The most recent blog of interest I came across was from a website called mininggems.org. From their website, they provide a link to their blog - http://marksalata.blogspot.com/ - that contains free resources and inspiring videos, updated daily. They describe themselves as...
“...an established international educational consultancy based in San Diego, CA committed to providing the best in services and resources in order to transform human relations to be positive, creative, and collaborative by mining the gems within. With this vision, our mission is to partner with all stakeholders and companies to provide professional development, seminars, and products to engage the mind, elicit hidden human resources, and empower individuals to transform their world for the better.”
Now I have to admit, I found this blog in a bit of a backwards fashion. I was searching for blogs that contained any information about Sir Ken Robinson who has authored books and given talks on the value of creativity in education. What I ended up finding was a blog that featured several people who believe the education system, as it exists today, is not performing as creatively as it should. This coincides well with this course, since we are trying to creatively incorporate the use of new technology in the classroom.
Several of the videos posted in this blog are from the Ted Talks series, and if you’re not familiar with TED.com, you should take some time to watch some of the amazing and inspiring people who are featured there. So, why not just review TED.com instead of this blog. I like that they’ve focussed the material here to revolve around education, and finding new ways to present the curriculum to our students. It is quite clichéd, but the thinking is outside the box.
The first blog entry that caught my eye, aside from the Sir Ken posting, was entitled “Failing, to Learn” and it was a video of Diana Laufenberg from TED Talks in November, 2010 - http://marksalata.blogspot.com/2011/03/failing-to-learn.html. She raises some interesting points about developing a lesson plan on the fly, and allowing the students to take ownership in the final result. The other point she raises is that much of the learning throughout our lives comes from making mistakes, and that failure is not an absolute negative. I’ve done this a few times with my students where we’ll take on a project that has a known end result (in-school drywall renovations, set design and construction for school plays), but we’ll take a few days in class to discuss the steps along the way and what we should all be responsible for. There is no set criterion for the project at the start of the semester (since the project did not exist then) so we create it as a group. It’s amazing to see how the students hold themselves accountable to each other in a setting like this.
Finally, the subject that brought me to this blog in the first place: Sir Ken Robinson - http://marksalata.blogspot.com/2011/07/sir-ken-robinsons-top-three-talks.html. Please take the time to watch the three videos that are linked in the post. If you’ve not heard this man speak before, you will be enthralled with the thoughtful, understanding, and humorous way in which he speaks of today’s education system.
This blog is full of valuable resources and varied points of view on how teachers can effectively reach their students. Whether it is through discussing the merits of digital books vs. text books, or in properly developing a student’s listening skills, the resources here can provide valuable information to enhance the classroom experience.
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