inspiring media – Page 3 – Exciting Curiosity

Chomsky Style

Passing tests doesn’t begin to compare with searching and enquiring and pursuing topics that engage us and excite us. Noam Chomsky

I was struck by the above quote by Noam Chomsky which I read in a tweet by Brian Bailey (@EdTechEmpowers). Inspired to investigate further, I found the video ‘The Purpose of Education’ in which Chomsky talks about various topics around education including the purposes of an educational system, the impact of technology and thoughts on assessment. (The video was presented at the Learning without Frontiers conference in January 2012.)

The Daily Riff has a good breakdown of various aspects of the talk and you can watch it there too (click this link to watch on YouTube), but the parts that stuck out for me were:

That “passing tests doesn’t being to compare with searching and inquiring and pursuing topics that engage us and excite us. That’s far more significant than passing tests. If that’s the kind of educational career that you are given the opportunity to pursue you will remember what you have discovered.”
That “teaching ought to inspire students to discover on their own, to challenge if they don’t agree, to look for alternatives

Messages That Matter

About a week ago I found sparkyteaching.com I can’t remember exactly how it happened, but I ended up looking at their Messages that Matter. These resources are truly inspirational. At first I was taken with poster #2, ‘Learn what counts’ and then saw #10, ‘Live Curiously’ and it felt like someone had put these together just for me! That feeling didn’t stop there – on their blog post ‘The Lost Art of Nurturing Sparks‘ (read it, it’s fab) I also found the same Picasso quote that hung on my classroom wall for years! Click here to read more on that one…

The Messages that Matter are all beautifully designed, wonderful pieces of encouragement and truth that should feature in every classroom and home. Maybe a bus stop campaign?! Each message encourages you to live the best life you can and do the best for every student (person!) you meet. It has certainly encouraged me to think about the ways in which we speak to each other as educators, students, parents and children alike.

It’s about seeing the little people who sit in front of us every day as individual characters not numbers or levels, recognising their sparks

Every kid needs a champion

I’d heard about Rita Pierson’s TED Talk, but I had never listened to it. I decided to watch it this morning and I am so glad I did. Rita reminds you in such a beautiful way that we all need relationships, and you may never know just how much that kid in your class needs you. Be their champion, they may not have another one.

I once taught a memorable class with a wonderful colleague and friend. The kids were hand picked for us (they hadn’t chosen to study music) and we were to teach them. We thought of a whole course for them, worked on it, sat them down, explained what we aimed to do, thought we were off to a promising start, asked if anyone had any questions and one student asked, “How am I here?” It was a good question, one we had not anticipated! Telling them they hadn’t been welcome anywhere else was not the answer, and so we stumbled around and came up with a few reasons. I don’t remember exactly, but I know it wasn’t as inspiring as Rita Pierson’s response to her class!

I told all my students, “You were chosen to be

Being Human

I was looking for a podcast to listen to on a run last night. Being a fan of the Jeremy Vine show on Radio 2 I searched and found a series of podcasts by Jeremy Vine called Being Human. With contributions from leading thinkers and writers these podcasts explore just what makes us human. I listened to the episode featuring Lord David Puttnam, a British film producer and educator.

Being human is remaining curious about the world, and remaining ambitious for what your contribution can be. (Lord Puttnam)

He spoke of the 2012 Olympics and how people collectively worked to make a success of the Games – the Games brought out the best in us, but it was always there! If you smile at someone, they generally smile back. We are all capable of doing the very best we can. We should never lose sight of this. Lord Puttnam and Jeremy Vine end the episode discussing the importance of focussing on doing the right thing and building each other up. This reminded me of a quote I once read:

Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible. (Dalai Lama)

This episode was a great encouragement and reminder that … Read more...

Born to learn

Our capacity to create and learn knows no bounds.” Born to Learn, March 2011.

This inspiring piece of media reminds us that we need to let our kids play (and us too!) – because it’s not just play. Einstein said: “The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education”. This video shows that this ‘education’ starts at all too young an age – our natural curiosity must be allowed to flourish. There is also an important message for high school educators.

Born to Learn is the first animation in a fascinating series aimed to provide easy-access to the exciting new discoveries constantly being made about how humans learn. Read more about the Born to Learn project here.