Session 2 Reflection

This week was camp week. Most people were able to attend but for many reasons there are a number who are unable to go. This poses dilemmas for me in terms of pre preparation, the experience itself and post camp work. How can I help all students to think about the issues that are being highlighted through the camp? How can i help students feel a sense of inclusion if they don't attend? These are the same kinds of issues that teachers always grapple with when some students have had an experience that others have not shared. One strategy I use is to try to draw on similar experiences that students may have had to compare with camp experiences, also to look to what can be learned from published material (theories of learning science from outdoor experiences)so that students can make a contribution from that angle; still another way is to give students a role in post camp reflection that helps them to clarify the learning of their peers through acting as a scribe or group leader. Paying attention to the experiences of all learners matters, in order that some learners do not feel marginalised. This is a much easier thing to write than to 'live' as a teacher, since it happens in all sorts of subtle ways in classrooms all the time.

I want to think about a couple of experiences from camp as a way of better understanding my teaching and your learning. On Thursday afternoon, we asked each group to get together with another group to explain the activities they had chosen to do and to choose one of the activities (the one they felt least confident about)and run it through with the other group. I thought this would be a good way of trouble shooting some of the kinds of issues that don't arise when simply telling others about the intended teaching activities. After that time, everyone came back into the main dining area and I asked for volunteers from each of the paired groups to share some insight, challenge or question that had been raised from this activity of sharing. On the whole, the contributions were few and i had to work pretty hard to get them. What people did identify was excellent (I will discuss this more below) but i felt very uncomfortable with the process of gleaning these ideas. Now, lots of reasons spring to mind about why there weren't more contributions but something I recognised as a teacher was in the structuring of that activity that could have helped my purpose to be more fully realised. In bringing everyone back to the room, it would have been helpful to give each group 5 mins to talk together about what came up for them - to name something they felt happy about, something they learned that surprised/helped them, and a question or issue. Then appoint someone who who talk (briefly) to these issues. This more structured approach i believe would have helped focus the learning and create more conversation.

Contrast that experience with the Dinosaur Dig in the evening.In that situation, each group was asked to appoint a spokesperson and the group had a brief to name the dinosaur-thing created and to talk about its lifestyle/habitat. Now, it could have been because of having a few drinks, or other factors, but to me that structure helped the flow and organisation far better than in the afternoon.

Here is something about teaching that I am reminded about through this reflection. Even when you are seeking a 'free flowing' discussion, the teacher still needs to create a framework or structure for the discussion to 'free flow'. This is kind of opposite to what you might expect - be mindful of structure if you want something to flow easily.

The final thing i want to talk about here is the great insights that were brought up by people in the group debrief in the afternoon. Here is a selection of what was said:
* When you're working with peers/colleagues, you need to make some compromises (not everyone thinks like you do)
*Working with peers/colleagues can enhance teaching ideas, since they can make suggestions for modifications that you might not have otherwise thought of
*How you think about an experience may not be how others think about it (what may be interesting for you may be uninteresting to others; what seems easy/strightorward for you may be quite difficult for others)
*What looks good on paper in terms of an activity may not work so well in 'real life' of doing it
*Instructions that you think are clear might be quite unclear to another.

These are wonderful insights into the teaching/learning relationship. However, as comments themselves while lovely to read are not so useful unless they become acted upon in teaching. I will look out for some instances of these this week from my own and others teaching. Perhaps you can too.

Mandi
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