we give them breakfast, lunch, and dinner, we provide them with recess, [we provide a lot of opportunities for them], but we really haven’t done the social-emotional piece yet, and I see it every day in this job.

lthough many benefits of music education take time to show, once they do, they are very strong and impactful.

Many schools throughout America have only one music teacher and 1000 students, meaning not all students get the same amount (or any) music.

,

it

Nature

This means that instrumental musical training can improve motor and auditory functions, aiding neural development.

For example, by listening to music, you are practicing recognizing pitch, rhythm, and tempo, elements which are also essential for language acquisition

school

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Important Definitions-

US

they should use social media in their professional practice, we must recognize that if we engage professionally with these practices ourselves, our advocacy comes from a position of power

Where there is freedom to share and collaborate, there is often also freedom to abuse and exploit, so we should be careful not to indulge in idealized notions of participation, sharing, and openness that may be misguided.

filter bubble

The tendency to connect with similar or like-minded individuals online as offline, what Thelwall (2009) calls homophily, means that social media may not foster diverse spaces for knowledge exchange and negotiation, leading instead to “echo chambers,” a situation in which we share knowledge and perspectives with individuals who already share the same views as ourselves

social media tools currently structure relationships and power structures in relatively flat and non-hierarchical manners

scholars not only need to understand the participatory nature of the Web, they also need to develop the social and digital literacies and skills essential for effective engagement with such networks. Unequal access to technology and/or lack of digital literacies is referred to as the participation gap

the type of education offered by these initiatives appears to be reserved for students who are intrinsically motivated, self-directed, and have the necessary prior knowledge to succeed;

that charge authors (and by extension their institutions) to publish their manuscripts limits the diversity of voices in the scholarly process to those able to pay for publication.

variety of others including reduced cost of delivery, improved efficiency, greater accuracy, and so forth.

digital participation for enhanced scholarly outcomes. Arguments for openness tend to focus on addressing the short-comings and limitations of current institutionalized practices through faculty participation in online spaces.

We believe that all human beings are endowed with a capacity to learn, improve, and progress. Educational opportunity is the mechanism by which we fulfill that capacity.

building a future in which research and education in every part of the world are … more free to flourish

“Open teaching” began as a practice of using technology to open formal university courses for free, informal participation by individuals not officially enrolled in the course.

asking students to post homework assignments and other course artifacts on publicly viewable blogs or wikis, so they can catalyze further discussion of relevant topics;

As governments move to require open policies, hundreds of billions of dollars of educational and research resources will be freely and legally available to the public that paid for them. Every taxpayer has a reasonable expectation of access to educational materials and research products whose creation tax dollars supported.

it is unthinkable that we might simply start taking books apart in order to assemble exactly what we want and exactly what our students need.

When we can’t find a single textbook that meets our needs, it is not uncommon for us to assign two or more textbooks, intending only to use parts of each.

The cost of textbooks is a significant factor in the cost of higher education, growing beyond the reach of more individuals each year. OER have considerable potential to be a part of the solution to this problem.

Today, the cost of having a 250-page book transcribed by hand is about $250. The cost of printing that same book with a print-on-demand service is about $5. The cost of copying an online version of that same book (e.g., an ePub file) is about $0.0008. The cost of shipping either the handwritten or printed book is about $5. The cost of distributing an electronic copy of the book over the Internet is approximately $0.0007.

Those educators who share the most thoroughly of themselves with the greatest proportion of their students are the ones we deem most successful.

If an instructor is not sharing what he or she knows with students, there is no education happening.

In both cases, every person in the world enjoys free (no cost) access to the OER and free (no cost) permission to engage in the “4R” activities

the need for learning contexts that bring together in-school and out-of-school learning and activity.

a disconnect between classroom and everyday learning,

Connected learning is socially embedded, interest-driven, a

lower barriers to access for knowledge and information

Without the disciplines, Interdisciplinary Studies would have nothing to build on, nothing to incorporate or weave together in order to find solutions to societal problems.

The great aspect of the twenty-first century is that mostly all disciplines encompass aspects of other disciplines creating a multidisciplinary approach.

