Thursday, October 16, 2008
Listening to Children
When reading the article by Paley I found that I could make a lot of connections to teaching science even though her article talks mainly about preschool and kindergarteners during play. A particular line that struck me was "It did not occur to me that the distractions might be the sounds of children thinking." This struck me because so often we are concerned with staying on track and coming to the right answer that we lose sight of the different views and knowledge that children have. This applies to science as well because each child come into your science class with different ideas and misconceptions about the world of science. I think we need to be more relaxed and let children share their views. This is the only way in which we are going to be able to build upon their knowledge. I also related to her statement about her own point of view causing children's voice to grow silent. We want to hear what they have to say. I know I am guilty of putting my opinion out there and I think it causes children to fear what they have to say. That is might be wrong in some way because it deviates from the teacher, I want to teach my students to share their ideas openly. I also think that this relates to using the conceptual change model in science because you are listening to what students have to say and then allowing them to figure it out by themselves, you are not providing the "right answer" through lecture. You are simply providing them with evidence to create a view based on science through interaction with evidence, or as Paley would say providing the glue. Therefore I drew many connections to science through this. I wonder why as we grow older we don't allow children voices and views to be heard as much, I'm sure we all remember being students and feeling like the teacher wasn't listening to what you had say, especially when had something very thoughtful to add.
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4 comments:
Britt- As I was reading that article, I was thinking about the things my preschoolers from the summer would talk about. I think that at that age they are so creative and imaginative- they'll talk about anything. As teachers we have to be careful not to stifle their wonderings and thoughts, and create an environment where conversation is encouraged. Sometimes I get tired of talking and wonder why I've lost my voice at the end of the day. That shows me I talked more than my students did, and I need to fix that. I'm interested in what I can learn from them, and students should know that they can be each other's teachers too.
Hi Kim,
I so agree! Younger children will talk forever and we let them! Funny thing is when students get older, "no talking" becomes a more common classroom phrase. Now, I believe there are defintely times quiet is necessary, but we need to give older students time to talk too!
Nicole
I think this talk in older classrooms can be facilitated by grouping and lab work. Experimentation, especially inquiry style, leads to talking among students. Students have to discuss the best way to test something, what controls and variables are, and data analysis. These experiments will lead to a more thoughtful discussion within the classroom if you, as the teacher, teach students how to thoughtfully discuss science topics.
Talk seems to occur when people feel as if they belong. For some reason, most of us lose that sense of safety at school. From what I have seen, when the climate is right the talking about ideas can be amazing. But the older the students become, the more experiences they have within being made to feel unsafe.
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