I cannot believe that it is already the third week of term. I haven’t written a post for all of that time, apart from transporting a couple of posts here from a sister site. Despite all good intentions, my regime of all-things-writing has also gone by the wayside. Note to self: ‘MUST do better.” And this blog isn’t going to shed too much light on my full head of thoughts right now, either. Instead, I though I would share this TED talk that I’ve just been watching (notebook in hand, for this is how I recommend watching all TED talks).
This talk is a fascinating journey through the history of ideas by Steven Johnson. For me, always the learning geek, I translate all that is presented into questions around school and learning. So when he makes observations about the ‘Architecture of Spaces’, for me, it raises the question of how we might consider working with our existing (and new) learning spaces; nothing new there, granted. But the heart of this talk is to observe the way in which humans are a social species where we spark off each other in order to innovate. How, then, do we organise learning, not just the physical aspects of it, to ensure that they encourage opportunities for the establishment of networks and the collision of ideas and nurturing as ‘slow hunches’. I have a few ideas about this, but in the meantime, make a cuppa and put your feet up for 20 minutes and enjoy learning from another great talk. I would embed it here but posterous appears not to be co-operating with me, so here’s the link instead.
Let me know what you think.
Certainly agree that it’s a great TED talk. I also love the RSAnimate version of it too.I use the RSAnimate you tube clip with year 12 and 13 as inspiration to try to produce creative revision posters (about Statistics). While they obviously can’t achieve the same quality in the time I give them, I think that showing them the clip really raises the bar for their poster work.As a nice bonus, the topic means we can have a discussion about how maths should be much more discussive and is rarely something people do entirely by themselves.The talk has made me reconsider my classroom layout and I’m now trialling having different areas in my room for individual work, paired work or small group work. The students get to choose their preference.I’m also making sure that I have some problems that can be solved over a longer time period than is perhaps normal in maths. I’d like those ‘slow hunches’ to develop.Dave