This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so passionate about this subject is unclear, but if Twitter chats and tweets are any indication, it is obvious that many of our connected educators strongly favor student–centric learning. Many view it as 20th century education vs. 21st century. In fact we have been having the “sage on the stage” vs. “ guide on the side” argument for quite a few decades.
Direct Instruction and Lecture are methods of education that have dominated our lessons in education for centuries. They are probably the lessons that most Americans imagine when they are asked to think of what a typical lesson in school should look like. It is the way that most content experts often deliver content to their students. Lecturing is the mainstay of college courses. The majority of the work in this model falls on the teacher to take in and understand the content and deliver it in digestible chunks to the students. This is then noted and memorized by the students for a later summative assessment. That would be the model applied from: chapter to chapter, unit to unit, subject to subject, and textbook to textbook. Both teachers and students were programmed into this model for the most part. Does any of this sound familiar?
The last few decades however have had teachers experimenting with other ways to deliver content. I remember the first time I used simulations in an integrated social studies and English project in the late eighties. It seems a little lame by today’s standards, but we were pushing the envelope back then. The classroom was noisy, the kids were all over the room, the furniture was used as anything but furniture, but we were all engaged in learning. It was active learning and not passive listening.
Moving ahead to the 21st Century we see the use of Project-Based learning, Problem-based learning, and now the Maker movement. None of this is really new, but many educators in larger numbers are newly employing it. We are seeing in more and more literature that lecture and direct instruction may not be as effective as these other forms of learning.
Collaborative learning, which has always been with us, has been turbo-boosted by technology. It once required face-to-face environment to even be considered. It was always effective, but the requirements of time and space limited its use in the classroom, and made it almost impossible outside the education setting. Technology changed all of that. Collaboration now has no boundaries of time and space. Collaborative learning can take place anytime and anywhere. Connections are both local and global. This has become the heart of connected education, and collaborative learning on a global sc
Direct Instruction and Lecture are elements of education that will always be with us. They should not however be the focus of education. Technology now provides the means for student-centric lessons. We need to educate our educators in the benefits and implementation. We also need to get our students familiar with having a voice in personalizing their learning. We cannot hold them responsible for learning, if we don’t teach them the skills of learning. This student-centric learning strongly supports lifelong learning. It creates independent learners and thinkers. It is a learning-by-doing philosophy.
The deterrents to this oncoming wave in education are few, but they are daunting. Observations by administrators are used to assess a teacher’s performance. The easiest observations to do are teacher-centric lessons. Otherwise, in a student-centric lesson, an administrator would have to observe student learning as opposed to teacher delivery of content. Although not impossible, it is a more difficult way to do things. Nevertheless, there are forms of observations that accommodate student-centric lessons. We need to prepare administrators with those tools. More importantly we need to get them as supporters of a method of teaching and learning that has not been the mainstay of education. This is a difficult task in an institution as conservative as Education.
Technology is a driving force for much of the student-centric learning. We need our educators to be at the very least literate in this relatively new digital literacy. It is not a generational thing that people over 30 cannot ever understand. It is a learning thing that teachers can be taught through collaboration, support, and prioritizing ongoing teacher learning for professional development.
The idea that content is king may just be a passing phase in education. Content should be the tool that we use to teach kids the skills of learning. What we learn should take a back seat to how we learn. Once we know how to learn, the content will come to us, as we need it. We need to prepare this generation not only to learn, but also to think critically as well. Learning and thinking are a far cry from listening, memorizing and regurgitating facts.
Besides lecture being a method of education that has dominated education for centuries, as well as being what most Americans imagine when asked to think of what school looks like, and the way that most content experts deliver content to their students, it is also the way blogs work. The blogger expounds, readers read and sometimes comment. At times a discussion evolves.
An apt analogy. The other interesting thing about blogs is that, if done well, the blogger is an expert in her field and enjoys sharing and an engaging with an audience looking to learn more about the blogger’s subject. So the blogger is naturally a life-long learner in her field. Therefore, the blogging medium has the potential, not only to serve as a lecture podium, but also as a model for young learners in terms of the critical thinking and problem solving that is involved in becoming an expert on something.
The movement from teacher-centered to student centered classroom is a paradigm shift in how information is shared in a classroom. More teachers are becoming comfortable with running a classroom this way. The discussion about how to evaluate a teacher that runs a class this way needs further discussion.
