My last few posts have strayed away from the learning end of things, exploring a few other things that are linked to education but not dealing directly with learning. So what have I been up to?
The last little while, I’ve been working with wikis and blogs, getting my students using them in class. Now, I ran into problems with IE7 and wikispaces. For some reason, the combination of the IE7, the filter we have and the way wikispaces is set up didn’t allow us to access the site I had created. So, after one false start, over to pbwiki I went. I set up the site for the class and we got down to work. The class has seemed to like working with the wiki. They have done quite a bit of work in just one class. I’ve also had them working on the blogs for awhile and their entries have been very good. They are beginning to read the entries of other people and make comments. I am thinking of moving them over to the edublogs site for a bit more access by others. I have also established a calendar for their timelines and homework so that they have this information available to them at all times.
Now, I maintain a school website with due dates and homework for the classes but, if this all works, I will definitely be switching to using a wiki for each class, their assignments, due dates and timelines. It seems to be working very well.
Now, my second class, Communication Production Technology, has been working from my website and have just begun using the wiki and the blog. This class is a little different in that they don’t really have much interest in any sort of work being done in school. We are doing podcasts and are now moving to videos. My plan is for each of the students to do a documentary about a subject that they are passionate about. This is proving more difficult than I first anticipated. The class is not motivated to do much work. So, I’ve take the approach that we go through the content, I discuss the information and we look at the technical aspects. I then give the due date and we proceed. I’ve one or two who work on the tasks, depending on what they feel like while the rest like to watch trailers and videos. It’s too bad. The topics that we are covering allow for a wide variety of topics that they could explore. I’ve suggested their favourite bands, movies, things they are interested in like trucks & cars to no avail.
At some point, I see that the students need to be responsible for their own work and achievement. Without that internal motivation, no amount of cajoling will work. As a teacher, this really frustrates me because I know that most other groups of students would be jumping at the opportunity to do this type of stuff especially the documentary. To explore a topic they are passionate about would really appeal to them.
Unfortunately, some of our students have had the excitement of learning extinguished. They have great ideas and are great kids but school, as it is right now, does not work for them no matter what we try to do. Right now, school is the last place they want to be because they see no relevance to what they are doing. They see it as being something completely foreign to what they will do later on. Much like the
Download might be something for our students. All I know is that it saddens me to see these students so disinterested but we must continue to try to find that spark that will start the fire burning again.
