Did you know how viable it is to create a makerspace for kids at your school? And did you know how easy it is? After this week's Eduporium Weekly, you'll surely be inspired!
Proper 21st Century Learning For Proper 21st Century Preparation
As today’s careers continue trending towards a nature of requiring innovative solutions for complex, technical problems, the time to introduce students to these concepts is trending towards being before they arrive at college. In the 21st century, so many careers are being made in the STEM fields and out of having prior background STEM knowledge and experience. For that reason, educators across the country are beginning to rethink how and what they teach to kids in their K-12 years and many are taking a new approach that includes a much heavier emphasis on technology use and STEM training, including coding and teaching it in new places, such as design labs or in-house makerspaces. And it’s all in an effort to prepare them for exactly what they can expect in the future.
Educators should be striving to convey not only the skills students will need, but also the content areas that they must be familiar with in order to boost their chances at future success. Broadly, 21st century students should strive to become proficient in Arts, Math, Economics and Science among some other subject areas. Mastery in these areas will go a very, very long way in helping them get to where they want to be based on the way the modern world is. Beyond the academic content, specific themes that go along with these subject areas include global awareness, digital literacy, creativity, innovation, critical thinking, problem solving, communication and collaboration. That is why it is so important for students to gain practical, hands-on knowledge throughout their K-12 years and perhaps the best way to do so is by integrating technology into a regular part of the curriculum.
By getting students out of their chairs and into a laboratory or a real-world scenario, they are able—through the meaningful use of technology—to learn things that a textbook cannot teach them. Not only are they physically learning the technical skills, working together in groups centered around tech tools helps cultivate other, equally important skills. By using technology that is specifically catered to learning for the future, kids are able to pick up on the skills they will need in the future—sometimes skills you wouldn’t even consider to be important. Skills like adaptability, initiative, self-direction, leadership, and socialization will all be instrumental to their future success. By using technology to collaborate now, students learn these 21st century skills and are able to apply them in a way that forces their retention and shapes their minds.
The Ideal School Makerspace
What does it take to build the best, student-centered, active learning environment you can dream up? SCALE it up! Here are some great tips for creating a Student-Centered, Active Learning Environment to learn with technology. Start with a desire to improve, a touch of motivation and a whole boatload of creativity and you’ll be well on your way to creating an ideal makerspace for kids to collaboratively explore all that a modern-day education should encompass. You can revamp an old space (dusty classrooms work as well) and don’t hesitate to throw out any VHS tapes you find. If possible, monitors for video should be placed strategically throughout the room so that they’re visible from all vantage points. This usually becomes a bit easier when tables and chairs can roll. Variety, flexibility and comfort are key to creating an ideal collaborative environment.
So, what are some of the coolest things to include? The most awesome one that’s caught our eye might just be white board walls. They provide a writable surface for each student to share ideas all throughout the room (literally)! Some learning spaces include a place for virtual field trip taking with monitors set up to explore any museum in the country, multimedia areas with green screens so students can learn to shoot and edit video, a quiet learning area for those who do their best thinking in silence as well as standing tables, theater seating and areas that can accommodate both small and large groups for collaborative projects. Everyone has their own unique ideas and until you try them out for real, none of them are wrong!
Keep in mind that it’s okay if it takes a few years to design and fundraise for your innovative space—the goal is simply to design an area that will change instructional practice for the better and promote active learning. Some things that look truly appealing include bar seating, having no “front” of the room, mobile and flexible furniture and a comfortable lounge area. In no time at all, students will begin to huddle around displays and become much more engaged when content is right in their face. You even can (and should) design areas that are wheelchair accessible simply by leaving some extra space between benches or making sure there’s enough space under tables so that your makerspace is 100 percent inclusive. You can spend as little or as much as you want when funding your perfect space and can get all the cool stuff for between $25,000 and $30,000 (roughly the same as installing a 90s computer lab). Consider eliminating “nice-to-have’s” and focus only on what you need to collaborate. One final tip: it’s not only the technology and furniture in the room that make makerspaces successful—it’s what motivates you to change instructional practice and shift learning UP!
Using Twitter As An Educator
Twitter, if used effectively and with permission, can be an invaluable technology tool or supplemental teaching medium for 21st century educators. Its versatility allows for teachers to use the social media site for one class or break things down so that there’s different lists and hashtags for each class they are teaching. In this space, it’s so easy to provide updated lesson plans and homework assignments for students to quickly see and also to make notes on anything you might want to rethink for the next time around. Plus, it’s a wonderful tool for keeping track of what’s going on in the world in real time with just a couple quick clicks!
