Recommended Book: "Enquiring Teachers, Enquiring Learners: A Constructivist Approach to Learning" Catherine Twomey Fosnot

I've completed reading "Enquiring Teachers, Enquiring Learners." There are many notes I would like to share directly from the text, but they require too much context. I would need to copy entire chapters into this blog.

In brief summary, the book challenged teachers to reevaluate our pedagogy. It called for more in-depth study into 'how' children learn and 'how' teachers can identify and accommodate the varied cognitive levels and stages of our students. The author also provided examples and recommendations for mentorship programs to assist the "teacher-as-researcher" with inventing classroom practices that support students in claiming ownership for their learning.

I found this book at a library book sale, so it is slightly dated; published in 1989. That said, it is still a valuable read.

Breadth versus Depth in Institutions: Elementary and Secondary Institutions (pgs 122-123)

The focus on thinking is the result of criticism from many directions. Futurists, for example, assail the schools for teaching facts that will be outdated before they are forgotten by the children learning them. They suggest instead that schools teach learners to access, organize, analyze, and synthesize material, which will be available via computers at simply the touch of a fingertip.

. . .

DeBono (1986), Lateral Thinking: "constructive, generative, and organizing in nature" (1) breadth- making connections or correspondences between various alternatives (2) change- making transformations such as viewing the same thing from different perspectives 

Notes on Enquiring Teachers, Enquiring Learners: A Constructivist Approach

now reading.

Constructing a Pedagogy for Language Arts (p. 70)

David was nodding in agreement. "Yes," he commented. "It makes me realize the inadequacies of corrective spelling from a stage-5 perspective if the learner is at Stage-2. Instead, it seems the role of the teacher needs to involve, first, figuring out how the learner thinks; then, second, providing a challenge to encourage rethinking. You have to be the tug that expands the circle, but the supporter to help the upward shift."

Investigations and Reflections on Learning: Teachers As Epistemologists (p. 88)

Jack Lochhead (1977), at the University of Massachusetts, began a study of strategies used in problem solving. He simply gave college students some math problems to solve, and, as they were working, he asked them to explain their thinking outloud. He also asked questions about their thinking in order to understand more fully what they were doing. To his surprise, the subjects in his study thanked him after the session, remarking that they had learned a great deal of mathematics from him. He was astounded, since he had not attempted to teach anything! From that early work, he went on to study the effect of probing questions on learners and found evidence that simply asking learners to explain their thinking enabled them to advance to higher levels of understanding. It seems that asking questions about thinking causes people to think more. In contrast, leading questions by teachers usually result in a guessing game, with learners trying to figure out what the teacher wants. The learner's thinking moves away from the problem and focuses on the teacher." 

Definitions of Free School and Unschooling

What is a free school or a democratic school?
What is unschooling? Do any of these terms describe The Real School?

Writer/educator John Holt, who coined the term unschooling, describes the process as follows:  “We do not need to motivate children into learning by wheedling, bribing or bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they are learning. What we need to do, and all we need to do, is bring as much of the world as we can into the school and classroom (in our case, into their lives); give children as much help and guidance as they ask for; listen respectfully when they feel like talking; and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest.”

Unschooling is fundamentally about process not about content. It is about learning through self discovery, about being open and confident,  about thinking critically and independently, and about making your own choices and taking responsibility for those choices. The process requires community; it  is about connection, not isolation. Many unschoolers  are also home-schoolers, but the unschooling process is never insular. Unschooling is also referred to as community based learning, natural learning and self-directed learning.

A democratic school functions as a participatory democracy with equal participation from both students and staff. These learning environments invite students to participate in every facet of school operations, including learning, teaching, and leadership. Students in these schools create their own learning path.

A free school is a decentralized network in which skills, information, and knowledge are shared without hierarchy or a formal institutional framework. The open structure of a free school is intended to encourage self-reliance, critical consciousness, and personal development. Here too, students are self-directed.

None of these philosophies is new. For decades, all have been effectively utilized, to varying degrees, by schools like Summerhill, Albany Free School and The Sudbury Valley School. Likewise, The Real School  employs pieces of each of these philosophies. Our decision making process is one of consensus, not democracy, but both approaches intend to empower young people. We are committed to a learning process that is student centered and non-coercive. And we are a cooperative because we value the role of the larger community in education.

Vygotsky, "Guiding" Genius by Scaffolding

Vygotsky is a key theorist in all the texts my professors chose for my studies. He does not dominate like Piaget and Erickson but he can be counted among those any early childhood professional should be familiar. And rightfully so. His observations on how people learn, via social and cultural interactions, is a key to understanding cognitive development. He promoted the importance of the learner's community in contributing to how they understand the world; providing a context for interpretation of stimuli and experiences. Children do not learn in isolation, they are constantly being influenced either directly or indirectly by others. And these influences contribute in varying degrees to the way children 'do the knowledge to', act upon, and understand the world.

