Weekly Writing #6

When is the best time to use group teaching techniques and when is the best time to use individualized teaching techniques? After reading and studying group teaching techniques these last couple weeks this is something I was asking myself. Well after my reading this week I have found the answer!

Every student has different needs, different personalities and learn in different ways. Their goals differ and they all have unique interests. Sometimes using individual teaching techniques can help students learn better.

Individualized teaching techniques can be beneficial because they
1. Help student learn to inquire subject matter
2. Promote independence
3. Learn to make use of more than one opinion
4. Learn how to evaluate and apply information
5. Teach students how to learn

All of these factors are beneficial and make individualized teaching a great technique but what are ways that we can effectively use this technique in the classroom?
This weeks reading talked about 5 different ways.

1. Supervised Study:
I really liked this idea but it truly gives the students the chance to work on something they are interested in. One thing it mentioned was for the supervised study to be effective the teacher must plan all the parts of it just as an other technique requires teacher planning.

2. Experiments:
Experiments are always interesting because whether the students are working alone or in a group there is a degree of real involvement. This often makes students more interested in the experiment and the subject matter.

3. Independent Study:
The role of independent study is to meet the needs of individual students. The teacher will take on more of a facilitator role during this individualized teaching technique.

4. The Use of Student Notebooks
Student notebooks have always been something I've been a fan of. The important thing is that teachers must be committed to using them but to also show the students that keeping good notes and an organized notebook has value.

5. Using Information Sheets, Assignment Sheets and Skill Sheets
These sheets are designed to guide student's learning experiences. They are valuable because they allow students to learn at their own rate.

This week's readings were really valuable to me because I wasn't really familiar with individualized teaching techniques. I felt like the information was definitely beneficial and it got my wheels turning on how I would be able to implement this during my student teaching experience.

"Be yourself. An original is always worth more than a copy."