The culture of participation is not a very new concept, it’s always been around…well sorta, people always aim for glory and praise, as what it was with the Spanish crusade, who traveled in the name of god to get gold and land. Though history wasn’t always about sharing knowledge, being collaborative, and communication which is what culture of participation is more related to in the sense of Wesch’s.
For my future classroom, this concept means that I am not the only one they can seek information from, they themselves and their classmates are also ones who bring information to life, and not to mention everything available digitally and where they can also share their ideas and creativity.
What this means for schools and our education system is that there is a lot that needs to be changed in order to reach all students. Technology is now such a big part of our lives and who knows how much bigger it will get in the future. I believe student led projects and assignments are much more suited than traditional quizzes and exams as students can express their creativity, their ability to research and much more this way, where as exams are mainly a test of memory. Again we are growing and the web isn’t really friendly to humans and specially not to kids, we should help students prepare as much as they can towards this future which can be bright or dark.
We can balance the challenges of our new digital reality by helping students understand all the safe ways, the non-safe ways, the dangers, and the misuse of technology. Allowing kids to learn about it all is much more helpful than to keep them simply away.
This short TED talk by Woody Roseland highlights how we see the internet when we post.
I really appreciate how you touched on students stepping into the driver seat of their learning. I agree that it is crucial for students to have the skillset to effectively find information online, to guide their learning and to access more knowledge. With this access, it is important that students also have the skillset to recognize what is fake news/false information when using technology to learn.
Great post! I really like how you connected the culture of participation to both history and the modern classroom. I agree that student-led projects allow for more creativity and deeper learning compared to traditional exams. Technology is growing fast, and teaching students how to use it safely and wisely is so important.
I completely agree! Tests are designed to see how well a student can memorize. Learning shouldn’t be about keeping data in someone’s brain, it should be about teaching the student how they can access information and utilize it in ways that matter.