C4T 4, 5, &6 Morgan Bayda

I am including links to several blog posts by Morgan Bayda, a new teacher in Saskatchewan, Canada.

An Open Letter To Educators

My response:
Morgan,
Last week I read several of your posts about your Summer in South America. I can tell the experience changed your life and I enjoyed reading your thoughts and reflections. This week Dr. Strange assigned our EDM 310 class to read your “Open-letter…” post and write an essay comparing our experiences and thoughts to yours. My essay can be found on my blog but I want to share one thought with you here. I agree with everything you wrote in response to the Dan Brown video you shared. Our system is ineffective, it needs to be changed, it interferes with true learning…
However, university classes have been taught this way for hundreds of years, and it was NEVER an effective way to learn. Pick any point in the last 150 years and tell me how memorizing history facts was an essential thing on its own. In the past, there was no way to retain those facts without memorizing them, unlike today, but WHO NEEDS FACTS unless you are taught how to analyze that information and synthesize it into new scenarios and apply it to current events. The system never worked and yet it has always been done. Those who can learn despite the system have, and those who cannot have not. I absolutely believe and agree that our present educational environments are ineffective and that they must be changed, however, the piece of paper (degree) still has value and will continue to and Dan Brown may be harming only himself by tossing his books back in the face of “the system”. What do you think?


Something Somewhere Sometime – Stop Motion Final Project

My response:
Great job on the video! I love that you took your idea and improvised a new way to make it happen when you hit limitations (the camera). Thanks for the application tip on teaching the science of motion. When you see great projects, it always makes us teachers think “How can I use this in my classroom?”


Tension Between Teachers and Parents – How does this affect my practice?

My response:
I have read several of your posts lately as part of my EDM 310 class for Dr. Strange with the University of South Alabama. From other posts I read previously, I had surmised that you were a recent graduate, starting your first year of teaching in the 2010-2011 school year. Therefore, in the tense situation you described above, were you a student teacher, or an employee of the school system. That may have had some affect on your co-workers attitudes towards your willingness to challenge the status quo. I think you are very on track with your ideas of bonding between teachers and parents and creating a true classroom community.