Building Lifelong Learners
- Ms. Althauser
- Nov 13, 2016
- 2 min read
An important part of this project is students taking responsibility for their own learning. Most often in school, students are told what to do, given specific instructions, lectures, information, requirements, grades. When you take away the "rules" of school, it can be challenging. One thing I hadn't realized is how addicted we all are (parents, teachers, students) to those rules. We've forgotten what the joy of learning looks like.
We've seen both struggle and success in the last week. Students have struggled to figure out what does actually interest them (not what interests their friends or their teachers). They've struggled to figure out how to connect with real people in the world (not just websites). Sometimes they've struggled to find meaning in a project that isn't resulting in a grade. But that struggle is worth it when we see the "aha" moments--those moments in learning when the students do something or realize something because of their own curiosity, rather than what a teacher told them to do.
One of those moments happened yesterday when students were reflecting on their learning in pairs. A couple of the students were talking about how music affected the brain. Jinhee was talking about SAT scores and wondering why research has shown that music increases SAT scores. Charissa added something about how music lights up all parts of your brain and uses all parts because you read it and play it and think it. Then Irene made a connection to her learning about how music can strengthen the bridge between the two parts of your brain. She talked about neuroplasticity and how she learned about how the brain can create new pathways. That prompted me to call Jina over to talk about her learning about how people use music to torture people -- even using Elmo songs to torture prisoners. That led Mady and Marcus to tie in their learning about PTSD and how music allows people to express their built up feelings and trauma.
It was such a great moment when they all realized the connections between their work and were able to build off of each other's learning. They transcended the role of "student," they went beyond rules: they looked like the kind of passionate, lifelong learners we hope all our kids become.
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