Seminar 2: How Can One Actually Learn?

A very interesting thing I learned about in the second seminar was about the zone of proximal development. It sounds like a bunch of jargon but it isn't that hard to understand. The zone of proximal development is a theory in educational psychology that tries to find the optimal spot where children can learn and be independent at the same time. On one side, the student can do a task. On the other side, the student cannot do a task. A common trait that both sides share is that this is where learning does NOT happen. Strangely, I found it to be an important realization. Before, I would associate learning a very hard topic as learning, even if I struggled a lot and had no idea what was going on. Although I had an assumption that I was learning because it was a difficult topic, in reality I did not learn anything at all.

Other insights I got from the seminar is that it is quite hard for a teacher to ensure that all the students are learning and flourishing in the class. As the advisor said, "Teachers change their learning plan all the time." The students' range of skills are all over the spectrum so it is kind of hard to make their learning individualized when there is only one teacher and one curriculum. Unfortunately, in the classes I have attended, some students struggle a lot in class. Their answers are not valued as much in the class because they answered the question incorrectly. To prevent this scenario from happening (one where no learning takes place), their answers should still be valued in class discussion because instead of automatically correcting them as wrong or right, trying to listen to various answers helps to facilitate a discussion that is open to all students.