Dancing geek

The pedagogy of teaching fascinates me, despite the hubris implied by use of the word 'pedagogy' in public.  Taking pride (of the appropriate kind) reflected in preparation and professionalism in ones craft as an educator requires an awareness that teaching is both art and science, in somewhat equal measure.

Benjamin Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives is part of the rich science of teaching; understanding how to use the taxonomy is part of the art.  Long a fan of the elegant simplicity of a hierarchy of thinking skills, I have used Bloom's Taxonomy in course design, test design, and content delivery.

In the midst of teaching, explaining to students how learning happens seems prudent; students are, after all, my partners in the process and it helps if we're doing the same dance steps.  The step-wise progression from lower order thinking skills to higher order thinking skills is beautifully choreographed in the latest revision to Bloom's--we now have digital verbs.  For example, from the Update to Bloom's Revised Taxonomy:

• Remembering - bookmarking, searching, googling, social bookmarking
• Understanding - advanced/ boolean searches, blog journaling, annotating, subscribing, tweeting
• Applying - executing, playing, uploading, editing
• Analyzing - mashing, tagging, linking
• Evaluating - commenting, posting, moderating, collaborating, reviewing
• Creating - programming, blogging, podcasting, publishing, wiki-ing

For those of us who are pedagogists as well as closet geeks, this is really good news.  It means I can use technology as more than a tool to enable learning objectives related to other content.  The effective and well-planned use of technology is its own pedagogy, music to the ears of a geek who dances.


Related Ramblings:
Learning Through Teaching: Pandemic consumption
Learning Through Teaching:  My cup runneth over
Learning Through Teaching: The "no textbook" decision