Blog Assignment #2: What Will Teaching in the 21st Century be Like?

Teaching in the 21st century will, by far, be so much different than the way teachers taught me in school. So much new technology is being used in schools now that I did not even know was being used, and I, as a new teacher will have to learn to use these different aspects of technology and teach my students how to use them in order to better their learning environment.

In the movie, “Mr. Dancelot”, Professor Dancelot attempts to teach a dance class to students using a powerpoint presentation. The students all seem very confused throughout the various class sessions that were recorded. This video relates to me personally, because I have recently gotten into Ballroom dancing. I understand why the students would be confused about the dances when they are being shown by a slideshow. This video reflects the idea that certain classes cannot be taught efficiently in a typical classroom setting of listening to a teacher lecture, taking notes, and taking tests. One learns how to dance well by performing the steps, and having hands-on experience with the different dance types. Looking at a diagram of the Foxtrot steps is not going to teach someone how to Foxtrot efficiently, much less allow them to understand it enough to perform it for a final test!

I enjoyed watching the video called “Teaching in the 21st Century” by Kevin Roberts, because it gave me insight into what is going to be expected of me as a 21st century educator. Roberts makes the claim that teachers are no longer the main resource for information, but are becoming the filter of knowledge. Another great video resource that discusses this process of teaching is “Networked Student” by Wendy Drexler. Both videos discuss how students today have access to basically any information they would ever need through cell phones, social media, Google, and much more. Why would a 21st century student need a teacher when all of these resources are provided to them? Roberts claims that teachers are needed to teach students how to use the resources provided to them: how to find the information they need and apply it to the task they have been given, communicate information to other people, and solve problems using such information. Students must be taught about plagiarism, slander, and many other “need-to-know’s” of the writing and communicating process. I agree with Roberts idea of  how learning should involve engagement and not just entertainment. Roberts claims that entertainment is passive, but being engaged in what one is learning will help them comprehend and retain what they have learned.

In Vicki Davis’ video, “Harness Your Students Digital Smarts”, she discusses her approach of getting students comfortable with technology in the classroom. She claims that one doesn’t have to know how to do something to teach it. I don’t agree with this approach to teaching, because I think a teacher should at least know how to do what has been assigned to the students, even if they aren’t directly showing the students how to do it. Having the students search for information and learn how to do things themselves is a great idea, but assigning something to students when the teacher cannot complete the assignment doesn’t sound like a good idea. The examples she used was a group of her students being in charge of “terraforming” in a computer program. The students were required to search for information on how to perform this task, and taught the teacher how to do it as well. She claimed that she did not know how to terraform until that day. As a future teacher, I would want to know how to do what my students were being required to do.

The last video I watched was called “Flipping the Classroom”. The woman speaking in the video is a teacher and she is explaining the process of “flipping” a classroom. This process includes students receiving an assignment, and completing the assignment at home while watching a video that was recorded by the teacher. This process saves time in the classroom because the teacher has already taught the lessons to the students the night before through the video assignment. Since the teachers have more time in the classroom they can focus on helping the students master the subject instead of spending so much time in front of the class lecturing. Also, having the video recordings of the lessons allows the students who need to review more to do so because they can re-watch the videos as much as they would need to.

Watching these videos has opened my eyes to the new way of teaching that is being implemented in our schools. I did not realize how important technology is becoming in our education systems and how much I will be required to know about this technology. These videos are great resources for information on how teaching is changing in our society.