I agree! While I know we are evaluating this in the context of a college classroom, it would be so cool to see how children responded to more experimental teaching styles like problem based learning!

I like the questions you ended with in your post! I don’t think that creative learning and memorization have to be mutually exclusive. As Siddharth mentioned above, it makes sense for some fields to memorize certain things; however, I still think that you can frame what the student “needs to know” in a way that is creative and engaging!

I can relate to your experience! I have found I also do better in classes that are applied or hands-on. I think most students enjoy this more, but sometimes wish there was the flexibility in a classroom to have students take a test on how they best learn (i.e. kinesthetic, auditory, etc.) and THEN design a syllabus or assignments around the audience we have represented in a class!

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I love that you broadened the context of the readings to teaching outside of a classroom context! In some ways, I imagine sometimes that mentoring grad students is similar to raising children. You want them to be free and independent thinkers, you should provide feedback on their work and decisions, provide correction when necessary, and often times you put in more hours than you feel like you have to give! ? I really enjoyed your post and the parallels you drew in your post.

I think this is great! I would love the opportunity to experience this! It would be so cool to live in a generation that experiences this as a norm!

This is a great post! You raised so many good points. I think asking good questions is so important but that designing the difficulty to where critical thinking is facilitated can be tricky! Nonetheless, an incredibly important one to address!

I agree with so many of your points made!!! I think the blame cycle is damaging both to oneself as an instructor, and to your students as an instructor. I love that you mentioned “the omnipresent extrinsic motivation of the omnipotent grade.” I think in so many ways, grades force a student to care or fail. This seems so self-defeating on a developmental level. Some students come to college with an unwavering aspiration of becoming X; however, many are here to “find themselves” or figure out what they’re passionate about. I would pose that grades can often be a conflict of interest for the student, and a hindrance to their ultimate purpose while on a university campus.

I think you ended your post with some great questions! I think as instructors we can strive to help students see value in whatever our course is centered around through our teaching methods (which tie into your question of intrinsically motivating them to desire knowledge through learning), but more importantly, I think we have to be okay with the fact that what makes us tick also makes us individuals. Not every student will love what we love- and that’s ok! While I don’t think that should be embraced as a teaching mentality (e.g. “they don’t love it, so whatever.), I do think it’s important to realize that success as a teacher doesn’t mean making students love what you love… sometimes I think we forget that and that this contributes to the guilt cycle you alluded to in your post. If everyone loved the same thing, we wouldn’t be debating all these pedagogical concepts, right?!

I completely agree with you! Not being graded, I think, allows for much more creativity. It allows a student to feel safe, take some critical thinking risks without fear of penalization, and receive peer and/or instructor feedback in a less formal (and often more constructive) setting! I also think this type of setting allows for collaboration, leadership skill development, and autonomy- all of which become extremely important once we enter the “real world.”

I agree! I think tests can be a very helpful learning tool. There have been many times that I thought I absorbed and studied all relevant content only to find (sometimes in going through study guides, and other times while taking the test) that I had missed something important!

I think assessment is helpful because it let’s students know if they missed something; however, I don’t think assessment necessarily has to contribute to someone’s grade in a course. What’s wrong with taking a test, getting useful feedback, and having THAT be the end of the process? No grade book, no anxiety, etc…

A friend and I were just talking about how valuable and under-rated trade education is! I love that you chose to mention this! I often think experience is the best teacher. In turn, as future professors, we need to remember to use whatever our experiences are (successes AND failures) to our advantage, and to not be afraid to admit to our students that we actually DON’T have all the answers… there actually might be someone who didn’t go the “B.S. –> PhD” route who is BETTER QUALIFIED to teach you about this topic than we are. I think too often, we get caught in the thought process that more traditional degrees = more qualified. I firmly reject this notion, and think that there is value in all forms of education. I think as individuals who are in a traditional academic setting, we need to reinforce the value of all modes of education!

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