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TEDx Talks
Published: 2014-07-01
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eIvGtn1NAU
I've been blown away by all these talks about Reba from renaissance today I believe humanity works on a cycle of rebuffs we at the crossroads of the new one our lives becoming more more dish ties and in time education will follow as a history major I struggle to find a job actually ended up working in the environmental industry in Kenya in East Africa working on renewable
energy projects with a focus on biogas in rural communities this then led me to Beijing China and the scene you can see behind me another beautiful sunny afternoon Chinese capital I was tired of briefing in this dirty polluted small here and I kept the lights in my friends and family back home of what it was like to live for this they don't really believe me so
I decided to look back on history so on the my history diploma what events that out for me the London great smoke if nineteen fifty two twelve thousand people lost their lives in five days twelve thousand people this is the worst manmade air pollution disaster ever and yeah hardly anybody knew about it so what I decided to do to create a fictional character someone who woke
up and I see fifty three had a small farm and the cats we think and he tweeted as if he was reliving the event in real time this was over sixty years ago I use the hashtag great smoke and I spoke in a language which kids were familiar with and they can understand we got picked up by media organizations we got picked up by fundamentalists and
everyone started following this feat reliving this historic event I was the true impact of the great smoked people don't actually know what was going on at the time it's only when the hospital started filling up people are dying of hot sex in the streets people were dying in their homes while they slept and yet they didn't quite realize how many people were dying it was only
when the more works well actually four that they realize the true impact the great small so I created four hundred twenty two tweets in the space of five days and I reached millions of people on Twitter you're probably thinking what's the point why did I do this what's the interest well I did it because history is still stuck in the dark ages history teaching them it's
outdated contracts out they to delivery kids simply bored of it one the kids a hate the iPad protects book on it the same of history because just live with static figures and dates and numbers kids are interested in that anymore we needs history to be brought to life need the teachers actually use the power technology and tell stories and this is what I strive to do
everyday of the technology entrepreneur innovation though it is difficult and that's what we really need is to push for schools that have a new vision and a new way to be open and pushing for collaboration here are a few examples of innovators in the space who use technology and mix it with history to bring the story to life one of the teachers I spoke to a
couple of months ago Karina she works in the Steve Jobs schools yes they do exist in our married the government's and she she told me just that she said that what she likes about using history and technology in the classroom is that it brought the content for life a gauge to students and made her kids curious and like about spark of curiosity inside them which got
him to go sprawl more and find out more about the historical event and that's exactly and she's right that every teacher that I liked and remembered from history told me a powerful story when all teachers have technology to actually make this happen and it's very easy the second example I want to show you is minecraft so for those of you that the minecraft it's a virtual
three D. sandbox game where users can create these amazing worlds from scratch now Microsoft is great because it pushes for collaboration for additional citizenships arms by that I mean sort of into the ethics and also privacy issues and then also people to really Chuck I'm there and discuss events what was so great about this minecraft was that it was a Stephen that created it for his
left some cloths for the student for minecraft did not feeling gazed of the content is having problems studying so he created this realm of off off off off himself and from there he actually learn lots and started giving towards the other uses it lots and I mean how engaging is on how inspiring is out and not so much creativity that my first example is the teachers
I look up to and admire and retailer Gaspee he's a social studies teacher in the U. S. and what he does as I actively uses Twitter within the classroom setting he uses the tool to get students to collaborate on that discuss events and uses one event one hash sack and it's actually found that students are not more engaged with the study of history what is also
notice is not the shy ones actually speak up now so every student in his class has a role and feels pub the classroom Henry K. is one of many of the teachers out there currently doing this space and this is what I want to do as an education technology watch Panetta is bring the story so life bring history alive make it active make it enjoyable and
fun for the students get them involved unfortunately it is a difficult space the beer and really with a pile of the incident millions of millions of people are getting access to the web and we can allow for this collaboration between students from different classrooms but also different countries one example is one which is maybe close to a lot of people in the room today is the
independence of conga why can't we have students collaborating about this historic event together on one platform discussing collaborating what was it like for student to grow up during Congo windows colonized by Belgians what it was what it was like for Belgium students grow up in Belgium discuss arm Belgium's colonization why can't we have the students in different countries from different continents discussing your collaborating together to
do this so we will needs bonus imagination and creativity unfortunately all schools do not allow for this currently so we need new vision for schools to push this for all students a very small for northern states it they are they need twenty first century skills now this twenty first century skills revolve around cognitive skills innovation and recognition and really to do this we needs to allow
and students to really have access to technology of schools and it's changed the way they are being taught when it comes to a liberal arts no longer are we in an era where someone like Henry Ford wanted workers who work begins who listens and you didn't question today someone like Larry page once people to actually be also questions I have never been saltier and he wants
creates is more importantly he wants innovates US and that's really what we need to push for more income to history social media as bad we shouldn't use in the classroom I'm tired and I'm really fed up of hearing that argument from top level edge cases that's actually let the students use these tools let's let them get engaged with history the sexy you've got them to use
tools are actually need for the future they don't need a textbook anymore they can Google summing two seconds of figure out the officer so Ken Robinson wants said nobody has any idea of what's gonna happen in the future but everybody has an interest in education I think he's right those words ring true especially for the future of the liberal arts and a particular history a child
is not born with a notepad adds a pen anymore Hizbollah technology at their fingertips so my very soul told today is really about Dreamin and going out there and going pick and really pushing for this collaboration making history personalized getting children involved getting engaged with history and that's really what I'm trying to push for today go out there and really make a difference so the themes
