Teaching = Learning

In the mid 1st Century A.D.,  Roman philosopher Seneca stated,
"While we teach, we learn."

In the late 18th Century A.D., French moralist and essayist Joseph Joubert wrote,

To teach is to learn twice. 

In 1993, American educator Dr. Gary Phillips determined,

"we remember 92% of what we teach each other."

Despite knowing that the best way to truly understand, one must be able to teach.

The American educational system is still dependent upon a model that places the expert

at the front, in the position of both teaching and learning,

while presenting knowldege to a captive group of passive students.

We must demand better of ourselves as educators and place our students in the

optimum position for their learning.   Students must become their own teachers. 

We must create in them a desire to understand the knowledge,

we hope for them to apply and retain, to a point that they can teach each other.   

We must place the burden of learning on the students and diminish the role of the educator

from expert presenter of the information to guide and facillitator of the learning process.

Students must understand that in a community of learning that they are responsible to and for each other in order to maximize the potential of learning for all.  It is in the ultimate success of the group that success as an individual is actualized.  

     

   

92% Of What We Teach Each Other

In my classroom I have a chart of the work of Dr. Gary Phillips on Brain Research completed as part of the National School Improvement Project.

I use this chart to remind me that when we teach each other we solidify our own understanding of the material. I design my classes to be teacher guided but student driven.  I implore students to assist each other in the understanding of material as a means of increasing their own knowledge.  I purposely design projects, activities and lessons to initiate the student to student interaction. 

This is not cooperative learning, as some teachers mistakenly call it.  I spend a great deal of time discussing the integrity of the process.  This is not giving answers to another student, but truly assisting another student to understand and in doing so increasing their own knowldge base. 

Amazingly you will find that sometimes, the student who struggles the most is actually the best teacher of material once they understand it. These students usually had to deconstruct the information in order to undertand the material and therefore can do a better job of actually building up and explaining the basic components of the topic. 

Remember, It's not about you; it's about them - "a guide on the side" 

Brain Reaserach Summary

We learn and remamber after one month...