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A good education needs free time

drebabels (Andre Deutmeyer) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 14:05:20 +0000

One of the questions that I have been wrestling with ever since I took a job as a teacher (which I must admit I am no longer doing) is how to fix our educational system. And by our I don’t mean just the one in the United States, but also the ones in places like Korea or Japan… those countries that people typically point to and say “Hey look at them. They have great educational systems.”

My response: I was a teacher in Korea. And the system here is just as f’d up as it is in the United States. If you want to compare math and science scores… ok Korea and Japan do have a significant edge on the United States, but you should see what these kids have to go through. A lot of these kids are addicted to coffee by the time they start middle school. It is not unusual for them to go to school from 7am to 10pm, Mon thru Fri and throw in another half day over the weekend. This can’t be healthy in the long run. And now I hear that people in the United States are saying that we should make our education system more like Korea and Japans? My honest opinion is that that would be a terrible mistake.

Why? Well if you are looking for solid data proving why this would be a terrible move, I don’t have any. But I do want to show you a YouTube video that I recently came across that will serve as my anecdotal evidence. This video (created by Kutiman) is a compilation of other user created music videos scattered across YouTube, blended together to create one longer video song. The result, an incredible creative audio endeavor.

But more important than the result itself was how it was created. You think that somebody went to school and was taught how to do this? You cannot be taught to be creative. Creativity comes from free time. And as Kevin Kelly suggests creating this video must have been a total waste of time and it will probably bring the artist immeasurable success.

What I am trying to suggest with this is that free time is important. The ability to waste time is important. Granted many of the things children do with that free time will be pointless (in our eyes) but we must still give them that time because one day they will create something that will bring them immeasurable success using that free time.

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Education Trends: Manga Meets Learning

drebabels (Andre Deutmeyer) — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 03:21:27 +0000

Long a popular form of media in Japan and the rest of Asia, Manga has taken the United States by storm. Wired reports that in 2007, Manga had finally arrived in force and had become one of the hottest trends in the American publishing. Children and young adults in the United States alike can’t seem to get their hands on enough of it.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, Manga refers to a style of comic books that can be found in every book store / newspaper stand in Japan. Everyone from students to business men can be seen reading it.

So how does this affect education? According to a report from Matt Ford at Ars Technica, Manga will soon be used to introduce students (and others) to various topics in science and technology – everything from relativity to statistics to biotechnology.

Entitled The Manga Guide, the series of comic books will be drawn in the style of Japanese Manga and each book will focus on a single topic or field. The series is a translation done by No Starch Press and will be distributed by O’Reilly. The first Manga to be published will be entitled The Manga Guide to Statistics.

On a similar note, this reminded me of another article that I came across while I was stuck in my World of Warcraft obsession period. From a report by Iconoculture, Kaplan Publishing has partnered with TokyoPop to bring SAT/ACT prep to Manga. Psy-Comm, Von Van Hunter and other full-length graphic novels in the World of Warcraft Manga series are studded with highlighted words commonly used in the SAT/ACT tests.

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Educational Trends: Video Games as the Future of Learning

drebabels (Andre Deutmeyer) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 04:03:52 +0000

In a little over 30 years, video games have become one of the most pervasive, profitable, and influential forms of entertainment across the world. Perhaps most illustrative of this is the existence of television channels dedicated to gaming – in particular Starcraft.

But video games have moved well beyond entertainment. From addictions, to ADD therapy, to providing comfort during economic recessions and depressions, video games are playing an increasingly active role in defining us.

With the role of video games growing in importance, is it really any surprise to think that education will have to follow suit? I don’t think so. Video games as education have existed for as long as I have been breathing. Growing up I played Number Crunchers, Math Blaster, Oregon Trail, and US Presidents to name a few. Even games that I wouldn’t have considered educational at the time contain educational value (Sim City) according to Mark Prensky. Simulations (like Sim City) were once “the province of gamers, scientists, and the military, [but today] has emerged as a huge buzzword in training.” Take for example the flight simulator. The “flight simulator was originally conceived as an entertainment device for fairs. Nevertheless, the flight simulator is [now] acknowledged as a revolution in learning and training [by the military and commercial flight schools].”

The real question is will games ever be accepted by those who need to accept it – the teachers and parents? That is a much more difficult question to answer. According to a 2007 survey conducted by Project Tomorrow we have some work to do in this area.

Among the survey findings:

More than half of students in grades 3 through 12 believe educational gaming would help them learn.
Only 16% of teachers, 15% of administrators and 19% of parents are on board today – although there was significantly more support for further exploration of the potential.
And 11% of teachers say they’re already using video games in class, no matter how much you roll your eyes.

To download the full report by Project Tomorrow click the link below.

Speak Up: 2007 National Findings

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Blogging as a Tool to Improve Writing

drebabels (Andre Deutmeyer) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 18:41:23 +0000

Two weeks ago I made the decision to require my kids (not literal) to keep a blog for my writing class. They have been doing the required once a week post, but that in of itself is not exciting. I would love to see them move beyond the required and start posting everyday. If any of you readers have any suggestions, please by all means… speak.

What I have found promising, though, is the fact that they have begun to personalize their blogs. As I mentioned on Playing with Words – my blog about my experiences with my class – I think that this small step will help them look at writing as something that is enjoyable, rather than as a task. As the weeks progress, we shall see if my assumption is true.

On a slightly different topic, I had a brief conversation with one of my co-workers (and good friend) the other day. And we discussed the possibility of actually integrating a blog into the course description – that is making it a requirement for all the students taking this course, and not just the ones in my class. I personally think that that is a great idea.

But then came the idea to monetize this… make it an optional paid service that parents could enroll their kids into if they wanted to (FYI I work for a for-profit educational institution). While I have no qualms about making money, unless Chungdahm Learning (the academy I work for) can offer something well above what Wordpress or other free blogging platforms offer, then its a cheat.

So to make this service something worth paying for, the platform must have the following options:

Ability to create individual, customizable blogs – like Wordpress
Students must have the ability to link to and incorporate outside media – movies, pictures, etc – and also have the freedom to do so
Must have a Wiki function – this is a great way to have students collaborate on research and share instructional material
Social Network – allows students to create unique profiles for the purpose of online discussions, commenting, asking for advice, etc
Forum – allows students to pose questions about homework or continue discussions started in class
Chat – similar to the functions that are integrated into Facebook or Gmail so that students know who is online at that moment and thus who they can ask questions to or collaborate with on their homework

The only problem that I see is that if you tie a program like this too closely to school, then regardless of the intentions, the students are likely to reject it just because it is school. That is my two-cents. If you have any other suggestions to add to this list, please let me know.

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