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| Photo by D. Rezac |
When she does this, what happens every time is this: kids will start following her. Then they'll try climbing up the pole, up the slide, try hanging upside down, and try playing in ways that the playground designers may have not meant to be played.
And what do you think the other parents say? For the past three years I've been collecting (in my mind- could have used Evernote here) quotes from what the parents on the playground say after their kids follow my kid's lead:
"No Billy- that's not how you're supposed to climb that."
"Honey- that's not safe."
"We don't want the other kids to get any ideas."
"Jenna- you're going to hurt yourself."
"Those bars were put their for a reason, kiddo."
Yes, I'm that parent
As a technology integrator I am keenly aware that we are preparing students for jobs that haven't been created yet. A speaker remarked at the recent Tech and Learning Forum that Britney Spears recently hired someone to be her "online presence manager." How do you prepare a student for a job like that? I'm reminded of that age-old quote with the two roads going into the wood.
Robert Frost's quote:
"Two roads diverged into a wood. I- I took the road less traveled by. That has made all the difference."
This has always been a romantic idea. Who hasn't wanted to be an artist, a filmmaker, a screenwriter, an astronaut, to climb Mount Everest- who hasn't wanted to go against the grain? Do we really dream as kids to sit in a cubicle and do data entry? Heck- we don't dream to do that as adults, but many of us end up doing that anyway. We put words like Frost's up in our schools and businesses all the time, and we preach to kids to take create their own path, to be unique. Is that what our culture actually produces? The reality is we then tell them, "you better have a backup" or that those dreams aren't "realistic" or, tell them flatly, like the Dad from Dead Poet's Society, "you're going to Harvard, and you're going to be a doctor."
And we may not use these words exactly, we may send these signals without even using words. Many of us pre-select their path.
Let them create.
How can we select their path, if we don't know what kinds of careers will even be available for them when they graduate college? If we don't even know what the future will be like for our children, shouldn't letting them create their own path be one of our top priorities? If their careers haven't even been created yet, don't we need to give them every freedom to discover that path? We need to be careful when we tell a child "that's not the way it's done." Their way is the only way sometimes, and we just need to get out of the way. Sometimes there's not much room for negotiation. To write a capital E for example, that is done relatively one, universal way. My child gets upset when I tell her that our language only has 26 letters. As our tools become more creative and collaborative, there are going to be new ways to communicate, and students are going to find new ways to make connections. Are we facilitating this kind of creation? Or- are we training our students to be afraid, to have multiple fall-backs, and to wrap themselves in bubble wrap? How do you have a fall-back career for a future where you don't know if the fall-back jobs of today will even exist?
Teach Them Programming.
We are currently undergoing an industrial revolution with the Internet right now. Web tools, languages, and Apps are going to be ruling the economy in the next few years, and, perhaps decades. Facebook is creating it's own virtual currency, and, with 500 million users, it stands to be it's own nation. I've never seen a bigger need for vocational training aimed at teaching students how to create and code web applications. This doesn't mean that students will be locked in a closet creating new ways to use MS Excel, but perhaps they'll be following Steven Kaplan's lead in creating iPhone and iPad apps like his new iChalkboard. Steven is only in eighth grade. If your students are gymnasts, musicians, guitar players, volleyball players- what types of Apps could they create with their likes and interests in mind? Take a look at the Scratch gallery, and take a look at the possibilities of what students can do with programming.
If you give a kid a paintbrush, they might paint a picture, but if you teach them to create an App, they might design a new art form altogether.
Photo by D. Rezac
"Two roads diverged into a wood. I- I took the road less traveled by. That has made all the difference."
This has always been a romantic idea. Who hasn't wanted to be an artist, a filmmaker, a screenwriter, an astronaut, to climb Mount Everest- who hasn't wanted to go against the grain? Do we really dream as kids to sit in a cubicle and do data entry? Heck- we don't dream to do that as adults, but many of us end up doing that anyway. We put words like Frost's up in our schools and businesses all the time, and we preach to kids to take create their own path, to be unique. Is that what our culture actually produces? The reality is we then tell them, "you better have a backup" or that those dreams aren't "realistic" or, tell them flatly, like the Dad from Dead Poet's Society, "you're going to Harvard, and you're going to be a doctor."
And we may not use these words exactly, we may send these signals without even using words. Many of us pre-select their path.
Let them create.
How can we select their path, if we don't know what kinds of careers will even be available for them when they graduate college? If we don't even know what the future will be like for our children, shouldn't letting them create their own path be one of our top priorities? If their careers haven't even been created yet, don't we need to give them every freedom to discover that path? We need to be careful when we tell a child "that's not the way it's done." Their way is the only way sometimes, and we just need to get out of the way. Sometimes there's not much room for negotiation. To write a capital E for example, that is done relatively one, universal way. My child gets upset when I tell her that our language only has 26 letters. As our tools become more creative and collaborative, there are going to be new ways to communicate, and students are going to find new ways to make connections. Are we facilitating this kind of creation? Or- are we training our students to be afraid, to have multiple fall-backs, and to wrap themselves in bubble wrap? How do you have a fall-back career for a future where you don't know if the fall-back jobs of today will even exist?
Teach Them Programming.
We are currently undergoing an industrial revolution with the Internet right now. Web tools, languages, and Apps are going to be ruling the economy in the next few years, and, perhaps decades. Facebook is creating it's own virtual currency, and, with 500 million users, it stands to be it's own nation. I've never seen a bigger need for vocational training aimed at teaching students how to create and code web applications. This doesn't mean that students will be locked in a closet creating new ways to use MS Excel, but perhaps they'll be following Steven Kaplan's lead in creating iPhone and iPad apps like his new iChalkboard. Steven is only in eighth grade. If your students are gymnasts, musicians, guitar players, volleyball players- what types of Apps could they create with their likes and interests in mind? Take a look at the Scratch gallery, and take a look at the possibilities of what students can do with programming.
If you give a kid a paintbrush, they might paint a picture, but if you teach them to create an App, they might design a new art form altogether.
Photo by D. Rezac