Today, technology permeates our daily lives, drives our economy, and delivers our higher education.

students were taught how to reflect on past history to make a difference in their future.

geometry, music, dancing, and astronomy.

Online courses provide the convenience of not having a designated time to learn, but they at first lacked the legitimacy of a physical university.  

The University of Al-Karaouine in Morocco, Africa is the oldest continuously operating, degree-granting university in the world.

The academy began with teachers simply preaching a topic of their interest.

Taylor Martin

But content, methods, and epistemologies are the central building blocks of disciplines,

epistemology explains the why of a discipline: why it focuses on certain content and why it chooses the methods that it chooses.

 qualitative, using interviews, case studies, and observations of human behavior to understand its content

Sometimes we actually don’t want to carve a problem or concept into small bits, but instead want to see how something specific fits into a larger pattern or fabric

since breaking a problem or concept down may help us see the different disciplines that are involved, which will then allow us to organize our research approach.

ack of a system of recognition for interdisciplinary scholars.

Academic Freedom: Freedom to study our interests, in the way we best comprehend knowledge.

Social Change: Interdisciplinarians work to build connections across divided ideas, and we seek out new ways of conceptualizing knowledge. This can lead us to truly change the world, structure our world differently, and see ourselves as connected in a wide web of humanity.

Unity of Knowledge: Being able to learn more so that you have the ability to connect with more knowledge. Most majors and fields look at parts of the world, but there is something beautiful and exciting about trying to step back and see how things connect.

Creative Breakthroughs: Taking a new perspective from a different angle can yield unexpected pathways that were not visible before.

Have you been part of a disciplinary community in high school or college so far? What did you do as part of that community?

Allen F. Repko suggests that “multidisciplinarity” is like a fruit bowl, where different disciplines are represented by the different fruits that are placed together in a bowl but which do not mix much or change shape themselves.

Interdisciplinarity:

Require commitments from university administration to qualify for funding for interdisciplinary efforts.

Such educational experiences require the opportunity to add to basic knowledge in one or more disciplinary skills or to broaden one's knowledge, not necessarily to create the capacity to conduct wholly different research alone, but, rather, to learn enough about other disciplines to work as a productive team member.

Accessibility at the speed of the Internet is making it far easier to learn what is being done in other disciplines, although the language and jargon barriers cited above will continue to haunt those developing the search engines for on-line publications.

Private industry offers another avenue for those with interdisciplinary training. Representatives of industry indicated that they are looking for people who can work in an interdisciplinary environment

Some have reported difficulties in finding positions for graduate students who received interdisciplinary training.

The committee similarly believes that extending these loan repayment programs could provide an increased incentive to pursue interdisciplinary research training.

These programs allow NIH to repay up to $35,000 per year in eligible education loans for participants who obtain research employment at NIH.

To pay for their training, many students are taking loans for their undergraduate or professional education

The explosion of information in each scientific discipline raises concerns about how long it would take to attain expertise in one, let alone two or more, fields.

The length of time required to complete training in more than one field—whether in the basic or clinical sciences or in a combination of the two—can be discouraging.

Even if all disciplines covered by a proposal are represented in a review committee, unless the committee members themselves have tried to do interdisciplinary research in the field in question, they might not appreciate the issues.

Professional organizations and journals are key ingredients of disciplinary identity.10 Their major impact is in providing an outlet for dissemination of information.

Interdisciplinary research requires a commitment from university administration. A cross-departmental program can suffer if the administration does not consider the needs for faculty, space, and funds. Through control of faculty positions, the university leadership can promote collaboration, for example, by requiring a position to be jointly supported by two departments

Some allocate funds and resources among the investigators and their units, but others credit only the person listed as the principal investigator. That can penalize coinvestigators in other departments, in that their home departments might get no credit. The cross-departmental nature of interdisciplinary research is likely to compound the problems of allocation of credit and research resources when grants are funded across departments or schools.52

However, departmental organization changes relatively slowly. The priority given to contributions in fields that correspond to departmental structures can inhibit interdisciplinary approaches.

sserted that the modern university is “partitioned along academic lines that no longer truly reflect today's intellectual life

Washington University invested $28 million in a new laboratory building to house a shared imaging facility, animal facility, and psychology laboratories with the intent of encouraging interdisciplinary collaboration.43 More recently, the University of California, Berkeley launched an interdisciplinary “Health Sciences Initiative” that includes the construction of two buildings that will house laboratories of researchers from several departments.

