About David Navis
Shift Happens … and is happening now.
My passion is to be leading the shift.
How long will educators continue to teach in an ancient language? Today’s digital natives have grown up with digital technology such as computers, the Internet, mobile phones and MP3. Educator’s today are digital immigrant, individuals who grew up without digital technology and adopted it later. The language they speak is no longer the same.
Is the digital gap between the haves and have nots … or is it really between the digital Natives and digital immigrants? Our educational institutions are in such desperate need of upgrading. Most schools now have some form of technology, many schools are proud of their student to computer ratios. Our hardware in place, we’re wired and ready to go. But … what happened to our leaders, our educators, are they ready to meet the challenge.
I have worked in international schools for the last 25 years. For years most of them have been wired with the latest and greatest hardware and software. Yet, they’re still at the starting gate, There has not been the expected institutional shift, the paradigm shift that needs to happen. Our leaders and classroom teachers have not received the necessary professional development necessary to compete with industry today. Our brightest and best are leaving our schools so their voice may be heard.
This is my goal, this is my passion … to help train teachers. Now is the time to make the paradigm shift. To encourage and walk with educators into the next generation of learning. It is imperative to think a whole new way, to talk a new talk, to walk a new walk with students. Educators must (not just need) to communicate with their students in a whole new way.
Otto was scoring 45% – 55% in his 10th grade classes. He had no drive or desire to succeed at school. Yet, he took the time to organize his friends to play games on the internet. He reserved a ‘game room’, rented a bus, organized a meeting place, refreshments, times … he did it all. It was a massive undertaking all on his own outside of school and class.
His parents asked the teacher if there was something Otto could do to help his grades. The teacher leaned back, folded her arms, and told the parents, “No.” Yet, if the parent had taken an interest in Otto and his gamers, she would have seen the real learning that was going on. She could have asked him to present his work in class, to reflect on how he could make the event even better and more successful.
Otto was a failure in her eyes. Today Otto owns a gaming company worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Today Otto is a success in the eyes of the world.
