Cathy Davidson’s “Project Classroom Makeover” explores the concept of reconstructing the education system in a way which would provide opportunities for all students to develop their own learning potential. Davidson incorporates aspects of our modern digital world into the daily educational routines of many students as an attempt to “change the one-directional mode of attention that has formed the twentieth-century classroom” (Davidson 54). Davidson tells the story of her groundbreaking experiment and why she feels it is necessary. She explains that her experiment serves as a “lesson in institutional unlearning,” that ultimately this experiment will create an educational environment where students of all learning levels and who possess many talents may succeed (Davidson 50). The term “institutional unlearning” is especially important as it emphasizes the necessity of change and ignored to She also describes her experiment as a “conceptual breakthrough,” and that incorporating the idea of crowdsourcing into modern day education created a “hybrid of old and new thinking” (Davidson 53).
Davidson structures this piece into a form which highlights it’s overall message. She describes the importance of working through a problem and finding a solution, particularly that which is found in the new digital age and the traditional education system. Davidson moves through this piece introducing her main issue and describing how she attempts to work through it. She does not fixate on her own single experiment but provides her audience with the history of her issue and personal examples. She describes to her audience the three key factors which constitute educational success— “rigor, relevance, and relationships” (Davidson 60). She then in the following paragraphs describes teachers she encountered who have embodied those three points. By doing so, she emphasizes how necessary it is to for the education system to maintain its level of difficulty, relevance, and strong relationships.
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