Aim: To understand the importance of student led learning What is student led learning? (sort the cards into two lists; student centered and teacher centered learning)

Which list would your teaching mainly fall into? Focused on each student's needs, abilities, interests, and learning styles, placing the teacher as a facilitator of learning Requires students to be active, responsible participants in their own learning. Allows students to actively participate in discovery learning processes from an autonomous viewpoint. A variety of hands-on activities are administered in order to promote successful learning. Promotes peer communication Responsibility for one’s own learning The teacher at its centre in an active role and students are in a passive, receptive role. Teachers choose what the students will learn, how the students will learn, and how the students will be assessed on their learning. Students work alone. The classroom remains orderly. Students are quiet, and the teacher retains full control of the classroom and its activities.

So if it is so important why doesn’t every teacher facilitate student led learning all the time?

"No matter how creative, colorful or exciting a lesson is, if the teacher's brain is the only one interacting with the material, the teacher's brain - not the student's brain - is the only brain forming dendrites." Pat Wolfe, "The Brain Matters: Translating Research into Classroom Behavior. “Some people would rather die than think.” ~ Bertrand Russell “The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think— rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with the thoughts of other men.” ~ John Dewey A student-centered classroom isn’t a place where the students decide what they want to learn and what they want to do. It’s a place where we consider the needs of the students, as a group and as individuals, and encourage them to participate in the learning process all the time. Leo Jones 2007 Cambridge University Press "The number one reason people lose their first real job is not a lack of technical skills, it is because they can’t get along with other people." National Job Service

In small groups build a decagon using the marshmallows and cocktail sticks you have been given

Was that a successful student led task? How do you facilitate student led learning in your classroom?

To be successful what do you need? Clear outcomes Discipline Consistency Clear expectations Clear guide lines Roles

How does this fit in with the ethos at SRS? SRS vision – to establish nationwide centres of educational excellence that are founded upon the highest international standards SRS values – excellence; independent learning; uniqueness and diversity; creativity; life skills; partnership Learner profiles-independent enquirers; creative thinkers; reflective learners; team workers; self- managers; effective participators; effective communicators; competent in the use of numbers and ICT

Now think about how you will/already facilitate excellent student led learning in your classroom Share this experience/idea and inspire someone else to try student led learning in their classroom