Humanism & Constructivism

Humanism

• The belief that everyone is entitled to their own personalized learning experience
• Fits into education through the idea that students deserve CHOICE and personal relationships with their teachers
• Every person has a right to an education... why not personalized?

Constructivism

• The belief that everyone must create/construct their own understanding of information
• Learning based on prior knowledge and experience
• Piaget, Vygotsky and Bruner

Differentiation

What education often looks like now...

What it looked like for me...

What does education look like elsewhere?

Endorsed by many educators, child advocates and researchers...

Goes far beyond the grade...

In ELA, there are many opportunities...

• Skill based vs. Content based
• Diverse set of materials available
• Always changing
• YAL for every experience/situation

Reasons for Resistance?

Where could it go wrong?

• If grades drop, the theory will be "to blame"
• Students may not take class activities as seriously
• Not enough support with implementation

Possibilities for change?

• Multi-genre work
• Student-led expectations - class rules
• Student surveys
• Book choice
• Interest surveys
• Student-based units
• Relevance-based vocabulary

Student Reactions?

• For students already used to the educational model of today, how will they react to this change?