Student Driven Learning
Week 9 – EDUC454D100 – July 4, 2017
This week’s reflection question is: What does student-driven learning mean to you? We watched the TEDxWestVancouverED talk by Shelley Wright titled: The Power of Student-Driven Learning. Throughout this course we’ve been modelling student-driven learning where students take control of the class and teach it with our group facilitation projects. They decide what they are going to teach and how they are going to teach it. The group facilitation project must include environmental education/studies, quantitative approaches/mathematics, and their curricular area(s). Other than that, the freedom is theirs. We have completed 5 of 6 group facilitations and they have all been great. I look forward to our last one next class.
The irony does not get past me with this week’s class. There are no great photos to share because it was an INDOOR TEACHER DAY. It was such a downer. I left the class feeling uninspired and heavy. I facilitated most of the class and sadly we were inside the whole time. Furthermore, the activity was inconclusive and 9 students were missing my class. The dynamics were different overall and I wished that my activity worked out better than it did. We were designing Curricular Competencies for our upcoming Philosophy Presentation (aka. IGNITE) and how they would be assessed. Tough conversations. We decided to evaluate 2-3 curricular competencies as meeting or not meeting with feedback. Students will also be providing formative feedback.
The content of the Philosophy Presentation is environmental education, quantitative approaches, teaching & learning, and their subject area. The big idea is: Environmental education and quantitive approaches are embedded in my teaching practice. The approach attempts to use BC’s New Curriculum as a framework for students to demonstrate their learning. We still have to complete our vote and I hope that it will work out in the end. By the end of class, students seemed tired and listless… or that might have been me. This week’s class did not meet the expectations for the group facilitation and it wasn’t suppose to. It didn’t feel good. I’m happy that this class happened to help me realize that I want to be outside everyday with my class and students take the lead. My job is to help facilitate their learning.
