Philosophy of Education

Philosophy of Education

Education exists so that one generation may pass on the cumulative body of current knowledge to the next generation.  This is done by providing students access to knowledge.  That is it.  It’s not about grades, it’s not about achievement test scores, it’s not even about equipping young people to “keep up” with other young people in the ostensible competition of life.  It’s just about passing on all there is to know to the next generation, who, by the way, may do with it what they please.  It comes with no particular responsibilities.  They may choose to continue the tradition of adding to the body of knowledge and then passing that on to the next generation, or they may not.  The pattern is not inevitable.  It is just the way that much of the world has chosen to behave since the Renaissance.  In Medieval Europe, for example, society did not use this pattern, and generation after generation lead a sort of static lifestyle for several centuries.  Families did pass on provincial knowledge of everything from moral values to agricultural procedures, but there was little emphasis (or means) to tap into a greater body of work, then add to it with research, invention, and so on.  Once that emphasis became a cultural value, the Renaissance began, as did a pattern of education that continues to this day. 

The primary way that knowledge is passed on is through documentation- books, scrolls, inscriptions, maps, etc.  With each new invention the size and connectivity of documentation grows.  Libraries and public forums were among the first of these inventions.  Recently, electronic data bases, and the internet have greatly multiplied the amount of documentation, and the potential for connectivity among those who want to study it.  To a young student, the amount of documentation can be overwhelming.  This is where teachers come in.  The contemporary educator is not a keeper of information, and certainly not the source of the cumulative body of knowledge who must pass it on through oral tradition like an ancient sage philosopher.  The teacher is simply a guide to accessing the knowledge that exists.  Teachers exist to provide young students with the basic tools of access (which are reading, writing, and math) and to provide intermediate students with a variety of entry points into knowledge (history, science, advanced math, art, literature).  It is entirely possible to learn without the presence of a teacher, however, as guides, teachers facilitate education by demonstrating the processes of learning (questioning, research, experimentation).  In this way, teachers provide a living key or legend to an infinite map.  This means that teachers should not teach simply through transmission (lecture and presentation).  Teachers are not audio text books.  They are not documentaries of their content area.  They are more.  Teachers themselves are learners and contributors to the collection knowledge and information.  It is through guidance and example that teachers perform their most important tasks.

Teachers and students now find themselves in a culture where this approach to education is more important than ever.  The cumulative body of knowledge and the connectivity of its documentation are growing at an unprecedented rate.  Access, too, has become much easier.  While this is all very good for the potential of education, it brings with it new challenges.  The first is that the media that give access to information are not silent.  Each has the potential to share messages, and students are at risk of being influenced by the loudest and most ubiquitous of these.  Unless teachers model the processes of critical thinking, examining “the motive of the creator relative to one’s own experience” (Semali, 2001) we risk allowing students to become “passive citizens” (Semali, 2001) who live to play out these dominant messages.  Teachers must then provide a model and challenge students to think critically in all encounters with information.   Another major challenge is that students and teachers must work together to keep up with the methods by which information is shared.  If teachers are going to model the act of contribution, they must be up to date on technologies that enable it, and in many cases the students must go with them.  Yet, very rarely do students walk into a classroom where the teacher knows everything there is to know about current technology and media.  Teachers sometimes must model by learning it themselves.  This is not something that every teacher is comfortable with, but it is the most effective way to “pass the torch.”  It is also the only way to help students avoid becoming people whose media usage is “characterized by consumption rather than production, such as watching movies on the PC or the television, playing computer games, listening to music, and reading magazines” (Avila & Pandya, 2013).  Students now live in a “participatory culture” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013) and if teachers want to continue the tradition of providing access to knowledge, education must reflect that.

References

Ávila, J. (2013). Critical digital literacies as social praxis: Intersections and challenges. New York: Peter Lang.

Semali, L. (2001, November). Defining new literacies in curricular practice. Reading Online, 5(4). Retrieved from http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/semali1/index.html.

Five Resources

Miss Representation Remember “Killing Us Softly” with Jean Kilbourne.  Well this is the website for a very up to date documentary that tackles those some dominant media message videos.  I have seen this documentary, and Kilbourne along with many others are in it.  It’s on Netflix now, and this webpage has a link to the school curriculum.

Reading Online Here I love the sections on “Teaching Hip Hop Culture” and “Teaching Popular Film.”

