You Teach, I Listen. Me Teach, You Listen.
They say that you learn more about a subject by teaching it than by simply being a student in a class where that subject is taught. I have found that to be the truth for me. When I have to teach something, I do research and I make sure I learn it well enough to be able to at least answer some simple questions about it. In some of the more effective classes I have been in the teacher has asked students to teach small portions of the lessons in class. By keeping the portions small the teacher still is able to make corrections if necessary and while the student learns more from teaching the small portion of the lesson does not overwhelm the student.
In some classes that I have had, the teacher will invite the students to tell about what we learned from the chapter we read. This technique gives the student an opportunity to teach the class what they learned, and gives them the chance to really cement that knowledge into their heads. The best way to learn something is to review it over and over. Teaching is basically reviewing out loud.
Allowing a class to teach themselves entirely is not always a good thing. If teachers were to give complete control to their students, learning would slow dramatically. If teachers left the teaching completely in the students' hands then instead of learning about The Death of a Salesman we would learn about who in the class was suicidal and why, instead of learning about how we can prevent another holocaust, we would learn about how that fat kid in class got all the free doughnuts. We would learn interesting information, but not the most important information.
When a student pays for an education the assumption is that the Teacher is a lot more expert in the subject than the student is. In order for the students to learn more about a subject they have to be fed new information about that subject. If you have a group of people who want to learn more about algebra it makes sense for the one in the group that knows the most about algebra, to teach the others what that he knows. You wouldn't want the kid who knows hardly anything at all trying to teach algebra to a bunch of people that know way more than him. For that reason, a complete freirian approach would not work.
The ideal then would be a combination of the two. A great teaching style would have some depositing of knowledge and some inviting the class to teach what they know and what they have learned. When allowing the students to teach the teacher still needs to be in control of what is happening in the class, that way you don't end up learning about the fat kid's doughnut run. At the same time, the teacher is able to use part of class to deposit new and interesting information to the students to increase their knowledge on the subject.
In some classes that I have had, the teacher will invite the students to tell about what we learned from the chapter we read. This technique gives the student an opportunity to teach the class what they learned, and gives them the chance to really cement that knowledge into their heads. The best way to learn something is to review it over and over. Teaching is basically reviewing out loud.
Allowing a class to teach themselves entirely is not always a good thing. If teachers were to give complete control to their students, learning would slow dramatically. If teachers left the teaching completely in the students' hands then instead of learning about The Death of a Salesman we would learn about who in the class was suicidal and why, instead of learning about how we can prevent another holocaust, we would learn about how that fat kid in class got all the free doughnuts. We would learn interesting information, but not the most important information.
When a student pays for an education the assumption is that the Teacher is a lot more expert in the subject than the student is. In order for the students to learn more about a subject they have to be fed new information about that subject. If you have a group of people who want to learn more about algebra it makes sense for the one in the group that knows the most about algebra, to teach the others what that he knows. You wouldn't want the kid who knows hardly anything at all trying to teach algebra to a bunch of people that know way more than him. For that reason, a complete freirian approach would not work.
The ideal then would be a combination of the two. A great teaching style would have some depositing of knowledge and some inviting the class to teach what they know and what they have learned. When allowing the students to teach the teacher still needs to be in control of what is happening in the class, that way you don't end up learning about the fat kid's doughnut run. At the same time, the teacher is able to use part of class to deposit new and interesting information to the students to increase their knowledge on the subject.
posted by Bob at 7:56 PM
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