By the time our students reach third grade they have started to figure out some ways that works best for how they learn. Everyone learns differently. Some students work best in groups, and in pairs, and others know that they learn best alone, some like music while they work, others like silence. I could go on, but I think by now you the reader gets the gist of things. Learning is fun, but when a student is placed in a learning environment because they aren’t given a choice learning becomes difficult. As a teacher you will sometimes have to force students out of their “learning zone” that way they can experience new ways of learning, and learning how to manage ourselves in times where we are out of out zone because as they grow older these are just skills they need to have.
In this Ted Talk he talks about how he literally jumped out of the window to avoid reading out loud. In his talk he mentions it wasn’t until he graduated High School and joined the Military that he found out he wasn’t dumb because all of his educational career at that point in time was out of his learning style and made him feel dumb.
I think the best thing we can do as teachers when it comes to learning is not only teaching using different learning styles, but giving the student the chance and the choices to explore their learning. One of the most heartbreaking moments I have faced as an observer in a class was during a reading time where students were reading out loud to themselves with PVC “phones” to work on fluency, I was walking around and he was off in a secluded corner and as he was reading (His back was turned to me), he whispered into the phone “I wish I could read”. Now, the student could read, but Like DJ Cunningham this student had a learning disability. It’s not that this student couldn’t read, it is just reading for him was hard.
I wish that student had to choice of how to work on fluency, because if given the choice to read alone with a PVC phone or read together with another student. He would have chosen to read with another student, because he knew having someone there to encourage him to keep going would benefit him much better than getting frustrated with himself by reading alone.
Give the Students choice in their learning, and watch their love of learning grow.
