This youtube clip was presented to the BOE last night. Worth reflecting on.
Shift Happens 2.0
by turfgrrl
April 8th, 2008 · 5 Comments
Tags: Education
5 Responses so far ↓ “Shift Happens 2.0”
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yes- and this tells us that learning to think, evaluate, create is more important than it used to be.
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As Bob once said, ” Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command/Your old road is rapidly agin’/ Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend a hand, for the times they are a changin’”
I’m glad that by 2049 I plan to be dead.
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Did you know… considering the past performance of the BOE, I don’t expect the $13,000+ per year in property taxes that I pay to make a hell of a lot of difference in the quality of education that Norwalk students receive? And thus to attract more education-conscious, upper-income level parents to Norwalk?
I, for one, will be gone from this town in ten years’ time and hope that I can afford to keep my home for that much longer.
Maybe this clip should be shown to all City of Norwalk employees and board/committee members.
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This is the education post that should stimulate the greatest blog reaction. In the message of “Did you know 2.0, Shift Happens” are harbingers of great opportunity, untold change, and warnings to the complacent.
Norwalk’s schools require serious attention in all areas of Information Technology:
• Many computers are outdated and in need of replacement.
• Access to numerous useful internet sites is “blocked” in the name of “security”. Building Administrators and Teachers need override capability here. Instruction is seriously hamstrung because IT will not relinquish total control over access. Kids can still be safe and properly guided in the fantastic, inquiry-based learning available online. The current attitude is “Just block everything.”
• Student log-in by student ID number is not currently in place. Such a provision will peg individual responsibility to computer use and address many concerns surrounding illicit activity.
• The structure of how students may use computers in school is generally locked into centrally located “labs”. This severely limits the number of students who can have access to a computer at any given time. We need to go mobile and wireless.
• Smart boards are not widely available.
• Attitudes towards ubiquitous digital devices like Ipods, Blackberries, Iphones, etc. is geared to prohibition when it should be harnessed to “guided-instruction.” Teachers and the district should be creating more podcasts, web sites, blogs, and computer-based simulations rather than focusing on banning each new device that arrives on the scene. Harness student enthusiasm for digital learning. It’s a tidal wave of technological innovation and we need to ride that wave.
• The district’s IT department needs more staff and resources. They simply cannot properly service all the district’s schools at their current level.
• More teachers need to embrace technology in their instruction. They need access, training, and support, but refusing to use it is not a defensible option.The demography displayed in the video, “Shift Happens” is a clarion. The pace of change for everyone, but younger people in particular, has gone geometric. Our duty to prepare them for success in such an environment is a great responsibility, but also an exciting challenge. The “shift” offers unimaginable prosperity and growth to the nimble. R-E-A-D-Y…..shift!
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“Shift Happens” has been around for a while, but Norwalk has finally presented it to the BOE. Charles the Hammer, given the history of the district for the past seven or eight years, my bet is that nothing more will come of this.
