Do we enrage them or engage them? Prensky (2005)

Prensky’s argument of engage or enrage

http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0553.pdf

Prensky’s (2005) concept of engage or enrage seems to me to be far too black and white. Just as there are multiple learning styles identified in test in tests such as Felder’s Multiple Intelligence Test surely there are many different types of students in today’s classroom.

I would suggest that we look at today’s classroom and approach it just as Felder would have and that is with an eye to balance. Trying to cater to one particular type of learner will only seek to alienate those other types.  Even Prensky himself identifies three kinds of students. Those who are self motivated. Those who go through the motions and simply “play school” and those who choose to tune out. The last group are the ones that Prensky suggests have a motto “Engage me or enrage me”.

Do teachers need to engage their students… the answer is YES every day in every classroom, but they need to do that using a range of teaching strategies and resources.  Use the curriculum as your framework but make sure the “tools” with which you teach are as interesting and varied as the students’ backgrounds, history, culture and learning styles.

Prensky,M. (2005) Engage me or Enrage Me Educause, Sep/October  60-64

Questionnaire by R. Felder & B. Solomon of the North Carolina State University (http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html)