Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
being an active learner
essay about active learning
active based teaching and learning approaches
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: being an active learner
Active Learning
According to the book Promoting Active Learning by Chet Meyers and Thomas Jones and referenced by Kathleen McKinney, active learning means "(1) that learning is by nature an active endeavor and (2) that different people learn in different ways." The first segment of the definition "by nature an active endeavor" is important because it allows the student to develop her critical thinking skills as well as practice her writing techniques. The student can discuss class material in a less formal setting, which can be beneficial in creating more open-ended discussions for the student. As a teacher, promoting various learning styles is critical because one student learn differently than another.
It is an important life lesson a student to understand he will not always get his first choice of how to complete a task, whether it be a job, playing a sport, etc. Say one is at work making company brochures and suddenly a boss comes to the worker. He explains to the worker that using thicker, wider paper for these brochures will increase profitability. The worker may be upset for a while because he is unaccustomed to this new building technique, but in the long run will be glad because he learned how to design pamphlets in a different way. Much like that worker not wanting to change the paper type, a student may not want to change or add to the way she learns. The worker, like the student, fails to see a new building (or learning) method that is beneficial to her. A worker could enjoy constructing brochures with thick, wider paper which would be like students' differing learning styles. Only through learning styles and both parts of Meyers and Jones' definition of active learning, one can understand that active...
... middle of paper ...
...ey learn listening, writing, and producing creative ways to do tasks that are important as well. Through debates and discussion, the students learn how to be better public speakers and improve communication skills. The summary of another student's answer is a great way for students to realize that active learning is a cooperative process. To me, active learning involves an activity that promotes any of these ideas because these ideas help the learner discover these essential learning characteristics.
Works Cited
Asaro, Jeri. "Great Active Learning Strategies." Inspiring Teachers. 2010. Inspiring
Teachers Publishing, Inc. 28 Mar. 2010 .
McKinney, Kathleen. "Active Learning." Illinois State University.
Active learning is seen as an appropriate way for children and young people to develop vital skills and knowledge and a positive attitude to learning. It engages and challenges children and young people’s thinking using real-life and imaginary situations and takes full advantage of the opportunities for learning presented by:
According to Worthen, "these newer and innovative teaching methods are moving out the traditional lecturing method " while on the other hand according to Annie Murphy Paul, the active learning helps students to openly interact with one another and participate in lecture. Annie Murphy Paul says, "The act of putting one's own thoughts into words and communicating them to others, is a powerful contributor to learning. Active-learning courses regularly provide opportunities for students to talk and debate with one another in a collaborative, low-pressure environment". Whereas as per Worthen, "Absorbing a long, complex argument is hard work, requiring students to synthesize, organize and react as they listen". I do agree with her that it is a hard work but at the same time I also feel there is no scope of interaction for students during traditional lecture teaching. I would say the key to lecturing method is to keep them short as well as one needs to in cooperate other innovative teaching approaches like active learning. This helps students to interact with the given piece of information which promotes active thought, with the help of activities like discussions, debates , seminars, showing educational videos, application of principles etc. Students are doing more than simply listening which helps in skills development rather than just note-
Lamarche-Bisson, Diane. “Learning Styles - What Are They? How Can They Help?” World and I Sept. 2002: 268. Academic OneFile. Web. 20 July 2011.
Doing that involves an increasing mastery of skills, knowledge, and ideas." (Robinson, p. 119) The mentioned idea can be used to motivate students to participate in the learning process. The same way young children learn playing with others, the older child can do it experimenting and prove their theories. As a teacher is easy to noticed the difference between a lesson that is pure theory, and the lesson that incorporates creative factors. Students present a better behavior during the lesson, participate, interact, formulate questions and get the answers working together without
Within this essay I will show why I think the interactive learning resource we created is so fundamentally linked to the practice of ‘active learning’ and why it is so important to young peoples’ positive educational development. I will also show some of the views of leading experts and theorists as to why they view active learning so importantly, and think about what some of the obstacles may be when trying to implement active learning in the classroom. The topic we were covering in my year 1 class was ‘spring’ and we cover this topic every year with great success and the children always achieve a lot of amazing learning during this period, especially in science. We spoke about what spring meant to them and what they already knew about what happens during this time of the
Learning is defined as a permanent change in attitude or behaviour that occurs as a result of repeated experience (Sims & Sims, 1995). Understanding one’s learning style has many advantages as it can help one to identify the learning method or activities that can help to optimise the learning experience. It has been suggested that the importance of one’s learning style has been identified through studies and research on how one can maximise the potential for success and further learning development (Honey & Mumford, 2006). Learning styles are unique to each individual and are developed in childhood (Chase, 2001). We all have different personalities; therefore we all have preferred learning styles that suit us best. The way one learns depends on preference. Some learn by observing, listening and imitating others and draw conclusions from their experience. There are several factors that affect our learning style; for example, background, culture, religion and environment can have a major influence on one’s learning.
