Do Students WANT Choice?

I often wonder…do students WANT choice? When I give students the opportunity to own their learning, many choose the easiest option.  We live in an era of nothing but options.  The tools change before we have time to master. Learning is fast and furious. Goodbye teaching hello facilitating.  Sometimes I feel it’s impossible to keep up.  Do students feel this way? Is it easier to write a report on Cheetahs in a Google doc, print it out, and turn it in then to create a GreenScreen video on Cheetahs, share the link and share it out in a blog post? Does the choice of typing a report vs creating a video on Cheetahs overwhelm?

Learning can sometimes be hard work.  I listened to my daughter coaching 6 year olds on how to do the butterfly kick.  She asked them, “Is this hard work?” They all chimed in with a resounding, “YES”.  Her reply to them was yes this is hard work but you need to learn how to do this kick before you can master this stroke.  They may not have liked it but in the end they were all swimming across the pool because they had learned the kick.

It made me think about the students who don’t want to put in the hard work to #becomebetter.  You know why? Because it’s HARD WORK to do something uncomfortable or to push yourself. We as teachers are sometimes no different than our students. The easy route of “sit and get” PD is sometimes preferred over flipped or blended PD.  Why? Because flipped/blended PD requires work, sometimes HARD WORK. No one is telling you what to do or how to do it.  Isn’t it easier to come to training, sit in your chair, teacher/facilitator feeds you the info, then you are on your way? Easy, right?

I say we must choose to move outside of our comfort level.  We must push ourselves to #becomebetter.  Why? Because modeling the “hard work” for our students is necessary.