The Blunder

I traveled with three colleagues to Beijing this weekend to attend the Learning 2.012 conference. We were invited to dinner by a former colleague who moved here in August; he promised to send a driver to pick us up and bring us to his new house. The driver was to meet us in the lobby of the hotel between 4:30 and 5:00 with a sign saying the name of our school.

We were a little late returning from our afternoon at The Great Wall, arriving at about 4:40. No driver. No worries; we hung around the lobby, eying the Chinese man with car keys who was also hanging around the lobby, but he didn't have the magic sign. By 5:15 we started to worry.

A phone call to our dinner host explained what happened. Mr. Ren, the driver, arrived at the hotel lobby at 4:30 with his sign. A very old couple walked up to him looking expectant. He showed them the sign, and they nodded, so off they went together. What a surprise when my friend opened his door, expecting old friends and seeing, instead, old strangers! It took my friend about 10 minutes to explain the mistake to the somewhat senile couple and Mr. Ren. They piled back into the car and returned to the hotel. We met up with Mr. Ren, the old couple met up with Mr. Wong, their very worried driver, and we separated to our own rightful destinations.

Funny story! But also how I have been feeling during this technology conference. I am somewhat like that old couple, wandering off with the wrong driver and not realizing my mistake until someone meets me at the door to explain it to me. All of it is harmless, as was the driver mix-up, but an unfortunate detour nonetheless.

One of the big questions that has been bouncing around my head today has been this one from Heidi Hayes Jacobs and her Curriculum 21 work: What year are we teaching for? So much of what is driving our teaching is dated: SATs, IB exams,  College entrance requirements. We teach the 5 paragraph persuasive essay in grade 8 English Language Arts because they need to know how to do that in high school. We teach literary analysis essay in grade 8 because they need to know how for high school. And in high school, they still write the 5-paragraph essay because they need to do that on the SAT. And they teach annotating a printed text because they have to do it on the IB exam. But that is 1982 teaching because those exams haven't changed as the world of the learner has changed..

I am beginning to realize that even if we use technology to do some of those same things, it's still 1982 teaching. For example, typing an essay on Word rather than handwriting is still 1982 teaching. Videotaping a lecture and having kids watch it at home, AKA "flipped classroom", is still a lecture, and is still 1982 teaching. This is when I feel like the old couple standing at the door of my friend's house. I thought I was using technology; I thought I was on the right road to the correct destination. No harm done, but the bigger objective was not really achieved.

Jacobs' teaching point is that we have to "upgrade" (her word) our curriculum to make it relevant and responsive to the world 10 years from now, the world our students will encounter as adults. We need to re-think and re-imagine our learning targets and assessments to capture the multi-media, connected, globalized world. Some ideas I've taken away from my first long day here that could lift the level of teaching out of 1982 are:

• have students videotape themselves demonstrating and explaining their analysis of a poem and embed that video into their poetry reading portfolio instead of a written analysis
• have students make a Public Service Announcement (PSA) video after they've written their persuasive essay instead of "performing" it as an oral presentation
• have students blog about their Social Studies homework reading: What I know, what I think, what I wonder, instead of completing the reading comprehension questions

When I return to my school, I am going to make a sign to hang over my desk: What year am I teaching for? As I plan, I will use that sign to guide me into the right car so that I end up at my preferred destination.