在王府生活工作了5年之后,为了能够充实自己的教育理念和教学方式,2016年9月,我们一行十位王府老师奔赴美国北科罗拉多大学进修,身临其境了解西方先进的教育理念、教学模式以及异国文化底蕴。
1
主动学习的激励模式
这学期我们主要有三门课程,第一门是 Wagner老师指导的Methods of Teaching World Languages,也是三门课程中的核心课程。
在本门课程中,老师教授多语言教学中的核心理念、教学方法、教学标准和教学大纲。这些理念和方法对于语言教学有极大的帮助,可以更加科学地指导和作用于实践教学当中。
令人印象深刻的是,老师可以灵活地运用小组讨论的方式,合理利用课堂资源,结合不同学生的语言背景和学习能力进行科学分组,使得我们中国留学生能够去和美国本土学生进行相互讨论和学习。
在这里,学生们没有压力,可以畅所欲言地探讨学术,但每一节课都需要大家的头脑风暴,个人的思维可以在课堂无限地延展和飞跃。当然,这种课堂也充满了挑战。比如课前预习需要大量阅读,一周至少要有一本教科书的阅读量
课堂上的放松并不等同于课下的轻松。这种主动学习的激励模式可以极大地开发学生们学习的主动性。
经过将近5个月的学习,我发现原来我的阅读量如此惊人。课后,王府的老师们分享了学习心得,对比中美课堂差异,感受颇多。
2
开放性的学习方式
第二门课程是Milian老师教授的Second Language Acquisition Theory语言发展理论,为第一门课程奠定了更扎实的理论基础。本学期,Milian老师要求每个学生根据自己读书的章节做两个Presentation,通过演讲,可以从不同角度,更加深入地讨论和了解语言学习的过程。同时,锻炼培养了学生英文演讲的能力。
第三门课程是网络课程,由Cory老师指导的Foundations of Language and Linguistics for ESL/Bilingual Educators,这门网络课程的高效性和科学性,给我留下深刻印象。
Cory老师本学期布置了周密的学习计划,每周都有详细的读书安排。大家将读书感受分享在讨论区后,就可以在讨论区相互分享彼此观点。
这种互教互帮的开放性学习方式,开启了新的学习模式,所有的学习任务和作业安排都可以在线上完成,简便快捷,可以随时与同学和老师进行互动交流。
我认为,在经济、科技迅速发展的中国,比较适合这种线上模式的学习体验。这无疑也是一种资源的共享——教育资源充分利用新型教育模式。
Cory老师教学的核心是语言学发展史和基本理念,同时结合语言学教学的方法,综合了以上两门课程内容的核心。因此,本学期三门课程相辅相成,高效完成了多语言教学理论和方法的核心内容。其中,课程与课程之间相互涉及,紧密衔接,这种呈现三角教学内容的课程安排,值得我们学习和借鉴。
3
教育理念和方法是王道
2016年12月9日,本学期全部课程结束,紧张忙碌了将近1个月的Paper也全部写完。对于我个人来讲,最大突破就是打破了原有教育理念的瓶颈。国际学校的教育无疑是将来要对接国际大学,所以教育的过程中最重要的就是思维,要解放思想。教学内容只是其一,教育理念和方法才是王道。
新世纪对于优秀教师也应有新的要求,我认为,创新、革新、突破、与时俱进并像科学家一样探究教育教学,才是新时代教师的核心理念。
王府学校正在开展的IB教学理念,非常符合国际教学目标:Inquirers, Knowledgeable, Thinkers, Communicators, Principled, Open-minded, Caring, Risk-takers, Balanced, reflective 这些充分体现出了对国际人才的发展要求,而王府学校所要培养的也就是这样的人才。
在美国学习这段时间,我对美国的教育、文化和课堂体现出来的教育教学理念也有了更深刻的体验。
UNC‘s curriculum is comprehensive and impressive
Peng Cui /University of Northern Colorado
After working at BRS for five years, ten teachers were chosen to the go to the University of Northern Colorado to develop and refresh our teaching philosophy and methods, as well as to further study and develop a better understanding of the American education model. In addition, I now have a more in-depth knowledge of American culture.
UNC’s teaching style is a model to encourage actively learning
Dr. Wagner led the learning process in the core course of the curriculum: The Methods of Teaching World Languages.
Dr. Wagner introduced the key concepts of teaching methods, the teaching standards and the syllabus, which are extremely important and useful in Multilingual Education. The concepts taught are invaluable to me as a teacher now and will guide me in the future to effectively and successfully scaffold learning in students.
The most impressive teaching strategy applied in the class was group learning. Dr. Wagner always carefully divided the class into smaller groups according to our language backgrounds and learning ability so we could share and discuss different perspectives on education. Furthermore, there was at least one native English speaker in each group to facilitate fluent cultural interaction. The group learning experience was a super learning climate enjoyed by all in the class.
I felt completely comfortable participating in this course, because the professor built a positive classroom culture and climate which encouraged us to collaborate and participate. We brainstormed together each week as we received a huge amount of reading material each week. By working and researching together we maintained a high level of academic achievement, even though the work load really challenged us to keep up, and we began to understand the benefit of these active learning strategies.
After this five months of study, I have found that my reading ability has improved markedly. I sometimes cannot believe I finished so many assignments in this semester. After class, we always shared the learning experience and compared the differences and similarities between Chinese classrooms and American classrooms.
Open-ended learning model
Our next course, Second Language Acquisition Theory, was taught by Dr. Millian. So that we could develop a deeper understanding of the core course and how to create new ways to learn language, Dr. Milian directed us to prepare two different reading assignment presentations on our own. By using this method, we learned from each other and not just the professor, seeing the same lesson through another teacher’s eyes. This allowed us to learn from the perspective of a student just how the theories function through the methods of another teacher.
The third course was an online course called Foundations of Language and Linguistics for ESL/Bilingual Educators led by Dr. Cory. It was amazing to experience how Dr. Cory applied the technology to the scientific curriculum.
Dr. Corry prepared a very detailed reading process schedule and we were required to complete a reading every week. Once we finished reading a book, we wrote an online reflection or summarization so we could view others’ perspectives on the reading, and we provided feedback for each other. I benefited greatly from the discussion and think this way of learning is super fun.
Learning in this open-ended learning model is a new kind of learning style: All the assignments and discussion are posted online. This allows students and professors to interact with each other all the time. I think we should put this style of learning into the Mobile Learning project so that everyone can share learning resources anywhere and anytime.
These three courses complemented each other so well because we could learn the core concepts from different perspectives and through different activities. I think it is very similar to the IB curriculum.
Teaching philosophy and teaching method
To me, the biggest breakthrough is to embrace breaking out of the ordinary educational methods to some extent. There are numerous teaching resources and new teaching strategies for us to try and we need to explore fresh perspectives to teaching all the time ... never, ever stop.
A teacher is a life-long learner, so we need to spend a lot of time studying and refreshing ourselves in order to be innovative and creative for our students. We need to keep up with the ever-developing and evolving methods of teaching, because teaching is a belief in learning more than just a subject. It’s a sort of thought transference, and those thoughts should be refreshed and renewed constantly.
Teachers should be qualified professions, as well as inquirers, thinkers, communicators, risk-takers. They should be principled, knowledgeable, open-minded, caring, balanced and reflective. These requirements are what we should expect the future teachers to be.
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