I think Monday's class was an excellent insight into a lot of things about teaching. It was an excellent demonstration of the idea that there needs to be an alternative lesson plan when using technology (incase it doesn't work). Our class ended up going quite well, but it's good to realize that there is the potential for technology to be unreliable, and it's best not to stand unprepared.
All the tech issues aside, I think the webinar was interesting and quite informative. I'd never actually seen one, so the process, in and of itself, was quite educational. But perhaps even more interesting was observing our class hold an informal socratic seminar completely unaware. Student run, student participants, we pretty much had ourselves an informal seminar. So many valid points about teaching were raised, and I really liked hearing about it from all different subject areas and experiences. I believe the most effective way to deal with issues is to get multiple perspectives.
So, I'll try to relate this video to teaching... Some of the best things come from old formulas...
***Warning: it swears 4 times***
Katie, I appreciate the lessons that you drew from our last class, and I'm glad that you were able to take useful lessons from both the content of the webinar and the bumps in the road (plan B...always have a plan B). I was past delighted to see the wonderful way that you all conducted the conversation inspired by the Sessums blog post, and your posting reminds me (by the way) to write Chris and tell him so.
ReplyDeleteI'm really excited to see how the webinar looks to you when the groups are smaller and when you and a partner are running the webinar.
Hee hee...your blog is so much more positive than mine! We had completely different experiences last Friday it seems like...I didn't really get anything out of the class! Does this support the concept that we create our own realities?? :)
ReplyDelete