Juggling isn’t just for Clowns

The Final Update

As you know, for the past few weeks, I’ve been figuratively and literally juggling all of life’s daily tasks. While I can’t control what happens on the figurative aspect of juggling, I can and have been able to control the literal aspects. How? By hours and hours of videos and practice.

(Check out my

video below) When I first started juggling, I could barely keep track of two balls going from hand to hand without dropping them. At times, it was frustrating – I even broke a sweat after repeatedly chasing after all the dropped balls. I felt like I needed to just change my topic because it was taking so long for me to grasp the concept. As if juggling wasn’t already difficult enough, my obsessively playful dog would sit at my feet and stare at the balls, just waiting for me to drop one so that he could steal it and run away. This continually happened, and further prolonged the learning and practicing process. At first it was cute, but then I felt like he was thinking “she can’t do this. She’s about to drop it any minute..wait for it… wait for it….. GOT IT!!” I eventually decided to practice ALONE without the help and “lost ball retrieval and support” of my dog, Jester. 

I also decided to choose a new video and help forum to guide my process and to address the common mistakes I was making. After I read about the mistakes other people were making and their methods for correcting the mistakes, it helped me begin to juggle correctly.

In my last blog post, I outlined the steps I took for learning how to juggle. Since then, I have built on the process to make sure that I could juggle in a neat and presentable fashion, without dropping the balls so often.

I feel that networked learning is a simple and practical way to acquire new skills and to complete tasks or even find answers to questions you might have. I am completely supportive of using this method in the classroom in addition to my everyday life. In fact, I used it this past weekend for my appearance as X-23 at HeroesCon 2016. (Yes,my nerd flag is flying now..) Because of how successful networked learning went with teaching myself how to juggle, I decided to use the same approach to help me create my own Wolverine claws for my costume. 

In  a classroom setting, students could be challenged to acquire a new skill in exactly the same way we were instructed to in this assignment. Also, a students could be encouraged to use networked learning to help them solve real world problems like communicating with someone who doesn’t speak the same language as you, how to create solar ovens, how to solve a math problem or even how to create new programs at your school that benefit the community. Students use technology everyday in various forms. Why not make that same technology work for you? For educational purposes, of course.

Overall, I’d say that the network learning approach to acquiring new information or skills is one that should be incorporated into classrooms and living rooms all across the world.  When combined with all the technology we have at our fingertips, personal learning network and networked learning in general are great ways to learn a new skill.

Now that I have mastered literal juggling, the real challenge begins with figuratively juggling. THIS is one of my consistent struggles. Although apps like Google Keep help me stay on track, I’ve still got a long way to go to master figuratively juggling. For now, I’ll keep on juggling my 3 balls, and who knows? I may get a little ambitious and continue my networked learning approach to try to juggle 5 balls!