I recently wrote a blog piece on the Creation Renaissance. One day I tweeted about it and the next day I posted about it on Facebook. I would have guessed that the Facebook posting would have generated more views, but for all three; pageviews, visits and unique visitors, the tweet brought in slightly more people. Of course there is some overlap of users, but I have to say that I don’t think there is a whole lot.
100 years ago and prior, people knew how to do things. Sears, Roebucks and Co. sold kits to build your own homes. They delivered the plans and the materials to your lot, and you built it. People could eat off the land. Even those working in a factory might only bring a bowl and fork for lunch, and eat greens that they would pick off the surrounding property at lunch time.
Up until recently (and really most people still fall into this category), we modern society humans haven’t known how to do much. We would probably starve to death with edible plants growing in our own back yards. If, left in the woods, successfully building a shelter might depend on whether you had watched a season of Survivor or some other “left in the woods naked” reality TV show. (And really, how do you think that would really work out?)
Why has this happened? Why this dumbing down of the people? One reason may have to do with how much money it takes to get by. Another reason may have to do with the manufacturing requirements of an overpopulated society. Consumerism certainly doesn’t help. But something seems to be changing.
Now that all the knowledge of the world is so easily accessible, and answers are all around us – people can, and need to, learn how to do, make, tinker and innovate again. There are so many things to rediscover (not everything is innovation), mechanics, urban/vertical agriculture, textiles, 3d printing, woodworking, electrical engineering, — AND higher education is the perfect time to do it. Before you have a mortgage, while you still have time to explore, find your passion and discover the peers that make you tick! Some of these ideas could be the beginning to something wonderful, and some of those people might be the team that you go forward with to tackle challenges that face the world today. (Anyone interested in space elevators? Anyone have a great idea to remove all that space junk?)
Students don’t need to sit down and listen anymore for hours on end. They need to hold tools. We need a bit more pre/primary school, the scissors, work benches, glue, and mess. If given the chance, we will amaze ourselves with what we can accomplish. There is a renaissance coming. Let’s make higher education be a part of it.
Ironically, bringing women into the workforce may have led to a brain drain in terms of knowing how to do more practical skills around the house.
“The shift continues towards becoming a creator society. Today, society is increasingly mobile and continues to demonstrate evidence that creation is gaining traction over consumption. The Maker movement, user-generated videos, self-published eBooks, personalized domains, and other platforms have all seen steep increases in recent years. Higher education is now in a position to shift its curricular focus to ensure learning environments align with the engagement of creator-students and foster the critical thinking skills needed to fuel a creator society. Courses and degree plans across all disciplines at institutions are in the process of changing to reflect the importance of media creation, design, and entrepreneurship.”
Margaret Schedel, Alexandra Pickett, Jennifer L. Adams
Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher, Dr. Frank Mayadas
J.L. Adams
Dr. Margaret Schedel, Lisa Stevens, Jennifer L. Adams
Nancy Wozniak, Linda Unger, Jennifer Jaiswal
Carey Hatch et.al.
J.L.A., Lisa Stevens, Margaret Schedel
J.L.A.
Alexandra Pickett, J.L.A., Margaret Schedel
Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher
full flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/74869634@N08/tags/slnsolsummit2014/show
Video Recordings: http://slnsolsummit2014.edublogs.org/mediasite/ and http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrSUIV-q1uFVD7Zg1Gn7Nfm55KPWPU3AZ
@jlabeatnik
warning… Not strictly work related. Also not a place to find out about my son. :).
Laszlo Bock, Senior VP from Google, responding to what he looks for in a new hire:
The second, he added, “is leadership — in particular emergent leadership as opposed to traditional leadership. Traditional leadership is, were you president of the chess club? Were you vice president of sales? How quickly did you get there? We don’t care. What we care about is, when faced with a problem and you’re a member of a team, do you, at the appropriate time, step in and lead. And just as critically, do you step back and stop leading, do you let someone else? Because what’s critical to be an effective leader in this environment is you have to be willing to relinquish power.”
I was talking to a senior lecturer here on campus who shared with me his technique for exam grading, that included an element of self assessment for the involved students.
How this came about, was from students complaining that they didn’t know what his exams were like. He could confidently state that the exams from the past couple of years were on file for them to look at, but he also acknowledged that looking at an exam, and sitting in the room taking it were in fact, two different experiences. SO, instead of stopping there and having a tough sh*t attitude about it, he came up with something I feel is kind of ingenious. They sit in the proctored room, take the test, and then at the very end, make a decision. They either opt to count the exam as 10% of the total grade for the class OR they say don’t count this test and the weight of all of the other forthcoming exams goes up.
And it works. They self assess very well. The ones who opt not to count the exam, typically did poorly, and the ones who count it get decent grades. Plus, they come to the next test far better equipped and have no one to blame but themselves if by the second exam they still fail to prepare properly.
Do you have any grading stories to share with me?
I don’t want to write about this one service too much, but we just had another snow day and some instructors have thought to do this, but I’m sure more could do this and it just hasn’t occurred to them. SBCapture has been on campus now since 2008. Some of you that use it, have captured lectures in the past. Even for the very same lectures you are giving now, or would have given if school hadn’t gotten cancelled.
Yes – you can republish your old lectures into your current class.
Find the lecture that you are interested in, select edit, scroll down to the bottom and select “edit media”, then the “Save New” tab. From here you can give it a new name and description, then pick the current term, course and section and “Save as New”. The old lecture will appear in your current echocenter.
WANT.