Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Learners
People learn in a variety or ways. In my undergrad we talked a lot about Blooms taxonomy and different learning styles, but after teaching I have seen that it takes many different styles of teaching with many different teaching methods to fully reach the majority of students in a classroom. In my classroom I concentrate on presenting material in many different ways, which relates to cogitative theory. I am also very concerned with having students discover and interact with topics before I actually teach them anything. I don't know if this is true constructional learning, but I have found that creating an interest in the topic by pulling out students questions prior to a lesson helps them create a context with the material before the lesson even begins. Lastly I repeat, repeat, and repeat vocab, definitions, expectations, and any important objects hence using the behaviorism theory of education. I find that students recognize that students retain information after they have said or done it a thousand times. In the past I felt that constructional learning was going to be the basis of my teaching style, but I find myself more in a partnership between all there, especially behaviorism and cognitivism.
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5 comments:
I feel that I pull from a combination of theories. I believe that students do need to have concepts reinforced so that they will retain the information better.
I like the fact that you stress the importance of prior knowledge and the stimulation for the topic from the get-go.
I agree that it takes a combination of many theories to reach the children. I also have concerns about "Discovery" learning. From a student who grew up with lectures and note taking, I don't like it at all. Unless the teacher is willing to accept whatever the student turns in as the right answer, there needs to be some guidance,feedback, or examples. It is not fair to say the sky is the limit, and then grade by specific standards. You wind up with students who are confused and frustrated.
Some great points here. I agree with your concerns about discovery learning. It can make a nice "lid opener" and can be a good way to complement other instructional methods, but by itself it has the potential to run a bit out of control, in my experience. I also like your repeat, repeat, repeat model. Put it out there as much as possible, involve as many senses as possible--see it, say it, hear it.
An adaptive teaching style stands a better chance of reaching more members of a target audience. Humans are habitual creatures. There is a direct correlation between the number of times that information is presented or repeated and the percent of information retained. The more information is repeated, the more likely we are to retain it. Good post!
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