Mid Michigan Community College

English 111
Instructor: Iliana Miller

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Author, Title

What is the main problem?

Why does the problem

occur?

How does it affect learning?

What lessons about effective

learning did you take from
this author?

"Changing
Educational
Paradigms" Sir Ken
Robinson - video

U.S education system is

outdated, Pushing students to
pass classes in K-12 grade
school, assembly line learning,
the standardization of
delivering knowledge

Students are classified by age

rather than ability or intellect,
funding of education, fear of
change, social status stands in
the way

Develops the assumption that

doing the bare minimum is
okay, creativity is stifled, offers
students only a sense of
helplessness disconnects
between school and real life

Divergent thinking is an
alternative to memorization,
rather than compliance and
conformity, stop medicating
kids

Educational assembly line,

Educators are not asking for
Educators are constantly
more from students, everyone
"In Praise of the "F"
allowing students to "skate by", is blaming everyone else
Word" Merry Sherry
students can constantly do the (drugs, divorce, life) instead of
p.338
bare minimum
on the inherent problem,
educators never have the
attention of students

Students are not being taught

or forced to value education,
they are becoming resentful,
basic skills for employment are
lacking, false understanding of
success

Allow students to fail, let them

understand the importance of
education, allow failure to be
an option rather than just a
threat, parents and teachers
need to start collaborating

BARRY ALFORD
"Rereading the
World"

Often, we do not make sense

of what we are reading.
Students read to get the
answer rather than to interact
with the text

Mike Rose"I Just

Want To Be
Average"p.295

Social standing in society,

Students fail, become average, educational standards are one
just ride the rollercoaster
size fits all, educators don't
through education
expect more than average
students

BARRY ALFORD
"Frierian Voices,
Student Choices"

Jack Mezirow
"Transformative
Learning Theory to
Practice"

Students lack the ability to

read academically

One size fits all education

Reading is taught as a one

track process, technology is
making reading more
simplistic,

Students are not taught how to

read and understand academic
text. Educators speak at the
students rather than getting
them involved and actually
teaching.

Educators teach to the text

and expect all students to
learn the same way

Students are not retaining

information. Teachers are
teaching the bare minimum,
assuming that information is
what the students expects, are
Read, enjoy, relate, ask
indifferent to students progress
questions, interact
and level of understanding, no
responsibility, people who do
not interact with the text
become disconnected from the
world, from reality
Students are becoming cynical
grade collectors, being placed
in curriculums designed not to
liberate but to occupy, school
systems are failing students in
every way

Stop educating students with a

one size fits all method, help
students be enthusiastic about
learning, lessen the gap for
standards of education
between poverty and social
standing

Students never feel

empowered, never know how
to ask questions, and become
overwhelmed.

Educators need to get

students involved, let their
voices be heard. A classroom
needs to be a place in which
students can discuss,
contemplate, and collaborate.

Students become
overwhelmed, learn nothing,
breeze by, or just quit.

Educators need to realize that

students are inviduals, with
different needs.They need to
transform their way of teaching
to transform students way of
learning.

Educators are all about

authority and domination;
Bell Hooks "Engaged Education has become a litany
unwilling to see students as
Pedagogy"
of one dimesional teaching
multi-faceted beings and show
themselves as such too.

Nicholas Carr "Is

Google Making Us
Stupid?"

Google and the internet has

changed the way that we think
and has caused us to become
lazy.

We rely so heavily on
technology to the point that it
has literally changed our
brains way of thinking.

Students can never find their

potential and truly learn
without being empowered by
educators.

The more open you are to

learning, the more open your
point of view. Students need to
demand that educators make
knowledge relevent. Learn to
discuss, contemplate, and self
actualize.

We skim articles, rather than

taking in all the information
that we need. We can no
longer be bothered to read
things that do not catch our
interest.

We need to retrain our brains

and find a balance with
technology, otherwise we will
lose our ability and skill to
effectively learn.

What personal
narrative best
illustrates the
author's lesson
about effective
learning?
Growing
up, many of
my fellow students
were on Ritalin.
Highschool was
always about the
standardization of
tests, remember,
remember,
remember. Now,
fourteen years later, I
can't
just
Manyremember
fellow students
about
anything
that
in highschool could I
was
suppose
have
barely
read orto
spell,
learned.
yet, time after time,
they were able to
squeak by in school
and graduate. Even
tutoring programs
were bare minimum
for most, as
educators did not
have the time or
resources to assist
students properly.

Everything in school
was about
memorization, rather
than learning. I did a
lot of homework and
reading that I did not
understand, but
educators were too
busy
to help
tutorto
In
school,
weorread
outside
class, so it
meet
theofeducational
was easier to of
learn
requirements
the
the bareMost
minimum,
district.
of us
give the
answers
were
bored,
tunedthat
wereand
expected,
out,
wishingand
to
just
forget about
be anywhere
but itin
afterwards.
class.
We did not
learn anything, we
just retained
information long
enough to pass the
Itests,
do not
believe
that I
than
we were
have
a personal
allowed
to forget it
narrative
for now,
this
And I notice
particular
article.
many of my
fellowI've
never
been
to
students
thatone
were
speak
in class
unless
considered
poor
were
Iusually
really had
in the
something
to say.
vocational
classes.
I am experiencing
However,
throughout
this in almost every
school,
a I do
class to unless
this day.
teacher
specifically
not learn by being
asked
foratan
answer,
lectured
and
being
there
was
never
made to just write
much
discussion
to
long essays
that just
open
young
minds
give something to to
the
possibilities.
grade.
I have a hard
time seeing the point
of being in a
classroom if I can just
be told that I need to
write twenty, ten page
essays and have
them turned in by a
due date. I do not
need an educator for
that because that
isn't teaching and I'm
not learning.

In school, we did
what we were told,
no questions asked.
Half the time, the
educator would be
out of the room,
napping, or doing
anything but
teaching. It was
about the
Ialways
have noticed
authorityinand
keeping
change
later
the
students that
in line,
generations
have
like
glorified
grown
up on
babysitters.
Ana way,
technology. In
assembly
line
of
you can see the
bored zombie
laziness
and slow
students, withofan
deterioration
educator
that was
abstract thinking.
just
showing
Unless it can up
be to
get
paid.
found in snippets on
Twitter, Tumbler, or
Facebook, most
people could care
less about learning.
And if they do read
the information, it's
usually wrong
because they were
too lazy to look up
verification.