Training Skips Effective Techniques of Teaching :: essays papers

Training Skips Effective Techniques of Teaching â€Å"U.S. Educators’ Training Skips Effective Techniques of Teaching†: Article Review The article, U.S. Educators’ Training Skips Effective Techniques of Teaching, states that teachers in the United States have not been sufficiently trained on the details of beneficial teaching techniques. According to a study done by James W. Stigler, the United States’ teaching styles are drastically different than those of other countries. For example, Stigler found that teachers in America focus their math lessons primarily on rote learning and repetitive drills. On the other hand, in Japan teachers let the students make mistakes in hopes that these mistakes will later help them understand the problem and the reasoning behind it. The article also explains how teachers in the United States tend to stay isolated in their room and do not share or discuss their teaching techniques and experiences with each other in order to seem unintrusive. In Japan, the teachers often form teams to create lessons and share ideas while also clustering all their desks into one room. A t hird example of the differences among American schools compared to schools in other countries is the teacher’s main topics of discussion concerning their students. In America teachers tend to discuss student discipline instead of instruction, while in Japan, discussion focuses on different ways to teach lessons and concepts. This article states how American teachers need to work collaboratively and share their knowledge with their colleagues in order to help our students. I agree with this article when it states that â€Å"†¦[the U.S.] needs to create a culture in which teachers examine the way they teach and how they can better achieve their own goals. I feel that this article gave some good examples on how American schools need to improve their teaching techniques to help the students. While it is important to teach students the process of a math problem, for example, it is also just as important to teach them the underlying concept for the problem. Children need to be able to experiment and discover for themselves what math concepts mean in order to own and understand the information or skill. If students are not taught reasons for why they are learning something, they will not be interested. I also believe that discussions between teachers should focus on sharing their techniques and instructional ideas with each other rather than on discipline and logistics.