Five Characteristics of Learner

Five Characteristics of Learner-Centered
Teaching
In May I finished a second edition of my Learner-Centered Teaching book. Revising it gave me the chance
to revisit my thinking about the topic and look at work done since publication of the first edition ten years
ago. It is a subject about which there is still considerable interest. The learner-centered label now gets
attached to teaching strategies, teachers, classes, programs, departments and institutions.
Like many trendy descriptors in higher education, with widespread use comes a certain definitional
looseness. Active learning, student engagement and other strategies that involve students and mention
learning are called learner-centered. And although learner-centered teaching and efforts to involve
students have a kind of bread and butter relationship, they are not the same thing. In the interest of more
definitional precision, I’d like to propose five characteristics of teaching that make it learner-centered.
1. Learner-centered teaching engages students in the hard, messy work of learning.
I believe teachers are doing too many learning tasks for students. We ask the questions, we call on
students, we add detail to their answers. We offer the examples. We organize the content. We do the
preview and the review. On any given day, in most classes teachers are working much harder than
students. I’m not suggesting we never do these tasks, but I don’t think students develop sophisticated
learning skills without the chance to practice and in most classrooms the teacher gets far more practice
than the students.
2. Learner-centered teaching includes explicit skill instruction.
Learner-centered teachers teach students how to think, solve problems, evaluate evidence, analyze
arguments, generate hypotheses—all those learning skills essential to mastering material in the discipline.
They do not assume that students pick up these skills on their own, automatically. A few students do, but
they tend to be the students most like us and most students aren’t that way. Research consistently
confirms that learning skills develop faster if they are taught explicitly along with the content.
3. Learner-centered teaching encourages students to reflect on what they are learning and
how they are learning it.
Learner-centered teachers talk about learning. In casual conversations, they ask students what they are
learning. In class they may talk about their own learning. They challenge student assumptions about
learning and encourage them to accept responsibility for decisions they make about learning; like how they
study for exams, when they do assigned reading, whether they revise their writing or check their answers.
Learner-centered teachers include assignment components in which students reflect, analyze and critique
what they are learning and how they are learning it. The goal is to make students aware of themselves as
learners and to make learning skills something students want to develop.
4. Learner-centered teaching motivates students by giving them some control over learning
processes.
I believe that teachers make too many of the decisions about learning for students. Teachers decide what
students should learn, how they learn it, the pace at which they learn, the conditions under which they
learn and then teachers determine whether students have learned. Students aren’t in a position to decide
what content should be included in the course or which textbook is best, but when teachers make all the
decisions, the motivation to learn decreases and learners become dependent. Learner-centered teachers
search out ethically responsible ways to share power with students. They might give students some choice
about which assignments they complete. They might make classroom policies something students can
discuss. They might let students set assignment deadlines within a given time window. They might ask
students to help create assessment criteria.
5. Learner-centered teaching encourages collaboration.
It sees classrooms (online or face-to-face) as communities of learners. Learner-centered teachers
recognize, and research consistently confirms, that students can learn from and with each other. Certainly
the teacher has the expertise and an obligation to share it, but teachers can learn from students as well.
Learner-centered teachers work to develop structures that promote shared commitments to learning. They
see learning individually and collectively as the most important goal of any educational experience.
http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-teaching-strategies/five-characteristics-of-
learner-centered-teaching/

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