Reflections on my current practice:
1. Have I been engaging students emotionally, creatively and intellectually to instill deep and passionate curiosity in learning?
Engaging students emotionally:
We connect, understand, and remember things much more deeply when our emotions are involved. [e.g. consider the impact of seeing a photo of a firefighter carrying a koala injured during the 2020 Australian bushfires VS reading a fact-filled analysis of the bushfire itself; the former is definitely more memorable.]
Looked back at the year's worth of teaching and picked out 2 instances of intentional 'emotional bamboozling' that students enjoyed (as much as I enjoyed designing the learning experience):
1. Sec 2 GE Chap 10: Transport Systems and Their Spatial Distribution Students were learning about the purpose of transport systems -- to facilitate movement of people, and goods and services. Apart getting students to reflect on their own daily experiences with transport, I included a clip from a documentary titled 'Most Dangerous Ways To School | NEPAL' [13:30-18:11]. The clip shows the treacherous journey that children who lives in Kumpur, Nepal, have to make every day to get to school. The mountainous village of Kumpur is more than 4000 meters above sea level. After an hour-long hike in the hill which is full of risk, the children need to cross the river Trishuli by a basket attached by two rusty ropes. It is operated by the elder ones and the younger ones stay in the basket. Sometimes the basket remains on the other hand of the river after being used by someone else and in that case, the students become unable to cross the river. This journey to school and returning home takes almost eight hours per day, but the Nepalese children still persevere because they know the importance of education. This video connected with my Sec 2 class because beyond the application of what they have learned on characteristics of transport infrastructure [i.e. evaluating the safety, accessibility and convenience of the basket as a mode of transport - see ITT below], this video got them reflecting on their privilege. A few students also remarked that they cannot imagine having to rely on such an unsafe mode of transport, and commended the Nepalese children on their determination to make this journey every day.  |
2. Sec 3 GE: Coasts [Extension Activity] I started off the lesson by sharing with students about my FYP, introducing the issue of sand mining in Cambodia. For over a decade, the Cambodian government has granted several private companies concessions to mine Cambodia's mangrove forests for sand. Each year, millions of metric tons of sand are shipped to Singapore to enlarge our land mass, while Cambodia destroys its only natural protection against erosion, rising sea levels, tsunamis, and hurricanes and lays waste to a vital and fragile ecosystem that thousands of families depend on for their livelihood. This was an extension to a previous lesson where students were introduced to land reclamation in Singapore. I thought it would be meaningful to help students realise that though land reclamation is beneficial to Singapore's development, this development comes at the expense of others. I elicited this point by showing them a video narrated by a young Cambodian villager who bears witness to the destruction of her home from the excessive riverbed dredging. The key guiding questions that I planned enabled a very fruitful class discussion - one of which tapped into their emotions by asking them how they felt as a Singapore resident after watching the video. Multiple perspectives were raised by students. One felt guilty because Singapore was complicit in causing hardship to the vulnerable communities in Cambodia, while another felt that Singapore should not be faulted for importing sand from Cambodia if Cambodia is willing to sell the sand to us. I then highlighted the corruption that goes on in the sand mining industry, to help students gain a deeper understanding of this prevalent environmental issue. I could tell that this was a memorable activity for them, since they commonly brought up coastal development as an activity that poses threat to the coastal ecosystems in structured questions and LDQs in subsequent practices, using the Cambodian coast as an example.
[Full activity can be found on this padlet].  |
Engaging students creatively:
The Sec 2 post-fieldwork task empowered students to express their creativity in their final product. I hope to be able to create more of such learning experiences in our everyday lessons with more intentional planning.
Engaging students intellectually:
Still grappling with what it means to engage students intellectually. Is it in the form of research? Or discussing more debatable/controversial topics? Something to mull over.
2. Know, Understand, Do [KUD]
I realised that though I have been exposed to KUDs previously, I still struggled with extrapolating transferable understandings, especially in the LSG realm. (Hence I am able to pinpoint the K and the D, but not so much for the U.)
Without concepts as an anchor, I suppose learning can still take place, though their learning may be shallow given that they don't have the framework needed to organise information in a cohesive manner. Yet another reminder to self that knowing facts =/= evidence of deeper, conceptual understanding.
Went down the rabbit hole of 'WHAT IS A CONCEPT/CONCEPTUAL UNDERSTANDING', which culminated in a review and refinement of the Sec 2 GE topic plans.
**A 'tip' from the chapter on how to deepen thinking: including the phrase "...in order to understand that..." to allow students to demonstrate understanding at a level beyond the facts.
E.g.
Will continue to read up on concept-based curriculum and instruction. Till next time!
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