Pedagogies: Theory and Practice
Course Description
Summary
This course will focus on teaching methods. While applicable to college, they鈥檒l mostly be of the K-12 variety. Proleptically, it should always already recognize the false dichotomy rather too neatly encapsulated in its subtitle.
On the one hand, yes, weekly, we鈥檒l scour the history of education, the issues most pertinent to it, its possibly reified institutions, rationales, epistemologies, (mis)conceptions, and tactics, across a range of disciplines, asking difficult, consequential questions about authority, ownership, management, change, diversity, freedom, individualism, knowledge and power. We may learn a thing or two. As a former graduate of Bennington鈥檚 BA/MAT program once put it, perhaps a little more sanguinely, 鈥淕iven my past experiences working in schools, I knew that I could not simply rely on my philosophies to carry me through, but I knew that in moments of doubt and exhaustion, these positive and energetic ideals could act as safe places to return to and recuperate鈥 (2013).
On the other hand, to begin our process of conflation of ideas and reality from the beginning, in this description, yes, weekly, we鈥檒l put said theories to the test, designing our own lessons and 鈥渢eaching鈥 each other, while asking similar, difficult, consequential questions about what we are teaching and why, if now using other, palimpsestic vocabulary, such as planning, objectives, understandings, skills, scaffolding, improvisation, advocacy, colleagueship, technology, differentiated strategies, or informal and formal assessment, on a quest for epiphanic moments that make everything else feel trivial. In reflecting on the best of our praxis, we may even learn a different thing or two, or the same things, but differently.
Learning Outcomes
- Learn at least something about the history of education.
Become more informed as to its most pressing issues, and au fait with theoretical constructs and their possible application.
Begin to teach.
Define meaningful questions, objectives, and diverse forms of learning.
Scaffold, characterize, and assess instruction to yield the desired result.
Improvise.
Advocate for yourself and your peers.
Perhaps most importantly, establish your own relationship with the material and a disciplined, somewhat independent educational practice.