EME2040 Reflection 4: What is a Constructivist Lesson Plan?

Reflection 4: What is a Constructivist Lesson Plan?

A Constructivist lesson plan is base on students’ real life experience. For example, the teacher gives the students a topic and the students need to find out how they are related to that topic. Most of the time the teacher will discuss with the students what type of materials that they will be using, and the objectives of the lesson. In a constructivist lesson plan, the students usually divided into small groups of three of five before assign each task and the final task will combine two groups to form group of six before the teacher assign the assignment to the class. The teacher needs to discuss the student’s groupings for the first two tasks, discuss the grading criteria and what is expected of each student and the groups, discuss objectives and the goals of the lesson, and also discuss the roles each of the group members need to decide upon to allow for a positive collaborative experience and allow each group member to ask questions a teacher must not ignore the inquiries of students. If teachers ignore the questions of students, they will begin to stop asking questions because they believe it is wrong to ask. During my school years, when I was younger coming from Haiti I was not familiar with the language I was afraid of asking questions because I thought it demonstrated weakness plus I was still trying to understand the language. From the moment students enter a new classroom, the teacher should enforce the asking of questions. Asking questions is not the only aspect of inquiry learning; it is more profound and includes other elements. After questions are asked, the next step is the answering or giving of the information. With their questions answered, students have now been given the information that goes hand-in-hand with their way of gathering and analyzing information. I believe students learn better when they ask questions because the questions they ask are a result and portrayal of their educational needs. There is one absolute truth, and that truth is that in the real world, there will not be answers to many questions. So it is important that students learn how to look for the answers, because they are not easy to find. Inquiry-Based Learning also emphasizes that everything cannot have an answer, so as teachers, we must build ourselves and our students to focus on the learning process and not the answering process.

In a large classroom setting it is best for the teacher to provide the students with samples of how they will need to present the project, and what type of questions will be expect from the teacher regarding their findings. For example, the first task usually requires each of the group to brainstorming what and how they are to start the project, the second task the students are to discuss and brainstorm ideas for the project, and the third task discuss how each group will need to combine so they can present the final task. Basically a constructivist lesson plan is to provide the students with a topic where they can relate to, and develop an outline for the teacher to check for understanding. Constructivist lesson plan provides opportunity for the students to develop a community of self learning and togetherness by applying knowledge to creating good critical thinking to create something new.