Teachers urged to instill assignments with ‘choice and relevancy’ — from thejournal.com by Dian Schaffhauser
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
A new report from the Education Trust looks at the role of two “powerful levers” — choice and relevancy — in motivating and engaging students. This national nonprofit works on issues that disproportionately affect students from low-income families and students of color. In its new paper the organization offered guidance to help educators bring relevancy to their assignments and give students “authentic choices.”
As they concluded, “When teachers consistently offer assignments that include choice in content, product or process, students will find the learning ownership needed to stay engaged and achieve at high levels.”
From DSC:
At this stage in life, my wife and I have one of our kids in high school…our son, who is now in his junior year. He is a very intelligent young man who wants to go into acting/drama/the theater. But he is a game player. He knows how the game is played and he plays it (most of the time). He can’t wait until the next phase of life because he views so much of his current education as being forced down his throat. Many of the topics that his courses deal with are things that he doesn’t care anything about. He would much rather study topics that HE wants to learn about.
He shared two recent examples with me:
- In his acting class, his acting teacher gave some of his own personal background and how he came to be where he is today; every eye and ear were open my son said…it was completely quiet in the room
- In his econ class, the teacher shared about the value of time on investing and gave some examples involving the growth of some investments over time; again, every eye and ear was open according to my son.
These were items of extreme relevance to those classes/audiences. And the students were paying attention, big time.
Also, when given more choice, students are apt to be much more engaged in their learning — even, perhaps, developing more of an actual enjoyment of learning.
Funny (but not really) how many times we hear of adults who later on went on to love learning…but they hated school.