My Zeitgeist 2013 Here is a great PBS Lesson plan which basically forces students to explore media and evaluate the world by describing current beliefs.

Family Guy and Censorship It boggles my mind that someone took the time to put this together, but I might actually use it.  I can’t stand Family Guy but so many of my teenagers love it.  If it can be used to help address questions of censorship, then maybe that is a good thing.  This lesson is only for older students, so if I am assigned a younger age-group sometime soon, this website has an “Elvis and Censorship” lesson plan.

Media Smarts This website contains a variety of resources that address the same topics we studied in this class.

Digital Story Rought Draft- "America in a Word"

Reading and Discussion #14

A quote from the reading:

"The ability to render one's world as changeable and oneself as an agent able to direct that change is integrally linked to acts of self-representation through writing, as Freire taught us long ago, and through other semiotic systems."

This quote adds to the credibility of digital storytelling.  It equates the process with the power of the written word and puts one in mind of the origins of storytelling itself.  It also shows why more people need to tell stories.  In the past, most publicly circulated stories were created by those who had the money or influence to publish them.  So only society's most powerful could self-represent.  The dominant message was skewed in their favor. Now with digital technology, anyone can self-represent. If enough people do this skillfully, the so-called dominant message will become less dominant, giving balance to public narratives.  (Imagine if history could have been written with many more personal stories... Imagine if every American slave had had an equal chance to tell his tale along side of his oppressor... How might we have come to view U.S. history?)

Discussion questions:

1. How does digital storytelling support academic literacies?

Digital storytelling challenges students to view their lives an their worlds in the form of a meaningful narrative. It is not unlike what we do when we write. We remember, we research, and we synthesize it all into something that makes sense to us, and to our audience.

2. Now that you have created your own digital story, do you think that using images, words and music to create a message is simplistic compared to traditional alphabetic print based argumentation?

Not at all. As a theatre teacher and a storyteller myself, I was never in danger of finding the use of images, words, and music simplistic.  The great thing about factual images is that they can say things, important things, that you may not have intended to say. Family images often illustrate time period, and representations of relationships and personality that the composers of the script overlook.  Look at a documentary by the award-winning director Ken Burns.  All he does is provide narration and music to some carefully chosen historical still imagery.  And it's amazing.

3. After creating your own digital story, do you see how digital storytelling can help develop a stronger sense of agency in their own lives? Do you think this might have a positive impact on students academic lives? How? Why?

I do.  This can give students a strong sense of purpose when representing oneself and life story to a critical audience.  Often students fail to feel that sense of purpose about writing because they believe it will be read by an audience of one teacher.  Digital story telling has no limit to the size of the audience.

Reading and Discussion #13

Quote from Chapter 7, “Beyond Technology Skills”:

“There is both subtle and overt pressure to focus on teaching technologies as tools, without incorporating an understanding of their uses within the participatory culture, and without integrating technology instruction fully into the pre-service curriculum in ways that result in critical analysis of content or alignment with pedagogy” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013).

This quote sums up how old ideas about technology are perpetuated in the classroom still.  I feel that this was my attitude up until recently.  Those of us who remember what life was like before the internet and the culture it has shaped, are sometimes tempted to lean toward the perspective that technology is superfluous.  However, I can now see how communication technologies have shaped the culture, and vice versa.  It’s hard to imagine 21^st century American culture without cellphones, internet, etc.  So it is no longer an option to consider technology a tool that we can train students in, as if it’s something they can take or leave.  I would liken the entire thing to how the automobile shaped the country.  This first generation to see cars thought they were a danger and a nuisance, and many campaigned to have them banned within city limits of many towns.  Within a generation or two, cars were a huge part of daily life, and they began to reshaped neighborhoods and cities, and greatly affect the commerce between them.  Who can imagine our lives without them now?  They are a part of all we do, and we must give a little time each day to recognize the ethical concerns of using them safely and wisely.  In a lot of ways, this is what the advent of the internet has done to the developed world in the past 20 years.  This really calls for a realignment of attitudes toward technology to match those expressed in this chapter.

Chapter 7 Discussion Questions:

 1. Why do the authors of this chapter chose to use the term "critical digital literacies" rather than just "digital literacies"?

The authors use this term to step away from the “variety of concepts” already represented by the term “digital literacies” and to express a more specific definition that includes “sociocultural perspectives that acknowledge the generative interplay between literacy and the contexts in which literacy occurs” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013).

