I think that one underlying theme prevalent in both the Resnick article and the article by Peppler and Kafai was the idea that media needs to allow students to create and design in order to learn. Learning is no longer about lecturing students, students need to be given a chance to experience and personalize their curricular experience. I see this daily in the mathematics curriculum, no longer do we give students notes and formula and a page of skills practice we now have curriculum that is designed to Discover Algebra and have math as a Connected and collaborative experience.
My only question is if technology of this nature is suited for the secondary classroom? Peppler and Kafai discuss using the technology in an informal computer club type setting and Resnick states that “too often, educational techologies are overly constrained”(p 2). Perhaps the constraint is due to curricular needs and perhaps due to the inherent nature of today’s educational system. I understand that we are looking for more creative and engaging outlets, however, I wonder how approproate this is when we are working on teaching building block and foundational skills. I full fledge agree with the Reggio Emilia approach, did quite a bit of research back in my undergraduate years as well as a major paper on Frederich Froebel. Reggio Emilia operates under the premise that students learn best in groups and are resourceful enough to come up with their own ideas for lessons and discovery. This mirrors the new direction of mathematics in that it is very inquiry based and students go through explorations and investigations with one another. Students learn through discussion and discovery rather than just being given the formula and skills practice. The problem I have with this is: what do you do when students make incorrect discoveries or when they overgeneralize the ideas? What do you do when the investigation does not work out as it should? I like the idea of play and creativity, but wonder if there are certain subjects that lend themselves better and more appropriately than others?
Here is an excellent article on the project-based approach in relation to mathematics: http://www.nctm.org/eresources/view_media.asp?article_id=817
Resources:
Resnick, M. (2007). All I really need to know (about creative thinking) I learned (by studying how children learn) in kindergarten. Creativity and Cognition. New York, NY: ACM, 2007.
Peppler, K.A., & Kafai, Y.B. (2007). From SuperGoo to Scratch: Exploring creative digital media production in informal learning. Learning, Media, and Technology, special issue: Media education goes digital, June, 2007.
