2. Constructivist approach creates a good atmosphere where the students start to work together and think of a variety of ways to complete the activity instead of one way. Students begin to learn how to figure things out by themselves without having someone to always tell them. A belief a trust begins to develop within them. Another benefit would be the thought process that gets developed in the child. This can cause them to remember measurements to a higher level rather than if they just were taught with the ruler first. They begin to really think critically and problem solve. Some draw backs is the time it took to really figure out the answers. Using up so much time takes away from other things they really could be learning if they had proper instruction. Also they never really found the best way to measure, but they did realize the importance of measuring with the same thing every time. By doing this as a whole class there may be some who don't really understand it still. The other students may represent understanding of the concepts but others may sit quietly and still not know. In this particular instance I don't believe the benefits are worth the cost. Mainly because of the time it took to learn such a simple subject. I think that in other situations constructivism would be more beneficial than the traditional didactic approach to learning. I do believe having a balance is what we need. Constructivism is great for student learning. It has the students think and develop critical problem solving techniques that wouldn't be gained any other way. There still needs to be proper instruction and guidance from a teacher to show the proper way to go, but having a student develop the characteristics that a constructivist approach brings can only be developed through the child's exploration of knowledge.
3. Constructivist lessons create an atmosphere of learning. The students feel free to discover without the fear of failure. You are giving the students an opportunity to learn and discover for themselves. In this study you see the process the students go in. First no one had an idea, or at least felt comfortable enough to share, about what to do. The students went first to the visual appearance of the instructions to maybe get hints of how long the boat was. Three was the answer they got because the word edict started with an "E" and it looked like a three. Here you see basic thinking of something they have previously learned, but as they continue to think about the problem you see more critical thinking come to play. Having Tom state his experience with the doctor begins critical thinking for the whole class. Constructivism approach helps the students to build upon ideas whether its their own, another students, or the teacher. This approach makes the students think for themselves rather than the teachers ways. The teacher in this case study was great to bring questions that continually made the students think even more critically. In this case study you could see the students using previous experiences that related to measurements to learn how to measure this boat. For example Mark had an experience with how they measure horses he implemented that into his thought process. Allowing the students to think and share their ideas creates them to think critically. It is a great way for students to really learn, feel, and understand a concept.
4. Yes I would think so. You find yourself in life always trying to measure things to hang on the wall, or the distance away from an object. Many of times we are found without a measuring tape. The fact that they critical thinking is a life concept that you use everyday with so many things.
No comments:
Post a Comment