The debate about AI usage in schools rages as some educators want to block all AI access, and some want to embrace the new technology and leverage it for learning.
A core tension has emerged: Many teachers want to keep AI out of our classrooms, but also know that future workplaces may demand AI literacy.
What we call cheating, business could see as efficiency and progress.
A new book, Teaching with AI: A Practical Guide to a New Era of Human Learning, aims to help teachers discover how to harness and manage AI as a powerful teaching tool.
AI is a fabulous tool for getting started or unstuck. AI puts together old ideas in new ways and can do this at scale: It will make creativity easier for everyone.
Where are you on the AI in schools debate? Fan or foe?
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I love learning—I really do. But my dreadful experience with “school” still influences much of my work in education.
I hated “school.” It was pointless for me, as it is for so many other students.
From John Warner:
One of the distinctions I often draw in thinking about engagement and education is that there is a difference between “learning” and “doing school.”
Learning is, you know, learning. Doing school is engaging in the behaviors that result in satisfying the demands of a system built around proficiencies as determined by assessing the end products of a process. You can successfully do school without learning much of anything. At least that was my experience through many periods of my own schooling.
My belief is that organizing schooling around doing school is part, a big part, of the current problem of student disengagement. When classwork is purely an instrument for getting a grade and moving on to the next check box, learning becomes incidental. It may happen, but it doesn’t have to happen.
JW: One of my personal obsessions is thinking about the difference between “learning” and “doing school” where doing school is essentially just a series of behaviors designed to achieve the desired grade with the minimal necessary effort. This seems counterproductive on its face, but you say it’s even deeper than that.
SB: Given how much time, energy, and money nearly everyone in our world spends in school, this “doing school,” as Denise Pope called it, is tragic. Students have learned to imitate learning; to provide a performance, a facsimile of whatever each teacher demands as evidence of learning. So much of what we do in schools doesn’t work, whether by “work” we mean learn or thrive or prepare for a competent, meaningful life beyond school. The central organizing concept for me was a contrast between alienation, brought about by numerous sorts of disconnections, such as doing things only because of coercion, and authenticity, which is connection, meaning, genuineness, and even use.
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The Atlantic reports that a group of researchers will get access to Instagram’s data to study how the platform affects the mental health of teens and young adults.
Now, after years of contentious relationships with academic researchers, Meta is opening a small pilot program that would allow a handful of them to access Instagram data for up to about six months in order to study the app’s effect on the well-being of teens and young adults. The company will announce today that it is seeking proposals that focus on certain research areas—investigating whether social-media use is associated with different effects in different regions of the world, for example—and that it plans to accept up to seven submissions. Once approved, researchers will be able to access relevant data from study participants—how many accounts they follow, for example, or how much they use Instagram and when. Meta has said that certain types of data will be off-limits, such as user-demographic information and the content of media published by users; a full list of eligible data is forthcoming, and it is as yet unclear whether internal information related to ads that are served to users or Instagram’s content-sorting algorithm, for example, might be provided. The program is being run in partnership with the Center for Open Science, or COS, a nonprofit. Researchers, not Meta, will be responsible for recruiting the teens, and will be required to get parental consent and take privacy precautions.
It’s a much-needed step forward from Meta to participate in research like this. While I’m no fan of blocking access to social media or smartphones for teens, there is no question about the effects social media can have on teens.
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Many folks have no clue how expensive it is to be poor. It’s something we should be aware of as educators, knowing that some of our students are experiencing situations we could never imagine.
If I’ve learned anything in this life, it’s that we creative folk have to stick together. At the heart of it all, we are our own worst critics, thinking that no matter what we do or how amazing it may be, we are totally worthless, and our work is garbage.
Feel free to correct me if you think I’m wrong, but you’re just lying to yourself if you do. You know what evil lurks in the hearts of men, and it is self-loathing.
This is why it’s so important to come out of our little imperfect, introverted turtle shells and interact with others in the world who do what we do. Teachers, hang with other creative teachers—avoid those who hang in the staff lounge and do nothing but gripe about everyone and everything and say that it’s all someone else’s fault—they’ll help you refuel and tackle the world.
