Goal 27: Let Them Explore of The 30 Goals Challenge for Educators! Click the link to find out more about the 30 Goals Challenge for Educators!
“Children are born passionately eager to make as much sense as they can of things around them. If we attempt to control, manipulate, or divert this process…the independent scientist in the child disappears.” ~ John Holt
In goal 26, we talked about nurturing curiosity. One of the reasons schools fail to nurture curiosity is because the curriculum fails to provide students enough time to explore and experiment with new knowledge. When our learners are introduced to new material, they are often provided with tons of information to digest. What if we changed the dynamic? What if our students walked into our classes and just had a question to work with? What if we wrote one statement, word, or question on the board, then offered students a chance to search online for as much information as they could? What if we gave our students time to ask other students about the topic and see what information they could gather as a group? I bet many of our students would find some of the information their textbooks detail.
Many of us will begin a new semester with students. We have some experience teaching with our current curriculums. We have the ability to inspect our curriculum and make changes. We have the power to teach our subject matter in various ways. We can take out some of the tests and have students complete projects instead.
Goal
Long-term– Throughout the year begin to provide less information to students and have them complete tasks that help them discover the information on their own.
Goal
Important News
- Lisa Dabbs and I have decided to change the hashtag to #30GoalsEdu
- We are focusing on 1 to 2 goals a week.
- Check out my Pinterests for other posts with this goal or ask me to add yours!
- We are collecting all goals in this LiveBinder to make it easier to follow.
Challenge:
Change at least one lesson plan or assessment to support student exploration and experimentation.
Did you reflect on this goal? Please leave a comment that you accomplished this goal by either posting your own video reflection on Youtube, using the hashtag #30GoalsEdu, posting on the 30 Goals Facebook group, adding a post to the GooglePlus page, or adding a comment below!
Be inspired with these Inspirational songs, videos, quotes, and more on my Pinterest board, Inspiration for World Changers!
