Paper 2: Welcome to the Exploratorium! « Arieliondotcom the LORD-loving Learning Lion
Ideas on changing the role of instructional designer and teacher to a "sharer," focusing on creating the environment where learning connections are made and setting up guideposts to help learners find their own way.
<p>I believe that the roles of the Instructional Designer and Teacher are changing and must change in the face of the ever-increasing onslaught of information every human being faces today. Those roles must merge into the Sharer, who shows new technologies and connections to information to others while always keeping in mind his/her own role as perpetual student. </p>
<p>To do this, the Sharer must, at least in some respects, plant the environment for others, set up what may grow into connections and give opportunity for emergence in ways even the Sharer may not envision yet, but in a reasonably “safe” environment for exploration.</p>
The Teacher/Sharer, parents and student collaborate on ensuring that whatever method the student is using is assisting in wayfinding toward those goals. If more connections are made, so much the better. But along the path, like signposts, each of the connections (parents, Teacher/Sharers) and each tool (video, Second Life, writing, drawing, blog, podcast, etc.) used to connect to people will prompt the student for responses (dates, opinions, responses to readings) of the set curriculum, but framed in the context best suited for that student. A record of the waypoints shows how the student connected and which connections seemed to spark the most activity and best learning. If the student misses a certain number of waypoints, the direction of the connections is adjusted until success is achieved.