English Curriculum.
-Innovative Approaches in English.1.Multiple Intelligences
-I want my children to understand the world, but not just because the world is fascinating and the human mind is curious. I want them to understand it so that they will be positioned to make it a better place. Knowledge is not the same as morality, but we need to understand if we are to avoid past mistakes and move in productive directions. An important part of that understanding is knowing who we are and what we can do... Ultimately, we must synthesize our understandings for ourselves. The performance of understanding that try matters are the ones we carry out as human beings in an imperfect world which we can affect for good or for ill. (Howard Gardner 1999: 180-181)
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/gardner.htm#cite
2.Contextualism.
Dialectics, Developmental Contextualism, and the Further Enhancement of Theory about Puberty and Psychosocial Development
Michigan State University
Contemporary theory in the study of human development in general and of adolescence in particular emphasizes reciprocal and changing relations between the developing person and his or her changing context. This article analyzes the Adams et al dialectical model of the role of a key component of adolescent development-puberty-in such person-context relations. To interpret the model's meaning and critique its usefulness, the present article considers the place of this formulation within the recent history of theory development in the human developmental sciences. It is argued that dialectics is flawed as a means to understand variation in puberty-context relations because it involves an inherently teleological notion of change; as such, dialectics cannot be used successfully to model the multidirectionality and plasticity of adolescent development. A developmental contextual alternative formulation is presented.http://www.contextualpsychology.org/fox_2006
http://parenthood.library.wisc.edu/Lerner/Lerner.html
3.Learning How To Learn.
Socialization in our families and schools results in our learning how to learn with a particular bias (in the same manner that it is rare for a person's four brain quadrants to develop equally). As a back-up to our primary way of defining the truth (feeling-seeing-thinking-doing), we draw also upon one of the other adjoining modalities
As a result, a fourfoldtypologyemerges from these stages: Convergers emphasize a combination of abstract conceptualization and active experimentation, while divergers combine concrete experience with reflective observation.
4.Futures Studies.
Why Studying the Future and Change is Important
Change is happening at an ever faster rate today--driven partly by technological changes leading to changes in all other areas of our lives, and by the increasing interdependence between countries and peoples today, as well as the decentralization of societies and institutions within countries (also furthered by information technologies today). The end of the Cold War is also changing political and economic borders, systems, and alignments, as everyone seeks to become part of a global economy and society, while still maintaining national, ethnic, and cultural identities and meaning. While the danger of all-out nuclear war between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. (now Russia and fourteen other former Republics of the Soviet Union) has greatly receeded, with the end of the Cold War, nuclear terrorism remains a danger, and other issues, such as sustainable development and preservation of the environment, have gained greater ascendancy. This has made it necessary for governments, businesses, organizations, and people to better understand change and the future, since we will all be living and working in a future world that promises to be different from today in significant ways. When people better understand change, they also often see more opportunities for their lives and ways to better positively influence the future that is being created.
http://www.metafuture.org/Articles/teachingfuturestudies.htmhttp://www.csudh.edu/global_options/IntroFS.HTML
5.Constructivism.
http://www.questia.com/read/93540752
6.Mastery Learning.
Mastery Learning
Definition
Mastery learning proposes that all children can learn when provided with the appropriate learning conditions in the classroom.
http://www.funderstanding.com/content/mastery-learning
Thinking activities need to be planned and scaffolded.
Students need to be aware that they are thinking (meta-cognition)
and that different thinking strategies are required for different problems.
Edward De Bono believes that, "..many highly intelligent people are bad thinkers.
Intelligence is like the horsepower of a car. A powerful car has the potential to drive at speed.
But you can have a powerful car and drive it badly.
Thinking is the driving skill with which each individual drives his or her intelligence."
('Mind Power' 1995)
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