Creatives unite! In creative ways, if you can. Yes, unification can come online, regardless of what the experts say (remember, those experts who are telling you to get off your computer and go outside are the same ones who complained about spending too much time on your Nintendo, so clearly, they’re idiots).
Connect with others in whatever form makes sense for you and for them. You’ll be surprised how rich your relationships can be once you find kindred spirits.
My friend Brian is a kindred spirit and inspires me all the time. Brian writes books and comics and does his own illustrations. He’s run several successful Kickstarters. He’s incredibly creative.
And every day, his body is trying its very best to kill him. On many days, Brian can hardly breathe. But he soldiers on, day after day, breath after breath, doing his best to do what he was born to: create cool stuff.
He had to cut back on drawing because it took too much energy and breath, so he switched to writing his dreams. And now, he’s almost ready to launch another Kickstarter for the prose edition of his first epic, Memoirs of an Angel.
I’ve supported every Kickstarter and support Brian on a monthly basis through his Patreon. It’s certainly not much, but, like I said, we creative types gotta stick together. I’m supporting a friend and putting a little good karma out in the world for when I launch my own Kickstarter someday.
Yesterday, a little of that karma came back. Brian shared the dedication page for Memoirs of an Angel: The Grey Pilgrim, and wouldn’t you know it? Somehow, I got the honor of making the list.
Pretty flippin’ cool, if I say so myself. The goal and intention of supporting Brian wasn’t to get a mention in the book, it was to support creativity in the world because we need more creativity in the world.
You have something to give the world. Get busy. Show your work. Show your struggles. Show others that they have something inside of them to share, just like you do.
If we can do that, I believe we’ll make a better world for everyone.
Quote of the Day
“You have to be curious about the world in which you live. Look things up. Chase down every reference. Go deeper than anybody else—that’s how you’ll get ahead.” (Austin Kleon, Steal Like an Artist)
David Gray had an absolute stranglehold on the pop music airwaves in 2000. His album, White Ladder, which he’d initially released on his own —he’d even recorded it in his London flat—was re-released on Dave Matthews’ ATO Records and man, did it ever hit.
Babylon was the biggest hit from White Ladder and it’s a great song, but Please Forgive Me is the bop that you can’t get out of your head.
More than twenty years later, this song still slaps, especially when your drummer is a talent like Clune (who goes off on an incredible riff around the 2-minute mark), and you’ve got the BBC orchestra backing you up.
Crank this one and get up and dance in your office.
Long Read of the Day
“No stupid literature, art or music lasts.”
That’s a quote from literary critic George Steiner (1929-2020)—in his highly recommended book Real Presences from 1986.
I was shocked when I read that sentence. But pleasantly shocked.
Could it really be true that all the sonic detritus circulating in our culture will just magically disappear? It seems too good to be true.
Speaking of Hunter S. Thompson, his good friend Ralph Steadman created many illustrations alongside Thompson’s writing. Steadman’s art is pretty iconic. Here’s a glimpse into his work and signature style:
Final Thoughts
Spring storm season in Kentucky is stressful and seems to be getting worse every year, regardless of your political stance. Last night, several large thunderstorms marched through the area, bringing with them tornadoes.
Stay safe and keep your family close, friends. Heed warnings and don’t try to be a storm watcher, leave that to the experts.
The Eclectic Educator is a free resource for all who are passionate about education and creativity. If you enjoy the content and want to support the newsletter, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps keep the insights and inspiration coming!
Meta plans to make Quest VR headsets a key tool for classroom learning, offering students immersive educational experiences. The push for VR in education raises questions about the future of learning and student engagement. Despite concerns like cybersickness and limited accessibility, Meta sees VR technology as a promising avenue for transforming education.
Meta will release a suite of visually engrossing education apps for teachers to use with students ages 13 and older in time for the fall 2024 semester.
Teachers will be able to manage multiple Quest devices at once without preparing and updating each device individually.
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Stop worrying about what you think other people think of you and what you do. They don’t care. They’re too busy worrying about themselves.
