Joy in Virtual Reality
In the article Harmony Quest by Kenneth Sakatani, I am struck by his phrasing on p. 56 when he writes, "A third, and perhaps the most striking, outcome was the motivational and empowering joy the students esperienced from the process of working with this form of interactive technology. Students felt in charge of the Harmony Quest project and used the multimedia technologies to create interactive narratives that meant something to them."
The joy and ownership that he describes is not as common in education as some of us would like it to be. I think this idea of ownership and relinquishing power is certainly related to good constructivist teaching. In some class discussions, students have pointed out that the teacher may not know more than the students. This may be a good situation and may help to empower students to "teach" the teacher and for the teacher to relinquish power and become a co-learner along with the students.
Have you encountered a situation as a learner in which you experienced joy and ownership of your learning? What was the situation and why do you think it caused this positive learning experience?