TWO ROADS DIVERGED IN A YELLOW
WOOD
As an academic and a teacher, managing
students with a lot of learning styles and
abilities/intelligences, and new tools for
learning, we are increasingly facing
choices about how we manage the
learning environment
AND SORRY I COULD NOT TRAVEL BOTH
Tools we traditionally associate with learning - notes,
books, images, blackboards and chalk have history, they
fit comfortably with our teaching.
New tools – technological gadgets can be difficult to keep
apace with?
AND BE ONE TRAVELLER
As learning becomes more accessible,
the student profile is changing.
4.6% in Ireland,
In nursing, teacher training, medicine,
engineering courses
LONG I STOOD
AND LOOKED DOWN ONE
AS FAR I COULD
Students with disabilities are taking
courses we would never have thought
possible.
A Nurse with one hand, A Teacher who is
deaf, Engineer with visual impairment
TO WHERE IT BENT IN THE UNDER
GROWTH
There is a quiet revolution we need to embrace!
We must stop and think about teaching, learning and technology,
How, Why, What for? Universal Design, what is it….
And most importantly, How much do I need to know????
THEN TOOK THE OTHER AS JUST AS FAIR
When considering students with disabilities
and the choices they are making,
it may (will) challenge our biases and
presumptions.
AND HAVING PERHAPS THE BETTER
CLAIM
We need to recognise students are
choosing courses that they believe they
have the ability to study
and want a career in….just as their peers
do.
Students - today - can engage in learning
in a different way
and claim it in a way that suits them
THOUGH AS FOR THAT THE PASSING THERE
HAD WORN THEM REALLY ABOUT THE SAME
But is not student success and high quality
of education still what it is all about?
AND BOTH THAT MORNING EQUALLY LAY
Yet things cannot remain the same for any student
…Control – quality of education, appropriate usage of technologies,
…Standards –what’s fair to all students?
…Equality – what will this look like??
IN LEAVES NO STEP HAD TRODDEN
BLACK.
This is all new ground
OH, I KEPT THE FIRST FOR ANOTHER
DAY!
So with all the changes
– the primary objective is that all students with a diverse need can be the
best that they can be – and that best will get better….
YET KNOWING HOW WAY LEADS ON TO
WAY,
And now more than ever we need to share our learning,
our concerns, our experiences, our questions….
I DOUBTED IF I SHOULD EVER COME BACK
Through this sharing and
evolution we will all realize
change…
I SHALL BE TELLING THIS WITH A SIGH
And sometime in the future…we will all be
able to say we were part of this great
change
SOMEWHERE AGES
AND AGES HENCE:
TWO ROADS DIVERGED IN A WOOD,
AND I--
..WE TOOK THE ONE LESS TRAVELED BY
AND THAT HAS MADE ALL THE DIFFERENCE.
FROM – THE ROAD NOT TAKEN,
ROBERT FROST, (1874–1963)
Robert Frost
four-time Pulitzer Prize winning American poet, teacher and lecturer.
Although he never graduated from college,
he received over 40 honorary degrees.
He also suffered from depression and a fear of public speaking
Thank you – Mary Quirke
www.thelinknetwork.eu
www.ahead.ie