Overcoming My Pedagogical Fears
What follows is a list that represented a few of my pedagogical fears. In the past these matters have stopped me from becoming a constructivist, authentic, democratic, coherent, and post-modern curriculum designer. I have attempted to use these fears to my advantage in becoming a better educator.
Conventional Education:
A new science curriculum is in order to create a meaningful experience for young scientists. An inquiry-based approach that is rich in content and practice, arranged in a coherent manner across all disciplines, that will set the framework to illustrate how knowledge and practice must be intertwined in science education. |
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Control:
As a designer of authentic and constructivist curriculum I have liberated my ability to recognize, nurture, and build upon the genuine, play-inspired, spontaneous fascinations of my students. As Duckworth stated (1993), I try to construct situations for people to think about and I watch what they do. They tell me what they make of it rather than my telling them what to make of it. Ego:
I have tried to free myself from the role of The Possessor of Knowledge and become a collaborator with my students in discovery. By viewing myself as a learner, who asks questions with which I still grapple, who alters content and practice in the pursuit of meaning, who values students present conceptions, I also help students to demonstrate these qualities in themselves. |