Transcript Active Learning and Your Child

Active Learning and Your Child
Mrs McGuigan 2014
What is Active Learning?
• Active learning is seen as an appropriate way for children and young
people to develop vital skills and knowledge and a positive attitude to
learning.
• Active learning is learning which engages and challenges children and
young people’s thinking using real-life and imaginary situations. It takes
full advantage of the opportunities for learning presented by:
• spontaneous play
• planned, purposeful play
• investigating and exploring
• events and life experiences
• focused learning and teaching.
Continued...
• Active learning has long been an established approach in early years
settings, and when asked to reflect on what active learning might
look like in early primary school, delegates to a Curriculum for
Excellence conference for early years suggested:
• 'A true building on experiences in nursery. Hands-on independent
play with appropriate skilled intervention/teaching.'
• 'Children learn by doing, thinking, exploring, through quality
interaction, intervention and relationships, founded on children’s
interests and abilities across a variety of contexts. All combining to
building the four capacities for each child.'
• 'Environments that offer differential play and challenge, staff who
are well informed and able to challenge learning, child-centred and
building on previous experiences, fun absolutely essential, children
planning and evaluating their learning.'
Continued...
• Active learning can support learners' development of the four capacities in
many ways. For example, they can develop as:
• successful learners through using their imagination and creativity, tackling
new experiences and learning from them, and developing important skills
including literacy and numeracy through exploring and investigating while
following their own interests
• confident individuals through succeeding in their activities, having the
satisfaction of a task accomplished, learning about bouncing back from
setbacks, and dealing safely with risk
• responsible citizens through encountering different ways of seeing the
world, learning to share and give and take, learning to respect themselves
and others, and taking part in making decisions
• effective contributors through interacting together in leading or
supporting roles, tackling problems, extending communication skills,
taking part in sustained talking and thinking, and respecting the opinions
of others.
The Practical Context
• There is a range of practical contexts and wider opportunities
within which children and young people can develop a breadth of
skills. These may include:
• Enterprise in education activities, courses and programmes
enabling young people to build the skills associated with enterprise,
entrepreneurship and employability
• Learning out of doors
• Sustainable development activities including environmental and
community activity and participation in the Eco-Schools programme
• Cultural and creative activities including music or dance classes,
drama and musical productions
• Health promoting school activities
• Out of school hours learning
• Community sports and leisure activities
The Practical Context
• Specific opportunities such as Skills for Work qualifications, Duke of
Edinburgh’s Award or ASDAN
• Work placements and work shadowing where Curriculum for
Excellence offers the flexibility for a more individualised approach
which is relevant and meaningful for young people providing
opportunities for them to consider the skills they will need in
advance of their placement, to practise and develop their skills, and
to reflect on their experience post-placement
• School/college partnerships which provide opportunities for young
people to develop skills in a relevant, work-related environment,
national training programmes such as Get Ready for Work which
provide young people with confidence and skills for learning, life
and work to enable them to engage with the labour market.
In School
• Give the learner feedback on their incomplete
understandings and encourage them to fix this, for
example by helping each other.
• Give the teacher feedback on which learners
understand, and who needs help
• Develop thinking skills such as analysis problem
solving, and evaluation
• Help learners to use their learning in realistic and
useful ways, and see its importance and relevance
• Leading Learners Week
• Bloom’s Taxonomy
At Home
• The key to active learning at home is.....
INDEPENDENCE!
• Developing questioning using Bloom’s
Taxonomy
And Finally
Any questions?