Finding nonconsumption: Time on a school bus
Posted by michael_horn | Under Educational technology, Non-consumption, Online learning Thursday Mar 19, 2009Paul Tough of the New York Times chronicled a fascinating innovation—the One-Room School Bus—in the 8th Annual Year in Ideas.
Professor Billy Hudson of Vanderbilt University started up the project, the Aspirnaut Initiative, to turn the school bus into a mobile classroom. Buses are wired for connectivity, and students receive laptops or netbooks and are enrolled in online math and science courses. On the way to and from school, children take the courses, complete assignments, do research, and communicate with instructors online. In the pilot project, other students use video iPods to watch science and math content.
What is equally fascinating is where Hudson started the project. In rural Grapevine, Ark., children spend up to three hours a day on the school bus—wasted idle hours at the moment, but also a perfect example of nonconsumption and a golden opportunity. By next fall, Hudson and his wife hope to have enrolled 2,000 students in rural communities across Arkansas.
For districts and states seeking to foster some disruptive innovations, thinking in ways similar to this is a good start. Any other similar stories out there?
Thanks to an innovative director, we have had embedded credit classes for the last three years (to make up for travel time on the school bus).
The Cass Career Center offers English and Math credit based upon the projects done in a CTE (Career Tech Education) environment.
Since we are in a small town (Harrisonville, MO) we’d have to modify Billy Hudson’s ideas to make it work with 9 sending schools–but he’s sure come up with a noble idea.
This is a great idea. Many adults make productive use of their commuting time every day on trains, planes, etc. Give kids the tools, like here, and they can learn to do the same. Nice!
[...] Finding Nonconsumption: Time on a School Bus– Michael Horn, Disrupting Class [...]
As a solo middle school biotechnology instructor in a semi-rural school district, the budget hasn’t allowed for expansion of our program to the other two middle schools.
I hope to develop a middle school biotechnology program that will be suitable for distribution through the Internet.
What tools and best practices would you recommend that allow individual teachers to create disruptive classrooms?
Gregory, this is a great question–and shows a great need for online learning. Just thought I’d throw up a few suggestions on this site, and others should feel free to weigh in as well.
Moodle, moodle.org, is one resource for teachers looking to create an online course. Depending on what state you live in, there may be local resources as well to help. For example, in Michigan, the Michigan Virtual University, http://www.mivu.org/, presents itself as a resource to districts and educators. Another resource regardless of where you live is the Virtual High School Global Consortium, http://www.govhs.org/. They offer courses to help train teachers in creating good online courses so they could be a valuable resource–and they have a model to help you reach students beyond just the other schools in your locality.
Hope this helps! Suggestions from others?
[...] Finding nonconsumption: Time on a school bus from Clayton Christensen [...]