Saturday, September 05, 2009

Student Directed Learning

Jackie West (Resource Teacher Learning & Behaviour Maori) and I ran a workshop on Thursday for teachers from two local kura. As part of the session we delved more deeply into the issue of teacher directed versus student directed sessions: what each would look like in a discovery time session and how to make the shift toward giving students more control.

As teachers we are generally very good at directing the action and feel very comfortable doing so, but it can be quite a scary prospect to pass control over to the students.

One of the discussions centered on what the shift might look like.

Teacher directed session
"This is the card we are going to make for father's day. You can cut out these flowers and stick them on and write a message to dad inside."

Teacher /student shared session:
"I thought some of you might like to make cards for father's day so I've put some paper and card out for you." (teacher)
"Has anyone got any ideas for how they might do this?"

Student directed session:
"Can we make cards for father's day?" (student)
"What ideas have you got for doing that?" (teacher)
"What might you need?"

Change happens slowly, and the move to a student directed session may take time. Teachers need time to learn to stand back, while students need time to realise that they really can direct the action.

No comments: