Accountable

What works!? The 21^st century educator whenever in front of his lesson plan should ask this question. How could such important ideas reach the minds of intended recipients, and linger there, at least until they could be of good use? What the educator can do is to make use of effective methods. This would require certain level of creativity, this would require a strategy. And these methods are the things we discuss in our class. We aim for effective teaching; we aim for liberation from the traditional dogma that has been prevalent in our education system. We go for the creative approach.

But what to do when many methods are available? Can an educator just select randomly? Is a lecture always applicable? Will a round table or demonstration be as good as discussion at any given situation? The answer is obvious; the learners should determine the method to be used. We cannot force a case study to those who do not possess prior knowledge of the topic. Learners cannot brainstorm over something they do not know about. Students should not be given long lectures when what we want them to learn is how to swim. The task of the educator then is to know what card to play for every particular game – to use the right method at the right situation. But it is also his task to know first all the cards, all the effective methods in teaching. Limited cards would mean limited option; and limited option would mean limited strategy. So we educators are accountable for two things here – we should know what works; and when to use it.

A Notice

There was a time when a child was born. The world was too busy to notice, the people didn’t mind. His parents found a stable, and there he lay, welcomed by shepherds and wise men. The hosts of heaven watched and seemed to wonder why the prince of heaven would do such a thing, why the world would miss such a thing, and why God would allow such a thing. And so, the virgin and her husband, the shepherds and the wise men praised the God of heaven, for bringing into the world the Savior, the promised Messiah. The angels sang with them, all of heavens sang with them, all of creation sang with them, all except man.

There is this time when we remember the child who was born. We celebrate his day with exchange gift activities and noche buena; with thought of salary bonuses; of things to give and things to receive. We utter a short prayer and rush to the mall where it’s business as usual, do a long shopping during a time when discounts are high, and prices are low; in a place where everyone is so busy acquiring things and buying things; with the help of attendants who were not allowed to take a leave because it’s business as usual; and we rush back home mindful that, for crooks, it’s high time, and also business as usual. Everyone is excited, everyone seems to be, so excited about what's in store for you and me. And all the hosts of heaven watched and wondered, why the world, just as before, failed to notice the main thing; why man is always thinking, even during such a time, of the lesser things. Because now we have reindeer, and snowmen, and a fat guy on a red suit, who knows what more may come; there is just so much out there, it’s become hard to notice what’s to notice. And so this very lovely day, these have become to many the X-mas way. With little thought about the reason for the season, we utter to him joyful songs and declare our praise; but the angels in our singing will not join, and all of heavens and all of creation in our invitation of praising him shall decline.

Convergence

Have you ever tried fried ice cream, or how about an ice-cold coffee?

This concept of mixing contrasting substances arouse our curiosity for imagination and leave us thinking of other ways of approaching conventional things. Ideas like these gave birth to new businesses, some of them a little bit familiar, like Starbucks perhaps. And so, I kind of wonder how it would be like bringing this concept to teaching. What inspired me to dwell in such idea was the last church service I attended. There’s this pastor, a bit old already, but still on his prime; with a speaking voice so well-modulated, you can imagine hearing a newscaster preaching. His message was about the fall of Jericho under the leadership of Joshua. And so I took out my pen in order to take notes. He started with a video presentation of the fall of Jericho, which was probably taken from YouTube or a movie. I’m sure it grasped everyone’s attention, perhaps even those who were about to sleep. And I got kind of surprised because it is the first time he did that on a preaching service (you know when people get used to your redundant and familiar style, they don’t expect you just trying out something new). And considering the age factor, one might expect multi-media effects from a younger pastor, but probably not from someone of a later age; you would expect older pastors dwelling more on oral expository preaching. And what's more, in order to make an argument, he pointed to a scene from the movie Lord of the Rings; and then went for jokes and funny stories from time to time; and I was just astounded – he just never did these things before. His message was creatively clear, and highly retainable, I did not find the need to jot down. It’s amazing how he adapted to modern ways and incorporated them to his style. It’s like buying an ice cream, and it’s not frozen but hot; it’s like sipping a coffee, and you expect it's hot but it's not, its cold with lots of ice in it - you expect something good, you get something even better. The old accustomed expository style got merged with modern technology and contemporary ways, and suddenly, someone is twice as effective. Now, whoever said you cannot teach old dogs new tricks? Perhaps whoever said that is right – the old dog learns new tricks by itself.

