Changing Role of the Teacher

I watched this video and the part that really struck me was open communication, freedom to share, decentralisation of authority, market as a conversation. These all have a really big impact on learning. The traditional roles of instructional designer and teacher are being challenged.

It seems like part of all this is learning to be online:

• Teaching different reading skills
• Finding entry points for students
• Introducing systems (from tagging conventions to software to groups of people)
• Telling students when they’ve missed something

The value to learning is real. Engagement. Real life skills. Real life relationships. Articulate students armed with measurable results.

The difficulty is it can be time-consuming and challenging. Perhaps the answers lie within and outside the learning communities. Peer assessment, public feedback, mentoring. These are the types of activities that I think could make for rich, dynamic experiences.