One of the first things you should do is create a unique hashtag for each specific class. For Ms. Green’s ninth-grade Biology class, a good example might be #GreenBio9. This has been a widely-used method by tech-savvy teachers in recent years and, trust us, kids—especially teenagers—will get excited at the idea of using Twitter to learn. When they click on the hashtag, students will see only relevant thoughts, ideas, questions and suggestions from the teacher and other classmates, so hopefully distractions won’t present themselves. This allows for everyone to post answers to a particular question in real time and (if they’re feeling extra tech-savvy), teachers can display the results using a projector so students can see their collaboration in action!
Out of the classroom, Twitter perhaps becomes an even greater tech tool due to the monumental amount of fellow educators with accounts dedicated to expanding their classrooms and increasing connectivity. Educators from all over the world share their ideas and practices on a daily basis so there’s always new and exciting project ideas for you to try or suggestions on what to avoid! In no time at all, teachers are able to build a community of passionate contributors and almost always find something they have to say to be useful and relevant to what they’re doing. Also, make sure you use Twitter for what it was made for—interacting! Establishing connections, offering advice or asking questions is the best way to gather feedback and keep enhancing your 21st century teaching practices with this innovative learning tool.
Peer-To-Peer Learning Can Be Powerful
Teachers, as we know, have the power and wisdom to truly change somebody’s life for the better by imparting endless amounts of viable knowledge on students every day they enter the classroom, often through the use of innovative technology. They should—and do—get a ton of credit for what they do. It’s the other people in the room, though—the groups of students—who can also play a vast role in enhancing each other’s education. Teachers set the tone, but oftentimes, students can connect with each other in special ways—ways that open up brand new avenues and set in motion a learning revolution while teachers simply watch and observe. In a 21st century learning space, this concept becomes incredibly useful and can result in some truly innovative discoveries.
It’s true—really—that two minds are better than one! This continues to be the case for students even as much of the curriculum shifts towards learning tech skills needed for the future. Perhaps a student is not all that interested in an area such as computer science or coding, but after working collaboratively with peers to arrive at innovative solutions, they may suddenly find themselves pursuing STEM and applying to engineering schools. Student interaction and collaboration in the classroom can do so much to increase engagement and overall learning. Students are able to relate to each other and are often able to explain concepts or instructions in ways they know their counterparts will understand. It’s in this area of hands-on learning with technology that students can be there for each other and help fill any small area in which a teacher is struggling to relate.
The comfort level that peer-to-peer collaboration provides often results in students letting go of their shyness and voicing controversial opinions, even if it’s something the other person does not want to hear. This, in turn, begins the construction of key STEM skills, like communication and brainstorming, which they will need for future employment. What’s unique and beneficial about peer-to-peer learning is that there is no power dynamic affecting the learning process as students all share the status of fellow learners. Whether it’s a tech-heavy group project or just a small-group discussion, students have shown the ability to truly relate to each other and create a positive learning environment with each other’s best interests in mind when they take control and become their own best teachers.
Defining Innovation Spaces And Deciding If You Need One
It seems by the day that more and more schools are following in the footsteps of some of the nation’s most prestigious learning academies and establishing their own innovation spaces (or makerspaces). These new-age classrooms are thought of as designated spaces for tinkering with the goal of creating lifelong desires to learn, innovate and get ahead. All of this has come about thanks to greater access provided by the Internet as well as manufacturing breakthroughs that have resulted in cutting-edge tech tools designed specifically for bolstering education and real-world skills at a young age. These spaces drive innovation and enhance learning.
As STEM/STEAM education in America trends towards promoting “learning by doing,” it’s becoming clear that this is an optimal way for kids to begin learning the skills they will need in the future. Research has shown a correlation between students experimenting in a makerspace and improved learning. It states that “encounters with tools can promote self-discovery and new ways of thinking, which support both social and technological innovation.” For educational purposes, students are able to innovate through tinkering with physical tech tools as well as computer-based tools, resulting in widely improved access to the things they need to succeed. These include mobile computers, laser cutters and 3D printers among others and are great for anyone interested in creating a beautiful project in a short amount of time.
If you think you might want to cross the threshold into this interactive learning world (and we think you should), there are a bunch of things you could include and luckily we’ll provide a few suggestions! Learners should have multiple resources available to them that they can easily make use of in the room or if they need to take them home as well. The learning space should also be attractive to and accommodate both STEAM novices and experts. Think of the collaborative potential! Finally, be sure everyone is doing just that—collaborating. The proficiency with equipment will come, but collaborative projects will, at the same time, build other important STEM skills, like communication, that the tech can’t always achieve. Embrace the diverse ideas of like-minded people to maximize learning by doing in the 21st century.