 | Mar10Written by:Porter Michael
3/10/2008 3:25 PM
 I wonder in the age of readily available information if it’s worth spending valuable instructional time memorizing “facts.” If so many details are available on Google, should we just move on? Case in point: Google Earth, a free program, presents current, high resolution satellite images of the entire world. Why should we have globes with names of countries that are out of date? And, with Google Earth, you can “write” notes on the earth and easily share those notes in the form of .kmz files. If a classic question of the twentieth century is “What’s the capitol of Colorado?” perhaps the classic question of the twenty –first century is “Using satellite imagery, determine why Denver makes a suitable capitol for Colorado.” Which question do you think will lead to higher order thinking? Tags:2 comment(s) so far... Re: Should a student be required to memorize the capitols to all the states? I feel the same way as you do when I imagine myself back in spanish class dealing with the rote memorization of verb subjugation. Learning conversational spanish clearly would have been more interesting, more useful, and something I would have been more likely to remember today. However, memorization is still an important skill for someone at almost any job, and it's something (I think) you get better at with practice. Criticial analysis is a more valuable skill, but you can't reach higher levels of understanding in any subject without having the language and basic principles commited to memory. Memorization as a skill is necessary, even though the specific facts probably wont be.
By Anonymous on
3/19/2008 7:44 AM | Re: Should a student be required to memorize the capitols to all the states? We have changed the way we teach US regions by not expecting the kids to learn the capitols. Instead this year we worked hard on making each region of the US come allive through more meaningful studies. The response from the kids and the parents have been very positive!
By Carol Boorom on
4/9/2008 9:56 PM |
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