‘Don’t get the SCHOOLING get in the way of the LEARNING’

The trip to Prague that I made about a fortnight ago has indeed been a fruitful one, for both the professional and personal side of me. It was an inspiring and enriching experience to see what are the possibilities that lay out before me as both a teacher/educator, and as a man who believes in the underlying value of education as the great connector of any social chasms. It was a uniquely satisfying experience, to see fellow educators in action, and to see how they have managed to change the lives of tens, hundreds, and perhaps even thousands, by the mere believe in the education of the child, rather than of a subject...and in the belief that technology is just a mere tool, as a means to an end, and as a great leveragor (for lack of a better term) of making the classroom experience that much more engaging and enriching.

‘Don’t get the schooling get in the way of the Learning’

The mantra above has somehow just got stuck to my head from the time that it was uttered during the seminar. Upon reflection, I guess it was one of those moment of revelation that perhaps we as teachers and educators would regularly need so that we may not lose sight of our bearings! Of how sometimes we as educators, tend to ‘lose’ the notion of what learning is all about, and perhaps even of embracing the belief that it is something that happens beyond just the mere confines of the four walls of a classroom too. And I personally believe that here at my current institution, we have been doing something right so far, it is perhaps novel, new and innovative, but it is definitely something right! And I guess in doing all things that are of such a nature, there would be critics, both positive and negative.

And as we trod along a path that has never been trodden, we do need to muster a lot of courage in doing things that have not been done before. And perhaps also, of believing and embracing that the way to go forward is to believe that we are, and should be just as curious as our students...perhaps even enough to say that in a class of 20 students that we are usually teaching in, there are actually 21 learners!

An interesting facet that I realise is how the convergence of technology has merely hasten the transition between one of digital immigrants to digital natives, and how 'DIGITAL' is now THE natural environment that our students are growing up in! For us educators, we must realise that by leveraging on our unique teaching and learning experience in a 1-to-1 platform, what we are doing is actually ‘disrupting’ the status quo, the very same modus operandi of how teaching (and perhaps learning at times) have been conducted for the last 1 to 2 generations. History have shown how these ‘disruption’ and 'disruptors' are both revolutionary and evolutionary in nature, and how these have turn out to be the ones who have stood the test of time as THE way to go forward! And perhaps, what we are doing here @SST right now could just perhaps be that, THE great disruptor, to both revolutionise teaching, and perhaps to evolutionise learning!

(S)Killing them softly...part 1

It is interesting to note the recent debate in the papers regarding the skilling of our students with soft skills. I guess it is one of those things that will eventually happen...this realisation that no matter how much we equipped our students with the more 'hardcore' and fact-based content knowledge, it is sometimes these 'softer' skillsets that matters in the end..very much like how a skilled striker in a soccer game will need to be a good finisher to score more goals.

And it is interesting to note how these need for 'softer' skillsets is very much different from the focus during my time, about 15 to 20 years ago, where the major concern in education back then, well at least from the perspective of a student, was more to indulge and imbibe the students with content knowledge from the more hard sciences stuffs, and very little on the arts and media. I don't seem to be able to remember the number of times that I actually did a presentation to my classmates or schoolmates, because simply these were few and far in-between. And compare that to now, whereby if a student was to share the same statement, it would specifically mean that he or she would have had done NUMEROUS presentations, so much so that he or she would have lost count!

But let me reiterate that soft skills is not just about presentation alone! More importantly, it is about developing that HUMAN RELATIONSHIP component in our skillsets, specifically that Emotional Quotient (EQ). Daniel Goleman's book on EQ clearly states the dichotomy in EQ, whereby it is not just about understanding oneself, but also reaching out to others, and UNDERSTANDING them. How many times, as adults, have we been so clearly transfixed with getting things done, and focusing too much on our own Cognitive Intelligence, and forgot about the human dimensions to any forms of interaction. And how many times have we forgotten about the inequality of perception, whether actual or assumed, about our own EQ, i.e. human dynamicism...about the fact that there is someone on the receiving end of our interaction,whether good or bad? Perhaps it is something that all of us should reflect. And if I may borrow the words from the late Michael Jackson's song, 'Man in the Mirror', you should be the one who initiate the change.

