A New Culture of Learning
Wow! So when I first started reading this book, I honestly thought I was going to just get through it. I mean I had to if i wanted to succeed in my latest course in the DLL program. But, this book really inspired me to seriously look into and figure out a way to change the culture in my classroom. I know it can be done. It has to be done. But how I am going to do it? That is the ultimate question and challenge that is now before me.
We live in a world that is constantly changing and our children, and us grown ups for that matter, have to cope and adapt to the changes all around us. A static classroom that is still teaching learners the way I was taught 20 years ago, just doesn't work. I was taught to trust, obey, and do whatever my teacher told me. They were the experts. In my young mind, they knew everything! I remember wondering, as a child, how my teachers knew so much. Did they go home and just study the encyclopedia? Looking back now, they didn't know everything. They knew a little bit about a lot of different things and I had no way to prove them wrong. That is not the case in our world today. Teachers are not the experts. Google is! Our learners have a world of information at their fingertips. Within a few seconds, they can find out more about a topic of interest than a teacher could ever store in her brain.
Music is an OLD art form. Rehearsal, performance standards, and teaching techniques have been around for hundreds of years. Yes, we are still doing things they same way they have been done for hundreds of years. How can we change this to reflect the way kids learn today? That is something that I am going to have to do a lot of thinking, researching, planning, and experimenting with.
I can implement play into a lot of areas of instruction. I can teach music theory with games of all types. (Twister, Relay Races, Jeopardy, Snowball Fights, Singing Games, iPad games, and more) . My learners can play on instruments to create sound
effects for stories, write their own compositions, create new dance routines, and even design the backdrops for their plays. But, how do I modernize or change how we prepare for performances or how we play an instrument like the recorder? This is where my work begins.
I am glad that I was introduced to this book and I plan on reading it again when I can really sit down and think about everything Thomas and Brown mention. The first chapter had me hooked when it talked about the little boy using Scratch, an app that I recently began playing with. My husband, and two groups of best friends used to be avid World of Warcraft players. I remember bringing up the idea of using a game like this to teach about history, war, alliances, and even finances to a group of teachers 7 or 8 years ago. They thought I was crazy, but really I was looking at new culture of learning. Players in the game learned from one another. My husband was a class leader. He taught me what he knew and introduced me to others in the game that could teach me more about my characters. I didn't read books or go to class to learn. It was a community learning and growing together through trial and error, lots of questions, sharing of knowledge, and a bit of friendly debate.
Thomas, D., & Brown J. S. (2011). A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the imagination for a world of constant change. (Vol 219) Lexington, KY: