What does Mike Wesch believe about how students learn?

 Wow, so impressed by this Ted Talk by Mike Wesch (2016) - so much so that I want to be sure to share it with my colleagues at my school. I'm fortunate to be part of a learning community that celebrates, as Wesch does, the "superhero" in all of us. Our head of school refers to the faculty and staff as superheroes, and the kids as well - it's actually common practice for us to ask, "What's your superpower?" I think that question is affirming for kids, but I am glad that Wesch notes that the "worth it" goal can always be evolving, as can our superpowers. Sometimes we need to get lost to find ourselves, etc, and we're not always feeling super.

I took note of how he had lunch with students to get to know them. I was doing that more frequently pre-pandemic; the one-on-one lunch meeting that is. While I sit with groups of students and enjoy our lunches as a class, I realize that I haven't really spent much time one on one in a while. I'd like to bring that back to this coming school year, especially for my students who tend to retreat a bit behind more vocal peers.

Wesch highlights the "worth it" as the goal to which we'll invest our time and energy and willingness to try and fail and try again. And I think he's right about those three key questions:

Who am I?

What am I going to do?

Am I gonna make it?

A question I have for Wesch is about how these questions play out for students with a range of advantages and privileges. I think these are all important questions about identity, security, reason for being, etc, but I do wonder if these questions are "easier" to grapple with for some than others.

Love the visuals and the fact that he was willing to put himself out there with the animation. Overall this talk was inspiring to me as an educator and reminded me to think carefully about each individual student in my class as a unique human with the potential to be the hero in their own story.