Well school (or university) is out for the summer and as I write my final blog post, I find myself reflecting on what I have learnt from this assessment and how I will apply my learning to a classroom context.
Incorporating youth and popular culture into the classroom can be beneficial for students, however it is about finding balance. Students do benefit from engaging lessons that make use of web 2.0 tools, social media and popular culture texts, as they want to be interested in what they are learning. There are so many new and interesting technologies out there, so it seems a waste to just stick to traditional based teaching methods when we are able to create some exciting learning opportunities for our students. I also believe that by incorporating youth and popular culture references and texts into lessons, students are more likely to relate to the content. For instance I recently taught The Great Gatsby, and while for the most part students enjoyed the novel, they really related to the latest movie by Baz Luhrmann, especially because of the music by Jay Z and Lana Del Ray.
New technologies can be fun and really interactive. Students also benefit from having digital literacy as it extremely relevant to the day and age we live in. There is no escaping technology so we may as well embrace and it and teach students how to use it responsibly and how to be active participants especially with social media.
Sure sometimes students do just need to learn for the sake of learning, but what is the harm in making it fun for them? Who know, you might just have some fun too, and learn some new things along the way as well...
Incorporating youth and popular culture into the classroom can be beneficial for students, however it is about finding balance. Students do benefit from engaging lessons that make use of web 2.0 tools, social media and popular culture texts, as they want to be interested in what they are learning. There are so many new and interesting technologies out there, so it seems a waste to just stick to traditional based teaching methods when we are able to create some exciting learning opportunities for our students. I also believe that by incorporating youth and popular culture references and texts into lessons, students are more likely to relate to the content. For instance I recently taught The Great Gatsby, and while for the most part students enjoyed the novel, they really related to the latest movie by Baz Luhrmann, especially because of the music by Jay Z and Lana Del Ray.
New technologies can be fun and really interactive. Students also benefit from having digital literacy as it extremely relevant to the day and age we live in. There is no escaping technology so we may as well embrace and it and teach students how to use it responsibly and how to be active participants especially with social media.
Sure sometimes students do just need to learn for the sake of learning, but what is the harm in making it fun for them? Who know, you might just have some fun too, and learn some new things along the way as well...