Chapter I . Student Centered Teaching: definition and goals

Chapter I . Student Centered Teaching: definition and goals

Learner-centered teaching is an approach to teaching that is increasingly being encouraged in higher education. Learner-centered teachers do not employ a single teaching method. This approach emphasizes a variety of different types of methods that shifts the role of the instructors from givers of information to facilitating student learning.

Student- Centered Learning is characterized by innovative methods of teaching which aim to promote learning in communication with teachers and other learners and which take students seriously as active participants in their own learning , promoting transferable skills such as:  problem –solving, critical thinking, and reflective thinking. (Jones, 2007, p.2)

Student – centered learning is focused on each student’s interests, abilities, and learning styles, placing the teachers as a facilitator of learning. In a student- centered classroom, students choose what they will learn, how they will learn, and how they will assess their own learning.  Teacher- centered learning  has the teacher at its centre in an active role and students in a passive , receptive role. In a teacher – centered classroom, teachers choose what the students will learn, how the students will learn, and how the students will be assessed on their learning. Student- centered learning requires students to be active, responsible participants in their own learning and with their own pace of learning.

Student- centered approach allows students to actively participate in discovery learning processes from an autonomous viewpoint . Students spend the entire class time constructing a new understanding of the material being learned in a proactive way.  A variety of hands – on activities are administered  in order to promote successful learning. A student –centered approach provide students with varied tools, such as:  the use of valuable learning skills , students are capable of achieving lifelong learning goals, which can further enhance student motivation in the classroom. (Killen, 2009, p26)

In the teacher centered approach teachers are the primary source for knowledge. Therefore the focus of learning is to gain information as it is observed to the student, providing rationale as to why rote learning or memorization of teacher notes or lectures was the norm a few decades ago. On the other hand, student-centered classrooms are now the norm where active learning is strongly encouraged.

Active learning is a process whereby students engage in activities, such as reading, writing, discussion or problem solving that promote analysis, synthesis and evaluation of class content. Cooperative learning, problem – based learning, and the use of case methods and simulations are some approaches that promote active learning. Active learning engages students in two aspects – doing things and thinking about the things they are doing. (Bonwell and Eison, 1991 p.110)

 

Maryellen Weimer proposes five characteristics of teaching that make it learner-centered:

1. Learner-centered teaching engages students in the hard, messy work of learning.

Maryellen believes teachers are doing too many learning tasks for students. We ask the questions, we call on students, we add detail to their answers. We offer the examples. We organize the content. We do the preview and the review. On any given day, in most classes teachers are working much harder than students. She is not suggesting we never do these tasks, but she doesn’t think students develop sophisticated learning skills without the chance to practice and in most classrooms the teacher gets far more practice than the students.

 

2. Learner-centered teaching includes explicit skill instruction.

Learner-centered teachers teach students how to think, solve problems, evaluate evidence, analyze arguments, generate hypotheses—all those learning skills essential to mastering material in the discipline. They do not assume that students pick up these skills on their own,  automatically. A few students do, but they tend to be the students most like us and most  students aren’t that way. Research consistently confirms that learning skills develop faster if they are taught explicitly along with the content.

 

3. Learner-centered teaching encourages students to reflect on what they are learning and how they are learning it.

Learner-centered teachers talk about learning. In casual conversations, they ask students what they are learning. In class they may talk about their own learning. They challenge student assumptions about learning and encourage them to accept responsibility for decisions they  make about learning; like how they study for exams, when they do assigned reading, whether they revise their writing or check their answers. Learner-centered teachers include assignment  components in which students reflect, analyze and critique what they are learning and how they are learning it. The goal is to make students aware of themselves as learners and to make  learning skills something students want to develop.

 

4. Learner-centered teaching motivates students by giving them some control over learning processes.

M. Weimer believes that teachers make too many of the decisions about learning for students. Teachers decide what students should learn, how they learn it, the pace, the conditions under which they learn and then determine whether students have learned. Students aren’t in a position to decide what content should be included in the course or which textbook is best, but when teachers make all the decisions, the motivation to learn decreases and learners become dependent. Learner-centered teachers search out ethically responsible ways to share power with students. They might give students some choice about which  assignments they complete. They might make classroom policies something students can discuss, let students set deadlines within a given time window or ask students to help create assessment criteria.

 

5. Learner-centered teaching encourages collaboration.

It sees classrooms (online or face-to-face) as communities of learners. Learner-centered teachers recognize, and research consistently confirms, that students can learn from and with each other. Certainly the teacher has the expertise and an obligation to share it, but teachers can learn from students as well. Learner-centered teachers work to develop structures that promote shared commitments to learning. They see learning individually and collectively as the most important goal of any educational experience.