Buildings that isolate laboratories and research groups from one another can limit this type of interaction. But, bringing people together through the creation of central facilities or common areas can increase its probability.

Leaders need to have vision, creativity, and perseverance. To establish a successful interdisciplinary program requires education of scientific colleagues and administrators about the potential value of interdisciplinary research. To coordinate the efforts of a diverse team requires credibility as a research scientist, skill in modulating strong personalities, the ability to draw out individual strengths, and skill in the use of group dynamics to blend individual strengths into a team.

In building an interdisciplinary team, clarity regarding roles, expectations, and authority—particularly with regard to sharing of data and resources—is important for success

A feeling of community can facilitate interactions in an interdisciplinary team

Good communication skills are helpful in alleviating such problems, but most members of interdisciplinary teams lack training and proficiency in such skills.

Heated discussions can result when people with different backgrounds try to assert the correctness of their views

As a consequence, other disciplines might be viewed as less rigorous or important.

Communicating with another discipline requires time and work. An extensive effort must be made to learn the language of another field and to teach others the language of one's own. Many have recognized that this barrier must be overcome before successful collaboration can occur

We speak the language of our discipline, which raises two problems: first, we may not understand the languages of the other disciplines; second, more dangerously, we may think that we understand these, but do not, because although the same terms are used in different disciplines, they mean something very different in each.

Scientists trained in a discipline learn to speak a specific language and adopt the analytical and methodological constructs that have accumulated in that discipline. This constitutes a form of professional socialization that serves as an important part of the training experience, but it can present obstacles to interdisciplinary research.

those who do collaborative work could not succeed in their own discipline; they would be lost in a team effort and “lose their professional identity.”

psychology and medicine who expressed opinions on obstacles to interdisciplinary research.52 Some of the comments indicated concerns: working in interdisciplinary research was not “pure”; it was “less challenging” or “high risk”; those who do collaborative work could not succeed in their own discipline; they would be lost in a team effort and “lose their professional identity.”

most significant scientific problems cannot be accommodated within arbitrary disciplinary structures.

Most scientists recognize a need for interdisciplinary research, many are reluctant to abandon their disciplinary focus.

nterdisciplinary education promotes knowledge transfer as students learn to use the skills and concepts attained in one field and apply it to another.

urthermore, students have more ways to associatelearning with their interests and relatelearning experiences with real-world application [12] as “knowledge in the real world is not applied in bits and pieces but in an integrated fashion”

Inquiry-Based Learning engages students inthe learning process andchanges the traditional role of instructor from lecturer to learningfacilitator, coach, and model [35]. Inquiry-Based Learningispredicated on building knowledge as opposed to passive learning which follows the more traditional collegiate instructional model based primarily on lecture.

Opponents of interdisciplinary education assert it creates “jack-of-all-trades, but master of nonegraduates.

Beyond desire, instructors shouldchallenge studentsbypresenting them with questions addressingskills and conceptsslightly above their existing levelof competence. When students reach a newlevel, an entirely new set of challenges should bepresented, once again slightly above their existing level of competence.

Inquiry-Based Learning engages students inthe learning process andchanges the traditional role of instructor from lecturer to learningfacilitator, coach, and model [35]. Inquiry-Based Learningispredicated on building knowledge as opposed to passive learning which follows the more traditional collegiate instructional model based primarily on lecture.

Inquiry-Based Learning engages students inthe learning process andchanges the traditional role of instructor from lecturer to learningfacilitator, coach, and model [35]. Inquiry-Based Learningispredicated on building knowledge as opposed to passive learning which follows the more traditional collegiate instructional model based primarily on lecture.

instructors rarely have the required competencies to implement interdisciplinary educational models.

instructors rarely have the required competencies to implement interdisciplinary educational models.

