dystopian literature, millennials, and teaching
TRANSCRIPT
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Dystopian Literature, Millennials, and Teaching:
Why It May Be Time for Us to Rethink How We Teach?
Gordon Harvey, Professor & Head!JSU Department of History & Foreign Languages!
[email protected]!@thisrunninglife!
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Generations
• Greatest (WW2)
• Baby Boomers
• Gen X
• Millennials
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Greatest Generation• 1901/1924 - 1924/1943
• Depression, WW 2
• Sense of purpose, duty
• Hard work = progress, improvement
• Reagan, Jack Nicholson
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Baby Boomers• 1946 - 1964
• Space flight, Civil Rights, Vietnam, Watergate
• Stereotype: Hippies
• Current holders of power
• Oprah, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs
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• WW 2/Baby Boomer generation
• no tech
• accidental selfie
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Generation X• 1965 - 1981
• “MTV generation”
• Post-Vietnam, Post-Watergate, Recessions, Peak and end of Cold War
• Stereotype: greedy, self-involved
• Jon Stewart, Kurt Cobain, me
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Millennials• 1982 - 2004
• Gen Y, “Nexters"
• Prosperity & recession, rapid change technology,
• Stereotype: narcissistic, aimless
• Mark Zuckerberg, LeBron James, Morgan Knutson (dropbox)
• google this: “millennial entrepreneurs”
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• Millennials grew up with tech
• Intentional selfie
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Not your father’s classroom
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Courtesy: Susan Rennie
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–Person who doesn’t get millennials
“…glued to smartphones rather than engaged with work or their world”
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–Strauss and Howe, Millennials Rising
“Expect teamwork instead of free agents,
political action instead of apathy,
t-shirts with school colors instead of
corporate swooshes, on-your-side teamwork
instead of in-your-face sass.”
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Optimistic!
• they’ve been told all their lives:
• how special they are
• how they can do anything
• so, they believe their generation can do good things
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Sheltered upbringing
• Post-Columbine, safest kids in US history
• They expect to be protected
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Confident!
• Optimistic about their future and the future in general
• BUT, confident within structure
• Taught that follow rules = success
• They stifle creativity if it is a threat to success
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Team, not “me, me”!
• Strong team orientation
• Community is crucial to them
• “tight peer bonds”
• Seek practical implications and solutions
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Pressure
• Pushed to study hard, make good grades
• “Trophy kid” syndrome
• Can inhibit own creativity = “right answer” over “good answer”
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Characteristics of Millennials
• Achievement!
• Smart, high self-expectations
• Technology is central to this
• Expect to be challenged
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We often teach in the manner in which we were taught
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But perhaps we should teach in the manner in which they learn
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Embracing change is not easy
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Millennials I get, but Dystopian Literature?
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Dystopia • Futuristic society where
the illusion of a perfect society is held in place by corporate, bureaucratic, moral, or totalitarian control.
• Follow and don’t question our rules and all will be well for you
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Dystopian Society
• Independent thought and freedom restricted
• Conform to uniform expectations
• Individuality and dissent are bad
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Dystpoian Protagonist• Feels trapped, wants
escape
• Questions existing social, political system
• Confident enough to fight back
• Feels like there has to be a better way
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–Dana Stevens, slate.com
“It’s not a mystery why so many young-adult best sellers would take place in post-
apocalyptic societies governed by remote authoritarian entities and rigidly divided into
warring factions.”
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–Dana Stevens, slate.com
“Young adult dystopias externalize the turmoil that’s already taking place in adolescent
hearts, minds, and bodies.”
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The conundrum• They want shelter, but not overprotection
• They want to be challenged, but not controlled
• Thrive in structure, but stifle creativity to do so
• They’re confident, but almost overconfident
• They’re group focused, yet we teach them individually
• No kid learns the same, yet we often teach them as if they do
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Teaching Millennials• Sheltered lives? Give quality student-teacher contact
• Need community? Offer reciprocity and cooperation
• Pressured? Provide regular and constructive feedback
• Confidence/Overconfidence? Teach them about time management, time on task
• High expectations? Move beyond the grade to life itself
• Diversity of learning styles? No ONE solution. Some kids are chalkboards, some are paper, some are iPads, some are all three
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Institutional resistance
• Not everyone will embrace you: the state, the board,your colleagues, “the man”
• “Yeaahhhh…this new pedagogical technique is nice, but I’m gonna need you to check these boxes we established for you. That’d be great.”
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Milton’s stapler
• Bureaucracy, state regulations, outcomes, parental expectations, student motivation…all we want is our red Swingline stapler…
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Remove one wall, see a new world
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Take one bite, you MIGHT like it
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Thanks for the pie-in-the-sky stuff, ivory tower guy
• I’m going through this, too
• I’m a great lecturer—love being the star, hard to give up
• Incremental change, embrace your tech comfort zone
• NOT for everyone
• I know we have standards to meet, rules to follow, trouble to avoid— but let’s be daring
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Sources• http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/movies/2014/03/
divergent_starring_shailene_woodley_and_the_hunger_games_why_teens_love.html
• Howe and Strauss, Millennials Rising
• www.professorjosh.com
• http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jul/07/local/la-me-millennial-optimism-20130708
• Maureen Wilson, “Teaching, Learning, and Millennial Students,” (2004).
• http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson926/DefinitionCharacteristics.pdf
• http://www.scdgroup.net/2012/01/generations-by-numbers-why-association.html
• http://www.pewinternet.org/2010/12/16/generations-2010/
• http://allthingslearning.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/ivory-tower-tg-version.png