In this TED talk, Diana Laufenberg illustrates why she thinks failure is just as much a part of education as “the right answers”.
I was particularly interested in what she mentioned after the 6th minute in this 10-minute video: School administrators need to be prepared to allow students to fail. Can this be said in Tanzania? Do students have an opportunity to do something with what they have learned?
Related links:
- Previous Vijana FM posts on education
- TED Talks
This presentation was on point. Creativity in teaching is very important, but I am skeptical if Tanzania and will get there any time soon. The reason I am saying that is, its hard to be creative when you dont have the resources, but someone else can say, thats where creativity comes in. True, however, problem number two is the amount of students that you have to teach, amount of material one teacher has to get through before the end of the year.
This kind of environment forces the teacher to worry about getting by, rather than how be creative so the material can get into the students heads.
Another thing that I liked on this presentation, is when she talks about failing being part of learning. Those who have been through public primary schools know very well what awaits you if you were to get something wrong. The teacher has no time to tell a student, its okay just take a minute and think about it, but its usually a punishment that comes along.
Now I dont know about you, but I will be the first person to question if fear and thinking go very well. Although sometimes pressure does help people to think, but again, we’re talking about children not adults.
This style of wrong=punishment equation I believe discourages a lot of students to think about the task at hand, but fear of what will happen if he/ she get the answer wrong. But again, we go back to my first point, teachers can be blamed, but they shouldnt carry all the burden. This is because they also need to get it done, and since the syllabuses are compressed with a lot of materials to be covered, the students become the victim of this.
So, the day public schools start having smaller classes, and resources together with teachers who are thinkers, then what is being talked about in this presentation will also start becoming our reality. But until then, we will remain to be inside the box, because we’re taught to just think inside the vicinity of our comfort zone.
What if students were able to learn from eachother, rather than one teacher?
thats true, i remember I seeing another TED talk on here where the speaker talked about that.
Now I am not sure how the problem of too many students in one class will help or pose yet another problem for such method to succeed.
I think we’re going to need very good teachers who will know how to work that kind of system.
I am convinced the lack of creativity among teachers hinders a lot of things, but again the education system is self is not design to create thinkers so I really cant blame them..