Learn Lots!

This idea has been bouncing around in my head for awhile, but today I added to it significantly.  After helping teach the Teaching with Technology course last semester, I realized how little students know about professionalism.  Receiving emails from students with incorrect grammar, punctuation, and sporting titles like LittleBunnyFooFoo@gagmail.com caused me much reflection and even some wincing at times. Currently, I'm working on idea at the CTL for teaching a class or at least providing materials to incoming or outgoing students to address such issues.  The hope is to provide them a greater chance at success in addition to removing the excuse that "no one ever told me." I then started wondering if any research or theory has been developed in this area.  It seems like professionalism is becoming harder and harder to define in our increasingly casual culture, yet it remains a reality that can come back to bite you if you don't know the rules.  Attempting to...

This morning during an impromptu brainstorming session with myself, I came up with this idea.  I was lamenting the fact that it seems like more and more children in America are growing up not learning how to sing.  (I don't have any empirical evidence for this, just personal observation.)  Thus, it could be amazing to design an application for the Wii that teaches voice lessons.  For example, lesson one could be matching pitch; it plays a tone, you hum it into the mic, and it gives you a score.  If it could get more people singing, I highly support it.  Perhaps it's too educational for the Wii, though.  At least the title is great!

This is a word conglomerate I made using wordle.net.  It shows the top ten key words from the last ten years and their comparative prominence.  Although I may never have a practical use for it, I wanted to share it anyway!  Enjoy! Link to Wordle

Situated cognition was a concept that caught me a bit by surprise in graduate school.  I don't know if it wasn't discussed or if I just didn't catch it as an undergraduate, but it didn't seem at all familiar.  Thus, I've had to wrestle with it a bit to decide whether or not I believe environment is as deterministic of learning as they contend. However, as I was thinking about it today, I realized that every theorist that has ever lived serves as a viable argument for situated cognition.  One could contend that they never could have come up with ideas they did without their environment and it would be a very valid point.  Perhaps I'll end up converted after all!

Research.  This topic has become so controversial in my own mind of late I'm not even sure how to feel about it anymore.  On the one hand, it is unarguably the lifeblood of the academic world.  On the other hand, is it really making a difference? Since I've been in graduate school I've been exposed to a lot of research and academic writing.  So far, I can't say that I'm a huge fan.  It seems like the unspoken purpose of so many articles is to use as many confusing and domain-specific terms as possible.  If you're going to write something, why not make it accessible?  One would think that the purpose, especially of educational research, would be to inform practitioners, not just researchers.  But, if our research only informs more research and never makes an impact at the classroom level, what is the purpose of doing it in the first place? I do recognize that my wishes for reform in research are not likely to come about...

As I was reading through a book on coding today (Saldana's, for the record), I was reminded of an idea I'd had previously.  He used an example a study on oppression among teenagers.  This reminded me of a previous roommate of mine who did her thesis on the presence of shame and its effects in certain situations.  In reflecting on that idea since then, I've realized that we as a society sometimes use shame to modify behavior.  For example, if someone is wearing an outfit or sporting a hairstyle we consider strange and thus socially unacceptable, we ostracize or verbally demean them. The shocking thing?  Using shame as a modifier has little to no effect on behavior that I've ever observed.  However, our attempts to reform someone through applying shame seem to take effect in the way they feel about themselves.  It is obviously not an effective strategy and shouldn't be employed even if it was.  Awareness about this issue might prove helpful not on...

This is an idea that has been burning inside my head since yesterday.  It was inspired by the presentation on Design-Based Research by Dr. Brenda Bannan of George Mason University.  The basic concept of such research, as I understand it, is applying design to other widely accepted research methods.  My thought was, why not apply the same concept to teaching and learning? As it often does, my mind flew to the realm of Elementary Education.  What if it was possible to create a charter school that taught students to design in addition to or as a way to teach content?  The possibilities are endless!  Students then leave the school not only with content knowledge, but with design as a strategy for problem-solving.  It's a skill they'll be able to use for the rest of their lives! I believe this idea could also have implications for higher education.  What if in teacher education, for example, we taught students how to design?  It's a skill that...