200 College Students Study Themselves
Staggering. I have kept this post short. Because your attention span is small.
For those with a longer attention span: This is a short video summarizing some of the most important characteristics of students today - how they learn, what they need to learn, their goals, hopes, dreams, what their lives will be like, and what kinds of changes they will experience in their lifetime. Created by Michael Wesch in collaboration with 200 students at Kansas State University.
( via swissmiss )
Labels: college students, Made me think, Micael Wesch, research, staggering facts, stats, swissmiss, video, YouTube
posted by studiosmith @ permalink
5 Comments:
WOW! I love this clip -- another great one by that department. However, I continue to be astonished that it is cultural anthropology bringing this to light and not another discipline. Additionally, I continue to wonder what plans colleges have to remedy this.
And then, because my own attention span flies on whim, this segment reminds me of an anthropology class I took at WSU. We were at a satellite facility (here in Vancouver) and we attended class via video conferencing. We experienced our teacher as a "talking head." When she visited our location and class was hosted at our site, we couldn't change our mindset. We continued to look at her via the TV, rather than focus our attention on the live person in front of the class. Funny and a bit telling. Times are changing...will educators and the system catch up?
Also, thanks for always finding gem after gem! I just love your blog so much, Barry. I'm always learning from and feeling inspired by it!
I'm still digesting it myself, but it does seem the system is a bit sprained, if not broken. It does take both parties though and some of the onus is on the student's to dig in and put in the time and ask the questions to educate themselves. If I was in school (as I feel I still am sometimes) I would be taking full advantage of all web resources. I didn't have that and it is a huge advantage. Another tool. Students shouldn't sit back and complain, they should get ahead by all means possible. And of course, as the video suggests, the schools have a big responsibility to change with the times too. Interesting how many degrees end up meaning nothing and how many people without degrees are billionaires. Certainly an about face.
What discipline did you think would have better bring this to light?
I agree (that students share in this) and I'm laughing a bit because I suddenly remember using an old beat up typewriter in college (at least for the first year). Word processing was completely new back then (1985). And, the web would have been so awesome! (My second year, I met this cute guy with a computer...the rest is history.)
Oh, and I love the quote from 1967.
You know, after thinking about it a little more, I've decided that cultural anthropologists are the appropriate observers here. I'm still impressed by the video itself (the zoom in for more info, like you'd do on the web). I guess I expected computer geeks to notice this and report on it, but then again, they are deeply embedded.
As for my mention of remedy -- I think I was too quick to judge, too. There may be no issue here. Just a behavior that is interesting. I guess I put myself in the shoes of a current student and just couldn't see myself survive if I worked like they are working (apparently). But, they may be very good at it. It'd be interesting to find out more.
This is an incredible video. I love how all the students collaborated to make it. It would be interesting to know what teachers think of this video as they are on the "other side" trying to teach the next generations. The arcane methods that we still use to teach kids remind me of my college days. I had to take classes that used methods of editing and writing that even back in the early '90s we knew we weren't going to need. I endured the methods because I was learning a lot from that teacher and I liked the subject, but even then I wondered how much more I could be getting out of the class if the teach was preparing me for the future instead of showing me how it was done in the past.
Righty-o. Maybe the democrats can fix 'er? All I know is that according to my fifth grade teacher wife, "no child has been left behind" (that is except those who were left behind, so-to-speak – not that there are any).
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