We are cooked. We cooked ourselves, really.
Every meeting I am in is less about teaching and more about gatekeeping and CYA. The entirety of what we talk about is about how to STOP students from doing things and how to PROTECT ourselves or our students in some fashion. We are spending less and less time talking about new learning and integration. The main (or new) problem is AI. We’re shook at the thought that students might be cheating the learning, as though if they get a great grade in our class and don’t know anything it becomes a loss for us. On a basic level it does. However, does it really? Is our job to teach or to troll? Is our role to dispel the act of cheating? Has it ever been? I want my role to be that as Hunter Boylan described: Meet them where they are at and take them as far as I can.
My classes are built on explaining and developing the iterative process. I want them to learn the fundamental tools so they can use those cognitive tools and strategies for whatever technology they are using in the future. It is foolish to assume they won’t use AI. It is getting to the point where it is impossible not to. I have to tell the google bot not to write a dang email for me.
This is how the world is moving right now. We are moving forward and the system is treating us like the clamps or cuffs designed to hold people back. Let’s teach to the future. Not the past.
Some Thoughts:
- Bonkers Headline of the day: “Teachers describe immigration enforcement’s impact on classrooms in challenge of Trump policy” Elementary schools, folks.