I am trying something new today. Because my course is 50% in schools and a lot of the reading requires hands-on contemplations (and weekly reflections), I chose to do a midterm where students had to create a six minute, 20 slide presentation on a topic they chose at random. My goal, of course, is to get a wider variety of philosophical foundations so they have angles of "schools of thought" that hasn't been harnessed by course readings: environmental education, feminist theory, Charter school movements, Ted Sizer coalition schools, Montessori, etc.
On the first class, I welcomed students with Edie Brickell's What I Am on loop, and I stated that that "I'm not aware of too many things, but I know what I know, if you know what I mean."
Today, however, students were assigned to share what 'they mean' from 'what they know' after doing a mini-research project. Of course, the assignment: Pecha Kuchas, required honing into the theme directly and making the point in summary and with 20 visuals to capture the points. A few have chosen digital stories and more will do it live (Ted Talk style). I was impressed to see early drafts created in digital Prezis, which I didn't know was an option.
As always, I'm nervous about first times I alter my educational pedagogy, but so far I'm actually liking this style of fast paced, poignant communication.
The morning before, however, I'm nervous. I will do one more as a model before splitting them up in two classrooms so they can present to each other. Because the Praxis requires much knowledge on variations in philosophy and every student is required to create a philosophical statement (they are undergraduates), I'm excited to see how this genre harnesses the knowledge they accrued.
And with that, "It's humpday, y'all."
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