2. How well did our own teacher education program prepare you to use technology in your teaching practices? Was it more tools based or literacy based?

I received my BA in Education in 2007, and at that time I think many of the classes I taken held the view of technology as tools.  However, since I began taking graduate classes in 2011, I feel that many of the courses have been literacy based.  Perhaps the program has changed over the past five or six years to include a literacy based approach.

3. What should teachers be thinking about when they engage in critical thinking as it relates to technology use in school?

Teachers should be thinking not that students are “digital natives” but “natives of consumer culture.”  We have never known a time without a dominant message that says, “you can fix anything with a purchase.”  We are used to being marketed to, and influenced by feelings of inadequacy.  That said, teachers should also be thinking, “I should introduce students to ways to question this take-for-granted reality.”

4. On page 149, it is stated that students have certain rights with respect to "critical digital literacies." Do students in your teaching context have these rights? Give an example or non-example of at least one of these rights.

I feel convicted to provide these rights.  Recently, I have worked to secure all but one:  “The right to explore or experiment with one’s own digital space” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013) has been difficult to secure at public school.  This is a right that no teacher can safeguard without the permission of parents and of the county and state school boards.  Unfortunately, most of the technology that can help students to do this is blocked out of fear that such exploration and experimentation will bring harm to children or lawsuits to school systems.

Reference

Ávila, J. (2013). Critical digital literacies as social praxis: Intersections and challenges. New York: Peter Lang.

Digital Storyboard

Point of View: The story will be told from my point of view as a 36 year old, looking back on a experience that happened when I was 8 or 9.  I can see how the experience “awakened” several things that became a big part of my interests and personality over the years.

Dramatic Question: “When I was nine-years old, my grandfather taught me a secret word.  A magic word.”

Emotional Content. I would call the predominant emotion in this “awakening.”  You can’t “find yourself” at the age of nine, but if you look back you might see the beginning of who you came to be.  Another emotion in the story is “connection.”  On this trip with my father and grandfather to see my grandfather’s homeland, and to see the funeral of his mother, I felt like I was in the inner sanctum of family history and lore.  The “secret word” in the story is part of a ridiculous country folktale… a complicated nursery rhyme… But for me, I had felt like he had given me the access to a hidden treasure.

Voice: I will narrate this story.  I don’t think anyone else could, given the personal nature of the story.  Chances are I will read from a prewritten script, but I should have no problem making my own words sound fresh at the time of recording.

 Soundtrack: I may use stock music from the Youtube library, or I may use some bebop jazz.  Already, I am leaning toward “Moanin” by Charles Mingus.  Why not country (since we are driving from WV to AR)?  Some American country music may fit the setting, by I consider jazz the most American of American art forms, and “bop” was the music of the beat generation travelers whose writings have helped me frame these memories in my mind.

Economy: I will keep the script as short as possible.  Although I have a lot to say, I will try to let the pictures and music tell the story.

Pacing: I think pacing is the second biggest element in the performance of any story.  Plot is first.

Reading and Discussion #12

RESPONSE TO CHAPTER SIX:

1. How did the Ask Anansi game support critical literacies?

By making students “indigenous anthropologists” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013) students were challenged to look at their community South Los Angeles (“South Central”) as both insiders and outsiders.  Students were challenged to ask questions about their community and select important issues facing their environment.  This helped provide some input into the creation of the game, and determined the themes the game would cause them to investigate.  This asking questions and evaluating one’s own culture and community supports critical literacies. 

2. How did the Ask Anansi game support academic literacies?

Three things in the game supported academic literacies: First the log the students kept while figuring out the solutions to the clues caused them to keep a record of the deductive reasoning they were doing.  Second, the role play itself caused them to engage in real conversations with people in their school and community which helps “civic development” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013) by turning concepts in to actions.  Third, the frame narrative of the game was that the students had to somehow satisfy Anansi’s “insatiable need” for a “good story” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013), and this potentially helped students to view the project as a narrative. 

3. How did the Ask Anansi game support digital literacies?

Students used mobile phones, and iPods to communicate with the teacher, decipher clues, and log solving the clues.  Students also used the internet to do research when necessary to help make it through the various challenges of the game.  As the author points out, the way technology helped students use participate in the use of media without “overly relying on complicated digital tools” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013).  This integrated use of technology supported digital literacies.

4. What is meant by the term "reading the word and reading the world and writing the world"? Give an example from the chapter.

