Amanda Chance
Eng 101
Paper #3
Observation based teaching is using what the child already knows and individually helping them learn more when they are ready. It is given many different names in different organizations that already use it. In the National Association for the Education of Young Children or NAEYC, they call it creative curriculum and it is REQUIRED for a school to have accreditation (NAEYC). In a classroom that already uses this type of method; a group of 24 students in one room is given an assignment. The teacher presents the assignment and then uses the remaining time to help each student work through it. This type of learning requires more than one teacher in the room at a time, usually a primary teacher and an assistant teacher. At each step of learning in the assignment, the teacher helps their students. When a child is struggling it doesn’t take a bad test score at the end of the chapter to learn about it. Instead the teacher is aware of the struggles of each student and helps them overcome them. Using observation style teaching is also very parent involved. Each week the teacher must make an observation about the student. In a younger classroom it can be in language or social development. It can also be in math and science because even young children learn science and math without knowing it. An example observation is “Child A enjoys feeling different types of leaves from outside.” Using observation style also helps the teacher to create a curriculum that is centered on what the child enjoys. Because Child A enjoys leaves, next week the teacher is going to show child A the trees they come off of and present other things to feel. In an older classroom an observation can be “Child B has mastered the quadratic formula” and the curriculum for the next week is “Child B will continue practice for the quadratic formula with introduced new step of negative numbers in the quadratic formula.” These observations are positive and each parent has access to them. Since the teacher is working with each of her 24 students, they can use each individual session to help make observations.
Many professionals inside and outside the teaching profession have noticed the problems with the current method of teaching. Even Bill Gates in the documentary Waiting for Superman mentions that there is a problem with finding qualified people for jobs in the United States, from the United States. Big companies are forced to look to other countries just to find people with the skills needed to perform at the expert level. Also in Waiting for Superman, the narrator outlines that fifty years ago the model was 20% of people go to college, 20% go straight into the work force and 60% go to factories and farms. The problem with schools now is they are still developed to produce those percentages. In the “real world” or career world today, most everyone needs college to get a career. For example, fifty years ago, a mechanic was someone who was good with cars and could fix any part without a problem. Today a well-paid mechanic needs to be certified with several different national organizations, has a back ground of working on cars in a professional manner, has experience with computers and probably has an associates or technical degree. Unless a person wants to make minimum wage they need to go to college. Some people may say this isn’t true; a mechanic if they are good can earn a decent living. The fact is that most large chain stores are now requiring their mechanics to become certified and more and more they are also only hiring those with either a college degree or technical schooling. When a person is asked to succeed in life without college it is almost impossible in today’s world.
In every class there are also some students that get frustrated by the kids that are moving quickly through the material. The usual solution is that the teachers use tracking and tests to determine what math, science, and language class that student will be in for the next year. With that method, the children that are labeled as under achievers all get grouped together and are expected to do poorly. In Audre Lordes book, Zami; A New Spelling of My Name, Audre explains that there were two groups in her class room. The groups were of children that did well and children that did not do well, labeled as The Fairies and the Brownies. She writes, “The brownies were never called up to the front of the room we had to read in the anonymity from our double seats, where we scrunched over at the edges…” (4) Instead of this usual method, by using the observation style, the students all get exposed to the same math and stay in the college preparation classes. So by not using tracking each student is exposed and expected to do well in the college preparation classes. By segregating the students based on merit and test scores they are being coerced into not believing that they are smart. By labeling them as “remedial” they are being asked to fail! Some people might ask if the students that are behind will slow down the advanced student. With hard work and dedication to the students, each student can reach their full potential. One of the most important aspects of the observation style of teaching is the amount of one on one attention each student gets.
The Observation style of teaching would force the teachers to spend time with each student. The attention the students get would keep them from having wandering minds, or day dreaming. It keeps the teacher engaged with their students and away from just reading a newspaper in the front of the room. Every subject benefits from this. A student doesn’t need to shy away from asking questions because of being embarrassed. The student doesn’t need to feel stupid for not understanding. Or get the stare down because the other students are ready to move on. Why does homeschooling work? Why do smaller class sizes work? Why does tutoring work? Individual attention is the key to teaching. The observation style of teaching puts the individual attention into the classroom. A reason for a person to doubt this style is because they would argue that a teacher doesn’t have enough time to get around to each of the children. The teachers will make enough time for each of their students but having smaller classes and more than one teacher in the room will help. Others may say that the students won’t be forced to work and will just rely on the teachers to get their work done. This is not true as the student is still required to take tests to ensure they have the knowledge to move on. In a normal school a child enters high school behind in math. They are put into a basic math skills class with other kids of similar talents and if they get a bad grade they aren’t allowed to participate in after school activities and probably are in trouble at home. In this model, the student gets the extra attention they need to catch up with the class. They also stay away from the punishment at home and being kept from after school activities. This model refuses to let children become remedial. In the article, The Banking Concept of Education, Paolo Freire writes, “Their responses to the challenge evokes new challenges, followed by new understandings; and gradually the student’s come to regard themselves as committed,” (4) This is an example of how each child is known to have the knowledge to do well in school. In the movie Waiting for Superman, Geoffrey Canada says that each child will, “…rise to the level of your expectations...” He created the working model for his schools that have completely bridge the normal association between poverty and bad grades. His model incorporates many things that go along with the individual attention each student needs like in the observation model. In another example inWaiting for Superman, a principle at a popular charter school refuses to use tracking as well, 96% of his students graduate ready for college as opposed to public schools 34%. These models for success have worked well in these schools and should be incorporated into public school.
When watching the movie Chalk, you watch a few teachers in a fake school go through their year. It is almost comical to see the similarities between them and the real teachers in the real world. Most of the similarities are bad ones that bring not so fond memories to mind. Everyone has felt neglected by a bad teacher. In one scene the teacher literally says,“Maybe not act so smart when I am teaching…” The changes that are needed in the public school system are numerous, but the single most important change is the Observation style needs to be put into practice. It allows for the students to start achieving in strides. In another article written by John Taylor Gatto, he writes, “If David Farragut could take command of a captured British warships as a pre-teen, if Thomas Edison could publish a broadsheet at the age of twelve, if Ben Franklin could apprentice himself to a printer at the same age…there’s no telling what your own kids could do,” (3). By giving into a new style of teaching in the classroom each child can literally make their dreams come true, whether it be through becoming a doctor an engineer or a mechanic. Children really do rise to the level of your expectations. Let’s stop asking children to fail and start showing them how to succeed.
Works Cited
Chalk: Real teaching Leaves a Mark. Dir. Morgan Spurlock. Dir Mike Akel. Perf. Troy Schremmer, Janelle
Schremmer, Shannon Haragan. SomedaySoon Productions. 2006. DVDFreire, Paolo. “The Banking Concept of Education.” Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum
Books, 1993.Print.
Gatto, John Taylor. “Against School.”Against School-John Taylor Gatto. Cornell.edu, Sept. 2003. Web
Mar. 2013
Vantage, 2010. DVD
