas and creations into their school life.
hmmm...I think it is because we are fearful of what happens when they screw up...
Came back to my funky hotel, swam some laps, had some dinner and ruminated on where to go from here...
to be continued...
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