Mar 20 2008
It’s time to change…
How true the lyrics ring of Wake Up Everybody by Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes:
“Wake up all the teachers time to teach a new way
Maybe then they’ll listen to whatcha have to say
Cause they’re the ones who’s coming up and the world is in their hands when you teach the children teach em the very best you can.The world won’t get no better if we just let it be
The world won’t get no better we gotta change it yeah, just you and me.”
We obviously need to change the way we teach the current techno-savvy, social networking generation. Why? Well, I think Michael Wesch, a professor at Kansas State University, hits the nail on the head in his 5-star digital ethnography video, A Vision of Students Today, which delves into the minds of Millennials and the state of education today.
I was recently introduced to the profound works of Professor Wesch via the Web 2.0 class that I am currently enrolled in, and I have taken the liberty of embedding the video here for your viewing pleasure:
A precursor to this work was Professor Wesch’s The Machine is Us/ing Us that deals with how the web changes the way people interact. And, indeed it does, the web also changes the way can reach our students. If the internet and all its inherent Web 2.0 tools allow us to engage an increased number of scholars, then we need to learn how to use it more effectively in our classrooms.
Thank you Professor Wesch for these thought provoking videos. And, much gratitude to Jim Walker for introducing me to them.
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Hurray you have your blog. What song are you quoting? If you find an mp3 file you could download it and play the song.
Jim
Great idea…Jim. I’m on it.
Thanks.
Anne Marie
I read you post in the Moodle forums, but responding in a blog is more connected. The information overload does take time to manage. I still have trouble trimming my RSS reader to a reasonable number. Try to stick to a few bloggers/resources and you will have more than enough information.
Ann Marie,
Mike Wesch is an amazing guy. After I read about the success of his “Machine is Us” video, I’ve made a point to get acquainted with him, since I also teach at K-State and our interests overlap. I’m planning to enroll in his digital ethnography class next spring as part of my graduate studies- I can’t wait!
I am only just beginning to explore the possibilities in my own classes with this technology because I have only recently begun to “wake up!” I thought blogging was an ego-trip, but I realize it goes far beyond that now that have I recently started my own education blog (billgx.edublogs.org) and getting feedback from readers. I think there is great potential here for interacting with our students in ways that were never possible before, not to mention sharing ideas with other educators!
Bill Gx