EduCon 2.4

Education likes to imagine itself as creating a population of individuals who excel in a range of subject areas, after all, we include a variety of subjects and topics that we push students through so that they can learn a little bit of everything. The problem is that our students don't really excel at any of them because they aren't given the opportunity to become passionately curious about any of them. The boxed curriculum in many of our classrooms is one dimensional, it's purpose has become to prepare students for testing.
Are we creating a classroom culture that nurtures the da Vinci's of the world? A culture that encourages curiosity, passion and exploration? To create a culture in your classroom that builds a true learning community, students need to have room to explore their passions. They need to be given the opportunity to view learning as life. Students should see that subjects of learning are not really separate entities, but rather that learning is multidimensional, overlapping and interwoven. When you look at what da Vinci accomplished, it becomes apparent that this was someone who understood that all learning is life, that it is connected. This is a call to create a classroom culture that nurtures da Vinci: an invitation to make learning more like life.