Blog 1: Old Story vs. New Story

All students makes sense of the world through story, what they are told and their past experiences. This is one things that all humans have in common, that they learn in similar ways.  Therefore it is totally understandable that there has been many different methods of teaching styles throughout history.  It has recently been categorized into what is called the old story and the new story.  The old story consists of the typical ideas of teaching, that the teacher is the expert, the student is the passive learner, there is one right and answer and the classroom consists of students in rows, and the teacher dead centre at the front.  In some cases not much has changed from classrooms today.  An example that I can think of off the top of my head is BIOL 1F90.  It was three one hour lectures a week which consisted of writing what the professor said and sitting in D. Howes, a lecture theatre set up in rows.  Before I can begin criticizing this type of teaching, I realized that this was the only way this professor could get the information across that he needed to, to 300+ students in a crowded room.
There are still old story values that take place in the new story teaching methods of the 21st century which are, tradition, accountability,standardized tests and teacher based tests. However the new story values consist of an open, dynamic and collaborative classroom.  It was John Dewey who incorporated the new story ideas to the old story method of education.(Drake, Reid & Kolohon, 2014)  He understood the need for a democratic classroom, that consisted of problem solving and student growth because it helped the students with moral and personal development through communication.  Students make meaning of what they are being taught through interaction with others.  Teachers interactions with students is very important, the more comfortable the student feels in a learning environment, the more they will learn and participate in what they are being taught.  This is the number one flaw of the old teaching methods, the lack of personal interaction between student and teacher.
I recently just returned from a semester abroad in Australia at Curtin University, although I had the best experience I could ever ask for, I found their teaching styles in university quite different from what I am used to back here in Canada.  All of the classes were online, this includes the lectures in written format but also a video of my professor giving the lecture, as well as all the course materials and chat rooms that would help you if you didn't understand something.  The option was there to go to the classes, however no one ever went so if you did it would be yourself with maybe a couple other people. For the most part I loved this idea because it left a lot of time for so many other activities because you could get a weeks worth of school work packed into one day on your own time.  However there was one class that I was particularly interested in, Geographies and Food Security.  This topic is very interesting to me however I feel as though the learning experience wasn't as enhanced as it could be because there was no interaction to go along with the learning.  The textbook for this class has information in the first chapter about personalization, and this is exactly what this course was lacking.  "Passion takes them on different paths, even though they share the common, big picture learning goals of the curriculum."(Drake, Reid & Kolohon, 2014) I am very passionate about this topic however I did not get to express it because I wasn't given the chance to engage in conversations about it, seeing as most of the course was online.  Therefore after that experience I understand how important the new methods of teaching are when they incorporate interaction and discussion into the classroom.

Drake, S.M. & Reid, J.L. & Kolohon, W. (2014). Interweaving curriculum and classroom assessment: Engaging the 21 Century Learner. Toronto, ON: Oxford University Press.