Maker Revolution

            The implications of the Maker Revolution lie primarily in the possibilities of task reimagination, in my opinion. The idea of “making” as a central construct in education is a familiar one to anybody working with literature. When interpreting, analyzing, and according to scholars like Robert Scholes, even just reading a work, the reader is engaged in making. The discipline of English is centered around the use of language to construct meaning, which means that the Maker Revolution isn’t so revolutionary in English classrooms. Any act of writing is an act of making, and if there is an appropriate emphasis on writing, the students are already makers. However, the Revolution can be extended, by making writing the focus of project-based learning. The possibilities for the variety of tasks is astounding. Students completing a unit about civil disobedience could read and interpret Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience and research an issue that they felt strongly about, and then write a letter to their Senator, or on a more local level they could address the schoolboard. The reimagination portion of the Maker Revolution lies in the medium used. Students could create a multimodal essay in which they use audio, video, and images to weave a richer media product than a simple essay. The students could use video cameras to produce short films they have written, sort of like PSA’s, that they could then broadcast to the school. The potential for reimagination of traditional cut and dry writing assignments is huge. Students reading Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men could use Google Street View to create a digital companion to the book, charting George and Lennie’s journey, in order to better understand the setting of the story. 

Comments

  1. UnknownNovember 29, 2017 at 7:52 PM

    These are all great, expansive ideas! Enjoying the creative force of expansion, especially in a collective imagination project, can be really inspiring. Each group leads you to new ideas for the next group of students who tackle that same content. I love your idea of bringing a timeless classic like Of Mice & Men in to a modern mapping tool. Of course, I must also agree that any excuse to guide the youth in correspondence with government officials is a time-honored tool that should be a part of all classrooms. Great post!

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  2. UnknownApril 23, 2018 at 7:47 AM

    This article has great insight on schooling today! You included research and examples to back up that writing is so important in education. My favorite part of this article were the examples because you stated that writing was important and you put ideas to implement that concept but you also added technology. That is a piece that I think teachers are struggling to incorporate. Adding those ideas such as the video or Google Street view are very unique and helpful to teachers who are lost for ideas when it comes to integrating technology in the classroom.

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