Blog Post 10

This week I am required to watch Joshua B. Bloom's video Do you Teach or Do you Educate. This video is a great conversation starter, and Joshua's video definitely started a process of thought that I hope will not be to difficult to sort out and describe. The center point of this video was based on a Socrates quote which stated, "Education is the kindling of a flame not the filling of a vessel". Do you teach or Do you Educate pointed out the importance of educating students as opposed to teaching students. This video most definitely cast a negative light upon teaching, and it cast positive light upon educating. I am in full support of Joshua's video. I perceive a teacher to be limited in approach, and an educator to be unlimited in approach!

I am going to jump out on a limb and make a radical statement here, "TEACHING IS BENEFICIAL!" Now I will back my point up with another statement, "EDUCATION IS REQUIRED!!" I do not like to refer to an educator as a "teacher", because I feel that the term is too narrow in relation to the task of educators. Yes, teachers do teach, but the role of a teacher is far more in depth than teaching! Teaching is an important aspect of education, and it is an aspect which takes a great deal of skill to master. Not every person can convey curriculum to a student in an understandable manner, and educators who have mastered the skill of teaching can greatly benefit a student. If a talented teacher were to base his or her class solely on teaching, then the class would be robbed of the education that it deserves. Teaching through lecture is beneficial and can be one of the greatest techniques that a teacher might use, but lecture is only processed by students audibly. Students who receive an over abundance of lecture-based lessons never put to the test the information that they have learned in class. Students are not as able to grasp a full understanding of the material addressed in class, because they have only perceived it through one receptive sense! I find the best educators to be the individuals who are able to verbally convey information to students along with ENCOURAGING students to research information, and to put to practice the information that they have HEARD in class. By researching information students are able to see how assigned information applies to their personal life, and students can see the importance and the relevance of the information addressed in class. Once students fully perceive information through RESEARCH, then a good educator would encourage his or her students to put to PRACTICE the newly learned information through DISCUSSION! I find that students become far more passionate about learning when they are asked to defend what they have personally researched. With this theory of education the teacher becomes the instructor who motivates the students to put into ACTION the material addressed in each lecture. It's hard to learn when information is dictated to you, and I definitely have never done well in a class where the teacher decides to flaunt his or her own knowledge of the curriculum. Teaching puts too much responsibility on the educator and not enough on the student. Education puts all emphasis on the student’s comprehension.

Teaching is beneficial and it is an extremely meaningful use of time. Educators must understand that the mind of a student is not an empty bucket to pour information into, but rather the mind of a student is a consuming fire that is hungry for all sorts of information. Educators MUST learn that it is not their job to cram information into a child, but to encourage the child to ENJOY learning within the bounds of the curriculum that is assigned. When a educator has this outlook, then the student is more likely to perceive the information that is spoken in lectures, because in their personal pursuit of knowledge they will welcome any help that is offered to them. The student who is ENCOURAGED to work for the information that he or she learns will be more likely to ask questions during lecture, while the student who is FORCED to listen to lectures will be more likely to take for granted the beneficial instruction of the educator. This is why I will strive to be an educator and not just a teacher. A teacher is limited in approach, and an educator is unlimited in approach!

Don't Let Them Take Pencils Home

For the second part of blog post 10 I was assigned to read Tom Johnson's blog post Don't Let Them Take Pencils Home. Through visiting Tom's blog Adventures In Pencil Integration I learned that "Tom Johnson" is John T. Spencer's pseudonym. When I first clicked on the link to view John F. Spencer's blog post, Don't Let Them Take Pencils Home I could not believe my eyes! I could not believe that Dr. Strange would have his "technology" class read a blog post about pencils. I took the privilage of following Dr. Strange's instructions in the blog post instruction manual by taking a gander at John's blog and I AM GLAD THAT I DID!! John Spencer does a remarkable job illustrating some extraordinary truths about teaching in his blog, and come to find out, John Spencer's post has NOTHING to do with pencils.

Let me take a moment to list a few of my favorite publications that I found on this blog: Why Were Your Kids Playing Games, Acceptable Use Committee, Avoid Social Networking (which I really enjoyed), I Banned Pencils Today, and He Just Likes the Class For the Pencils.I did not favor any one of John's posts more than another THEY ARE ALL GOOD. Ideas and thoughts about education were presented in a brilliant way through John's blog. Multiple times John uses pencils to help illustrate his point, and the main point that he is trying to convey through his blog is the idea that students are more likely to learn when they utilize technology. John feels that students are more likely to learn through technology, because the students see technology as a tool for fun rather than for work.

John Spencer did an exceptional job illustrating the problem that most educators have today. Far too often, an educator will focus on eliminating a problem, rather than promoting a fun solution to that problem. John told a story, though his blog post, about a conversation that he (Tom Johnson) and the School Curriculum Instructional Interventionist Academic Specialist (Gertrude) had about technology (pencils). In the post Tom and Gertrude discussed the consequences associated with allowing students to bring "pencils" home with them. Gertrude was against the idea of children bringing "pencils" home with them, and Tom was for the idea of children bringing “pencils” home with them. This dialog was based on a statistic which stated that students who take home their “pencils” perform poorly on standardized tests. Gertrude's reaction to the statistic was directed toward eliminating the cause of the problem, while Tom's reaction was directed toward the solution of the problem. Educators must aspire to approach situations like Tom did. Tom saw the positive that was associated with allowing students to take home "pencils", while Gertrude focused on eliminating the negative aspects associated with bringing the “pencils” home. Tom's main point was that the children in his class were more likely to learn because they viewed the “pencils” as a toy rather than a learning tool, but Gertrude displayed strong opposition to the idea of allowing children the ability to learn through having fun.

Educators should embrace the tools which provide positive responses in the classroom. If a child is able to obtain a better grasp on a subject through a certain stimulus, then who is the educator to eliminate the very thing that benefits the child the most? I often wonder why people think that education cannot be approached with technology, because students who have fun while they learn will be more passionate about mastering new curriculum objectives. Educating children is about the CHILD and not about the view of the educator. The educators main job is to provide the student with tools that he or she needs to fully comprehend the assigned material. I encourage any future educator to utilize the learning method that will best encourage fun and interactive learning. I might have over-shot the "brief response" requirement for this assignment, but I did enjoy conveying my perception of John Spencer's blog post.