As I sat at the table during my cafeteria duty last week, I kept wondering why I was having so much trouble getting through the Symphony reading. I read, highlighted, then put it down only to ask myself, "what did I just read?" I finally figured out the reason I was not into this reading is because I am a very structured, organized person and everything in the article pretty much contradicts my personality.
I don't disagree with the points in the article: creativity, crossing boundries and even found the FedEX arrow pretty interesting, but the overall theme was a bit of a stretch for me. Sometimes I think that advocates for non-traditional methods could be dangerous for dummying down our society. I know I sound old fashioned, but I think our educational system has to find a balance between traditional and alternative teaching methods, and lately, it seems we are tilting to far in the direction of alternative education.
6 comments:
Alice, you are not alone! I too have a hard time with symphony because I am a structured and organized person. And I agree with what you said near the end of your post. There are still many times where traditional teaching styles do have a place in the classroom. As long as students are being exposed to different types of teaching in there classes, I think that alternative teaching and traditional teaching all have a place in the classroom and I don't think that one should be favored over the other.
What exactly do you define as "alternative"? I would assume the antonym is "traditional?". If traditional is "drill and kill", standard testing, lectures, and "one size fits all" approaches, then should all children get an alternative approach?
To respond to what you said Professor, I think that all children should have a combination of teaching styles: traditional and alternative. Traditional being more of the lecture style and alternative being more group work and group learning. But, both can be done in one class period.
i personally belive that the traditional style of teaching is a waste of time. Lectures, tests and any other traditional method are very boring. Those with short attention spans have to fight to keep focused. i think that as a whole we should move to a alternative more progressive approach. direct everything towards each student and get them moving with a more practical approach and do away with the boring lectures and routine methods. the contempory world is changing and education should move away from the middle ages.
Can everything be taught unconventionally?
I agree with your balanced approach idea. Sometimes I think that every education 'fad' should not be viewed as the end all be all. Most strategies and theories have their place and purpose.
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