Ask students these two questions from Michael Wesch:
- How many of you do not actually ‘like’ school? (probably many hands)
- How many of you do not like learning? (probably no hands)
These two questions would be great conversation starters regarding the difference between school and learning. I wonder how many middle and high schools would see little difference in their results for these two questions. I’m guessing very few…
The idea that learning can and should be engaging is what led to the creation of the Rich Performance Task project at the LDCSB in Ontario, Canada.
In order to bring rich learning to students, teachers need examplars of what exemplary open-ended, collaborative, cross-curricular, hands-on, scenario-driven, performance tasks look like.
Learning can be much more than paper and pencil and assessment of learning can result in products far beyond essays and written tests. If you are looking for examples yourself, check out: http://www.ldcsb.on.ca/schools/cfe/RPT/menu.html