Essetial questions:
Doorway to understanding.
“It is through the process of actively interrogating the content through ‘provocative’ questions that students deepen their understanding”
I wanted to start with this quote since I think the idea of “interrogating” our students is not that new; in fact, we as teachers tend to ask questions to our students in order to know how much they understand. We need to know whether they follow us or not; nevertheless, there is something that caught my attention and it has to do with the “kind” of questions we ask. Because it’s not any kind of question, it’s “provocative” questions, which makes a big difference I think, since Wiggings refers to them as the kind of questions that make our students react, whose answers are not over there but need to be discovered through discussion and reflection, stepping back into their own experience, reviewing and analyzing carefully what’s in their minds, and which probably would lead them to ask more and more questions.
Therefore, as a result, we have this concept of Essential questions, which as I already said, besides promoting understanding of a content, they also spark connections and promote transfer of ideas from one setting to others, leading to deeper understandings and new questions. I think Wiggings is also appealing to students’ personal commitment with his concept of essential questions, because what he wants to do is to sort of “wake up” students and make them react to the different proposals offered by the teacher, in order to go beyond and search reflection of ideas. Students need to be challenged in order to not get bored in classes and feel that learning is a process where they are active participants and not a pasive audience which only receives what the teacher gives. But what if teachers are not able to provoke this real interest in students? What if the questions arisen in their lessons are not challenging enough? Would students lose interest? Would they really learn?
To sum up, I would like to say that - It’s not only to know the meaning of words in a sentence, but what it really means as a whole structure.- students must be able to interpret and analyze what’s in front of their eyes, and only then we will know that they are developing their critical thinking.
Sunday, 27 September 2009
Sunday, 6 September 2009
Understanding Understanding
Knowledge or Understanding?
I think that we as teachers of English are always exposed to deal with these concepts of “knowing” and “understanding” in our classrooms, since it’s very common to find students who although might know the meanings of the words that appear in a sentence or in a short paragraph, they are unable to create or give a whole meaning to the text they read. They tend to translate, word by word, but then they realize it is not enough. Therefore, the same students come to the conclusion that knowing words doesn’t really imply understanding, they need to make meaning of the facts. It’s more than words and it is in this process that teachers play an essential role, because we must give them tools to help and guide them in this process of understanding.
Transfer as a key to a good education
According to Bransford, Brown and Cocking, developing the ability to transfer one’s learning is key to a good education, and I think they are absolutely right in their comment, because students tend to think that what is learned in the English lesson has nothing to do with History or Language, or any other subject; and when they realize that there is a slight connection between subjects they feel quite puzzled, since it is not a common practice. We as teachers must recognize that the lack of transferability in our students is not only their fault, but ours too. Because this important process should be guided by teachers, through cross-curricular work for example, which implies permanent communication among teachers, so that what is studied in the English lesson today, might be seen in the History lesson next week, from another point of view probably, but students will notice the correlation and it is going to make sense to them.
Misunderstanding
According to Wiggins and Mc Tighe misunderstanding is not ignorance but the mapping of a working idea in a plausible but incorrect way in a new situation. It’s not that students don’t get the point of the things we are dealing with in the lesson; it’s not that they don’t understand a thing. In fact, students must have some kind of knowledge in order to fail or misunderstand things during the transfer process.
I think that we as teachers of English are always exposed to deal with these concepts of “knowing” and “understanding” in our classrooms, since it’s very common to find students who although might know the meanings of the words that appear in a sentence or in a short paragraph, they are unable to create or give a whole meaning to the text they read. They tend to translate, word by word, but then they realize it is not enough. Therefore, the same students come to the conclusion that knowing words doesn’t really imply understanding, they need to make meaning of the facts. It’s more than words and it is in this process that teachers play an essential role, because we must give them tools to help and guide them in this process of understanding.
Transfer as a key to a good education
According to Bransford, Brown and Cocking, developing the ability to transfer one’s learning is key to a good education, and I think they are absolutely right in their comment, because students tend to think that what is learned in the English lesson has nothing to do with History or Language, or any other subject; and when they realize that there is a slight connection between subjects they feel quite puzzled, since it is not a common practice. We as teachers must recognize that the lack of transferability in our students is not only their fault, but ours too. Because this important process should be guided by teachers, through cross-curricular work for example, which implies permanent communication among teachers, so that what is studied in the English lesson today, might be seen in the History lesson next week, from another point of view probably, but students will notice the correlation and it is going to make sense to them.
Misunderstanding
According to Wiggins and Mc Tighe misunderstanding is not ignorance but the mapping of a working idea in a plausible but incorrect way in a new situation. It’s not that students don’t get the point of the things we are dealing with in the lesson; it’s not that they don’t understand a thing. In fact, students must have some kind of knowledge in order to fail or misunderstand things during the transfer process.
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