Wednesday, August 06, 2008

The New Learning Landscape; The Future of Education

I highly recommend all teachers watch this video of Michael Wesch at the University of Manitoba on the Future of Education. In addition, you should show this to to your students and have some solid discussion about it. If you teach online, simply post it on a discussion forum and have at it.

Michael does a good job of giving you the BIG picture regarding the current state of education and technology and what he is doing with his class to improve the learning landscape. This video is a very good companion to my University 2.0 blog post. At the core we find that the collective body of knowledge is all around us in the air via the internet so why are we still emphasizing memorization as the primary form of education. Almost any question that can be asked on a test can be looked up in minutes, even seconds on a phone, so how is our educational system adapting? How are they preparing students to think critically, creatively, collaboratively, and communicate digitally? The Internet and specifically the more evolved web 2.0, is moving culture and education from an authoritarian one-way download of information to a collaborative upload/download/interactive experience. Because so much information is readily available, teaching students how to ask good questions, critique ideas, and disseminate quality information from bunk is quite central to the new learning landscape.

University of Manitoba: Information Services and Technology - Michael Wesch and the Future of Education
During his presentation, the Kansas State University professor breaks down his attempts to integrate Facebook, Netvibes, Diigo, Google Apps, Jott, Twitter, and other emerging technologies to create an education portal of the future.

No comments: