While education and curriculum evolve each year, most classrooms have looked the same for decades: rows or groups of desks with a teacher standing at the front. But many teachers have started to question and rethink traditional teaching methods in favor of a more collaborative, experimental classroom.
Positive, productive learning environments are key to students' academic, emotional and social success in school. Unfortunately, positive learning environments don't just happen independently–they must be created. Many components go into making a positive learning environment for students.
Dr. Thomos, in his Ted lecture, posits that learning, in general, is based on three areas :
engaging passion
imagination
constraint.
We need to listen to our students about what they are interested in and what motivates them, and based on it, we should reflect and adapt our teaching methods.
Our current approach with standardized testing is not helpful for our kids. Because of this, we are forced to prepare our students for particular tests by repeatedly practicing skills on the same tasks, and it cuts our time from engaging our students’ imagination.
Teachers are not content; they should explain a new material to their students, show the different areas where it can be implemented, and show available resources where students can get more profound knowledge on each new topic. The learning process shouldn’t be centralized on teachers and fulfilling teachers’ expertise; instead, it should be focused on students. We should give our students more flexibility with curriculums and how they obtain information. But at the same time, our students need an instructor who can navigate them and check their achievements.
Whether you modernize your physical spaces, teaching techniques, school technologies– or all of the above – your students will benefit from the effort to create a more effective learning environment. When children are more engaged, they are more likely to learn. And that's the goal for all educators.
References.
ChangSchool (2015, December 14). Dr. Tony Bates on Building Effective Learning Environments [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xD_sLNGurA
Harapnuik, D. (2015, May 09). Creating Significant Learning Environments (CSLE) [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZ-c7rz7eT4&t=2s
TEDxTalks. (2012, September 12). A New Culture of Learning, Douglas Thomas at TEDxUFM [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lM80GXlyX0U&t=1s
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