So, I have always considered myself a good teacher. I teach all ages of high school and kids like to take my biology classes. I get along with all kinds of student. I have been doing this for 20 years and it wasn't until THIS year that I realize that I could have been doing SO much better. You see, I now have my son in my classroom taking AP biology. I now see how students view and do the work I assign. I now see that I have been doing it wrong for 20 years (well, if not wrong, then poorly).
I usually assign a study guide and reading from the text as homework. Well, last week I read @ichrislehman post on research in education. I thought about it and realized that I was guilty of telling kids what to research. So with my AP class, I tried a bit of a simple experiment, one that I could not do without my son in the class to observe his at-home work actions.
I assigned my normal 2 page study guide on fermentation (alcoholic and lactate) for them to do. This study guide is as comprehensive as I could make it with all of the information they needed to know. I also assigned them to summarize this question: How are muscle contraction, beer and bread making related?
I then was able to observe my son as he worked. It took him approximately 15 minutes to complete the study guide. He had his book in front of him but, rather than reading it, he merely looked through the text for the answers or copied down the diagrams as necessary. He then attacked the question. 5 minutes in, he says "this question is dumb." "I can't find the answer anywhere." Being a pretty good student, he spent another 20 minutes poring over the text before slamming it shut. I asked him what the problem was and he said "I have no idea how to answer that question." I then asked him why not? "I can't find the answer in the book." What he meant was: "I am so used to just looking for the correct answer, I have no idea how to RESEARCH and CONNECT to come up with an answer that works." After thinking for a while, he logged on to a computer and managed to come up with a response but then said , "But I have no idea if it is right or not."
All I could think is...why have I not done this all the time? He spent far more time and learned WAY more by trying to answer one simple question than he did on the whole 2 page "study guide". AND his answer is not really copyable. In other words, anyone can do the study guide and give it to everyone else...not everyone can come up with an original response to a research question.
I think we have been shortchanging kids in education for a long time now. We have been teaching our kids to "use the glossary" and "look it up in the dictionary" and " fill out this study guide (which to students means test review guide) and memorize it and you will get a good grade" when we should be getting them to see connections and answer simple questions with deep meaning. If I can get my students to spend 20 minutes researching a simple question, they will learn more than if they fill out a rote form. I think I taught that way because that is how I was taught. Now I dont have to teach that way anymore. It is freeing. The trick will be to come up with interesting questions that make the topic researchable. But that is fun! And way less work for me than making a 4 page study guide on anything
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