January 17

For the Writing into the Day, we responded to a quote by Paulo Freire and discussed his concept of the "banking" model of education.  We defined this model in the following ways:

• Put stuff (educational information) in and spit it back out
• Students become like computers.  They do not apply, think about or understand the information; they just regurgitate it.
• Students are not learning; they are just memorizing.
• Freire uses the word "filed," suggesting that school is taking part of its students away.  There is no newness, creativity or individuality.  Students are being "filed" into a particular curriculum.
• School is boring. The way students are taught lacks creativity.
• A student is less likely to create new ideas or do something individual because he/she is simply following what he/she is told to do.
• Because students aren't taught how to apply the knowledge, it is difficult to know how to be creative once students have left school.

Then, we discussed the expectations and due dates for the Exploratory Proposal (first draft due February 7 for workshop; second draft due on February 14).  Next, we watched "Is Education Killing Creativity?" - a TedTalks video (minutes: 9:00-20:00).  We discussed the video in partners, concentrating on questions about whether school is really killing creativity and the kinds of people that school produces.  Finally, we used the "Dialogic Journal" handout to annotate the article, "Keeping Creativity in Schools."

Homework: 

• Finish the dialogic journal for "Keeping Creativity in Schools."  You do not need to post it on your blog.
• Read "No Child Left Behind Act 2001" and post a reading response on your blog.  Use the "Responding to Readings on Your Blog" handout that we discussed last class. You need to bring the article to class, but not the reading response.