[AWB小组第二次作业]Amblue's Issue51

amblueUID: 2264518

The speaker asserts that the only way to make an education of a child effective is to exactly follow the child’s individuality and personal needs. While I contend that excessive obediance of a child’s own mind would undoubtly hurt the effeciency of truly education, I agree with the speaker otherwisem. In fact, the tuth is that traditional teaching method—teacher centered classroom management has been proved less effective than the newly pavelant teaching method—student centered classroom management. And the latter just substitute for the traditional method gradually.

Admittedly, when children’s needs and interests are to meet unconditionally under educational situations, there would be a chaos in class time during which those naughty children would dominate the classroom and pay little attention to acquiring knowledge. As we all know, children are incapable of working concentratedly by themselves since their minds havn’t matured enough of setting priorities that work always comes first and of behavior properly. Comparing with sitting still in the classroom comsuming their energy and brain to learn something that seems like would not be useful in the rest lifetime, children would rather playing in the outer world or do some practical work, at least from their perspect at the very time.

In order to solve this problem, the traditional teaching method is letting the teacher rules the class and play the dominating role. This is, nevertheless somewhat dull and monotony, effective of pushing students learn. But then, teachers and parents found that without adults’ supervision children always lose the motive and passion for learning. What’s wrong? In fact, children are playing a surbodinate role in the learning circle. The only thing they need to do is to follow the instructions from teachers and parents or other adults,which results in lack of sense of self-responsibility and self-motivation. The true education is a lifelong self-awareness in one’s inner heart. With it, one can learn from life; without, one would learn nothing even under the supervision of adults. When the society became aware of the problem that the traditional means of teaching will never serve for the ends of true education, it turns to the student centered teaching approach.

Student centered teaching lies at the core of any effective classroom. Any teaching method, any instructional material, and any activity must be evaluated on its use of student centered principles if we want these methods, materials, and activities to teach students effectively. In student centered teaching, we center our planning, our teaching, and our assessment around the needs and abilities of our students. The main idea behind the practice is that learning is most meaningful when topics are relevant to the students’ lives, needs, and interests and when the students themselves are actively engaged in creating, understanding, and connecting to knowledge.

Students will have a higher motivation to learn when they feel they have a real stake in their own learning. Instead of the teacher being the sole, infallible source of information, then, the teacher shares control of the classroom and students are allowed to explore, experiment, and discover on their own. The students are not just memorizing information, but they are allowed to work with and use the information alone or with peers. Their diverse thoughts and perspectives are a necessary input to every class. The students are given choices and are included in the decision-making processes of the classroom. The focus in these classrooms is on options, rather than uniformity. Essentially, just as a professor said "learners are treated as co-creators in the learning process, as individuals with ideas and issues that deserve attention and consideration".

Student centered teaching has been proved effective in its ability to teach students the material they need to know. For example, numerous studies that followed students who were taught in the student centered approach found that not only does student motivation increase, but actual learning and performance do as well. Students taught in a student centered classroom retain more material for longer periods of time. In order to learn, the brain cannot simply receive information; it must also process the information so that it can be stored and recalled. The active nature of the student centered approach helps students actually work with information, and therefore learn it and store it.

In a word, the student centered approach helps design effective instruction for every member of the classroom, no matter what his or her diverse learning needs. And by its nature, student centered teaching is adaptable to meet the needs of every student. In a student centered approach, it is the students themselves who are responsible for the success of a lesson and therefore they tend to feel more responsible for the success of their own learning. This is what can be called true education.

(790words)

[ 本帖最后由 amblue 于 2007-2-10 19:34 编辑 ]