Whitney Hamm
09/08/2024
Theories of Critical Thinking
After reading all of the articles, I have seen and noticed these changes in education, especially from the pandemic to now. The first article, A Rich Seam: How New Pedagogies Find Deep Learning, mentioned three forces that are changing. They are as follows; new pedagogies, new change leadership, and new system economics (Fullan, 2014). Education continues to have changes as technology use increases. When looking at these changes, educators need to be able to continue to grow in our field of study and with technology. The statistics mentioned in the article above were very saddening when looking at the students that said they gained more knowledge and experiences outside of school.
Education is no longer regurgitating facts for a test. It involves giving students real world experiences and problem solving skills that will make them prepared for life after schooling. This can start as early as kindergarten aged students. At my current school, we have two large school wide project based learning opportunities each year. Every grade, kindergarten through fifth grade, participates and has the opportunity to showcase their learning to the community. The spring PBL is focused on the Talladega Race track because that is a part of our community. Students are given an essential question that drives their learning in each grade, which is pulled from science, reading, and math standards. Students are reading, writing, figuring mathematical equations, building and testing models, and looking for ways to improve their projects. It truly allows the students to be in charge of their learning with teachers there to guide them along. Kindergarten and first grade there are more teacher-led activities for the PBLs, but the students are still given the opportunity to think critically.
Digital literacy has become a major part of schools in every grade level. All of the schools in my district, and most districts, are one-to-one with chromebooks, Macbooks, or iPads. Students are using technology at home, school, and on the go (phones and tablets). Students are using technology for schooling, research, and social purposes. With that being said, they need to learn how to use it responsibly, and how to determine valid sources. That is where digital literacy comes into schools. Even in my kindergarten classroom, I have to teach the students how to use their tablets responsibly. In my district this is taught over several weeks by using interactive nearpod lessons with the students. When I eventually become a librarian, this will be a large part of my job. Not just teaching digital literacy, but teaching media literacy and informational literacy in a time where answers are at our fingertips. Students must be able to determine the validity of the resources they are searching for. The article Bloom et al.'s Taxonomy of the Cognitive Domain, the authors changed the taxonomy from nouns to verbs which reflect the outcomes that we want to see from our students. We want students to remember information, understand concepts, apply concepts, and be able to analyze information (Huitt, 2011).
References
Fullan, M. & Langworthy, M. (2014). A rich seam: How new pedagogies find deep learning. London: Pearson. Retrieved from https://www.pearson.com/content/dam/one-dot-com/one-dot-com/global/Files/about-pearson/innovation/open-ideas/ARichSeamEnglish.pdf
Huitt, W. (2011). Bloom et al.'s taxonomy of the cognitive domain. Educational Psychology Interactive. Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University. Retrieved from http://www.edpsycinteractive.org/topics/cognition/bloom.pdf
Hi Whitney,
ReplyDeleteIt is so interesting that your school does two school- wide project based learning opportunities each year. I feel like collaboration amongst the grade levels is so important and helps create a school "community". I love that science, reading, and math are all included in these projects, so students can see how the subjects work together. I love student led learning, and I would love to try this at my school.