Moreover, interdisciplinary education helps to increase student achievement by promoting positive attitudes toward subject matter, creating curricular flexibility, and integratingrapidly changing information with increased efficiency

Encouraging students to reach beyond the typical constraints of a single contentarea and engage in interdisciplinary learning fosters critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication skills.

interdisciplinary education is an important tool in creating new ways of thinking and helping toconnect fragmentedknowledge in a coherent way

If the purpose of teaching is to help prepare for adulthood including meaningful careers, then one can understand why young adults tend to tune out instruction that is focused solelyon the acquisition of content.

Educators areincreasinglycoming to the realization that teaching skills and vague concepts without connectionto real-world applicationsare seen by students as irrelevant andin turn, are easily forgotten[

eam-basedmindset whereby integrated skills and concepts areapplied across awide range of courses.

At the global level, this implies a wide range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary educational programs. At the institutional level, this implies encouraging students to take at least one consciously integrative course.

Disciplines serve not only as a convenient . . . way of dividing knowledge into its components, but . . . they also serve as a basis for organizing the institutionand hence the professionals engaged in teaching and research--into autonomous fiefs"

According to most interdisciplinary theorists, some problems of knowledge are neglected because they "fail to fit in with disciplinary boundaries thus falling in the interstices between them

career mobility . . . is among the most potent sources of innovation and development within a discipline." For instance, seventeen out of forty-one scientists in the phage group (which played a decisive role in mid-century biology) were physicists or chemists by training.

Thus, if chance favors the prepared mind, and if preparation often involves grounding in two or more disciplines, then those who wish to speed up the growth of knowledge should promote, or at least tolerate, interdisciplinary knowledge and research.

Students are highly motivated as they have a vested interest in pursuing topics that are interesting to them. As a result, the content is often rooted in life experiences, giving an authentic purpose for the learning and connecting it to a real world context. Consequently, the learning becomes meaningful, purposeful and deeper resulting in learning experiences that stay with the student for a lifetime.

Students engaging in interdisciplinary study are therefore creating their own understanding and knowledge of the world through their study choices

It goes on to suggest that when students encounter something new, they have to integrate it with previous ideas and experiences by connecting the new knowledge to something already known. 

Interdisciplinary teaching and learning is maximised when professionals from different disciplines work together to serve a common purpose and to help students make the connections between different disciplines or subject areas.

This can occur by allowing students to choose their own subjects and their learning is deepened when they reflect on the connections between what they are learning in different disciplines.

Students learning in this way are able to apply the knowledge gained in one discipline to another different discipline as a way to deepen the learning experience.

Greenwald does depict the challenges of teaching interdisciplinary knowledge, however Robin has done a fantastic job not only teaching me about interdisciplinary knowledge, but how to apply my chosen disciplines to the world of interdisciplinarity!

Gruenwald speaks particularly on interdisciplinary sciences. He believes that remarkably, the natural sciences have turned into interdisciplinary engagement by the inner logic of discovery.

According to Grunewald colleges must be redesigned as completely interdisciplinary. I couldn’t even imagine my excitement if I attended a school with zero majors. If every single person build his or her degree from the bottom up, how creative and amazing would that be?

interdisciplinary studies is proven to broaden our intellectual horizons, therefore we must fund this type of education!

First let me start of by saying, higher education is a key component to a successful life in my opinion.

And that feels really good because unlike many other majors where it is easy to feel trapped or to feel stuck in this routine that everyone who has graduated with your degree has gone through- the same process; this study has me standing alone and in this case, that isn’t a bad thing.

Just think about it, if everyone just stuck to guidelines and tradition, the world would never grow and would never have the chance to become any better.

I am creating and envisioning a possibility that others may not see or may not have the confidence to direct

Engaging in Interdisciplinary studies has broadened my understanding of entrepreneurship, abstract thinking, metacognition, and love of learning.

In the real world, interdisciplinary is just now starting to enter the discussion. A recent article about Minneapolis Psychiatry attests to the fact that “Now children’s mental health care is interdisciplinary.” The author, Gail Rosenblum, then lists the psychologists, school social workers, case managers, occupational therapists, physical therapists and nurses who are present in developing and preserving a child’s mental well-being.

Our society is only starting to get the ball rolling on interdisciplinary communication.