In the activity, students took what they read, and were made to apply it to the world by asking questions and evaluating their community as a group.  As “the class began enacting critical digital literacies practices in both online and physical environments” they were challenged to “build their own meaning and critique of the inequities within their lives” (Avila & Pandaya, 2013).  This activity then empowered the students to become active, rather than passive, citizens… thus equipping people who will write the world.

A QUOTE I LIKE FROM THE TEXT:

“Though students regularly engaged in mobile throughout this project… it was never the central pedagogical spotlight of this work.  Ultimately, the research that the students and I conducted yielded critical practice that decentered learning from the traditional classroom; it located engagement in the spaces that students explored critically and instilled literacies instruction within experiential community knowledge”  (Avila & Pandaya, 2013).

This passage provides an example of how digital media finds itself naturally integrated into a unit that causes students to learn about the world, and issues affecting their community.  The mobile phones and iPods were only a way to empower and enrich the experience. They were not the experience itself.  In this context, the use of technology seemed to serve as a model for the ideological perspective of literacy. 

References

Ávila, J. (2013). Critical digital literacies as social praxis: Intersections and challenges. New York: Peter Lang.

Reading and Discussion #11

Reading Discussion

This quote from the reading stood out to me: “…Much of their media usage is characterized by consumption rather than production, such as watching movies on the PC or the television, playing computer games, listening to music, and reading magazines” (Avila & Pandya, 2013).

In this discussion about the “myth of the digitally innovative teenager,” Avila and Pandya (2013) begin by explaining that many of the today’s youth do not create media products of their own after school, but engage in activities similar to those of the previous generation.  At first, this struck me as possibly a good thing.  An advocate of the outdoors and “old fashioned” social interaction sometimes my feelings toward digital culture is negative.  I thought, “Wait a minute.  Kids are not going home and blogging or maintaining a Tumblr account?  That’s great.  Maybe our online lives have grown too cumbersome.  Maybe it’s time to take our digital involvement and walk it back a little.”  But when I came across quote above, I suddenly remembered that young people, digitally inclined or not, now live in a world where power comes from understanding how to work and produce online.  Watch a video on Bitcoin for just another example of how being digitally innovative can make this happen.  So if we decide to join our young people in returning to more of a consumer than a producer, we may just be taking away their ability to be empowered in a global culture that growing in this digital direction.

Response Questions

1. What is the difference between an "essentialist" "traditionalist" or "autonomous" "perspective of technology and literacy and a New Literacy Studies or "ideological" perspective on technology and literacy? Which perspective do you adhere to? Why?

The "essentialist" perspective seems to have little to do with the teacher learner, and everything to do with how the technology itself can improve teaching and learning. In this perspective, Powerpoint and Prezi might be looked at as ways to facilitate (or "boost") traditional lectures. Those with this perspective choose to view new technology as a either positive or negative supplement to old ways.

The "autonomous" perspective focuses on the person and sees literacy as something a teacher or student has as a skill. This probably assumes that once a person has some level of critical thinking skills she can apply it throughout several areas of life.

The "ideological" perspective sees literacies as a factor in an ideology, and that those literacies are part of a web social and cultural factors.

As for myself, I seem to be stuck in the autonomous perspective right now. I have moved well beyond the traditional views of media technology, and have been teaching from the view that literacy is something a person has or can attain and use as a skill. The ideological model is too new to me, and I have to learn more before I can understand how that really can be true. (It may be true, but I am pleading temporary ignorance.)

2. Give three concrete examples of how the teacher in the chapter supported "new literacy" or "critical digital literacies" practices with blogging.

First, Anne the teacher, did not just use media to supplement a traditional method. She actually connected blogging to all of her Print & Photo class activities. This took media literacy out of the traditional realm, and made it a part of class, school, and community culture. Because of this, the measure of student literacy became more complex than whether they could apply certain thinking skills.

Second, Anne made students take personal ownership for the excellence in the photo blog. No student wanted to be the one to publish substandard work. This counts as a social and cultural context for media production. The class contained a teacher-inspired (deadline driven) value for quality work. Therefore, literacy was a part of this web of conditions.

Third, Anne allowed students to develop a digital publishing culture of their own. Students viewed on another's work (photos, etc.) and were able to share criticism and motivation. This may not be something the teacher did exactly, but her style of leadership permitted it.

Reference

Ávila, J. (2013). Critical digital literacies as social praxis: Intersections and challenges. New York: Peter Lang.