NBC has now joined the other major media outlets in taking a stab at kinda, sorta giving away it’s content but ultimately making you pay if you want to keep it model that the New York Times just failed at. Download your favorite show the night it airs, keep it for a week on the one device you download it to, and then, “poof” it goes away. Read the whole article.
But here is the graph that jumps out:
NBC’s move comes as companies throughout the television business search for new economic models in the face of enormous changes in the business. Networks continue to lose audience share, and viewers — especially many of the highly prized viewers under 30 years old — are increasingly demanding control of their program choices, insisting on being able to watch shows when, where and how they want.
Hey! Get me rewrite!
Valley Central’s move comes as schools throughout the education system search for new models in the face of enormous changes in the learning. Schools continue to lose relevance, and students — especially many of the highly prized students over 13 years old — are increasingly demanding control of their curriculum, insisting on being able to learn when, where and how they want
Never happen…
Hey Will
Wouldn’t it be great if students demanded control of their education from outside organizations instead of schools??? Who would have seen this coming?
Will,
You have to let go of this trope. It is just too easy, and too fatalistic. It has happened in many places and in many ways since the 60’s (the Brown New Curriculum, homeschooling, etc).
I agree with Tom, this is not happening anytime soon. Education is not only being introduced to the curriculum, but it is learning socialization, listening to directives, and learning to function in a work environment. Technology would have a very hard time accomplishing all this. The analogy is a bit of a stretch imo.
Love the re-write myself, without taking it as seriously as Tom and Bill. And Bill, I don’t see Will claiming that technology would “accomplish all” of anything; nor am I sure I would want my future child (knock wood and my fiancee 😉 to experience the nailed-to-desks variety of “socialization” delivered in schools (there are alternatives, as any home-schooler will confirm), or listening to adults talk all day (“directives” or otherwise). As for “functioning in a work environment,” I’m a teacher myself, and don’t see classrooms functioning as anything resembling a work environment – show me a job where you’re paid to memorize inert data, write pointless exercises for a number and letter, and otherwise to keep your mouth shut, not ask questions, let the boss tell you how to solve your problems, and otherwise behave inside the “schoolbox.”
But now I’m taking you as seriously as I accused you guys of taking Will 😉
I just dropped in to say I enjoyed the chuckle at the re-write – and here I am, evangelizing against “schooliness” instead!
Hey, but the geeks are working this way also! With the technology, they can work when, where, and how they want to,and socialize the same way. So, what is really being taught?
Yes, Clay, and with this technology, the geeks are working in the work world the same way. They can take control of their work schedule, commute, and often their socialization. I too am a teacher, and I think the tech will prepare some of these students pretty well for the real world!
Will, as usual you bring up important issues for us to consider. I just read David Warlick’s blog and feel like my reaction to his blog is similar to what I want to say on this one (unfortunately I am having problems commenting on David’s blog). Anyway, before any of us start pointing our fingers at teachers we must realize that a major problem in many school’s is sub-standard equipment. So even when teachers do go and try to bump it up a notch they hit a brick wall (wrong equipment, school filters etc.), which makes them totally turned off to technology. If we are going to demand that teachers shift their thinking then we must demand that they have the tools to make the shift!
Will,
I can see this happening in the future. First however, editing/creativity/trust needs to be taught to generations of students that have been walked around in strollers their whole lives. Until we teach how to become a self-sufficient learner, they will never know how to learn on their own.
I think the problem is that too many teachers have no clue how to be a self-sufficient learner. People, in general, fear what they don’t know. The whole concept sounds like it may take some work, and that scares people.
Will,
Interesting rewrite, and true from what I have seen in my high school students, who are increasingly becoming turned off to school because they hate being “force-fed” information that seems meaningless to them. I really believe that most adults in our country, and many other countries, don’t give childrens’ innate brilliance enough credit. Think about it – children learn to walk, talk, eat with utensils, draw and to accomplish many other skills without anyone “teaching” them. They know what they need to learn in order to get along in and to understand the world, and they learn it. In fact, young children, before they have become turned off by formal education, are filled with “why” and “how” and are excited about everything they encounter; as they go through school, the “whys” and the “hows” decrease, and they grow less and less excited about the world. It is school that does this to them. Many of the greatest leaders and inventors of our world became what they became because they pursued their personal interests and desires outside of school, and searched out, on their own time, people who could teach them what they needed to know in order to pursue those interests; many of them even dropped out school so that they could devote more time to learning according to their own desires and needs.
In today’s workforce, and the future’s, we don’t need workers who will mindlessly take directives, who dread the thought of learning something new, or making a change, and who only socialize within their peer groups. We need citizens who can think for themselves, who can identify what they need to know to be successful, who are eager and willing to be constantly learning, and who can get along with people from all different countries and of all different ages. We can not create such citizens with a school system that was created in the mid-1800s to produce factory workers. Children are born as self-sufficient learners, constantly identifying, completely on their own, what they need to know as they grow. Why, then, do we all of a sudden turn to them at the age of five and tell them that they can not be trusted anymore to identify for themselves what is important to learn or not to learn, and that they cannot be trusted anymore to identify for themselves how to learn what they need to know?
The rewrite speaks more to how we need to do business in education from now on.
With a focus on curriculum born from reading and thinking and communicating and collaborating and creating.
With this in mind, then control of the curriculum can and should be demanded by the students. Our jobs as teachers then become based on teaching them the processes from the previous paragraph without allegiance to an outdated knowledge based curriculum determined by school districts and curriculum directors.
Just today I heard of a teacher struggling to find interesting ways and interesting content to teach the subject matter of Native American content to an international school class of diverse nationalities.
Wouldn’t the study of aboriginal peoples of each student’s home country be more powerful? More individualized? Couldn’t a student determine the what and why they were going to learn about those people?
And wouldn’t communication and thinking be a massive part of that learning environment, as students share their own cultural histories?
Self-sufficient learners? (comment #8)
How are they ever going to become that if we don’t allow them to make choices?
I am tired of waiting for the future. We postpone changes we “see happening in the future” over and over again helping schools remain the same despite the world changing around them.
The comments here sound more like we teachers are afraid to change what education is because we fear we have little place in it.
I am not prepared to give up and leave school change to the “future”. If we know it’s not as effective as it should be, why aren’t we doing something about it now?
There is this fear that all the empowerment in Web 2.0 will ruin lives. Teachers, journalists, doctors, etc. won’t be needed…unless they figure out how to utilize such tools as blogs, wikis, etc. to enhance the work they do. Teachers will adjust to a more inquiry-based appraoach that utilizes technology and engages learners.