5. Application of Content
“The teacher understands how to connect concepts and use differing perspectives to engage learners in critical thinking, creativity, and collaborative problem solving related to authentic local and global issues.”
Standard Components
Experiences
Development
Perspective
Learning is the most meaningful and engages students best when they get opportunities to construct knowledge as they take it in, Providing hands-on, interactive, real learning experiences is essential to applying any content. Working across multiple disciplines, I strive to provide students with tangible and visceral experiences that strengthen the informational offerings I provide.
To support the development of lifelong learners, capable of growing up and solving the problems we collectively face, It is paramount to apply content in ways that scaffold problem-solving skills. My practice uses content as a means to strengthen and grow the skillsets of creativity, collaboration and critical thinking.
The experiences students have engaging with the content allow them to expand their perspective and practice stepping into the shoes of others. Building a skill of perspective-taking helps students face future dilemmas from multiple angles to come up with the best solution.
meeting the standard
One of my main motivators as an educator is the idea that I am sending problem-solvers out into the world. I care deeply about equipping my students with the cognitive, somatic and sensory skills they need to engage in learning and growing for the rest of their lives. Because I aim for such a holistic impact on my students’ problem-solving abilities, it doesn’t really matter what content area or interdisciplinary project I am working within the confines of - I will always incorporate the same structural development around how my students think.
An analogy I have come up with to use with my students posits knowledge as the equipment and understanding as the game. Aside from maybe tag, most games are pretty impossible to play without some type of ball, goal, glove, racket, etc. So to play the game of understanding, you need to acquire some knowledge. The more knowledge you accumulate, the more types of games you can play. Content is the knowledge, how it's applied determines what students will understand because they know it.
It is my goal when planning my units and scaffolding my material to weave deeper key teachings throughout, engaging students in processes that build up their thinking skills and guiding them to develop their own process of problem-solving that works best for them.
