A Student’s Perspective

Although I am a student at the University at Buffalo, I often look back and reflect on my high school education and what I enjoyed the most. From lunch with friends, to playing on the varsity soccer team, to going to football games on Friday night, there is a lot I miss about high school. However, this post will focus on the education I received in high school and what I think worked and what didn’t.

Looking Back…

Looking back on my high school days I think of what classes I enjoyed the most. Like many others, I enjoyed the classes that covered topics I find interesting to study. However, once I got to college where classes seemed to become more like one another, I realized what actually made me love a class in high school. I began to see that the classes I enjoyed the most were the ones that had the most hands on learning, and where the teacher was more of a guide rather than a demonstrator.

Before continuing I would like to allude to an earlier blog post where I explain the effectiveness of the mutual education method as opposed to the controlled education method. The study I described showed university students preferred the mutual education method, a method in which the students were the drivers of their own education and could make insights on their own while the teacher stood back as more of a guide. After reflecting on my high school education I realized that in all the classes I found the most worthwhile and invigorating, the teacher used more of a mutual education method. For example, I do not hold a deep interest in biology, or any of the sciences for that matter. However, in my sophomore year biology class, most of the learning we did was through engaging activities in which we were able to sort of teach ourselves as opposed to being lectured for hours on end. Other than a quick demonstration of the topic, the teacher was really there only to help if the student had a question with the activity. The students were allowed to develop their own insights and ideas which proved to be extremely effective, at least for me.

Looking ahead…

Moving forward I hope that other students voice their opinions on what worked for them and what didn’t. Developing effective education methods should not only fall on the shoulders of the educators. Students should have a voice in their own education. I believe that in the future students will have more control over their education and it will be the responsibility of the educator not to simply lecture, but to be a guide in each individual child’s learning journey.