Adrian Gibson
First published in The Tribune on Friday, August 21, 2009 under the byline, Young Man's View.
THE home and school environment is where the transmission of moral and occupational education, discipline and the values necessary for the continuance of a society are taught--however, controversies afflicting the local education system and an annual, failing national average leave much to be desired.
Learning is described as the gaining of knowledge, understanding and/or a skill by studying or through a person's experiences. However, the exertion of effort when undertaking a difficult task and the persistence of a pupil to learn--even if it means encountering obstacles or working for longer hours--are also important facets of the learning process that are also indicative of a student's motivation to learn.
Teaching and learning should begin at home; however, it is the task quality teachers endeavour to expand upon a student's schemata, by fostering direct and active learning and employing activities that stimulates the curiosity level of students, permits pupils to express their creativity and advances the development of positive relationships with their peers.
It is important for teachers to incorporate a variety of teaching methodologies and/or instructional alternatives in their lessons. Strategies that can be utilized in a social studies classroom, for example, can apply across the disciplines; however, to account for the various learning styles and multiple intelligences, the most memorable teaching strategies solely depend upon a teacher's own creativity.
I have found that the demonstration/modeling instructional alternative (dramatizations, illustrations, pictures, outdoor events, tactile activities, etc) is an effective aspect of teaching whereby teachers and learners are on display and, most importantly, engaging others.
Teaching strategies must be expansive, so as to incorporate those students at the lower cognitive levels and foster student-centred activities that lead to constructivist and discovery learning.
Student-centred instruction refers to teacher-guided instruction that focuses upon inquiry and information processing skills. It also can be discussed in the context of sub-categories such as individual and group investigation whereby an entire class could simultaneously conduct research, setting individuals or small groups to look into a specific aspect of research or to research different problems.
The drill-and-practice teaching methodology is another effective teaching strategy that is designed to support previous content instruction.
It supports the behaviorist view that "associations are most likely to be reinforced when feedback occurs in immediate conjunction with the stimulus (coursestar.org). Moreover, the independent study methodology equips learners with opportunities to work alone, express their viewpoint and individually shine--after all, there are some students who do not work well in groups.
Ranging from simulated events (role plays) to summarizations to quizzes to competitive activities to oral presentations to rewarding students by simply adjusting the seating arrangements of students based upon their average grade at certain points during a semester, strategic approaches to education must be based upon stimulating and/or performance-based events.
According to Anita Woolfolk (2001), social interaction is important to learning because higher mental functions such as reasoning, comprehension and critical thinking are fostered and shared, and then internalized by pupils. Educational theorist Edgar Dale's cone of experience also espouses the enhancement of student comprehension via direct and active experiences during lessons.
I have discovered that learning is the ability to deal constructively with the complexities, confusion, repetitions and ambiguities of life. It is a cooperative, reciprocal process between people, educational materials and their surroundings. Viewing it from the angle of the late educational psychologist David Ausubel, who developed the theory of expository learning, learning (and teaching) is initially a broad, general ideal that eventually moves into the learning of more specific concepts.
Nineteenth century early childhood psychologist Lev Vygotsky's theory of assisted and constructivist learning, Ausubel's theory and the concept of active learning are merely a few views promoting the direct involvement and participation of students in the learning process, instead of the archaic rote and passive chalk-and-talk method.
According to Vygotsky, providing examples along with scaffolding (over time adjusting the level of guidance to fit a student's current performance), allows people to grow independently. Jerome Bruner, another educational theorist, espoused the view that classroom learning should take place through inductive reasoning--that is, by using specific examples to formulate a general principle (Woolfolk, 2001). Dr Bruner's spiral curriculum is an outlook that I personally find appealing, as it shows that students can learn if they are engaged in the discovery of knowledge and also the discovery of themselves--step by step.
For teachers--particularly those new teachers--their initial approach to developing a philosophy of teaching should include an evaluation of their pupils' learning styles, as advocated by educational philosopher Carl Jung.
The acquaintance of what education is, and what its intentions are, seems to play an important role in the support of those institutions--socially, politically and financially--that are devoted to the training of our nation's minds and in ensuring that they hold a respected place within a society that has been dominated by political cowards, favouritism and bureaucrats rather than by intellectuals. Frankly, it seems that quite a number of folks at the Ministry of Education, as well as scores of the so-called educational stakeholders (parents, some teachers, government), are merely space cadets who are hardly acquainted!
The search for identity is today a common theme in the sociology of education.
If there is no reformation of the curriculum, no will to incorporate the public and educational stakeholders in the implementation of a long term educational plan and no forthright attainment of a balance in school affairs and education is arrived at, then truancy, unruliness, a lackadaisical attitude, failing grades and the promotion and graduation of dumb school leavers will continue to afflict our society and the educational system.