Even when grouping together to attempt solving a problem as a team, an interdisciplinary attempt can end up being multidisciplinary, where insights can come from two or more disciplines, but lack integration.

f it ever seems as though the disciplines are scorned, the only thing we deem negative is their lack of integration with other disciplines.

“…the disciplines are the place where we begin, but not where we end.” This quote from Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies by Allen F. Repko captures the essence of where interdisciplinary study comes from.

“…the disciplines are the place where we begin, but not where we end.” This quote from Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies by Allen F. Repko captures the essence of where interdisciplinary study comes from.

Many people as students observe professors and teachers in high school and middle school as being a part of individual social groups, kind of like cliques.

“These faculty members share common formative experiences…and appreciate a common canon of writings by the “founding fathers” of the disciplines” (Repko, 90)

Discipline was introduced as “discipline” by the Romans and was originally applied to the professions because of the need that was perceived to relate education to specific political, economic, and ecclesiastical ends.

In response to the expanding definition of higher education, the ability to navigate institutions became a preoccupation.

The onset of the Great Depression illustrated an interesting phenomenon: college enrollments increased during times of national financial hardship.

The onset of the Great Depression illustrated an interesting phenomenon: college enrollments increased during times of national financial hardship.

Employers seldom required college degrees, therefore college presidents faced the perpetual challenge of persuading young adults to delay pursuing their life's enterprises by spending four years on campus.

Employers seldom required college degrees, therefore college presidents faced the perpetual challenge of persuading young adults to delay pursuing their life's enterprises by spending four years on campus.

Going to college early in the nineteenth century was not particularly expensive.

Although the classical languages and liberal studies of the bachelor of arts degree remained central to the character of American higher education in this era, several new fields gained a foothold in formal study. Engineering and science acquired a presence on the campus.

Only white Christian males were allowed to matriculate. Women and African-Americans were denied participation by statute and custom

As the First Great Awakening of the 1730s to 1770s initiated growth in a wider variety of Protestant churches, each denomination often desired its own seminary. Furthermore, each colony tended to favor a particular denomination and so the new colleges took on an importance for regional development as well. Presbyterians in New Jersey founded the College of New Jersey (later renamed Princeton). The College of William and Mary in Virginia maintained a strong Anglican orientation

The colonists created institutions for higher education for several reasons. New England settlers included many alumni of the royally chartered British universities, Cambridge and Oxford, and therefore believed education was essential.

In the nineteenth century, the mission of higher education changed radically to include “practical subjects” like agriculture and engineering

Early colonial institutions like Harvard were founded to provide education to those going into the ministry, but after the American Revolution, colleges began to broaden their focus to include education for the ministry, medicine and law

There is Violet Degnan and her project, “New Black Masculinity and Hip-hop.” Degnan places this piece within a network of links, articles, and images while also abiding by strict scholarly standards. Also explore the satirical online store by John Chavez, dubbed “Stitcht,” which ‘hacks’ digital conceptualizations of gender. These two projects engage in public scholarship in creative ways: Degnan’s project participates in the very public conversation surrounding black masculinity, while Chavez uses the form of a satirical store to force an audience to question their assumptions around the online economy.

’m not arguing against putting class assignments online, but the assignments must be framed by a conversation about audience and the way the ‘domain’ represents the author to that audience.

Can ‘ownership’ and ‘assignment’ go hand in hand?

How often do traditional ‘assignments’ misrepresent student interests, passion, and rigor?

The web is a network for conversations, and if students still see their audience as a teacher with a red pen, then nothing changes.

If no one wants to read the hastily constructed blog post for a class participation grade, then what is the purpose of making it public?

Traditional assignments don’t necessarily empower students when they have to post them in a public space.

“To own one’s domain gives students an understanding of how Web technologies work. It puts them in a much better position to control their work, their data, their identity online.”

I could even keep the domain after graduation. It is a living portfolio, my representation in the digital world.

On our campuses, we must create an intellectual climate that encourages faculty members and students to make connections among seemingly disparate disciplines, discoveries, events, and trends — and to build bridges among them that benefit the understanding of us all.

A reform agenda must also include the creation of a balance between specialists and generalists

Another promising avenue is the Carnegie Corporation of New York's "Teachers for a New Era" program, which includes top-level collaboration between university faculty members in the arts and sciences with those in schools of education to ensure that prospective teachers are well grounded in specific disciplines and provided a liberal-arts education.

