Michael Wesch asks, "What if you could rebuild the university from the ground up? With today's technology? For today's student? For today's world? What would you build?" To be honest, I really don't know. A complete overall of higher education is beyond the scope of my purposes, at least at this time. But one aspect that Wesch points out in his video is how there is so much to do with technology for learning, and yet students (even at the university level) are taking exams on bubble-in test forms. Think about that for a moment. Students spend thousands of dollars and take on massive amounts of debt each semester, and the end result is a Scantron. Wesch also presents how massive amounts of information have become available over the Internet through websites like Wikipedia and how Google "is adding major libraries to its database, expanding the reach of the web." We have been experiencing a major shift in information access and distribution, a transition from print to digital format.
In this transition, we need to teach our students how to be digitally literate, and that's difficult to do if we test them using a written test form all the time. With so many tools available now we can expand our ideas about assessment. In my methods course we've discussed assessing students using electronic portfolios. In the portfolio, students include a cover letter, some homework problems and in-class activities they worked on, and they wrap it up with a reflection on what they learned. What's really neat about this approach is that we can delve further into the depth of knowledge our students have on the concepts that we teach while simultaneously teaching a real world job skill, namely teaching students how to prepare for a job interview. In this way we also have the student look more closely at how to learn the concepts instead of what the procedures are.
Reference:
Wesch, M. (2011, January 24). Rethinking Education. [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xb5spS8pmE&list=PLbRLdW37G3oMquOaC-HeUIt6CWk-FzaGp&index=15
In this transition, we need to teach our students how to be digitally literate, and that's difficult to do if we test them using a written test form all the time. With so many tools available now we can expand our ideas about assessment. In my methods course we've discussed assessing students using electronic portfolios. In the portfolio, students include a cover letter, some homework problems and in-class activities they worked on, and they wrap it up with a reflection on what they learned. What's really neat about this approach is that we can delve further into the depth of knowledge our students have on the concepts that we teach while simultaneously teaching a real world job skill, namely teaching students how to prepare for a job interview. In this way we also have the student look more closely at how to learn the concepts instead of what the procedures are.
Reference:
Wesch, M. (2011, January 24). Rethinking Education. [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xb5spS8pmE&list=PLbRLdW37G3oMquOaC-HeUIt6CWk-FzaGp&index=15