Instructional Strategies for a Student-Centered Classroom
Student-centered classrooms are learning environments that shift instruction from teacher lead lessons to students taking responsibility for their learning. The person doing the work is the person doing the learning. If the teacher is the only person in the room thinking, talking, and interacting with materials, then the teacher benefits most from the lesson. A classroom that centers students offer students opportunities to make decisions, assess their learning and adjust as needed to learn new information and complete tasks.
To create a student-centered classroom, teachers must be willing to share control of the learning by making students part of the lessons' planning and organization and providing opportunities for student engagement. Achieve a student-centered learning environment by incorporating instructional strategies that allow students to collaborate with classmates and instructional materials actively. Some of my favorite instructional strategies are below.
Discussion - Planning opportunities for students to talk about their learning should be part of the instruction. Students can talk in pairs using strategies like Think-Pair-Share or small groups. Modeling appropriate discussion strategies before handing out activities is essential to ensure the discussion stays on topic. Students must know who they will talk to (identity partners or group members). Posting sentence frames to guide collaborative conversations and modeling the use of conversation stems is helpful. Students will also need to know how long they have to discuss the topic (set a timer and assign a time keep when needed) and the expected outcome of the discussion (expectations should be stated verbally or put in writing so students can make sure they are on-topic).
Social Media (faux) - Students use social media to share content, so why not use it in the classroom? There are a lot of free social media templates available online. Websites like Ditch that Textbook provide templates; for example, students can simulate tweets. Teaching students to use only 280 characters to respond to a topic is a great way to teach concise writing. Students can collaborate to create a bulletin board, link tweets or have small groups create Twitter boards (boards that display groups of tweets) for social studies, language arts, science, or math lessons. Let's not forget Tik Tok. Students can make Tik-Tok-styled videos using Flipgrid, a video-sharing app that demonstrates their learning.
Virtual Field Trip - I am a huge advocate for going on virtual field trips. Students from kindergarten - 12th grade can log on and virtually traverse everything from the San Diego Zoo to the Great Wall of China to space explorations. The We Are Teachers website offers suggestions for Amazing Virtual Field Trips. The virtual experience requires listening and viewing media to develop knowledge on a topic. Before exploring, students should have a purpose for the "trip" and clear learning expectations. After the virtual field trip, students can write a blog post, draw a picture using traditional or virtual tools or create short videos about their learning.
Jigsaw - This cooperative learning strategy helps group members share responsibility for learning and completing a task. Divide students into groups, with each member, assigned part of the reading, a portion of the text, watching a video, constructing a model, etc. For example, the teacher would divide the class into six groups with four students in each group. Each of the four students is assigned a number 1 - 4. All of the students with the number one would watch a short mover. All students with the number two would read a fiction text. All students with the number three would read a nonfiction text, and all with the number four would research the topic on designated child-friendly websites. After becoming learning experts using their assigned materials, group members come back together to share their learning. Using Jigsaw is excellent for developing students' communication and problem-solving skills.
Blog - Creating online writings is an excellent way for students to share their thoughts or beliefs, steps for completing tasks, or various perspectives. A class or subject matter blog can be constructed on nonfiction and fiction topics related to any subject. For example, students learning healthy eating habits can write about ways to eat healthily, locating healthy foods in their community, recipes, why healthy eating is essential, etc. They can write nonfiction posts about their eating habits or fiction posts that drive home critical points about eating healthy. Use Wix.com and other free blog sites to create class blogs. Teachers can also use Google Docs to create blogs and post entries on classroom bulletin boards.
Students need opportunities to do the heavy lifting. Provide time for them to think, talk, and interact with materials and their classmates to benefit most from the lesson and gain from the learning. Student-centered classrooms enhance engagement, increase problem-solving skills and stimulate cooperation and teamwork.
