In effect, rather than memorizing facts or formulas, throughperformances of being an urban planner, lawyer, doctor, engineer, carpenter, historian,teacher, or physicist the player learns the particular ways of thinking of these professions.
Yet I feel that there are many times when our district/administrators would rather us adhere to the provided curriculum than take risks to make learning more fun, engaging, and meaningful.
Contemporary video games allow youth to play with sophisticated simulations and, in theprocess, to develop an intuitive understanding of how we might use simulations to test ourassumptions about the way the world works.
This reminds of a game I used to play called Kerbal Space Program. The game simulates realistic calculations and physics involved with space launch, flight, and travel. I have learned more about how difficult it is to launch crafts into space from this game alone than any other textbook could ever teach me.
Students also need to develop technical skills.They need to know how to log on, to search, touse various programs, to focus a camera, to edit footage, to do some basic programming and soforth.
What about Webex and Zoom etiquette?
econd, new media literaciesshould be considered a social skill
This has what I have been trying to teach my students over the years. That there is a form of etiquette and understanding of what they are saying, showing, or doing and the impact it can have on others. It is just as important as students learning that they shouldn't talk over each other, waiting their turn, being able to respectfully disagree, or the importance of sharing.
.They need to think critically about information that can be found nearlyinstantaneously through out the world.
Man is this quote more true than ever. With the amount of content that can be found digitally either through YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok etc. Information is more than every literally at the fingertips of adolescents. If the ability to think critically is not there for adolescents, misunderstanding, misinterpretations, and a warped view of what is right and wrong will develop.
Stories.
I really enjoyed Kurt Vonnegut's lecture. Informative and also funny. It's amazing how similar story arcs are. These story arcs I'm going to show my students when they start writing narratives. I loved the above the line and below the line examples.
Diverse Media. You will be challenged to work with a diverse collection of digital media. We will be remixing and mashing-up elements of audio, video, graphic, web, and social media.
I'm very much looking forward to learning and experimenting with media tools to put in my toolbox. Also, thank you for the extension on the assignment Brad.