LaPlante's TED talk left me wondering how I can incorporate the 'hacker mindset' in my own teaching. Traditional schooling has relied on learning things in a set order, for a set purpose, for a set benchmark. There has traditionally been very little flexibility. You either know who it is that shot Franz Ferdinand or you do not. Instead of analyzing why his death led to World War I, students look for facts. It is that analysis, that building of knowledge through exploration that leads one to truly understand what led to WWI and how that impacted the development of the modern world. As LaPlante mentions, taking shortcuts is encouraged in the way he learns, why read through 20 pages of text to find out a few mere facts when you can just search for them online and find them easily. By making effective use of your time you are able to use that saved time to analyze, create, and share what you have learned in a meaningful manner.
This is why I believe that project based learning is best suited for the modern classroom. In a time when students can find facts and resources instantly, why not instead have them analyze all that data into a culminating project where they can present what they learned and how it is important to their lives. Granted, it is more difficult to test for and quantify what students learn with these projects, but that does not mean that it should not be done. As LaPlante shows us in his presentation, finding real world applications to things that he learns is what makes him happy. It stands to reason that that is true for many other students.
This is why I believe that project based learning is best suited for the modern classroom. In a time when students can find facts and resources instantly, why not instead have them analyze all that data into a culminating project where they can present what they learned and how it is important to their lives. Granted, it is more difficult to test for and quantify what students learn with these projects, but that does not mean that it should not be done. As LaPlante shows us in his presentation, finding real world applications to things that he learns is what makes him happy. It stands to reason that that is true for many other students.