The Culture of Learning

    " Learning methods that are embedded in authentic situations are not merely useful; they are essential." This quote from the article Situated Cognition and the Culture of Learning by Brown, Collins and Duguid sums up the entire article for me. It is so very important that educators start thinking about how they present their topics to their learners in order for it to be authentic and meaningful to the student. Introducing topics that are required and then asking students how it is relevant to them is one way to spark interest and get a "buy-in" from them. This article gives many examples of how learners use previously learned knowledge relating to their environment to solve problems. Hands on experience is how most people learn the best. I like the term of "apprentice" when thinking about how to view my students. In addition, experiences in real-life situations help learners relate one problem to another. And in this day and age of shortened attention spans, it is important to not only make learning fast paced and interesting, but to give the students meaningful opportunities to discover the process of learning and how best they can achieve a variety of solutions to a problem.
   In my teaching experience teaching Physical Education, it is not about learning skills- although that is a bonus- it is about the process of learning the skills. ( how can I do this better, what works for me, how might I use these skills later, etc.) Students use previously learned knowledge to play a game, sport, or demonstrate some other fitness skill, and I simply add to that and try to help them see how it will benefit them later in life. What I find most beneficial to my students is relating teamwork and positive attitudes to the life skills that will benefit them in the workforce and social and family situations.
   When teaching Health and Family Life Education, I am very much limited in how I disperse this sensitive information. We are actually given manuscripts on what exactly to say. I find this extremely limiting and so outdated. It does not take in to consideration any individuality of the students.
   Overall, it is clear that educators must see the relevance in designing their lessons and simply not putting information out there for the students to regurgitate. Unfortunately, until the SATs and ACTs stop becoming such an important university acceptance issue, and SOLs continue to be a graduation requirement, teachers will need continue to teach to the test.