Standards for High Quality Learning Experiences

How do we ensure that ALL students have high quality learning experiences?

Dr. Roland Tharp presented five standards for achieving this goal which were derived from the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence. The five CREDE standards are as follows:
1) Teachers and students working together
2) Developing literacy and language skills across the curriculum
3) Connecting school to students' lives
4) Engaging students with challenging lessons
5) Emphasizing dialogue over lecture

I agree that these standards help ensure that students will have a high quality learning experience. Although, I think that in order for teachers to correctly implement these standards, they would need some type of professional development, lessons, or examples of activities that serve as an example as to how to use this correctly. These standards are good, but sound pretty general. Someone might read them and go, "Of course!" or "That sounds easy." It might seem that way, but I think the more teachers are trained in how to do this correctly, the better the outcome will be. We also learn from each other. It would be good for teacher to get together in small team meetings to discuss ways that they can use these standards in their classrooms. Teachers could create activities together and share them. A good way to model working together is for students to see teachers working together.

Dr. Tharp spoke about Vygotsky and the movement from total assistance to the zone of proximal development to assistance no longer needed. He said that, "the task of teaching is to provide assistance at the time it is needed." The zone of proximal development is what a student can do with and without help. It is the job of the teacher to figure out when and how much to assist a students. This involves a lot of observation of the student in different settings and learning arrangements. It is important to know what kind of assistance a student needs in order to still make activities fun, but at the same time challenging.