The C word that stands for constructivism also stands for the challenges to both students and teachers and for the courage it takes to practise it. – Marge Scherer
Barbadian superstar Rihanna has got virtually everybody using C-words. The media has sought to use her “slip” to promote certain events. Recently, at Laff It Off, the incident was used to comment on certain issues of both local and international relevance.
As a member of a profession which our society holds to high standards and expectations, I wish to distance myself from the use of any C-words, especially in the original context of abuse.
While I would not want to ride on a “foul” wind, I wish to join Marge Scherer, of the Association of Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), in discussing some C-words that teachers might use without offending their own professional integrity and certainly without setting any bad example for or before their charges, whose moral code they are to foster and guard.
Volume 57, No. 3 of ASCD journal Educational Leadership spends considerable time focusing on C-words that are extremely relevant to the teaching profession. It is clearly suggested that C-words must be part of the jargon of the educational discourse which sees teachers engaging both their charges and their colleagues within the context of education.
C-words and their associated concepts undergird the principles and the science of pedagogy. In her perspective (Page 5), she cites a C-word that stands for the challenges which confront both teachers and students in today’s classrooms.
Not only do these words represent challenges, but they also represent the courage with which teachers must arm themselves as they confront and grapple with these challenges.
One of the first C-words that must be confronted by the 21st century classroom practitioner is “change”. In fact, if schools are to remain relevant, they must engage in a dialogue with change in all of its dimensions. The reason why many schools and educational systems have short-changed their charges has to do with their inability or failure to confront, understand and manage this global constant – “change”.
Schools and teachers who pledge allegiance to the dying traditions of the past have long died, but fail to convene the burial ceremony. The stark reality is that schools are to cater to the diverse needs of a changing society, one in which students mirror the changing dynamic as it relates to knowledge, values, standards, skills and competencies.
A second C-word that must emanate from the mouth of pedagogues is “collaboration”. The 21st century classroom must be collaborative. No longer can problem-solving, one of the key goals of education, be driven by the didactic teacher who seeks to “pour” knowledge from his decanter into the passive minds and intellect of his charges.
Classrooms must become environments for collaboration in which learning is not just two-way but multidimensional. Teachers learn from students, students learn from the teacher and from one another. The days of the teacher being the lone instructor are gone. The days of the teacher fostering an environment of competition and cognitive rivalry must end.
This brings me to the biggest C-word that classroom practitioners have been articulating more fluently over the last two decades or so with greater frequency. Scherer insists that “constructivism” is a term from the obscure vocabulary of educators, though she stresses that it is no quick-fix strategy for improving standardized test scores.
When the term became more pervasive in use, teachers could not even pronounce it. In fact, to say the word engages five points of articulation including bilabial and sibilant elements. This C-word, constructivism, is multidimensional. As David Perkins puts it: “No one can live in the world of education long without becoming aware that constructivism is more than one thing.”
The key proponents of the principles of constructivism, including John Dewey, Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky, have elucidated the concept. ASCD’s Language Of Learning defines it as an approach to teaching based on research about how people learn. It holds, among other things, that each individual constructs knowledge rather than receives it.
Mark and Jacqueline Brooks see constructivism as a theory of learning that describes the central role that learners’ mental schemes play in their cognitive growth. This C-word manifests itself when teachers seek and value students’ points of view, structure lessons to challenge students’ suppositions, recognize that students must see relevance in the curriculum, plan lessons around big ideas and assess learning in the context of daily classroom investigations (Page 5).
As a passionate educator, I have a penchant for C-words. My C-words are key ammunition in my arsenal as a pedagogue and when they emanate from my mouth, it is because my cognitive structures are fully engaged to have a romance with change and to work collaboratively to make the principles of constructivism come alive in my school, not just for my benefit, but especially for my charges.