A Feast of Disruptive Learning

So here we are at week nine, actually week 10, but we didn't meet on Labor Day.  I hope everyone is looking forward to the epicurean delights that Annie and others are providing this evening.  I promise to bring the best ice and cups in San Diego.  Tonight, we have a few items to address – primary will be a discussion of disruptive innovation, specifically, chapter 1 and chapter 5.  I hope you are all seeing the connection between the text and what we have been learning this semester.

I will introduce a new, tool that you can add to your teaching arsenal, Symbaloo. "What is Symbaloo?" you ask.  Think of it as a mix between iGoogle and Diigo. . .It's a way to house resources, links, and other types of web content, like RSS feeds on one visually interesting page. . .once created, you can also embed a "webmix" into your blogs. The amazing folks at Symbaloo have generously offered to get your certified for free!

Here are the steps:

1. Click Here to sign-up for the certification program.  (I will give you the code in class)
2. Click Here to access the certification website.
3. Follow the tutorials by row, check out the webinar assignment & take the webinar quiz.
4. Repeat the process until you complete the four tutorials.
5. Take the final exam.
6. Wait for your confirmation email that you have been certified. . .
7. Add your new badge to the sidebar of your blog!
8. Celebrate your new skill by sharing with friends and family!!

I also want to show you how to place our Pink 6 Senses website on your blog.
And, I thought we would take a look at the "essential questions" for this course from the syllabus:

1. How does learning occur?
2. In what environment can technology promote learning?
3. What is the process by which technology enhances learning?

In light of how this class has progressed, what changes would you suggest for the essential questions?  Imagine you were writing the questions for my class next fall.

A quote from Christensen's website:

By only pursuing “sustaining innovations” that perpetuate what has historically helped them succeed, companies unwittingly open the door to “disruptive innovations”.

Some notes:  

Interdependence & Modularity

Interdependence in Schools

temporal: what one is expected to learn from year to year, which "builds" on itself.
lateral: If you made a change in one area, it would necessitate change in a related area (changing foreign language would necessitate the changing of how English grammar is taught, which would change the English curriculum).
physical: some schools physical makeup (layout of buildings) prevent things like PBL to flourish.
hierarchical: mandates, union-negotiated work rules, curriculum, texts, the way teachers are trained

some points from the book: 

• costs of special eduction and for EL populations has created a need to standardize all other education 
• reverse magnetic attraction (trying to meet the needs of m.i. will cause this)
• teachers in classrooms are products of monolithic batch-processing systems of education
• the current educational system - the way it trains teachers, groups students, curricular design, physical structures are designed for standardization
• we need to move to a student-centric model of education
• Continuum:  monolithic batch process–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––student-centric
• computer-based learning offers a way for student-centric learning (more modular)
• teachers in a computer-based become professional learning coaches rather than a "sage on the stage"

Disruptive Innovation Theory

Why can't companies deal with the disruptive innovation?

• Companies do not have the motivation to focus on the disruption because their current customers can't use it and, in business, it produces a lower profit margin –– so investment goes to sustaining innovation over the disruptive one!
• asymmetric motivation is the how and why disruptive innovations cause a dramatic change in the landscape of an industry (Kodak camera, Sony transistor radio, Ford Model T, Xerox, Southwest Airlines, Google advertising, etc. .)
• the "sustaining trajectory in the original plane of competition takes a company in a direction that is opposed to the direction of disruption. . ." (e.g. a better personal computer is smaller, cheaper, and easier to use. . .whereas the better DEC minicomputer was made bigger and more powerful)

So, how does this apply to schools: pages 51-65 (Applying Disruption Theory to Public Schools: Defining Performance)

Why cramming computers into class isn't the answer:  when you try to replace a quality math teacher with an online course that isn't as good as the math teacher herself . . .without an area/subject of non-consumption, teachers will use technology to sustain their existing practices and pedagogies

"competing against non-consumption" - example:  offering an online course in Arabic, when there is no Arabic teacher at a school or district. . .In this example, the online Arabic course, even if it not a well designed online course is "better than nothing."  Then we would start to improve online education so that it might possibly improve and change the way learning takes place in schools.

The S-Curve Pattern of Disruptive Innovation versus the Substitution Curve (Linear)


Chapter 5

Public Education=Value-Chain Business

Disruption toward Student-Centric Learning  

What are some alternatives to the current model? 

Thinking of this model, could you recommend an alternative for each of the steps in Figure 5.1

Assignment: I would like you to blog about creating your future Student-Centric School. . .consider the model from Figure 5.1 and what you have read and learned throughout this course and recommend a school design that moves from a value-chain business to a facilitated user network?  How would teachers be trained? What would the textbooks look like? Would you want to work there?

Question: please leave your response to the essential questions as a comment.  Thanks!!