Time for Growth!

Time to set aside all my bias and go into to this with a open mind… Parts of knowledge building pedagogy go against all my learning from my early years education and some of it lines up perfectly. This inquiry into knowledge building Pedagogy was meant to expand my thinking on pedagogy for learning and teaching. For this blog post I decided to take a step back and look at the bigger picture of types of alternative pedagogy in education today. For my previous inquiry I looked at how children can use their strengths in Project based learning. I think that considering alternative ways of teaching are important and help me to understand where knowledge building fits into this pedagogy spectrum. This may help me to consider knowledge building in relation to other teaching methods. After some research I narrowed down some common teaching methods:

The first is direct teaching where teachers front load information, children do tasks to practice specific skills or process knowledge the teacher has provided them. Here children do their best to use the strengths and knowledge they have that apply to the topic and teaching methods to increase their own learning.

The next is project based learning where teachers create projects for students with some front loaded information but children are also researching to gain and practice knowledge and skills. Here children have a small amount of freedom to use their strengths and previous knowledge within the framework of the project.

Then there seems to be a more progressive approach to project based learning where students create the project and methods, and have space to develop and increase their capacity by using and sharing their strengths through exploring their interests within the topic. This seems to give students more autonomy to explore the project within their interest and show their learning in flexible ways. Here is one of my favourite websites to follow for getting started with Project based learning:

The last is inquiry based learning, where children explore a topic through questioning, theory building, research and discovering. Here children are given the autonomy to use their strengths and knowledge to collaboratively work together to create new learning.

I found that often teachers are mash up problem based and inquiry based learning where students use the inquiry model and then move towards a more project based model to show their learning. I also research problem based learning, which is often where students are presented with a problem and find information to be able to solve this problem.

I feel that all these teaching strategies can and are useful in teaching at different times and that perhaps a mash up of all of them is best?

So now I want to consider how if and how knowledge building fits into my thinking.

Back to Knowledge Building:

I was first introduced to Knowledge building through a video called Austins butterfly. At first I was horrified, I felt that children should be able to develop at their own pace through exploration of materials and that their work should be celebrated. After watching the video a few times I realized what was actually happening was a collaborative effort to build another up. To celebrate what they know but also inquire into how they could improve their ideas and abilities. It was peers supporting peers by knowledge sharing and a focus on growth. The children helped each other to scaffold on what they already know and improve. They started with what the child already knew and built on that knowledge through a collaborative effort. Take a look at this video and share your thoughts!