I appreciate your comments about people unconsciously excluding those who are disabled from the diversity conversation. Obviously, the Oscars have been under great scrutiny the past couple years over its diversity issues, but every time people attacked the Oscars saying there’s no diversity, not one person mentioned the fact that there were disabled individuals included/excluded. Additionally, the level of barriers against mental health is staggering.
Author: Meghan Beardsley
Comment on What Harry Potter Taught Me About Teaching: Be a McGonagall, not a Lockhart. by Meghan Beardsley
Are you the one that has the Harry Potter-themed tattoo on her arm? If so, thumbs up! I am also a Harry Potter fan, and felt bonded to it because I basically grew up with the series at all the right ages (I was 17-18 when Deathly Hallows came out). I appreciate your connection to McGonagall at that one scene because I felt a similar emotion. Mine was more like, “see teachers are lifelong students and can be up for something new”. I think people keep a mindset that teachers are stick-in-the-mud types, but my experience more often than not has contradicted this. Moving along, I do agree that being more human with your students can make you more approachable, but you also have to be careful with the self-deprecation. Too much can lead to negative consequences in how students see you or how you see yourself. Too little might communicate that you’re not truly humble and you could come off as someone just trying to get attention. It is definitely like walking a tightrope. It seems we are of similar personalities in how we communicate things, for I too have a self-deprecating nature.
P.S. How do we convince Rowling that more books are needed?
Comment on Three “Wow”s about Finding My Teaching Voice by Meghan Beardsley
You’re right about acting as a teacher not lasting long. Portraying something you straight up aren’t over an extended period of time. Despite my concurrence with your blog though, I think that some personality types need that type of separation if you will from who they are outside of the classroom and who they are inside the classroom. Some of us may need that division. How I speak to people in these settings may be rather different. I don’t think I would try to encourage an intellectual discussion on tourism development with my friends while I am out to dinner. I also want to keep some of me to myself and to my personal life. I think a person who wishes to become a teacher must find the stride that suits them best.
Comment on CAN WE LEARN FROM PLAYING GAMES? by Meghan Beardsley
Sooooooooo, I may or may not have just downloaded SuperBetter after reading your post.
As far as your question regarding what situation do games provide favorable learning outcomes: I feel like they would be best suited for active learning situations where an application of taught concepts would be useful (i.e. a government class, physics class, event planning class). A game + lecture combo incorporates several learning styles into itself.
I think that given the millennial generation, there might be a few upcoming teachers in there not only with a knack for technology but an interest and willingness to develop and adopt games.
Comment on Experts Declare: Gaming is Good! by Meghan Beardsley
I love that you brought up Dungeons and Dragons. I too have had the opportunity to play this along with a great number of other strategy-type and/or role-playing games. I think that there could be an interesting evolution of course make-up if we were to incorporate such elements. These games could serve as the final leap. First, there’s a lecture or some form of conveying information. Next, the game encourages application of concepts and an extension of learning.
Comment on In Students I Trust by Meghan Beardsley
I wish my physics teacher had had a similar mentality. Alas, he did not. Trust is very important. Autonomy can be empowering. I feel like a lot of our upcoming students do not feel empowered. I think they rather feel like a herd of cows. I am not sure what the best changes are, but we do need to work towards an environment of mutual trust and empowerment. This makes me think of research done in my area regarding leadership. There are several types of leadership, the primary focus being on transactional and transformational. Transactional are outcome-focused and basically check things off a list. The followers are not given much autonomy. Transformational is different. Followers are empowered and awarded a level of autonomy in their work environments. Perhaps we need to transfer this to the teacher-classroom relationship.
Comment on We have met the enemy and… by Meghan Beardsley
Hey Mary. Once again we are on a similar mental thread. I think that a happy medium needs to be found. Also, these arguments never take the teachers into consideration. They just say, “OK teacher, now write these multi-page qualitative assessments for your 30+ students on a semi-regular basis”. We aren’t going to provide more resources, pay you more, or remove any other expectations, but do this.
I also wonder if K12 teachers are even being asked about this. When I generally hear about this debate, it seems to be coming from higher education. This however can be pure happenstance that maybe I just have not come across that material.
Comment on Childhood is a journey, not a race…. Lessons from my daughter by Meghan Beardsley
Thank you for sharing the story about your daughter. I think what her school was trying to instill in her was the value of being a lifelong learner. I feel that a lot of people go through the school years with the mindset that it will all be over soon. Meanwhile, people like me see the upcoming years as opportunities to continue to learn. I am always up for something new, and I know others share this feeling.
That being said, I wonder if there is a happy medium somewhere where students are individualized based on their strengths/weaknesses while still being assessed in some manner. I am worried about students who only focus on their strengths. In gifted education, there are two schools of thought regarding what is best for a student’s development. The first is for students to advance to a higher level. The second is that that student spread out horizontally and diversify. I tend to follow the second school of thought. I think we as learners should cherish our strengths AND our weaknesses and find that happy medium.
Comment on Dinosaurs, Mindful Thinking, and Unicorns* by Meghan Beardsley
Hey Mary
I agree with your thoughts regarding science and the like. However, I also believe the university system has beaten out some of the flexibility that you discuss. You mention how scientists build on past research and accept that things can change. There are unfortunately many people (and journals) in place that would rather have you follow their system of repetition than to provide something too innovative and new that it cannot be supported by a mountain-sized literature review. In my area (hiding out in social sciences over here), several researchers have come out complaining that they see creative, new articles rejected for the sake of safe, repetitive articles that offer minimal contribution.
I am pretty sure what I just wrote was what we would straight up classify as a babbling. Anyways, on to my next comment. I sincerely appreciate your comments regarding teaching and recommendations of avoiding being a dinosaur or a unicorn. I agree with your sentiments on this matter. I too disagreed with Wesch and his support of the lack of a teacher is best. Being a dinosaur with feathers, or whatever creature suits you and the metaphor, is a nice mindset to have. I do however wonder if universities and public schools will be open to it. I feel like there’s a lot standing against it.
Comment on Kellyanne Conway & Ellen Langer, They Must Know Each Other by Meghan Beardsley
Nice connection to Kellyanne Conway. Every time someone of the present administration speaks I actually cringe. I am concerned about all of those out there sitting mindless and accepting what they are told. We definitely need to work on our mindful/critical thinking skills. As present and future teachers, we are inherently responsible for our students. Perhaps with some practice we can teach them to be mindful and learn to think for themselves. Hopefully there will be enough of an impact to help propel the next generation back into academia and into an era of mindfulness.