Many students are at different levels of their education. Some students retain information better than their classmates. This method of learning has given the students that are struggling the opportunity to spend time on material they are struggling on. Also, this gives students the ability
Guillaume, A.M., Yopp, R.H., & Yopp, H.K. (2007). 50 strategies for active teaching: Engaging k-12 learners in the classroom. Upper Saddle Ridge, NJ: Pearson/Merrill Prentice Hall.
One example of a way to support student’s active thinking and learning within a behavioristic learning environment would be to give the students a sheet asking
Lectures have dominated the history of education. It is time that society pushes lectures aside for a more effective teaching style; this style is active learning. Lectures need to be pushed aside due to the lack of participation that they promote in the classroom. Active learning opens the classroom up to more participation from the students rather than the teacher dictating the classroom. There are several techniques that can be used within Active learning, role-playing is one of these techniques. Role-playing allows the students to experience the subject matter first-hand, solve problems as a group, and reinforce what they have previously learned.
In my teaching, I use the principles of active and cooperative learning. As a teacher I encourage students to understand concepts and apply them to problems, rather than simply memorize information. I have observed that the students’ motivation is the highest when I incorporate real-world examples in lectures and laboratory instructions. Most impor...
Lecturing can be defined as “a speech read or delivered before an audience or class.” (Dictionary.com). On the other hand, active learning is defined by “a learning environment that allows students to talk and listen, read, write and reflect as they apply what they are learning.” (Meyers and Jones). There are many distinguishable differences between these two types of teaching/learning styles. Lecturing may be seen as simply reading as it is derived from the Latin word “to read” (Hanford). Active learning is different. It entails many different types of learning such as cooperative learning which is simply problem based learning and the use of case methods and simulations to promote active learning (Hanford). There are many other ways active learning can be used, such as one minute papers which entail students to answer a question given within a minute time frame so that the teacher may see how or if they are grasping the material (Paulson and Faust). Daily journals are another way active learning is used. They are similar to one minute papers except students record what they learned during the day (Paulson and Faust). Active learning stimulates critical thinking while lecturing only allows the student to listen and tune the teacher out.
Discussion, the active learner participates in peer discussion and any other assignment. This will help problem solving, experimentation, synthesis and other evaluation of contents.
Students are more attentive when actively involved in the learning process. By the lesson being centered on the student, they feel their role in the activity is important. Active learning is especially important in educating young children because it not only keeps student interested in the lesson, but also helps students to retain more information. “Research shows that when people are engaged in doing something rather than just listening and watching they actually learn better.” (Peterson, 1996) Being that students are learning fundamental lessons in their early childhood, it is important that they retain the information that they learn. Active learning also has the benefit of promoting attributes that employers will val...
Today I used a variety of instructional delivery methods to ensure that my students were able to accomplish the learning targets. Having different modes of instruction (direct instruction, individual writing, pair-share, small group discussion, large group discussion, etc.) allows students to demonstrate learning in a variety of ways. If students do not master a key skill, it also provides students to relearn, rework, and rethink key concepts. This type of instructional design also encourages engagement as it appeals to multiple learning styles and builds in time for me to interact with students in multiple ways (including one-on-one) (IE: Chloe can be quieter. I was able to touch base her to make sure that she understood the abstract vs. concrete exercise). Using multiple instructional delivery methods also provides me with opportunities to personally motivate students to be active in their learning (IE: Emily is very creative and likes small group work. IE: Taylor likes politics and would grasp the global climate change example IE: Big Mike works best when he has time to think individually before responding to a group. A notes handout helps him process key ideas before feeling pressured to apply them. IE: Several students enjoy speaking in large groups. Asking for examples and group participation appeals to the sense of camaraderie in the class).