Good teaching is just that.

Think about your typical class of 20 students. You know all of their names, their basic likes/ dislikes, and according to many Best Teaching Practice lists, you should know how they learn. From a quick search online, there are anywhere from 3-7 learning styles. 

If we were to believe that these learning styles were solely the way we learned, I feel that there would be a lot of wasted classroom time as we try to switch gears and tailor instruction individually for each group. The "visual learners" for example, would become disengaged and bored while the "auditory learners" are being catered to. While over learning may occur through such repetitive yet different processes, I believe that making sure the content is presented in a meaningful and sensible manner is the most effective way to teach content. For example, when teaching about color theory (the mixing of primary colors to create secondary colors, for example) I wouldn't just word for word describe what you would see if you happened to mix primary colors, but instead, I would let the students take the paint and manipulate it to see what happens. I think that considering different ways of content delivery for students who end up being lost can be helpful and prove that there may not be just one way to think about answering a question. Students are diverse in how they learn and what background experiences they bring to the table, but according to Willingham, we don't need to categorize students in regards to their learning styles. In the end, good teaching is good teaching. 

Sadly, in college- level classes (and in high school classes too, but I experienced this a lot more in college) you too often see professors just "stand and deliver", lecturing on and on about content. This disengages the student, but also may lose students along the way if the content they're discussing doesn't make sense to just be lectured on about. It's good teaching practice to have variety in pedagogy, benefiting both teacher and students. 

On Keeping an Eye on the Forest....

Through my experiences in the art world, I have learned many details and facts that I would love to share with my students. Their interests and goals for the class, however, are different than mine. While a few of them may be interested in the tiny details that I love to share, most of them are there to learn general art concepts or fulfill a credit.

While that doesn't mean that I water down their education, it does mean is that I must pull the bigger picture ideas away from the little details so as not to overload the students and push them away from the topic. As Ormrod says on page 158, "People are more likely to learn general ideas than learn words verbatim". I think when we focus on teaching students concepts rather than get lost in the little details, they are able to find more success in an enjoyable manner. Once they become interested in the topic, we can then focus more on the little details. 

The first year that I taught digital photography, for example, I had twenty point and shoot digital cameras to work with. Point and shoot cameras automatically expose for any given lighting condition. The only control that you have is over the composition- and if a point and shoot camera has different modes- such as sports mode- you may change those as an adjustment to the shutter speed. With manual cameras, you can change the aperture, shutter speed, and ISO to create different aesthetic outcomes in your photograph. 

Although many would consider teaching about exposure an essential facet of basic photography, I felt that students would not understand this concept if I taught about it without having the ability to manipulate the cameras and perform these functions. 

I learned this the hard way- taking one class and trying to teach them about aperture and shutter speed without having the cameras that could do this. I had them memorizing f/stops and shutter speeds and it just wasn't working out. For what were they trying to commit this information to memory if they didn't have the cameras that could do this? It was a disaster, and the grades and attitudes in the class reflected this. 

Ormrod says on page 190, "It's important to help students sort through essential and non essential information so that they don't lose sight of the forest because of the trees." While I believe it's important to teach students the skill of deciphering what information is important for students to learn, I believe that teachers must put this into practice as well. When I finally realized what was going on and steered the class curriculum more toward concepts of creative thinking, visual culture, elements of art, and composition, the students found much  more success and students were becoming more and more eager to sign up for the advanced photography class (where I finally was able to secure manually controlled cameras!)

Self Regulation and Behavior

Self Regulation 

People are able to modify their behaviors through self regulation. A process that takes time and requires the investment of the person who wishes to change, self regulation can be effective. 

Self Regulation requires that people:

• Set goals and standards - acknowledging that there is a behavior that needs to change and setting a goal to change it. 
• Self observe - an awareness of what's working and what's not
• Self evaluate - creation of personal standards and examining if their behaviors fit those standards
• Self react - reinforcement and punishment inflicted by oneself in accordance to behaviors and goals
• Self reflect- examining and reflecting on goals and the process of achieving or failing said goals. 

Last year, I was faced a difficult class. In a class of sixteen, I had seven students who had a difficult time controlling their own behavior when the in the presence of one another. Alone, each student was respectful and willing to do work, but when together, they were toxic. I had one student who attempted self regulation in order to change his behavior.

This student's trigger was another student in the room. When together, student A acted up in an aggressive manner. The thing was, however, that he chose to sit next to student B. When student B was absent or even across the room, he could focus and was a positive contributor to class.

One day, after a particularly large blow up, he approached me asking to drop the class because he didn't think he could continue being in the same room with student B. I knew he was enjoying the subject matter and would do well, he just needed to understand his own behavior. I refused to let him drop the class saying that throughout life, we encounter people we may not get a long with, but we come up with ways to survive. He needed to learn those tools.

Ormrod states that in the Social Cognitive Theory, humans "eventually develop their own ideas about appropriate and inappropriate behavior, and they choose their actions accordingly." (p137) Through understanding what his trigger was, he made the decision to change his own seat. He set a goal to achieve a certain letter grade in order to maintain status on his sports team. He knew that part of his grade relied on his behavior in class. He created a plan and approached me about the use of a signal if he needed to take a break from the classroom situation in order to cool off.

Behavior changes didn't happen immediately, but happened in small ways. Ormrod states that "People must believe they can make the necessary behavior changes." (142) and while my student thought he could do it, he found it was harder than anticipated. He would take break when needed, and could stay focused on a task, but often times was dragged back into social situations he was trying to avoid.

At the end of the first quarter, he wrote a beautiful self reflection on his behavior and that he was happy that he was trying to improve. He was proud of the work he did. Sadly, however, I had to deliver my response to the school suspension room. He was not taking the self- regulation skills he was developing in my classroom over to other parts of his life.

As frustrating  as that was to see, I understand that self regulation is a tough thing to do. On page 142, Ormrod states, "Techniques designed to promote self-regulation work only when learners are motivated to change their behavior." Its hard to look at oneself in this manner and ask what you can change, especially for egocentric teens. Its our job as teachers to help lay the framework for students to be introspective and teach the skills of self- regulation in order to achieve goals.