Years ago, when I was in my 20s, a bold and artistically daring older friend who has since passed on gave me what I often think was the best advice I have ever gotten. I was worrying what 'people would think' of a decision I had made, and she said, "Amanda, There is no audience."
Teachers and students, this is your call to get busy doing your own thing, and don’t worry about what anyone thinks.
The Eclectic Educator is a free resource for all who are passionate about education and creativity. If you enjoy the content and want to support the newsletter, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps keep the insights and inspiration coming!
The Eclectic Educator is a free resource for all who are passionate about education and creativity. If you enjoy the content and want to support the newsletter, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps keep the insights and inspiration coming!
“It would be nice if all of the data which sociologists require could be enumerated because then we could run them through IBM machines and draw charts as the economists do. However, not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”
William Bruce Cameron
If there was a better quote for how many schools assign grades to student work, I don’t know what it might be.
Yes, the US’s most popular form of grading still uses letter grades. I know I know, those letters have numbers assigned to them to make it easy for teachers to score.
But who decided what the numbers meant, and why is the range for failure so huge compared to everything else?
Normally, on a 100-point grading scale, more than half of the “numbers” give you a failing grade.
Really? Can we finally admit that, much like Whose Line is it Anyway, the points don’t matter?
Authentic work, the goal so many of us in education are working toward, isn’t easy to “count,” no matter how you frame it.
But the skills students learn when they are presented with real problems and shared with a real audience absolutely count.
Count what counts, leave the rest to the number-crunchers.
The Eclectic Educator is a free resource for all who are passionate about education and creativity. If you enjoy the content and want to support the newsletter, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps keep the insights and inspiration coming!
Much of my teen years and into my twenties revolved around music. I played trumpet from 6th grade onward–and wasn’t too shabby–I eventually learned a bit of piano–I can chord and keep a rhythm like nobody’s business–and a bit of signing.
My wife has a music degree and is an excellent flautist. And my kiddo is already falling into the world of musical theatre with all her heart.
While I’m no longer actively involved in the music scene, I’ll always be a musician and hooked on the power of music. I love it and always will, and love sharing great music I stumble upon through my yearly playlists.
Music can bring us all together and inspire us to be more than we believe. For some, it can take you outside of your circumstances into a new world filled with sights and sounds beyond imagination. A new world of hope and promise.
I’m a huge believer in keeping arts programs in our schools. My time in the band kept me sane in my middle and high school experiences. Without the connections I made and the love of music that gave me a place to go and hide when things got rough, which happened regularly as a chubby, geeky kid in the late 80s and early 90s, I’m not sure what I would have done, but it probably wouldn’t have been great.
Los Angeles Unified School District is one of the last school districts in the country to provide freely repaired instruments to its students. The Oscar-winning documentary The Last Repair Shop takes us behind the scenes of that work.
More importantly, we learn the stories of a few individuals and what music and this instrument repair program mean to them.
From a mother who works to support her family to a man who caught the fiddle itch so bad he just had to have a $20 violin from a yard sale, these stories will inspire and make you weep.
By the way, that $20 violin took Duane Michaels and his band, Bodie Mountain Express, all the way to opening for Elvis on his biggest night ever and around the world, and then took him to repair woodwinds for LAUSD students.
From the film-
In a nondescript warehouse in the heart of Los Angeles, a dwindling handful of devoted craftspeople maintain over 80,000 student musical instruments, the largest remaining workshop in America of its kind. Meet four unforgettable characters whose broken-and-repaired lives have been dedicated to bringing so much more than music to the schoolchildren of the recording capital of the world. Watch “The Last Repair Shop,” directed by Ben Proudfoot and Kris Bowers.
In less than 45 minutes, you’ll see these stories and some of the students touched by this program. Music has a unique power among the arts to unite so many, sometimes without words.
We must keep music in our schools, forever.
The Eclectic Educator is a free resource for all who are passionate about education and creativity. If you enjoy the content and want to support the newsletter, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps keep the insights and inspiration coming!