The Strategy

Use activity in your lesson, try it out as a starter,
   Allow the learners to express what they already know,
     And make them realize ‘already’ could turn better.
Don’t forget analysis, and process that activity;
   To clarify interpretations, to connect assumptions with reality,
Don’t obstruct the abstraction, they might be missing some points,
    reinforce the lesson thrust, and connect all the joints,
End it up with application, don’t settle for just interpretation,
    Need to test it in real situations, go for active experimentation.

baw!

I was planning to write a simple blog when I thought of doing this. Don’t mind the childish rhymes, I just wanted to try something different. 

 On a more serious note, I think this experiential learning approach, also referred as andragogy really is effective. The four-fold structure of “know what student knows”(activity), “clarify what they know and do not”(analysis), “add more to what they have”(abstraction) and “test new learning into real life situation”(application) is definitely a must strategy to be incorporated in our attempt at educating the modern students. Gone are the days when they would spend hours listening to long lectures, and just long lectures. We teachers should in a sense be like google in providing relevant information, like facebook in delivering diverse perspectives and like wiki in filtering wrong presuppositions. We should aim for the four-fold system of the andragogy instead of the one sided “just take note and listen” methodology. 

The Faithful

I had another day of meaningful learning experience from our CTM class. Got another chance to evaluate what we have been practicing nowadays in terms of educating students. Truly, as what was implied in the discussion, teachers are blessed by God with such a significant responsibility. That is to educate our students the best possible way, to carry our task faithfully, and hope that what we teach will stick in their minds and be used to advance worthy cause. And we are to continually develop and improve our craft because our learners’ educational needs are also growing continuously.

We ought to always consider the learning styles of our learners. A teacher who always pushes for personal preferences would always end up not teaching much. What we should strive for is to understand the context of our learners, to realize that each one has his/her own learning style, in a sense, to be faithful in our practice. But then, what faithfulness are we referring to? Faithful practice of teaching seems very hard to determine. How can one say that he/she is faithful in his/her role? Of course there are evaluations and the likes, results of evaluations would determine if one is doing his/her work. But will evaluation be the sole determinant of one's faithfulness? Have we thought of asking ourselves, in what way am I being faithful in my task – a teacher faithful in the task of teaching? I think it would boil down to our personal conviction. In the case of a believer, faithfulness in teaching would be in a sense faithfulness to God in the task that was entrusted. We teach because God assigned us to, and we give our best because it is God who assigned. If I can honestly say to myself that I've given everything for this task of teaching, when giving everything means getting everything (equipping oneself to the fullest), in order to be able to give many things, then perhaps I could say that I have.

My First Class in CTM

Had a great time attending my first day in Creative Teaching Methods. Was not expecting the class to be so small, nor expecting all my classmates would come from the CE group. To be honest, I felt a little bit out of place but the warm welcome of both my professor and classmates made me feel at ease.

I believe I'll enjoy my time in this subject, probably as much as I've had with Educational Principles and Methods. Our teacher Prof. Son seems to be a very cool guy. He seems to be so energetic and excited to share to us what he knows. Looking forward to more learning and more bonding time.

We discussed in our first CTM class the difference between how adults learn and how the younger generation does. I kind of like the idea that Prof. Son allowed the group to discuss the matter on their own. That way we drew a lot of information coming from experiences of each one. That's really a learning experience, when teachers (as I believe each of us are) try to discuss diversities in learning style. It turned out that adults are the ones who need more facilitating and the youth more instructing.

The teaching experiences that our professor shared with us opened my mind to the reality of this generation in terms of education. Got kind of reminded again about the present teaching systems, that we are really far off compared to other countries. There are really a lot of things we need to change. It is not enough that we add more school years, but that we should adopt to better ways of teaching. I have a lot of respect to each and every teacher, and there are a lot of teachers who are very good, but generally speaking, there seems to be a need for the educator to be educated first, be educated in how to educate better. Pls. don't get me wrong, efficient or not, still the presence of teachers in school contributes much to molding of the students. It's just that because the future of our country depends so much on the kind of education the now generation is getting, the now teachers should no longer depend so much on what used to work before. They need to provide the education of the right kind. There are lot of teaching strategies that has now been developed and it would really benefit our country if they are used and maximized by each and every school that we have. And so, subjects like Creative Teaching Methods would really help if taught to teachers, of which I am one.