TED talks. ISTE. FETC. TCEA. CUE. ASCD. Top Ten Most Influential lists. Magazines. Books. Consulting firms. College professors. It seems everyone knows the solution to fixing education. There are a lot of big thinkers out there and the power of the inter webs have made their voices loud. We watch their videos, listen to their podcasts, attend their conference sessions, and we nod right along. “Yeah! Why isn’t teaching sexy anymore? Why can’t those teachers just use project-based learning? Why don’t we go ahead and integrate technology into education?” We listen, we learn, and then we return. Back to our campuses, back to our 9-5 (9-5? who am I kidding? according to the news media, it’s a 9-2 with summers off!) and back to reality.

Nothing changes. There’s something I’ve noticed as I delve further into the realms of education (particularly education technology): the folks with the big ideas expect other people to actually put them into action. The big ideas are just that: ideas. Sure, I get inspired just as much as the next person listening to Sir Ken Robinson talking about how schools kill creativity, but what is being done to change that? Maybe I just need to look around more, but hearing from people that don’t “ship” what they’re selling just isn’t doing it for me. So I ask: where are all the practitioners? I wanna hear stories about Kathy Schrock and Jen Wagner and Ginger Lewman. Flowery speeches have their place, but only if we (collectively and individually) do something different in our classrooms.

To paraphrase an ancient text, what good is it to believe schools can change if you don’t back up that belief with examples of your own? So what did you learn in school today?

-G
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