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Ideation: Shape Borrowing

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Ideation: Shape Borrowing

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Revving up their engines...and mine!

Week 4 has been more of a tiring yet grueling week for me, but thank goodness the heavens must have heard my laments and did allow me some breathing space to tie up some loose ends. The students were amazing, in fact I was surprised that they are actually able to manage their timing and work well, at least for a great majority of them. What really makes me so proud of them was their tenacity to be good, or at least to show a great degree of pride in their works, especially in their sketches! This is especially so since I am of the view that in order to be good communicators, sketching skills are just ONE of the pre-requisite skills that they must be taught, and at least be decently good at, in order to level up on their communicating competencies.

I still think that there is still a gap in how they can communicate their ideas better and hopefully with my help, and their great desire to learn, I would be able to scaffold their learning, and they in turn be able to be deeply engaged in learning to how then make their online portfolios that much more interesting. Well I sure hope that this great experiment that I am currently exploring would be a tremendous success...this whole idea and notion of an online portfolio! It is something new, definitely, but I am very happy to say that I have indeed a great amount of support from my colleagues, something that I truly appreciate!

But as in all things that are new, I do hope that this endeavour would also allow me to fail successfully, (not that I am wishing for it) if there were any shortcomings that I might not have been able to pre-empt. My dream would be to get them to know how to 'choose their nets and then be able to fish'...a metaphor to perhaps give, or rather empower, my students to be able to decide on what to put in into their portfolios. I do hope their reflections and works so far are just a start. Perhaps the photography and other media-related lessons in the very near future would help to enrich them and their portfolios even more. I am definitely excited about all these, but as in all exciting endeavours, a great amount of preparation time is also required to make it a fruitful and a positively-exciting experience, for both the learners and the teacher. And with that in mind, do step aside and allow me to put my foot on the accelerator pedal. I'll be revving up the engine just one notch higher!

Vroooom.....

Marking their benches...part 2

Things were just picking up steam the last week or so. Work, be it the teaching or the administrative components, are piling up, and well, I guess these are the things that I would need to do. But on a more reflective note, it has been another week of interesting turn of events, for me and my students. It was after all, still a benchmarking phase for me, of the students.

The last week had me enjoying some of my students' presentations and benchmarking their research and analytical skills. Presentation on the 2nd week of lessons...well YES! Why not? But hey, I'm not expecting the Steve Job's style of presentation with visually appealing graphics and a snappy accompanying song to boot. Just a simple one that gives me an idea on how much they know and have researched on, on the given theme, and how comfortable they are presenting in front of the class.

All I can say is that, a great majority are able to present and perhaps standards are decent when you see that they are still 12-year-olds after all! Reading from the slides are still the normal modus operandi for a great majority of them, and cartoonish graphics and multiple font uses and transitions are very much the order of the day when it comes to making their presentations more visually appealing. But hey, I think it was a joy to see them doing all those things, and even more for some of them! Sometimes I do find myself having to stop myself from looking at them from an adult's point of view, and then starting to critically see their presentation from those eyes! What is the underlying theme that they are presenting? Were they comfortable with their slides? Do they enjoy doing the research, the presentation slides, and finally presenting them? I sure hope they did, as much as I enjoyed watching them! But on a more serious and happier note, at least I know I would not be out of job in the immediate future, knowing that there are still areas of improvements that they can make in their own presentation and communication skills.

Research...I think one of the flaws that teachers usually make is to assume what the students already know, or even what they don't know. Interestingly I have made my fair share of such flaws on these 2 fronts too! Firstly assuming that they know what RESEARCH is all about...no no..assuming that they know HOW to present their research! I think my charges DO know what research is all about, but the manner and method of presenting these research information is totally another thing altogether. Perhaps it is this fluidity in becoming a teacher to a bunch of young adults who are soooo willing to learn is what I find great joy in! And that is why it is never ever a boring job! Well, now that I know where the problem....no I don't think I want to call it a 'PROBLEM', let's call it shortcomings instead. It does lessen the negative connotations doesn't it. Ok now that I know where the shortcomings are, perhaps it is good for me then to refocus my attention into the other aspects of presentation then...the presentation of their research information, versus research itself.

Hmmm...such is the interesting story of a teacher in week 3 of school! Until my next post...