Do you remember the days when the teacher would stand at the front of the classroom, leading the class in fervent discussion? Flash forward to now. The teacher sits placidly behind their desk, playing the fiftieth level of candy crush. Meanwhile, their students fend for themselves amidst a jungle of peers and papers. Many educators these days enthusiastically advocate the use of group work and the “teach yourself, teach others” methodology of modern day teaching. This is especially evident in modern high school curricular.
The student watches timidly as their teacher writes the problems on the board and waits as their teacher begins to divide them into groups. The teacher, then, checks out, while the students figure out how to teach themselves. Sure, once every 15 minutes or so, the teacher leisurely strolls through the aisles. Mostly, however, the class adopts a distinct "Lord of the Flies" ideology.
As a student of education, I am not trying to discredit group work as a concept. Contrarily, I personally advocate for collaboration and communication in my own classrooms. I believe that certain students strongly respond to the coaching effects of peer review, group work, and partner pairs. I try to lead my own lesson plans with a “think, pair, and share” style of agenda. The students first work individually on a question or topic. Then, they pair up and discuss the topic together, bouncing ideas back and forth. Finally, we will bring it back to a group discussion. The ideology behind this philosophy is that the students will first creatively ponder the question themselves, share it with a peer, then, hopefully, they will feel comfortable enough to share it with the class.
Since I am a prospective educator, my education courses attempt to convince me that the dry days of lecturing have come to an end. I remain skeptical on this ideal. While I thoroughly see the benefits of collaboration in the classroom with a teacher acting in more of an advisor role, I think that each lesson should be properly supplemented with the typical lecture style of teaching. Furthermore, this will create a healthy balance and reach the most students.
