The UCDS Teacher Education Center (TEC) creates and cultivates professional development opportunities, innovative programs and educational partnerships. The TEC is committed to promoting teacher excellence and enhancing education at UCDS and in the broader community.
Kieran Egan: The Future of Education
On November 10th, 2009 Kieran Egan presented two lectures at University Child Development School. We are proud to share these talks with you in the following videos. A brief synopsis accompanies each clip.
Morning Session
In this talk, Kieran Egan will argue that nearly all modern conceptions of Education are made up of various combinations of three ideas—socialization (derived from oral cultures long ago and continuing today), academic (derived from Plato’s and Aristotle’s program of shaping minds to perceive “the truth about reality”), and developmental (derived from Rousseau’s claim that successful education requires attending to the natural or spontaneous forms in individual difference and development). We assume that all of these ideas are essential components of any reasonable educational program, and assume too that the trick for educational institutions is to keep these somewhat competing aims for the process in balance. He will try to show that our problems are due to the fact that these aims are at a fundamental level incompatible and that any institution that tries to incorporate all three as aims is doomed to consistent frustration and general failure. After this cheery opening, a way around this trilemma will be suggested.
Evening Session
In this talk, Kieran Egan will offer a rather new way of thinking about the process of children's cognitive development which focuses on the kinds of "cognitive tools" or learning toolkits students develop as they grow up in a society like ours. In schools and in most currently dominant psychological theories of development, short-shrift is given to some of the most powerful learning tools students have available to make sense of their world and experience. We tend also to think of the imagination as something of an educational frill; something to try to engage after the hard work of learning has occurred. He will try to show that focusing on central features of students learning "toolkits" makes it clear that the imagination is one of the great workhorses of learning, and that we ignore it at the cost of making learning more ineffective than it should be and much schooling more tedious than it need be.
Kieran Egan Bio:
Kieran Egan was born in Clonmel, Ireland in 1942. He was brought up and educated in England. He graduated from the University of London with a B.A. in 1966. He worked for a year as a Research fellow at the Institute for Comparative Studies in Kingston and then moved to the U.S.A. to begin a Ph.D. in Philosophy of Education at Stanford University. He worked concurrently as a consultant to the I.B.M. Corporation on adaptation of a programming method, called Structural Communication for new computing models. He completed his Ph.D. at Cornell University in 1972. He is currently a Professor of Educational Theory at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia. He is the author of about twenty books, and co-author, editor, or co-editor of a few more; most recently, The Future of Education: Reimagining Our Schools from the Ground Up. New Haven: Yale University Press. His books have been translated into numerous languages.
His main area of interest is education. His work focuses on a new educational theory, which he has developed during the past two decades, and its implications for a changed curriculum, teaching practices, and the institution of the school. His work deals both with innovative educational theory and detailed practical methods whereby implications of his theory can be applied at the classroom level.
Constructing Mathematical Understanding:
Illuminating Visual Thinking
August 2010
During this weeklong theme-based course, participants will learn diverse and multi-dimensional teaching and assessment strategies that support mathematical concepts covered in any curriculum. In this course we will explore the distinction between arithmetic and mathematical thinking as well as the importance of imbedding both into your daily mathematical endeavors. Participants will experience a hands-on visual spatial workshop that links current educational research (multi-disciplinary approaches) with traditional arithmetic methodology.
- Learn from nationally recognized UCDS math specialists.
- Work with a variety of hands-on math manipulatives designed to help introduce and refine specific math concepts.
- Learn how hands-on materials enhance a teacher's ability to meet diverse student learning styles.
- Develop teaching and assessment techniques that align with various levels of student understanding and curricular standards for each math strand.
- Apply new concepts and techniques directly to your school's math curriculum.
- Focus on your individual grade level topics of interest in both large
and small groups.
About the Instructor
Melissa Chittenden, Assistant Head of School at UCDS and Director of the Teacher Education Center, is an international presenter and math education consultant. Melissa has taught and developed curricula in early childhood and elementary education for 28 years. She specializes in teaching educators hands-on math through diverse learning styles.
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