Tom’s opening
observation was that the more effective students are at being able to read,
above all comprehending what they read, the more they are liberated to be
independent learners. He followed up with
the further observation that adaptability to the rapid changes expected in the
job market over the next decade made independent learning essential.
Even in the
junior school years students can be given opportunities to learn independently
of their teacher. Around 5 years of age
or even before they often become rather dogged about wanting to do things
themselves. Tom observed it in his
youngest 5 year old granddaughter who was just in the first stages of being
able to read and now was a little impatient when he was reading her a story,
wanting to try and say the words for herself.
Other
appropriate challenges are to set up a situation for the child to observe say
the details of a large flower and describe what they see, even print and/or
sketch what they see if they have developed these skills. As they become older and develop more learning
skills what can be achieved as independent learners obviously becomes more
complex.
Tom was
thrilled when he recently observed at close quarters a year 5 student write a
quatrain format poem about Emperor Penguins, then search the net for an
appropriate picture, positioning it under the poem, followed by referencing the
source of the picture back to the URL from which it had been sourced. Already this youngster was sensitive to the
notion of sourcing information. Her
quick and accurate computer skills blew Tom’s mind. And so on into the assignments of the
secondary school years.
As part of
teacher in-service within a school Tom felt that it was worthwhile for the participants
to discuss the sets of skills that were needed for independent learning for age
appropriate levels. An effective
prescribed curriculum should and usually does contain such skills as learning
outcomes. He was concerned that students never be set tasks that were beyond
them thus leading to frustrations and even a loss of confidence. He made
special mention of skills with calculators and computers as well as reiterating
the basics of being able to read and write as noted in the opening paragraph above.
Tom suggested that it was likely the Panthers would be straining at the leash to carry out
independent learning tasks. Teachers
could well utilise this desire setting the Panthers loose on an assignment
enabling more time to be spent on direct teaching with the Jaguars and
especially the Leopards in classes where students were a heterogeneous group in
terms of general ability. This would be
more relevant at primary school level where no cross setting was in place.
Setting
projects to be done at home was an area of concern for Tom. It is well known that the parents do a lot of
the work just to get the task done and this defeats the purpose. This did not preclude the parents from
helping. Tom knew that teachers would
need to constructively educate parents about relevant contributions that they
could make. Tom recalled that one of his
teenage sons was tasked to write a poem.
He came to Tom for help. Tom
decided to also write a poem and with tongue in cheek sent it off with his
son. The teacher marked Tom’s poem and
enjoyed the joke. This set Tom to musing about one of his pet dislikes,
homework.
Apart from a
parent hearing their young child read and assisting with projects within
teacher guidelines as described above, Tom was totally opposed to homework for
primary school students. He was reminded
that the French had recently banned it in government primary schools. He accepted that at secondary school level
there would be a gradual increase in students needing to do school work outside
school hours.
He was firm
in his view that teachers needed to educate their secondary students on the
difference between homework and study.
Homework was the completion of work that had not been finished in class
time. Tom knew that effective teachers
motivated their students to get as much done in class time as possible, keeping
on task and thus minimising homework.
Effective teachers also pointedly educated the students in how to
study. He described study as students organising
the work for a particular topic and spending some time learning the facts,
practising the processes, writing the paragraphs and so on in readiness for
tests and/or exams. He was aware that
until students accepted that some facts or processes just had to be learned by
heart so that they could be recalled or replicated easily, they would
struggle. This principle was relevant
across a range of subjects for example mathematics and chemistry.
At the risk
of being branded old-fashioned Tom had something to say about the oft heard
statement in schools that students had to be responsible for their own
learning. He indicated that this view
needed to be discussed in teacher in-service so that a balance would be agreed
to between the role of direct teaching and independent learning. He knew that no effective teacher would shy
away from necessary constructive supervision of each student’s output. In crude old fashioned parlance Tom chuckled
as he used the term teacher marking of student output.
He knew that
effective teachers constantly used over-the-shoulder supervision in class time
as the students completed tasks such as writing, sketching, mathematical
calculating in their notebooks, pads or on their tablets. He would not resile from the need to have
students as soon as possible understand that what they presented on the paper
or the tablet was for an audience, namely their teacher. If the teacher could not decipher what was
written because of poor spelling, handwriting or figuring then something had to
change. He was particularly fussed about
accurate setting out of mathematical algorithms. He advocated that these setting out standards
be set firmly but constructively. He
mused about teachers who kept samples of work for each student that displayed
the level the teacher desired. When a student
strayed there would be a positive discussion about the sample that was stored
by the teacher : a resetting of
standards if you will. There might even
be a rewrite of a part of the current work so that the student could display
the standards required. It was a very
positive process that worked.
At the risk
of sounding even more old-fashioned Tom advocated that part of the over-the-shoulder
supervision should find the teacher signing off and dating on each page of
student work. As a student consistently
reached the desired standards the teacher supervision could decrease,
especially for secondary students. Tom
became distressed when he saw student output from year 12 secondary students
where there had been no obvious overt teacher supervision such as signing the
page and the output was a mish mash with no regard by the students for any
audience, including themselves when they might need to carry out revision
study. At year 12 level the oft used
teacher defence was that these students were old enough to be responsible for
their output. Tom felt it was up to the
teacher to know when to draw back from the close supervision.
At primary
school level Tom was aware that students are often allowed to mark their own
output, for example mathematical algorithms.
Without the teacher over-the-shoulder supervision described above this
can be disastrous. He was reminded of a teacher of a middle primary class who
let the students mark a lot of the own mathematics algorithms without much
checking by that teacher. The result was
students marking as correct many incorrect algorithms. For Tom even one class
doing this was one class too many.
Fortunately Tom had great faith in the professionalism of the greater
mass of teachers and this continued to give him comfort. Teacher positive feedback through such
over-the-shoulder supervision usually lifted the self-esteem of students.
It seemed to
Tom that this might be the place in his treatise to discuss the notion of
student laziness. He knew that it would
be very rare that laziness as an accusation would appear in the reports to
parents from contemporary schools.
However he was aware that teachers being human could not help having thoughts about a student’s lack of application that could be ruled as
laziness. Tom of course knew that it was
useless to brand students as lazy. If
their application was suspect then it was up to the school to find out why and
resolve the issue. A student might
appear to be lazy but it could be a symptom of many situations such as:
…….poor
teaching, where the teacher was under prepared and offered learning experiences
that were not very appealing to the students. It might even be the way the
teacher communicated with the students including not listening enough to their
inputs.
……the student
was experiencing an unsettled home life for a multitude of reasons;
……the student
was experiencing playground bullying;
……the student
was feeling unwell.
*************
Now Tom began
to sharpen his focus on to academic learning.
May the Force be with you!
GD
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