Reflection: TP #3: "Unpacking the Myths that Bind Us" - Christensen

I really connected with this article. My ultimate goal in life, after I've pursued all my other dreams is to teach. I want to make a difference in children's lives. I would to enrich them with my knowledge, skills and experience and help make them wonderful contributions to society. I've already taught Information Technology at the Providence Public Library for children and adults and I was a Multimedia Instructor (Web, Video Game Design, Animation & Graphics) at MIT & Merrimack College for ID Tech Camps. In addition I volunteered for a Graphic Design class at Providence Career Academy where I was given the opportunity to teach my own lesson. Teaching and exploring new ideas is extremely satisfying to me.

I hope to someday teach media and was really excited to see how Christensen was already doing so. What a child is exposed to as they are developing is what shapes and molds them as adults and the media children are being presented with are crucial to the way they will perceive the world. Obviously parenting pays an important role as well but media, schools and religion will be around influencing their minds when the parents are or even while they are. There are many factors working together, like they say it takes a village to raise a child. Because media lives in some many different forms, it can be extremely powerful - because we learn through repetition.

The idea of Christensen discussing children's movies and books with her students and having them look beyond the surface is exciting for me. She's even allowing them the space to think it out for themselves, like she said, she has to keep reminding herself to not answer the questions so that they can learn it on their own. Her method of teaching are admirable. Her style is similar to my style. To show them the movies, critique them in class and then allow them to further explore the ideas by writing something about it was cool. I really enjoyed the fact that she included her student's ideas in her writing, allowing one to see the effect of her cause.

Overall, my favorite part of the article was the end when she states that giving them the knowledge is not enough if they didn't do anything with it. So she made sure they were pro-active with it in order to create change one much act. That is the most important element of this all, the results, the movement, the outcome.