 

Student Centered Teaching Goals

1. Features

Learner – centered learning goals describe what learners want to know and be capable of as a result of a particular educational offering. In this respect, learner- centered goals are always situated, i.e., derived in a concrete educational context and taking into account all options and limitations of the context. We propose to characterize learner- centered learning goals by the following features:

• they emanate from the process of sharing one’s aspirations with the educator and optimally other learners in a particular educational setting;
• they are co- determined by educators an learners as part of their learning process;

 

• they potentially address the learner at all their levels , i.e., the  level of intellect, skills, and attitudes, and pertain to subject – specific and personal learning;
• they are facilitated by educators and /or peers as part of the educational offering;
• the degree to which they are reached or satisfied is co- assessed by learners themselves.

 

 

2. Preconditions

Based on the theoretical foundations of Person – Centered Learning, matched by our experience, we  propose a number of preconditions that need to be met in order to allow students and educators to effectively address learner centered learning goals.

 

These preconditions are:

• flexibility  and space in the curriculum to be able to react to students’ perceived goals;
• time to allow for finding, expressing and specifying learner – centered goals;
• willingness and minimal competence of students to state and share their goals; also, willingness, openness and interpersonal competence of instructors/ facilitators  to elicit students’ goals and to personally  accompany/ support  their being put into practice;
• cooperative attitude of educators and students;
• constructive relationship between educators and learners;
• assessment procedures that do not ignore learner centered achievements. Optimally , assessment contributes to and is part of learning, in that it provides and exploits inclusive access to all the learners’ inner resources , and helps to organize them effectively.

 

Advantages of Student – Centered Approach over Teacher- Centered Approach

The first step to helping students adjust to learner- centered teaching is to explain WHY this approach is the best possible way to enhance their academic success. This includes explaining how the new learning roles and responsibilities expected of them in a learner – centered classroom will allow them to better meet their learning and life goals. Perhaps the best way to help students understand why we have changed to a learner – centered practice is to simply say – this is where the research has led us. New discoveries about how the human brain learns and the subsequent recommendations for how to teach in harmony with these discoveries have guided the learner – centered approach to teaching. Our students need to see that we are following the best research  in designing our teaching approaches, just as we require them to follow the best research in doing their course work.

In Teacher –centered Approach…

• Teachers serve as the centre of knowledge , directing the learning  process and controlling student’s access to information. The focus is almost exclusively on what is learnt.
• Students are viewed as ‘empty’ vessels and learning is viewed as an additive process.
• Consequently, there is no ( or little) attempt to take into account student’s previous and/ or implicit knowledge, that is to say what learners may know already (even though ‘imperfectly’ or ‘erroneously’) about the subjects of their study.
• Teaching is geared for the ‘average’ student and everyone is forced to progress at the same rate.
• Assessment takes the form of traditional exams. These aim at making the students ‘prove’ that they have accumulated facts and information illustrated during a given course of study ( without taking much care about whether students are able to process these into ‘knowledge’ which is ‘usable’ and ‘transferable’ in both their professional and personal lives).
• Syllabi and curricula are both discipline and product –based. They portray knowledge as ‘cumulative’ and leave little or no space for the processes through which information is translated into ‘knowledge’.

 

In terms of learning outcomes this means:

• Discipline – specific oral information as the main focus of the teaching learning encounters.
• Lower order thinking skills (e.g. recall, identify, define) that allow students to pass summative assessment based on the regurgitation of ‘facts’.
• Memorization of abstract and isolated facts, figures and formulas.

The teacher prescribes learning goals and objectives based on his/ her prior experiences, past practices and state and/ or locally mandated standarts.

In terms of teaching strategies these are prescribed by the techer and are based on two main principles:

• Group – paced, designed for the ‘average’ student.
• Information organized and presented primarily by teacher  (e.g lectures, with some supplemental reading assigments).

The teacher:

• Organises and presents information to groups of students
• Acts as gatekeeper of knowledge, controlling students’ access to information
• Direct learning

The student:

• Expects teachers to teach them what is required to pass a series of assessments.
• Is a passive recipient of information
• Simply reconstructs knowledge and information, without necessarily understanding it.

The learning environment:

• Students sit in rows
• Information is presented via lectures, books and films and, increasingly, via media like Power Point (which often encourages a bullet – point approach to learning).

In Student –centered Approach…..