Randy Pausch talked about three different things in his last lecture. The first thing he talked about was his childhood dreams. Some of his dreams were being in zero gravity, playing in the NFL, meeting Captain Kirk, and authoring an article in the World Book encyclepedia. He then described how he made all his childhood dreams come true.
Second thing he talked about was enabling the dreams of others. He stated that it wouldn't do any good if just his childhood dreams came true, he wanted to the childhood dreams of other's come true. He developed a program that did just that called The Dream Fullfillment Factory. This program was all about making people's childhood dreams a reality.
Randy Pausch was also involved in several other projects including Building Virtual Worlds, which was a course he designed in which students built virtual worlds. He was involved in the project Aladin at Walt Disney World which was a virtual world that took you on a magic carpet ride. He was also involved in the creation of Alice which is a novel way to teach computer programming.
He also talked about an idea called "head-fake." So what is "head-fake?" Randy said that the best way to teach someone is to make them think that they are learning about something else. He used this idea in Alice. Students thought they were building games when they were actually learning how to program. What a great idea and a creative way to teach.
The last thing he talked about was lessons he learned. He says help others, loyalty is a two-way street, don't complain, work harder. Some other important lessons Randy said that he learned was not to bail. He said "the best gold is at the bottom of the barrels of crap." He also said never give up. I think that these two lessons go hand in hand. Life is hard and when you are trying to make your dreams come true, it can get even harder. But if you never give up and you don't bail, you might surprise yourself in what you can accomplish.
Several of the things that he discussed in his lecture I would definitely use in my teachings. For example, I think that the whole "head-fake" idea is great. It's a way to make learning fun for your students without them even knowing that they are learning something. The lessons that Randy stated that he learned are definitely great morals that I would use in my teachings as well. I believe that teachers not only teach math, english, science, and history, but teachers are role models. Teachers also teach their students morals and how they should act as decent human beings in society and in life. Teachers teach their students the difference between right and wrong, what to do and what not to do.
In Randy Pausch's last lecture, the "head-fake" was about life. Being good at something makes you valuable. Apologize when you mess up. Give gratitude to people always. Find the best in everybody. And last but not least, brick walls are there to make us prove how badly we want something.
His last lecture was amazing. This was a man that was dying and still had such a positive outlook on life. I definitely encourage everyone to watch his lecture. I hope it inspires you like it inspired me!
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