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+--- Thread: Good Practices/Bad Experiences at teaching (/Thread-Good-Practices-Bad-Experiences-at-teaching)
Good Practices/Bad Experiences at teaching - foreign brain - 03-11-2004
There are new teaching schemes that appear to be quite effective and some old strategies that are not useful anymore to face students' needs. However not all new pegaogic system is better, and some tratidional methods have been adapted succesfully.
What is your own experience? Do you know any good teaching method that has gone well? Have you tried any useful resource with out success? Do you know a good/bad source of information?
Good Practices/Bad Experiences at teaching - fvargas - 04-11-2004
Hello everyone,
My name is Francisco Vargas. I'm a full time professor of the Chemical Engineering Department of the ITESM, at Monterrey, Mexico.
Here, at Monterrey Tech, we have been focused in 4 learning methods: Collaborative Learning, Problem-Based Learning, Project-Oriented Learning and Case Method.
I implemented the collaborative learning in my groups, in order to enhance critical thinking and improve the team-work skills.
But I think that most of the information that we received about these methods is based in results of some experiments or theories made in the US, and there should be some differences when we try to apply the same strategies in Mexico.
For example, I think that students in the US have a sense of competition. I mean, everyone try to do a homework or an exam individually. What if a person A asks for the homework (solved) of the person B? The person B obviously will refuse it. But in Mexico this is very different. Collaborative Learning is a relationship among learners that requires positive interdependence (a sense of sink or swim together). This method suggests a very heterogeneous team: outstanding students working with low performance students. The idea is that the outstanding students help the other students to improve their skills and learn. I think that this idea sounds great, but it doesn’t work in Mexican students. Low performance students don’t like homework. When both kind students are together in a team, outstanding students do everything because they think that: 1) “bad students†do a “bad workâ€; 2) “good students†must do a “good workâ€; 3) in order to do the minimum effort it's easier to do everything than teach someone else what to do.
I applied some strategies in order to push them (both kind of students) to work, but in different teams: the team A of “good studentsâ€, and the team B of “bad studentsâ€. The results were very interesting: both works were very good. “bad students†developed skills in order to “surviveâ€.
I think that the cultural (and/or historical) background of the students is very important when you try to apply a learning method.
What do you think about it?
Good Practices/Bad Experiences at teaching - lisasimpson - 09-11-2004
foreign brain Wrote:Why don't you tell us who you are and what is your experience of teaching?
I have been a teacher from K-12, for about 15 years (mainly English, ESL, Humanities and Gifted and Talented Education) and I am currenly exploring Generative learning using technology such as Moodle (which I am still trying to download with Easy PHP - does anyone have any tips??!). I am also interested in Laurillard's Conversational model. I guess I am a Constructivist - but not a radical one. I believe that students need a good facilitator (the guide on the side - not the sage on the stage) to learn [with them and to help them optimise their learning experiences. I am very interested in Eldeman's new research on Value Systems and brain research. I hope that the future can mean true differentiation for our students.