Blog Post 8

What Can We Learn About Teaching and Learning From Randy Pausch?

Photo by: Los Angeles Times

I really enjoyed watching the video of Randy Pausch's Last Lecture. He is a very encouraging and uplifting person and I really applaud him for all he achieved in his lifetime. This lecture is very encouraging and two things Randy says that stuck out to me is "inspiration and permission to dream are huge." We should all remember that!
In the beginning of the video, Randy talks a lot about when he played football when he was younger and he says it's all about the fundamentals. If you get the fundamentals down, then it makes for success. I really think this relates to learning because when you are learning anything at all you must know the basic fundamentals in order to gain more knowledge about that certain topic.
Randy also references "Captain Kirk" and he points out that his role was all about leadership. I think this is something that we as teacher's need to remember because as educators we are in a sense "leading people" and our students being those people. Randy mentions about creating different scenarios using "Virtual Reality." I think this would be a fun technique and tool to use for teaching.
Randy says "Being an imagineer" is an important quality. His stories about when he was "Imagineering" and making his project Aladdin are very inspirational. Randy really shows how learning and working with something you are passionate about is the most rewarding thing.
Next, Building Virtual Words is a project of about 50 students. Randy discusses how educational it was and beneficial for the students. On the students first assignment using the Virtual Reality tools, Randy was blown away at all of the students projects. I think this says a lot about hands on tools and how learning is so much fun when you are working with tools that you find interesting. Learning should be this way and that is why Project-Based Learning is so beneficial for the students and the teachers. The entire Building Virtual Worlds project was a campus wide phenomenon and students were so involved and Randy talks about how he was so honored to teach that course. The course was all about bonding and working with your peers. As a future teacher, I know that I will want my students to learn in a way like this where they are all together excited to be learning and creating!
Furthermore, Randy shares about the program Entertainment Technology center (ETC) and in this program you get a two year professional degree of Masters of Entertainment Technology. As Randy puts it, this whole program is where students are in small teams "making stuff." The program is all about projects and not "book learning." Randy says that by now the students have had four years of "book learning" and now they focus on projects and "making stuff." I think this is a great way for the students to actually work and build to create. Project-based learning is THE best way to learn in a fun hands-on way that you enjoy and want to keep working to create. Randy also stresses working in groups. Groups are a great way for students to work together to create their best work while collaborating with each other.
In my opinion, Randy is so passionate about the "Alice" project and he says, "The best way to teach is to have them think they are learning something else." When kids are using computer programs they think they are just making movies, but really they are learning something hard about programing. In this instance, Randy also says, "the best thing is when kids are having fun while learning something that is really hard."

Overall, Randy's Last Lecture was very encouraging and I really learned so much about learning and teaching. He teaches in a Project-Based Learning atmosphere with the students he had and I think that was rewarding in every aspect. When the students are collaborating and creating projects they are constantly engaged and love what they are doing. Also, in a course like Virtual Reality, Randy shows how it is important to teach in a way that is NOT surrounded by textbooks. On the other hand, everything is surrounded by technology and the tools needed to create those projects. I really enjoyed this video and I am so glad I was introduced to Randy Pausch and everything he had to offer in his last lecture.