Vygotsky also prescribed educators, or "More Knowledgeable Others", to scaffold children within their Zone of Proximal Development (ZDP). This Zone is the difference between what a child is able to do alone what the child is only able to do with assistance, or scaffolding, and what is beyond the child's capabilities art that particular time. Another word for scaffolding is Guiding, and this is the context in which I use the term as this blog's namesake. I advocate for "Guiding" children to the next level of their individual mastery. I am Guiding Genius.  

'Guiding' Genius

Why did I chose to the word Guiding in my name, Guiding Genius:

I will give Lev Vygotsky his due justice in an upcoming post. But, I just came across an exchange that summarizes his theory, as it pertains to guiding children towards their genius. Taken from Enquiring Teachers, Enquiring Learners: A Constructivist Approach For Teaching by Catherine Twomey Fosnot.

"You know," Jane began slowly, "I'm just beginning to understand how important it is to understand how the learners you are working with think. As a teacher, you almost have to be able to get inside the child's head to think like that child."

 Susan nodded in agreement and extended Jane's point. "I was also thinking that it seems like learning is a case of going from the known to the unknown. What  one knows, and how one knows affect what one can learn. If the teacher helps the child make connections, then the knowledge becomes a connected network of meaning and relations. Otherwise, knowledge might be just separate bits and facts to be memorized."

"And then probably forgotten," added Steven in agreement.

  

Introduction to Dr. Amos Wilson: "Genius"

I make no apologies, nor do I hide the fact that a major priority of Guiding Genius is guiding Black children to acknowledge, respect and actualize their inherent genius. These are my people. And as an Original woman, they are my children. Therefore it is rational for my services to focus on creating solutions for my children and their families. That said, I introduce the power behind choosing the word Genius in Guiding Genius. Dr. Amos Wilson is a genius in his own right. If you are not familiar with his scholarship then do yourself the honors and familiarize yourself with his literature. As it relates to early childhood education and it's twin, early childhood development, Dr. Wilson has given parents and educators a gift of research and analysis on how to guide Black children's genius towards realization.

“Thus, the African child enters the world well equipped to intellectually interact with the world and to mature intellectually, socially and spiritually as a result thereof. However, the unparalleled inherent or natural readiness of Afrikan children must be matched with a sufficiently stimulating socially and materially interactive environment if their enormous intellectual and human potentials are to be realized. Positive attitudes towards them and their future, high expectations regarding their ability to achieve whatever goals they set for themselves, knowledge of their unique developmental psychology, the freedom and ability to provide them with the necessary social, cultural, material and spiritual resources; an African-centered consciousness and identity and high personal/cultural/moral aspirations, are the ingredients which when proportionately combined, can maximize all their positive abilities.” (Awakening the Natural Genius in Black Children, 29)

Dr. Amos Wilson

Guiding Genius Educational Services is an organic entity created to assist parents and educators with providing their young students high-quality learning experiences. This includes consultations and workshops on topics such as: Child Development, Curriculum Creation, Classroom Management, Holistic Assessments and Positive Guidance. Dr. Wilson's sage advice speaks to the lofty goal of guiding children who come from a tradition that historically has been legally and socially discouraged from excellence. As we find ways to assist this population, we also find ways to assist the larger population of children towards their inherent genius.

Visit our FB Page: http://www.facebook.com/GuidingGenius

 

Name: Guiding Genius

Initially, I really wanted a clever name like 'Rainboots and Puddles' or 'Macaroni Necklaces' for my program. I've seen so many blogs dedicated to early childhood education with clever names. But the names spoke to the temperaments of the blogs: unschoolers, homeschoolers, Super Moms that were raising Super-Creative children and former hipsters turned attachment parents. And I am sooo that type of educator. I challenge the rigidity and uniformity of compulsorily public education. I know most schools are failing to produce creative, intelligent, problem-solvers that are culturally literate with confidence and know-how to positively enter society as agents of positive change. Not too much to ask for, not at all. But, that's another post for another day. I've got to finish writing essays for an exam in Educating the Young Child, due on Thursday. So, this will be brief.
The inspiration for choosing to call my program Guiding Genius came mostly from two geniuses: Lev Vygotsky and Amos Wilson. These two men approached understanding and educating young children from a cultural perspective, placing responsibility on adults for providing the tools young minds need to grow and mature in a holistic pattern. Sure, the name isn't supercool like 'Pirates and Pineapples', 'Crayon Wizards' or 'Rock, Scissors, Paper.' The name Guiding Genius reflects my teaching philosophy and the mission of this organic entity: To guide children towards awareness of, respect for, and skills to apply their individual genius, outside and within the classroom. 'Guiding' using the concepts presented by Vygotsky and 'Genius' as defined by Wilson. That's cool right?