Blog Post 7: Randy Pausch's Last Lecture

This video is very inspiring. Mr. Pausch had a wonderful attitude about taking advantage of the life he had left and having fun until the end. He used some great lecture techniques including humor, meaningful pictures, videos, and props. There are some wonderful lessons about how to teach and how to live. I did not like the example he used to show the virtual worlds his students were creating, though. I mentioned it to my husband and he said it would be interesting to see if I would have reacted to it differently before the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Something about the rabbit crying, “But, we loved you!” and the bear shooting himself made me feel ill. It is a creative example, but I think I am a little over sensitive right now because of the disturbing images of the destruction of nature we are seeing every night. I guess it is sort of silly, but I was disturbed.

Anyway, back to the video. There is a lot of excellent advice in it about how to educate people. The theme of using “head games,” where you make the students think they are learning something fun instead of something important has been a controversial idea in education but it works. I have heard many teachers complain that they are not there to entertain the students, but I think it is good to be entertaining and the students will absorb more information if you are humorous because it holds there attention. I prefer learning that way. The props he used, such as the football and cell phone, to make his points are memorable. Learning is fun and exciting so why should we not make it that way for our students?

The program he started at Carnegie University using project-based learning is really interesting. It is wonderful that the university supported the experiment. I am not surprised it worked out so well because students get excited about creating things. They learn the valuable skills of collaboration and responsibility needed for future success from working together. It is such an unusual way to run a Master’s degree program, but I really liked how Mr. Pausch explained that the students did all the book learning as undergraduates and were ready for something else. It is great that one of his students ended up applying the same techniques to middle school students and we should all consider how to do the same.

Two other things really stood out to me as an educator. Mr. Pausch said the best gift we can give students is to make them self-reflective and I agree. You cannot improve yourself if you cannot evaluate yourself. A lot of people do not learn how to do this and although some people gain success without this skill, I would guess not many of those gain true happiness. The other thing was when he first started the Building Virtual Worlds class and the students turned in their first programs, which were well beyond his expectations. He did not know what to do next, and one of his mentors told him, “you have no idea where the bar should be and your only going to do them a disservice by putting it anywhere.” All educators should keep that in mind because each class is very different. It is full of diverse personalities and varying ability levels. As teachers, we will not know exactly what the students are capable of, especially if we let them collaborate and learn from one another. So, we should keep an open mind about how high the bar can be. We do not want to keep them from reaching their true potential by setting low expectations. I have always liked the saying, “reach for the moon; even if you miss, you will land among the stars.” We should want that for our students.

If you have not seen this video yet, you should. Click here to view it.