The TEDTalk presented by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie peaked my interested with the title alone, “The Danger of a Single Story”. As I myself am an english major and future English teacher the word story always gives me a slight jolt of excited so I decided to tune in. The idea of the single story that Adichie present combines two topics that I am passionate about; social justice and literature.
These two ideas come together because Adichie highlights the importance of viewing people, cultures, and nations from many diverse viewpoints. These viewpoints come from the media, books, music, film, and many other types of personal experience. If these many types of viewpoints are not taken into account when a person tries to understand a land and people different from their own a person risks only knowing a single story. One statement Adichie made that held a lot of people to myself was, “single stories create stereotypes and the problem isn't that they are untrue it is that they are incomplete.” This statement highlights that although stereotypes are sometimes true they are derived from only one viewpoint which limits the scope of understanding. When the ideas present by Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie are directly applied and examined from an educational perspective the influence is profound. As a future English educator this video shows the importance of teaching diverse works in the classroom and not allowing single stories to influence my perception of my students. The implementation of Common Core in the United States I feel allows teacher to expand the range of pieces of writing they present to their class. It is important that these works do not create a single stories in the students’ heads about a culture they have not been exposed to. I believe the way to navigate the perils of the single story to exposure. If I can, as an English teacher, not nothing more than expose my students to new ideas I will feel like I have achieved a what I set out to do. The dangers of the single story also encompass my personal view of my students and what their stories are. I must be mindful of my bias and activity work to identify them and disband them. Social justice is paramount to my educational philosophy. By exposing myself to multiple viewpoints and eliminating single stories from my mind my students will be better set up for success. Nogozi Adichie, Chimamanda (July 2009). The Danger of a Single Story. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story
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Nicholas Negroponte is a professor at MIT, creator of the MIT Media Lab, and founded of One Laptop Per Child. In Being Educated Negoponte examines his idea of the problem of education and thinking about thinking.
The main problem in education the Negroponte chooses to highlight is that “education is a problem in learning”. This idea can be interpreted that education does not focus on learning but rather it focuses on testing, competition, and market forces. Within the public education system Negroponte discusses three education determinants that only occur in the United States; these are that education funding come from real estate taxes, we segregated based on age, and education is designed and influenced by market forces rather than a mission. The idea that I find most intriguing is the view of education as a business versus a mission. This brings into view what the ultimate goal of education systems today are. We are pushing children through a system to prepare them for college but currently a bachelor of arts of science does little to prepare students for the business world. This major flaw shows that the base of business for education is doing little to serve our students. Negroponte presents the idea that “learning is an exercise in discovery”. I connected with this idea because I believe it is the only way to ignite excitement within students. The question for myself as a future English teacher is how to allow students to discover within an English setting? I clearly see ways for students to discovery in topics like engineering, chemistry, and psychology but how can I allow my students to discovery the purpose to literature and writing? This like most questioned posed about the fundamentals of learning, education, and student success do not have a clear and easily accessed answer. However, it does not mean I should not strive for an answer. Negroponte, Nicholas ( July 4, 2015). Being Education. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fIuZa_-H60&feature=youtu.be The TEDx talk present by Logan LaPlante highlights a radically different way of thinking about education when compared to the way most students in the public school system are being education. Logan LaPlante is a young man being educated outside of the normal parameters of public schooling. Because of this break from the norm Logan is able to learn in a fashion he calls "hackschool". The idea of hackschool for him focuses on the importance of being happy and healthy. He is educated centered around his love of skiing. It is this love of skiing that has ignited his passion for learning. Logan states that if you are , "motivated to learn something you can get a lot done quickly". This young man is an example of success when students are in control of their own learning. This video has created two contrasting ideas in my head. The first is that the presence of happiness and health in school is important. Similarly to that is the difference between "making a living versus making a life". The second contrast idea this video brought to the forefront of my mind was how can a model like this be applied to students that may lack a passion, personal work ethic, or supportive and active parent or guardian? I feel that this contrasting view is one that many products of the traditional educational system would have. So many people worldwide struggle with creating a happy life for themselves. Just as Logan points out,"people assume you will be happy and healthy once you go to college, get a job, and get married". The public school system does little, if anything, to help prompt a happy healthy life as part of daily instruction. As a future educator I this question holds special weight to me. How can I create a positive and supportive environment in my classroom that will help promote a happy and healthy lifestyle for my students? A question like this is not one I expect to answer today, or next week, or next month but I do plan to continually think about it. Unfortunately, not all children in the United States have the supportive parents like Logan LaPlante does. What will happen to students that do not have supportive parents, a passion to follow, and the self motivation to learn in a nontraditional classroom? I struggle with thinking of a way to create a more personalized education plan for the variety of students in a single classroom. This video highlights the struggle that, I feel, people that are a product of the public school have with the new direction education is going. The conflict I feel will take a lot of critical thought and understand to even begin to come to any sort of understanding. But asking those types of questions are the only way positive change will come about. LaPlante, Logan. TEDxTalks. (2013, February 12). Hackschooling Makes Me Happy/Logan LaPlante/TEDxUniversityofNevada. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=h11u3vtcpaY The Backwards Bicycle video, Dustin with Smart Everyday, examines an interesting idea. That ideas is that knowledge without understanding serves no purpose. This is mean to say that if a person has knowledge about something but does not understand the idea then that knowledge is not useful. This example is through the backwards bicycle that Dustin tries to learn to ride. Similarly to most people Dustin learned to ride a bike early. He learned the mechanics of riding a bike the same way that all of us who know how to ride a bike learned. Once the basic mechanics of the bike were changed Dustin was completely unable to ride it. When this idea is examined and placed in an educational setting if highlights the bias a teacher can bring into a classroom as well as the difficulty a student may have in unlearning and relearning an idea as presented in class. As future educators I feel one of the greatest bias we need to be aware of his teaching to our own learning style. This happens naturally because we have honed and strengthened our learning skills to succeed in our own education. In the video Dustin states, "be careful how you are looking at things because you have a bias whether you think you do or not". Once we are aware of our own learning biases we can actively incorporate other learning style in our lessons. However, just as Dustin would easily fall back into his inability to ride the backwards bike, we can fall back into our comfortable ways of learning and teaching. This video also lends insight into student learning. When students come into our classrooms they will have nine plus years of school behind them. These nine years will have taught students skills that have helped them succeed. Because of this success they may be very set in their ways. Dustin demonstrates through the backwards bicycle that, "once you have a rigid way of thinking in your head, sometimes you cannot change that even if you want to". However, this does not mean that relearning is not possible. Just as in the case with Dustin, our student will need constant practice and a desire to learn in order to gain knowledge and understanding. Sandlin, Destin (April 24th, 205). The Backwards Brain Bicycle. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFzDaBzBlL0 |
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May 2016
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