Blog Post #8

What Can We Learn About Teaching and Learning From Randy Pausch?

            After viewing Randy Pausch’s video I feel that he has taught me so many new things about teaching and learning though a somewhat short clip. Although he does go over some concepts and strategies that I am more familiar with he also opened my eyes to many that I have never even thought about. Below is a list of some of the new concepts that I have learned from Randy Pausch.

   Creditability

      It is FUN to have an audience

      Take things to the next level

      Be realistic

      The importance of PLN’s

      Not to set the bar to high for your students

Although Randy Pausch went over things more common like organization . He also talked about many other concepts that I would like to share. First Creditability, he shared with his students many stories from his personal experience to help students learn. But, he did something that I would have never thought about that I believe made a big difrence to the students. He brought in photos and props for example a large teddy bear he had won. These props made his story much more creditable making it easier for students to learn. Another concept was It is FUN to have an audience, meaning children love to have others witness and see what they are accomplishing/ learning. In relation to this course technology opens a world of opportunity in creating and audience for students. Students have access to an extremely large audience just by using the internet. Another perk of sharing their work on the internet is to get some positive feedback from viewers. Being Realistic is something else Randy talks about in his video. Being Realistic to some seems like an easy task but with much younger children in lower level classes such as kindergarten or first grade it can sometimes become difficult. Randy explains that being realistic is important when going over thing because it help viewer to trust what you are saying/teaching. He also goes over the importance or PLN’s. We have already posted on the topic of PLN’s once in this class but by Randy going over it once more truly shows just how important PLN’s can be. Randy explains that even at a time where he was an educator in a top position he still needed the help of his mentors. This truly helped me see that PLN’s are not just for the beginners or the young educators but for all educators. One of the last concepts that I really stuck out to me in Randy’s video was when he talked about not setting the bar to high for students. I feel as educators that sometimes we tend to set the bar to high without even realizing it. In this clip he explains that by setting the bar to high disables students. By disabling your students you might cause them to never truly see their own true potential. So this concept was very important and I feel that I from this point forward I will stop and consider if I am setting the bar to high. I would never want to keep my students from reaching their full potential.

            After reviewing all of the wonderful things I have learned from Randy Pausch’s video I feel that as I move forward to become an educator I will think about all of these things. I loved that his clip truly opened my eyes to many things that I have never even thought about.