How do I build interesting online courses for youngsters?

Answering the question: "How do I build interesting online courses for youngsters?"

Thanks for the A2A Roberto, but frankly I wouldn’t encourage it. I truly believe even the most advanced VR environment is no match for active learning among students in a live group - in the real world. Sure, there is a place for computer assisted learning, and I was there in the beginning when Oregon Trail and other such programs were introduced into K-12 here in the U.S. But our cultural screen-addiction will, I believe, ultimately be viewed as an antagonistic and even harmful trend, resulting in young adults whose knowledge, learning style, social skills, mental health, perceptive functions, physical well-being and intellectual capacities have all been hopelessly crippled by computer-based curricula (not by that alone, but in conjunction with a more general technology dependence).

I suppose this wasn’t what you were looking for, and I apologize for that, but having worked in IT, in education, for nearly a decade (four years in K-12, five in a University setting), I view the most essential elements of multidimensional learning to simply be outside the capacity of tech-centric modes. Being outside in natural environments, working in groups, having tactile learning experiences, performing physical tasks as part of the learning process, discussing, debating, questioning, socializing, and engaging with others in a joint learning adventure that is almost entirely outside of a representational world of computer graphics…these are the central characteristics of quality learning.

It is, after all, the real world that children most need to learn about, and beyond that what their own imagination can provide. A computer representation offers neither, and I believe can actually rob them of both.

My 2 cents.

Trackbacks

Trackback specific URI for this entry

This link is not meant to be clicked. It contains the trackback URI for this entry. You can use this URI to send ping- & trackbacks from your own blog to this entry. To copy the link, right click and select "Copy Shortcut" in Internet Explorer or "Copy Link Location" in Mozilla.

No Trackbacks

Comments

Display comments as Linear | Threaded

No comments

The author does not allow comments to this entry