The Contemporary Learner

 

Who is the contemporary learner?

How will the characteristics of our Gen Z learners depicted in the Meet GenZ video define their engagement in the traditional classroom snippet?

In the traditional classroom video it was seen that students were extremely bored, not engaged and learning was not being facilitated. This could be attributed to the characteristics that Gen Z leaners depict. For example, Gen Z learners are characterized as mature, in control, and performing the best in an inclusive and differentiated classroom. This could be the reason the students were not being engaged with the material or why they looked so lost.

Referring to the ideas presented by Willis and Robinson, is this level of creativity in evidence in the schools you have attended, both as a student, and as a preservice teacher? Furthermore, is this level of creativity in evidence in your University units? As secondary pre-service teaching students, you will experience a variety of approaches to teaching, learning and course design in your discipline studies. Why were your previous studies presented in that particular way? How could they have been presented?

As a primary school student the content was very much presented to me like in the traditional classroom video. However, when I moved to Australia I had access to so much more resources and most teachers had a very unique and engaging style of teaching. In terms of my university units, the level of creativity is not as exciting as it could be, but I think that has to do partly because I am learning from a computer. From an external student's point of view there is only so much a lecturer can do to make the unit creative. It is important to mention that all students have different preferred learning styles and that for some the traditional classroom setting might be ideal. But then again, will the students get the maximum amount of learning out of it as they possibly can? That is up for discussion. It is important that all students get exposed to an inclusive and differentiated learning environment, where the teacher is not afraid to explore a variety of teaching strategies to accommodate to the leaners. However, I think that this is not within many of the teacher's comfort zones, hence why they are only comfortable establishing that traditional classroom scenario. Teachers need to have proper education about what it means to be inclusive and how to be able to accommodate for every student's individual needs.

What do you think the implications are of a curriculum that is linear, progressive, aimed at a single learning outcome for the development of both individuals and the society we live in?

I think there are many implications of a curriculum that is linear and aims at a single learning outcome for two individuals. It is important to understand that every human in this world is different in that they have different needs, aims, goals, values and beliefs. What means success to someone might not mean success to someone else. The curriculum needs to provide variety and allow for students to be able to achieve different outcome in different ways. For example in a class scenario, a teacher could use a differentiated assignment task where students get to pick what grade they want to achieve and the different ways they could achieve it (e.g. one student might want to do a PowerPoint presentation and another student might want to write down an essay). As a teacher you need to be able to provide that choice and help every student in a different way. Even though it would be challenging to do so, it is crucial to find the way you could achieve that.

How can ICTs help you in the development of a professional learning network? How are you feeling about this?

I think ICTs would be greatly beneficial in developing my learning network. Like I mentioned above, if I could find a certain digital technology that I deem to be beneficial to my students I would be more that happy to introduce it to them.