Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Out of the Minds of Babes


As a future teacher who wants to expand my student’s minds and have them and provide opportunities for understanding, I am constantly looking for unique activities. I believe the best activities are those that can keep the interest of a child and also be remembered. In the article “A is for Avatar: Young Children is Literacy 2.0 Worlds and Literacy 1.0 Schools”, by Karen Wohlwend, there is an anecdote about two children who made and played a video game on paper. They had rules and characters and much more. With this activity or in the children’s eyes “game”, they improved their collaborative skills, problems solving skills, creative skills, social/emotional skills and more.
This activity came from two young individuals. They improved different developmental and foundational areas without realizing it. Along with this they created a work of art.

Before reading this section, I saw the picture I thought I wonder what the person who drew was thinking and this looks pretty cool.
The point I want to make is for teachers to keep their eyes open. I learned an unique activity that I can add on and incorporate into my future classroom that came from the minds of two young individuals.

4 comments:

  1. You bring up many interesting points. This post reminds me that the different forms we use can then be transferred/extended into another for of learning. For example, if we allow media(like in the form of video games) in the classroom, then we could extend this activity by asking them to draw what they played.

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  2. This is a very interesting post. You brought up a lot of great points. You are right that teachers need to keep their eyes open because there is so much that children can mold or change in the classroom that may be an idea that we never thought of. It is great to learn from our students.

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  3. Children are constantly bringing what they see in their homes and their outside worlds into the classroom and we as future teachers need to see these as potential learning experience. This a chance to get to know what the children are interested in and build upon that. Here two children depicted a video game they play at home into the classroom in a new form. They took what they saw and recreated in a way that both children could understand and play and where everyone had a fair shot at winning. Great post!

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  4. I think it is hard for some to understand because activities like the one you mention have a lot of interaction that is really important to understand how they are hitting those foundational areas and having a rich literacy experience. I totally agree though that their activity where they made a video game on paper was really eye opening to how children are bringing their technology into the classroom even when they aren't given access.

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