Student Centred Learning

We've been talking a great deal about the value of student-centric learning.
However, not all teachers are comfortable with the idea of placing students more central to learning.
Many feel a lessening of control results from student-centric learning.
Others are concerned about the increase in the spread of students throughout a unit of student-centric work.  
And yet the fundamental aim behind student-centric learning is to foster agency in students.  

What do you think? Is student-centricity a new idea for you? Are you feeling inspired or apprehensive? Is this something you've been dabbling with for a while? Or are you an experienced  student-centric educator?  

​Please share below ... ​

Some previous comments

Yesika Erina
I'm so blessed to be in this PD. The explanation and video so fantastic. But, I need more explanation and example how to create a student-centred in my class. I'm with 101% agree that student-centred approach is to allow students to gain a sense of control over their learning but in fact, we can not implementing for all topics use student-centred method because there are somethings new term to understand and we need to explain need moreover we have a limit time in the class (student-centred took a long time)
Richard​
One thing at a time, Yesika. Lots more are coming. So stay tuned. Love your attitude, btw!

Maja Rogic
The video reminded me of Dan Pink's book 'Drive' (a part of his TED talk can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc) and the idea that 3 factors that lead to better performance and personal satisfaction are autonomy, mastery and purpose. Once we allow students to share their purpose with us they will be more willing to work independently towards their goal. Also, showing them that they are being seen as individuals with their own desires and dreams will help building a meaningful student-teacher relationship. It is also worth mentioning the importance of repetition and practice especially in maths. Mastering the skateboarding is an interesting way of explaining the purpose of practice and willingness to fail, but to also get up and do it again. I might use this video for some of my classes :)
Richard​
Yes, many teachers have used that skateboarding video with their students.

Your student-centric comment here ... 

More previous comments

Waris Huang
There is an old Chinese saying: teaching a man to fish is better than giving him fish. I relate it very closely with this module of learning because they both emphasize the importance of fostering independent learners. It's sad to know that many children are spoon-fed with food and cloths at home, and spoon-fed with knowledge and skills at school. They don't get the chance to solve a real life problem or a school problem on their own, thus they never will develop this ability and how problematic their lives will be when they live on their own! So I totally support independent and student centred classroom. Students should be given enough chances to ask for help from and learn from their peers and explore from mistakes. I like the skateboarding video too. I can see how it can help some students understand the value of failure. but I also think it won't be so simple. You see, Dr.Tae is passionate about learning the skateboard tricks, so he tries and tries and is not defeated by failures. Not every child has passion on Maths.😂 Many children have never experienced success or any kind of joy learning Maths. So I think, yes, it's a true and valuable lesson to learn that failure is the mother of success, but it doesn't solve all problems.
Richard​
Waris, I love your analogy (teaching a man to fish is better than giving him fish) for independent learning. Glad to see you are relating. Question: Do you have some things to change so that your students can be more independent?

Mira Gao
I do agree with independent learning shouldn’t be teacher-centred and we need to start to shift to a student-centric teaching environment where students can gain a high-level understanding of their learning. However, it does need children’s self-regulation including self-motivation. Students have to be capable of controlling of their own planning, pacing, and evaluation. This feels hard to implement among the low ability children. In the lesson, I can see same children they are eager to give feedback to or explain the problems in peer learning. For those children who either lose confidence in learning maths or have no interests in maths, they tend to let other children do all the work and then just put down the answers. This is a long-term accumulating problem because they don’t think about how to learn. I heard children ask someone else just for answers and then checked the time to see when maths lesson could be over and started to dawdle. When I went to those children and asked could you explain this, they would tell me I don’t understand which is really frustrating that they didn’t benefit from their peer or ask for help. Independent learning requires problem-solving skills, a sense for classification, and logical reasoning which some low ability children are reluctant to achieve because it needs long time to structurally establish with them. This is the time I’m thinking that shall I really take credit for let some children be the real independent learner.
Richard​
This is a GREAT post, Mira, as you have covered so many valid points. Anja will give you input at your end I'm sure. Let me respond to a few points. You say Student-centred Learning (SCL) does need children’s self-regulation, including self-motivation. Students have to be capable of controlling of their own planning, pacing, and evaluation ... this is true. HOWEVER (and this is a really important point) - the best way to foster self-motivation is a SCL approach! Because it is the 'sense of control' that creates the engagement! HOWEVER ... you need to have good structure in place and this takes a little while to work out. Re 'This feels hard to implement among the low ability children' ... again, you need structure and the lower ability, the more the structure. You still need to control proceedings but the activities need to give students a sense of control. Re 'children who (are low in confidence) or have no interest in maths tend to let other children do all the work' ... this is learned behaviour and a result of lack of understanding and agency. Again, the only genuine way to turn this around is via an Understanding-first approach (coming soon) ie to give students a greater sense of control over their activities. Let me know if this helps, Mira

Aleaze Ugoala
Dr. Tae's video on skateboarding is an excellent analogy for learning, but it is not really representative of how a school is designed to function. Schools may have become teacher-centric as a result of industrialism, but little has changed to alter that paradigm. Our students are expected to achieve certain grades by external institutions, and those grades will determine a good deal of how successful they are through the rest of their lives. The bottom line I would suggest is that most of our students are not learning mathematics because it is something that they value intrinsically. In China, engagement in the classroom is reasonably easy to achieve because it is something that the culture values. In the UK, engagement is incredibly difficult, because previous generations were pushed through poorly-delivered mathematics education and the subject is not valued. So if we are to help our students become independent learners, our teaching needs to be shown to be all of: accessible, relevant and interesting. Lower-ability students who experience success will be able to enjoy their growth, and higher-ability students can explore and make connections that will give them deeper insights into the subject. 'Allowing students to follow their passions' can perhaps be more accurately read as 'what will make students passionate about Mathematics instruction'.
Richard​
Cheers for that, Alaeze. I agree that the skateboarding analogy does not represent how a school is designed to function. The point there was the role of persistence in learning. So many teachers love the years have said 'I'll show that to my students' (because it will help drive the message home - 'don't expect to succeed on the 1st, 2nd or 3rd attempt' Re 'Schools may have become teacher-centric as a result of industrialism, but little has changed to alter that paradigm' ... that's true. However, not all schools are teacher-centric and certainly not all maths classes are either. But teachers need a roadmap for change. Hence the reason for PDs like this one.
Anja​
Al, thanks for sharing. I particularly like the part of teaching needs to be 'accessible, relevant and interesting'. This is true for all groups, low-performing or high performing and should be at the front of any lesson planning. However, I must disagree with 'grades will determine a good deal of how successful they are through the rest of their lives.' There is a very weak relationship between school academic achievement and success in life. Angela Duckworth, one of the most respected contemporary psychologists researched grit (passion and perseverance) as the biggest factor for personal success. I also like the book by Daniel Goleman: Emotional intelligence: why it can matter more than IQ.

Will Martinez
I think it's important to have a balanced approach. There are times where I feel it is appropriate to allow students to explore a concept before helping them formalise their findings as well as times when I feel explicit instruction is needed to avoid misconceptions. I think it's important to highlight that a more teacher-centred approach (or at least my understanding of it) need not be void of opportunities for students to communicate their ideas and think for themselves. This can be achieved through questioning, whether it is the teacher directly questioning the students or actively encouraging the students to ask questions.
Richard​
These ideas are real can-of-worms-openers! You are correct re a balanced approach. The key question we need to ask ourselves is 'do my students experience a sense of control through the activities?' ... and 'How often are my students essentially following my instructions?' When we maximise the first and minimise the second then the learning is more student-centric.