1) There were 4 learning environments discussed in "How People Learn" Chapter's 6 and 7. These were learner, knowledge, assessment, and community based. The learner based environment focuses on giving the student the responsibility to learn the information through predictions and using their previous knowledge. The knowledge based approach is similar to the learner based in that the learner is very active but the type of instruction is more structured. In the assessment approach the teacher receives feedback through either formative or summative types of assessments. The community based instruction makes the classroom feel more like a family in which students do not feel threatened in the classroom. This relates to what we have learned in the cognition text by applying all of the cognitive principles to classroom instruction in order to achieve higher student achievement.
2) I think that the reason why math is moving quicker in Japan is that we have so much info to cover that we have to skim the top of everything. We are not doing our students any good this way. We are doing this because of the guidelines set by the state tests. Why do we continue to do this? Wouldn't it benefit our students if we had more time to try the learner based instruction where they would learn the material in more depth?
3) In my math classroom, I think that I take on a community based approach. The students feel comfortable in class. They know that mistakes are okay because we learn from them. I don't really make my students raise their hands to answer or ask a question. They are welcome to ask a question at any time during the lesson. I receive constant feedback by asking questions constantly. This would be an example of formative assessment. I would love to have more time to give the students the chance to do more with learner based environments. This would help the students have a deeper level of mathematical understanding and they will retain the info over time in their long -term memory.
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Yes it would benefit our students if teachers felt like their jobs did not revolve around test scores. If teachers felt like they had more time to devote to fostering learning opportunities that would allow for mastering of concepts instead of simply exposing students to as many concepts as possible, we would see improvements in all areas.
ReplyDeleteGood point you brought up here.
I agree that state tests are driving what we teach and what we are teach is a great deal. My students love to share how they problem solve and I feel that is one improvement of today's math lessons...students are encouraged to solve the problem in the way they understand it. When I was learning math, you learned the formula rather than manipulating and discovering. I have an aide in my classroom. She is a retired teacher and can be a character-She will blurt out a comment from time to time about how she has learning so much in being in third grade math with them...or wow, I use to just do the formula now I get it. So I think in some ways we have grown in education...we just need to keep working at it.
ReplyDeleteI think its a great thing for students to understand the benefit of learning from their mistakes in a community environment. It is a very beneficial way to learn. Especially when one student makes a mistake and there are others that made the same mistake, they can learn from each other, which is an advantage to their understanding just as much as hearing it from the teacher. They need to understand that is all part of the learning process and feel comfortable in discussing their questions and problem solving to find the correct answers.
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