How could your learning have been enhanced through the use of different approaches, resources etc.
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
How could your learning have been enhanced through the use of different approaches, resources etc.
EDUC 107 Learner Biography Project 
An example I can think of was in primary school. I had the same teacher for Years 4 and 5, however my Year 5 class was a 5/6 composite and my teacher did not take that well. In Year 4 she had been wonderful, not the type of teacher to get upset, but one who knew how to relate to us and enjoy our company and time. But in Year 5, I do not know if it was the stress of a composite or some other issue but she changed. There were no more jokes, just constant ‘you SHOULD already know this’. We were all terrified of her. While she didn’t really change her teaching, the enjoyment level was gone and replaced by this idea that we were suddenly meant to be more capable (I mean significantly more capable, not just the result of going up a grade) and since she’d had me already she should have known where I was at.
An example of this was the school Think-a-thon, a fundraiser in which we collected sponsorships for completely a class quiz. The idea was that the class would be given the questions to a quiz that was based on class work to go away and work out the answers and then would sit the quiz. (Of course, the class works out the answers essentially as a group.) The afternoon before the quiz my teacher announces that since we were a 5/6 class she was adding extra questions and that if we didn’t get the spelling correct on all the answers we would fail, (both of which were in direct opposition to the stated rules of the Think-a-thon). Naturally, due to my spelling issues I mentioned in a previous post, there was no way I could pass this quiz, a real blow to my self-esteem. What made matters worse she publicly denounced the two people in the class who, in her option, failed the quiz (though I had all the answers correct, including the new questions).
I have always wondered if it was the stress of the composite class (she ended out taking long-service leave and wasn’t at school for all of Term 4) that changed her, but I feel that if she had focused on where the class was at, not at her assumptions of us that we could have achieved significantly greater learning outcomes.
– Maggie
That is really interesting Maggie because I had a similar teacher at my primary school. When she first came she was SO FUN. She wore crazy stockings, bright clothes, lots of make-up and was always kidding around, jumping, she even juggled in class for her students. My older sister had her and loved her. Then 2 years later I got her. But by this time she had gone through a bad divorce and was a different teacher. She wasn’t bad or mean but she doesn’t wasn’t the fun, bubbly, lively person she had been and I (as a 9-10 year old) was very disappointed. It’s just interesting to think about how a teacher’s personal life or other experiences can be brought into their teaching and impact it significantly, even unjustly in your case. I really hope I can keep this in mind as a teacher and leave my personal life at home (though I know at times this will be difficult) so my students don’t suffer.
-Emily
Learning enhancement? Interesting. My mind immediately goes to my year 3 teacher. I could not handle her at first. She was SCARY and I cried every day of term 1 not wanting to go to school. But over the year I came to experience learning which was enhanced every minute of the school day by her teaching. On top of the usual year 3 curriculum she taught us to memorize things like “the rivers of NSW” (I can still say them off by heart), our times tables off by heart, many, many proverbs (we had to say one before we could go out to recess). She had extremely high expectations and worked on getting me to improve my handwriting, my maths and everyone’s presentation of their work. I had a friend who always had to be the first to finish a worksheet because teachers often praised these students in front of the class. When this same friend was in my year 3 class, she raced through a worksheet, quickly went up to the teacher for her praise and was screamed at in front of the whole class for her sloppy work which she had failed to take pride in, how dare she give that to the teacher as acceptable! My friend never raced to finish first again! My teacher remained scary the whole year but she was a very effective teacher.
– Emily
That’s so interesting! I never would have thought that a scary teacher would have facilitated learning. My scary teacher was my Yr 9 Computing Studies teacher. He was useless though because not only was he scary but none of us learnt anything either! But getting students to go beyond their comfort zone so that they can improve and learn from that is really great. I guess she really kept all the students on their toes because she made it clear that she had high expectations of them. Do you think some teachers just take the easy way out by not demanding this from their students or do you think it just comes down to individual teaching style?
