To me, the videos work with one another. They offer a deeper insight to one another. In general, they talked about how each student learns differently. I totally agree with this idea. I know that I am a different learner, especially starting school with no knowledge of English. The way I was taught was very book oriented, like most people probably were. When I watched the video on how kids learn to navigate the multimedia world and I saw how elementary kids are learning how to make animation and use very hands on techniques, I was slightly jealous. I wish I could've done that when I was younger since I feel like I'm more of the visual learner. This shows how much technology has changed and how it can influence how a child learns. I keep thinking about how learning English would be different if I had all of this new technology to use. Would I be learning it faster? Would my English be better? Would I have stopped learning English at a lower grade and spent more time in middle school and high school doing something more meaningful? What would have changed for me? I feel like not much would, but I would enjoy learning English greatly. I remember in elementary school, I would spend about an hour everyday in a special ESL class and every Friday, if we were good during the week, we got to play a board game instead of "learn". I loved those Fridays and always looked forward to them. So this made me think, if I learned with games all week, would that have affected me?
The education system right now is apparently flawed. Growing up, I never felt like it was but now, it is to me. Like the RSA video we watched, schools have quite a rigid set up based on hundreds of years ago. Kids have to learn this at this age with this method. There is no room to teach each student individually. What if technology can be used to teach students in a broader sense. How can one idea reach different learners differently. In the Seven Types of Intelligence, Howard Gardner listed seven learning types of children. Is there a way to develop some type of concept to address each learner individually? I remember I had a friend through out elementary school that had trouble learning with the class. Great kid but he was slower than the other students and he would get frustrated when he couldn't grasp the idea as quick as everyone. In third grade, I would sit with him and spend time helping him learn instead of doing my own assignments. At the end of the year, all the teachers told me how thankful they were for my help and how much his grades has improved. This made me think, can technology make some kind of one on one teacher to student ratio when the teacher themselves aren't available to help everyone? Through out all the videos and reading, it comes down to the question of how technology can improve learning for children. We can create that change. We are using the technology and the technology is us.
"Web 2.0 is all about harnessing collective intelligence." It is crazy. It is mind-blowing. It is us. Web 2.0 enables so much interaction and change in the world. The whole article is about what Web 2.0 can do, which is basically everything. Is there anything that hasn't been thought of yet? You can now travel with the web. You can touch, feel, see the web. You can track where you are and where your friends have been. You can communicate with people from across the world and be able to see them. What can't you do with the web now? It opens up so many doors to educate people. How can we use all of that technology to design an experience, an idea, that could help so many students. With all the new technologies being developed too, anything seems possible. At the same time, can it be too much? Can we use social media to teach? What happens if we integrate a traditional media into an iPad? Can we make it the same experience? Web 2.0 allows us to create so many changes, it's just up to us and how we use it to our benefit.
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