- Allison Leibly
Exploring New Ways to Learn
In what ways can education change to meet the needs of the 21st century? This is the question that Woodstock High School’s new Innovation in Learning Study Group is exploring.
The Innovation in Learning Study Group is made up of teachers, school board members, and students who plan on visiting various schools to learn about their innovative educational practices. The Study Group is divided into two teams: one visiting schools on the east coast, and one travelling to visit schools in California.
“We’re going to find inspiration. We want to see what we can bring to WUHS,” sophomore Maggie Parker, one of the student members, said before the trip.
Parker was part of the group who traveled to California, where they visited several High Tech Schools and Design 39 School. These schools incorporate technology and hands-on learning into their teaching.
High Tech High practices what they call “project-based learning,” in addition to encouraging their students to pursue internships and other real-world learning opportunities. These practices aim to let students learn by completing hands-on projects instead of using a textbook.
“All disciplines intermingle to work on the same project. These projects can pull on the core knowledge each student has, and relate them to their own interests in order to create a more personalized learning platform,” Parker said after seeing this in action at the schools.
“When walking into either of these schools, you get the feel that the students want to be there. I think a lot of this is based on the fact that a lot of the students learning is based off of things they are interested in. High Tech High was a perfect example of this. It was explained that the students interests are first explored, and then the given standards are applied based off those interests,” Abbey Duane, the second student on the West Coast trip, said.
A second group plans on visiting many schools on the east coast as well, including the String Theory School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which, according to their website, allows middle and high school students to spend 90 minutes per day studying a “major” of their choice in either the fine and performing arts or STEM, a program that encourages learning in the sciences, technology, engineering, and math.
Another school on the list is Dearborn Academy in Newton, Massachusetts, which gives students lots of individual help from teachers due to small class sizes and provides classes in woodworking, metalworking, and jewelry making.
When both groups return, they will be discussing the distinct educational methods and learning environments and thinking about how some of those ideas can influence learning throughout the Windsor Central Supervisory Union.
