Article Response

In reading the article, "Giving Reluctant Students a Voice" written by Reynold Redekopp and Elizabeth Bourbonniere, I saw a great deal of myself being described.  I related with the "level 3 rare discussion participators." Sometimes it takes time for responses to formulate in my head and by the time I am ready to share, either someone else has already shared a similar thought (a better thought) or the group has moved onto a different topic already.  I have noticed that I tend to feel the most comfortable expressing my ideas in written formats.  This article stimulated great ideas for encouraging “reluctant students” (like me) to speak up and share their ideas.  

 When the blog assignments mentioned in the article were conducted with the concept of privacy and anonymity, I again related to those relieved students who felt "safer" sharing their ideas in a public forum.  For myself, I was hesitant when informed one of our class assignments in ED 554 was to create a blog in which our fellow students would be able to access.  I could see that my same anxieties were building, hearing the voice in my head asking, “What if I say something stupid?”  “What if others think less of me because of my comments?”   “Is what I say even important?”  “I know nothing about how to do this.”  “What if I fail?”  Within this article, the authors tried to reduce the students’ anxieties by replacing names with numbers and instructing the students not to use others’ names within their comments.  This provided the safety of anonymity encouraging “reluctant participator” to express their thoughts without feeling personally judged.  I can relate to how that would encourage my participation as well. 

As a teacher, however, I need to understand and overcome these fears so that I can feel comfortable with the technology enough to know how to use it to provide positive learning experiences for my students, and then use my own experiences to design parameters for them and assist in their overcoming of their own fears and growing in their technological confidence as well.  In today’s society, students are already using these technologies to socialize.  This article presented great ideas on how to use those forums to stimulate classroom discussions and enhance and extend the learning experience . 

 The authors took the concept of "hearing their reluctant students" even further, by encouraging the students to interact with each other in a positive way,  By encouraging the students to read and respond to each other’s comments a rich dialogue was created.  Opportunities for discussion and debate and extended cooperative learning were also accomplished.  These types of online forums take the learning out of the classroom and into arenas where the students feel more inclined to interact.  Bravo!

 I am seeing how my ideas about teaching even from the beginning of my graduate classes have changed.  I can see even more clearly that to be a teacher, one must never stop learning and adapting to what is available and incorporating every avenue, tool, and resource possible to help the students relate to the material, to each other, and to their own learning process.  For the good of the students, the students must always be the focus (even if it means overcoming your own personal fears in the process).