Creativity

Question of the day. Does our current education system set all children up to learn? I believe we honestly have to answer that question with a "no". Sir Ken in the youtube clip that we watched brought up a very thought provoking statement. He claimed that the topmost goal of eduction was to create university professors. In other words, the world's education system is set up to engage only one side of children brains. More simply put, we are not encouraging children to be creative through school due to the subjects that students are required to take.

Now I do not believe that educators are squashing their students creativity as much as Sir Ken is proposing, however I do not believe schools are putting children in the best environment to learn. What I mean by that is children are not meant to sit in a desk for an extended period of time, and be expected to be attentive. Children are curious. Now all children are going to be different, that is obvious. However, I believe the best way to engage a child is to keep their bodies active. Just look at how children love playing outside. What if schools took the energy that was created on the playground and harnessed it into the classroom.

I'm getting this philosophy from something my mother implemented into her 2nd grade classroom two years ago.

My mother's 2nd grade class a few years back was an extremely "wild" class. She was always telling our family how fidgety they were, and what a hard time they had paying attention. Apparently my mother did some research and she found a new idea. This idea she read about was tailor to students who had a hard time sitting still and paying attention. (ADD, ADHD). She decided to take away all the chairs in her room and replace them with stability balls. No longer do any of her students sit in chairs. Instead, they all bounce continuously on stability balls behind their individual desks.

The first time I saw this in action I felt a little motion sickness coming on from all the children bouncing up and down. However, I soon realized how effective those balls really were. There was definitely energy in the room to the subject they were working on. Obviously, some strict rules had to be set up with the balls, and my mother would most likely not let her students break any of them without an immediate removal of the ball.

I know that personally I would have liked to be in that class when I was in elementary school, because I like to be active. Maybe more initiatives like stability balls are just what our education system needs.

Role Playing

Tensions ran slightly high this past Monday night class. Most of the different groups being represented in our town hall meeting were feeling some kind of increased emotions during the hour. For many of those groups the emotion(s) they were displaying was passion. I talked about passion in a previous blog from a teacher's perspective, however its more directed toward the students this week.

That hour was a classic example of how much of an impact emotion being displayed by students can have on their education. I do not believe one single student can say they walked out from that hour of class having not gotten anything from it. The town hall meeting setting is one where students almost feel they need to be passionate about the group/ideas that they are representing. This is not to say that a lecture on the No Child Left Behind legislation would have showed us more logistics about the policy. However, I firmly believe that we now understand the effects of the legislation. Which is just if not more important.

This method of learning shows that it is a legitmate process of teaching. Is it the best way to teach a concept to students? I think a better question is, "Is there only one way to teach a concept?" Obviously the answer is no. Therefore, a teacher must ask themselves to make goals for what they want their students to get out of each concept they teach. If you want them to remember logistics a lecture style is probably the best way to hold them accountable for the material. However, I believe remember a concept and understanding a concept are two different ideas. Both important. Yet both very different.

Passion

Some of my favorite classes ended up being my favorite because of passionate teachers. In other classes my favorite subjects ended up being my least favorite classes due to a teacher's lack of enthusiasm. Why is that? How come students are not always able to be passionate on their own? I think the answer to that question is students are more influenced by their teachers than some may like to admit.

Take me for example. I never was a huge fan of English. Writing was hard for me, and I just did not enjoy reading very much. However, I then came upon Mr. E (Engesether.) I don't know if I will ever meet a more goofy, wild, and passionate teacher in my life. This man would stand on desks, yell randomly, and use multiple different accents each and every class. Everyone could just tell how passionate he was with not just his eccentric nature and how he used that in class, but in also how he would assist anyone who needed it. He would get to school by at least six a.m. every morning to write comments on our writing, and to meet with anyone who wanted to meet. He would also stay a few hours after school to do the same thing.

Like I said before English wasn't my favorite subject up until I met Mr. E. However, after my first class with him (American Lit) I just could not get enough. I ended taking all of his classes which included Shakespeare, advanced composition, and AP English. Now this was the kid who wasn't very good at writing, and disliked reading.

Now, I had a completely opposite experience in my history classes. Up until high school I loved history. I enjoyed learning about all the different empires, the many rulers, wars, etc. I just couldn't get enough. At least until my sophomore year. That year I ran into the most unpassionate teacher that I had in my education experience. Most days we talked about his favorite movies. The only time it seemed that he put any effort into his lessons was the day he was observed by the administration. That day was the only day I saw him wear a tie as well. After his class I sort of shunned away from history classes.