-Sonal
I think a little less pressure to perform and not getting compared to others would have enhanced my learning. If someone had just told me that they believed in my abilities, that I was not stupid and that as long as I tried my absolute best was all that mattered. Or even that my achievements on their own were great, and not just ‘average’ when compared to others.
Furthermore, it’s amazing the things I have learnt this semester in one particular subject, that no teacher ever taught me. And if they had, I think it would really have facilitated my learning, because then they would have taught me how to learn, as opposed to just learn. For example, how to read a textbook, taking effective notes through Cornell notes, facilitating reading comprehension through read alouds, writing to learn etc. etc I could keep going. If I was taught effective learning strategies or study skills that I could apply to all subjects, I think this would have really helped me. It would have taught me earlier that no one is ‘born’ smart, they become smart through hard work and because they have been taught specific strategies for success.
-Sonal
Things that enhanced learning… for me a large part of this is based in the teachers style of teaching. You knew it was going to be a good lesson when you were told that you didnt need your text book…it generally meant that there was something more interesting planned for you. And lets be honest, if you’re a student and you have your textbook and a pretty good internet connection you can practically teach yourself anyway!
At university my i had then history lecturer that was crazy about cold war history. When you were in his class it was difficult to not be interested becuase he just knew his stuff so and and was able to engage every student in the room. Our turtorial task also forced students to get involved (which i suppose can be good and bad) when you have to create a posting on an addtional reading each week as part of your overall assessment grade. For me this seemed to work as all this suplementary reading made the lecutre material and tutorial discussion all come together instead of being really disjointed, which was the case for most of my commerce studied. I really enjoyed it when teachers were able to create a really well rounded learning ‘package’ i guess, so when you walk away from the class you do actually take a lot a way with you.
– Wendy
That’s so true! It’s scary how much information students have access to now. When I was at school, we still used books to do our assignments. But now….well let’s just say it’s not the same! So as a teacher you really do have to think outside the box about your delivery methods in order to keep students interested and engaged. And also ensure that they are learning!
-Sonal
Thinking about technologies available now I really wonder what it would be like to go through schooling now. When I think about my school experiences it feels like teachers were so limited, there wasn’t the variety. Computers were only a new techonolgy that were starting to emerge, our library was the only room with a computer for a long time (co-incidently it still has that same computer today – progress).
It makes you wonder, would I be different? Would I have achieve more or less? Would techonolgy have enhanced my learning?
I have very bad eyesight, I often struggle to read slides in lectures even with glasses. Am I lucky I didn’t spend all my school years looking at screens like that?
– Maggie
Yeah I was wondering the same thing. It’s really exciting because when we all become teachers, we will be able to use all these different modes of technology to teach students and make learning more interactive and fun! I wish the Rudd Governement would give every classroom in Australia an interactive whiteboard like they have at Macq, it would make such a big diference!
-Sonal
Looking back at all my teachers growing up, I noticed that they were using the transmissionist approach to teaching. We were just spoon-fed with all the information and our task was to memorize everything. Before I left though, things were starting to change where interaction among students were encouraged and the teachers were just there to facilitate the learning. It would be interesting to see the changes, if there are any, with how I learn if this happened at the start of my education.
Technology would have created a huge impact if the kind of technology we had today was available back when I was growing up. Kids today are very lucky because a lot of information are available to them with just a click of a button. In some ways I’m happy that we didn’t have it growing up because we learned everything the hard way. We were taught how to use the library, the correct way of doing research, and didn’t have time to slack off. Because of the technology that we have now, some kids just get so lazy sometimes.
-Francis
I’ve been thinking further on the “learning enhancement” and I have to add that my mother’s encouragement of me as a child always made me feel like I could achieve whatever I wanted to if I put my mind to it. She was always really excited about my little achievements (she even made me spell out words to my hairdresser when I was 6 because she thought my spelling was so fantastic!) and would comment about how clever I was. When I would be having “I can’t do this!” moments I would think of mum’s comments about what I could achieve and then I would be motivated to keep trying.
– Emily