viral

I hate to perpetuate viral videos except that some of them are worth promoting. The Digital Ethnography Group at Kansas State University regularly put out videos that make us think, ponder this social networking we do, and look at what we’re doing in a new way. It’s no surprise that this newest video makes us think about what we’re doing.

I saw it the first day it came out (a few weeks ago) and put it in my YouTubes favorites to think about and hold until I was ready to talk about it.

Having been a student for the past (*cough*) few years and an instructor this semester, I can say that many of these things are true — but not all of them and not for all students. What I think is important about this video is that it may make us look at education a little differently.

Lecturing from the front of a room doesn’t work. It hasn’t ever worked for all students. They aren’t engaged, their brains aren’t being challenged. Hearing a voice droning on and on about topics that most students won’t find interesting is a waste of the students’ and instructor’s time.

Instead, instructor’s should be out talking to the students, working with them, understanding how the topic will work within their interests and how they can build on the things they know to incorporate what can be learned in this course. If students are bringing laptops, iPods, ultra-mobile PCs, and cell phones to class, how can those tools be used to incorporate learning? What can we share with our students about sites like Facebook and MySpace to encourage them to use those sites responsibly (and this is a topic I’ll come back to later since it is my call to arms statement in my thesis)?

Where can we facillitate learning and not just give directed instructions? I think that we, as instructors, learn just as much when we open a classroom up and promote conversation than when we stand in front of a classroom and lecture. That type of instruction isn’t any fun for anyone.