Many novel approaches to revitalizing the liberal arts on campuses have been proposed, among them: learning by doing — including the use of community service, field study, internships, and research projects to integrate experience and application with academic work

The renewal and transformation of the liberal arts, however, remain the key to providing students with a rich and wide-ranging body of knowledge that will equip them to be both problem solvers and communicators and to assess situations and make effective, balanced, and timely judgments — skills that are essential in a knowledge-based, globalizing world.

Within disciplines, of course, teaching should encourage students to draw knowledge together from many sources.

Colleges must develop strategies to enable their faculty members, who are steeped in different disciplines, to have opportunities for multidisciplinary work as they continue their own lifelong learning

Without liberal arts to provide a context for technical training, young people cannot be expected to understand the general nature and structure of our society, the role of the university, or the importance of values.

In particular, higher-education reform must focus on a revival of the liberal arts. Yet, paradoxically, liberal education is in decline just when we need it the most

Unfortunately, many of those student workers say that holding a job hurts their grades, as well as limits their choice of courses. By one estimate, college students typically spend less than half the time on their studies than the faculty expects.

Because many high schools don't do their jobs, 53 percent of college students, including those who attend community colleges, require remedial courses.

Sometimes that vacuum is filled by esoteric ideas, cults, and extremist programs — which are very appealing because they provide answers for absolutely everything.

But while technology allows us to access more information, faster and in a more usable form, we must keep in mind the author and media critic Neil Postman's caution: "The computer cannot provide an organizing moral framework. It cannot tell us what questions are worth asking."

Of course, the same information technologies that have been the driving force behind the explosion of information and its fragmentation also present us with profoundly integrative tools

Yet the skills of synthesis and systemic thinking are not just luxuries, they are invaluable. Information — of all varieties, all levels of priority, and all without much context — is bombarding us from all directions all the time.

As a society, we tend to pay lip service to the complexity of problems and then continue to gamble on simplistic solutions

he complexity of the world requires us to have a better understanding of the relationships and connections between all fields that intersect and overlap — economics and sociology, law and psychology, business and history, physics and medicine, anthropology and political science

After all, political empowerment and economic opportunity stem from the same root: the spread of knowledge. Thomas Jefferson fervently believed that a nation cannot be ignorant and free; I share this view as well as Jefferson's optimism that societies become more democratic as citizens become more knowledgeable and cultured.

Understanding the nature of knowledge, its unity, its varieties, its limitations, and its uses and abuses is necessary for the success of our democracy.

nstead of helping students learn and grow as individuals, find meaning in their lives, or understand their role in society, college has become a chaotic maze where students try to pick up something useful as they search for the exit: the degree needed to obtain decent employment.

Giving students their own digital domain is a radical act. It gives them the ability to work on the Web and with the Web, to have their scholarship be meaningful and accessible by others. It allows them to demonstrate their learning to others beyond the classroom walls.

Education technology – and more broadly, the culture of education – does a terrible job with this sort of portability and interoperability.

something that they themselves can reflect upon, not simply grades and assignments that are locked away in a proprietary system controlled by the school.

While some schools are turning to social media monitoring firms to keep an eye on students online, rarely do schools give students the opportunity to demonstrate the good work that they do publicly.

These portfolios can contain text, images, video and audio recordings, giving students opportunities to express themselves in a variety of ways beyond the traditional pen-and-paper test or essay.

There’s some pushback against these proposals too, with arguments that restrictions on data might hinder research

a growing number of other schools believe that students need a proprietary online space in order to be intellectually productive.

the domain and all its content are the student’s to take with them. It is, after all, their education, their intellectual development, their work.

not only would acquire crucial technical skills for their digital lives but also would engage in work that provides richly teachable moments…. Fascinating and important innovations would emerge as students are able to shape their own cognition, learning, expression, and reflection in a digital age, in a digital medium. Students would frame, curate, share, and direct their own ‘engagement streams’ throughout the learning environment.

Having one’s own domain means that students have much more say over what they present to the world, in terms of their public profiles, professional portfolios, and digital identities.