The second last round of debates was a short one. Unfortunately, one of our groups were unable to present the other night. So next week will have the last 2 debates. One the bright side, it was my week lead the discussion.
Our topic of discussion: Educators should share lessons, resources, and other materials that they have created openly online.
The debate mostly focused on the difference between using open educational resources (OERs) and teachers pay teachers. If you are unsure of what OERs are you can learn more right here. A few of the points brought up were:
- Teachers are underpaid as it is, so why can’t they make a little extra money off of selling their lesson plans.
- New teachers need easily accessibly resources to help them get started
- money saved by using OERs can go towards other physical resources (equipment, manipulatives, supplies, technology, etc)
- With Covid, teachers may not know how to teach online. OERs provide free resources that allow teachers to become better online teachers, without spending money.
- Allowing teachers to access free resources could make lazy teachers.
- If you are making these lessons anyway, why not share them anyways.
Of course there were discussion and rebuttals for each point, but in the end, most of the class agreed that teachers should share resources openly online.
It was really fun to lead the debate. I had lots of fun creating my opening statement video which you can watch down below. I had not known a whole lot about OERs or how they worked. I think they are an important part of education and a great resource for teachers. It is especially a great resource for me as a new teacher. OERs can help me gain ideas and lesson plans for subjects that I am not quite sure how to teach, or not sure where to start.
Next week is our last 2 debates that will wrap up our discussions about technology and the classroom. I can’t wait for next weeks because we are talking about cell phone use in the classroom. This topic is very controversial, and I think we will have a great discussion about it.