 |
| Image Credit: Susy Morris |
Do you have an invested interest in promoting the health and wellbeing of young people? (that should be all of us) Then how we help them grow really matters.
Societies throughout the world need to admit that we are not very good at it. We seem very capable of starting wars and displacing millions but remain awful at resolving conflicts. (Perhaps we should re-evaluate the term “adult”?)
There is something really important to learn about how we help young people all over the world grow and I am suggesting three key areas:
Environment
Alexander Den Heijer once said “When a Flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.” Environment is key. Schools in the Western world lack clarity of the real impact their learning environments have on the well being of their students.
We can break down our thoughts on environment into two areas. The physical and the social.
Around the world I think we need a diversity of physical settings. Classrooms with large noisy groups are not the only place young people should be expected to grow. What about farms? Mountain tops? Theatres? Art Galleries? Home? Coffee Shops?
Young people on the Autism Spectrum, introverts and many, many others require our attention. Time and effort needs to be taken to discover how to get the best out of these wonderful young people.
The social is equally important. Many students love group work, others work better alone. Many become overloaded with the social complexities that can result in high anxiety and withdrawal. These same children can thrive in quiet and well considered environments where real learning relationships exist and we think about the whole child and not just the academic process.
Pace
Learning will never be a smooth process. Nor will it fit neatly within governmental guidelines. Pace is important because it recognises that learning often happens in fits and starts. If a young person gets something quickly and is motivated to press on with more, why not? If they need to spend more time or take time out for a while and come back to it then let's do that.
Autonomy
Last time I looked education actually belonged to the individual but we do not treat it that way. Young people should be given greater freedom to take responsibility for their own learning.
I often hear that young people can’t be trusted but we find ourselves with an awful “Catch 22”. Many students have spent so long being told what to learn and when that they have lost confidence in their ability to exercise their autonomy in constructive ways. They were born with it, so where have we put it?
All over the world children sit in classes.
If you think about it… In Africa, where most learning starts in the community, going to school is a wonderful opportunity because it supplements their ongoing education. It might look the same in the West but we have it back to front. In Africa it starts in the community then reaches into school. What they learn in school is then tested and consolidated back in their communities. However in the West, it is the other way round and learning often takes place in isolation and is rarely utilized in the real world. This is why we can’t remember what we learnt in school because it is not vital enough.
If you teach in schools, think about the environment, think about the pace they need to learn at and think about how you can make them part of the design of their own education. If you are doing that then great, because there is a wonderful chance you will see them bloom.
John Hassall, Johass
0 comments:
Post a Comment