Your post does a great job furthering that discussion. Well done.
[…] This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so p… […]
[…] This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so p… […]
Reblogged this on e-Odyssey and commented:
Content may no longer be king – and teachers may need to learn to put their ego aside in order for this kind of powerful, student-centred learning to take centre stage.
Like your comment ‘What we learn will take a backseat to ‘how we learn’. Yes, in a nutshell, once we know HOW to learn, the content will come to us as we need it! AGREE wholeheartedly!!! Very well explained Tom.
Another tool for student-centric teaching is the workshop model for reading and writing. Some need to give up the lecture model one subject at a time. Workshops where students can pick their writing and reading topics are good places to start. Once students are adept at setting their own goals and good classroom routines for student-directed learning are established, bringing in multiple tools necessary for invention may feel less ‘risky’ to a teacher.
I’m not sure the teacher appraisal models (at least the newer ones) are a barrier to student-centric thinking. The Marzano research-based teacher standards and the Australian teacher standards look more at classroom climate, planning of rich assessment tasks, clarity of objectives, differentiation, and analysis of student work. I suspect the problem, if one of supervision, has more to do with admin not knowing the research, not getting into classrooms, or not giving helpful feedback.
So many pieces to the puzzle :).
[…] This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so p… […]
You’re right that it’s much harder to observe students learning than it is to observe only what a teacher does, but as a school leader who observes teachers frequently, focusing on what the students are learning leads to far richer conversations later on. One way that helps me provide better feedback to teachers is to move around during independent work time. So far, teachers seem to appreciate a more balanced view of the lesson.
AMEN! Give me the opportunity, as the Lead Learner of a school, to focus on the students during an observation instead of only the teaching – that is the zone we should all be aiming for in our schools. I am fortunate to see a lot of that in our school but the shift is not an easy one especially in this day and age of high stakes testing, accountability and being reduced to a number. With that being said, if we focus on doing what is best for our children, in this case making the necessary instructional shifts, the results could be quite powerful!
Thank you Tom!
Tony Sinanis
The problem is leadership. Teachers, right now, can still opt out of technology in their classrooms. If we have visionary leadership in place guiding and coaching teachers to integrate technology in all classrooms for all students, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. We would all be talking about other things, like how to generate even more digitally literate graduates. Until leadership supports teachers by including technology in their visions for their schools and by supporting teachers to successfully integrate technology, we will be stuck in this same conversation.
[…] A favorite blogger of mine is Tom Whitby. In his blog he talks about 20th century vs. 21st century teaching https://tomwhitby.wordpress.com/2013/11/08/20th-vs-21st-century-teaching/ […]
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[…] This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so p… […]
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I’m glad you addressed the issue regarding administrators and observations because that has often been a big obstacle that I’ve encountered–to the point where I’ve been passive-aggressively chastised because students “weren’t all on task” during such a day. Add to that the fact that 40% of my yearly evaluation is on a SMART Goal that is dependent on test scores (and as much as I try to phrase and establish my own goal, I’m still being forced to use a pre-test/post-test model) and you have an environment that discourages this type of teaching and learning.
Okay, that’s not entirely true. It’s more like, “Be thought-provoking, creative, and forward-thinking with your methods. Have them own their learning. But if they don’t pass the state test that tests how they take a test, you’re fired.”
I think that resistance–my own, included–to some methods and technologies also comes from feeling like we’re being hustled into something and pushed to buy into something we’re not sure we want. To be honest, I’m tired of hype.
If we want students to come into their own and discover things on their own, then we need to be patient with teachers who need to do the same thing with methodologies and technology. Let us play around and experiment with things before we commit instead of saying, “This is the new way, the old way is dead. Do the new way now.”
Reblogged this on HarrisonHints.
I concur with so much of this and with much of your commentary but I am struggling to find research that backs up the student-centric way of working. There is little doubt that it is a growing movement but is there any research which shows what happens under various models where teachers give up control. I would love to see this
Reblogged this on miradespacio.
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[…] reading Tom Whitby’s 20th vs. 21st Century Teaching last week, I posted his article on our ECMP355 Google+ page and my prof asked me the following […]
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[…] This week’s #Edchat was about teacher-centric learning vs. student-centric learning. It is a topic that often gets teachers actively involved in discussion. The reason why so many teachers are so p… […]