THOUGHT

ADOLESCENCE

Adolescence is a stage where an individual human person encounters big changes not just in physical appearance, but also in his cognitive abilities to cope with the demands of the world. While most physical and cognitive features are built in this stage, the behavior of the individual also changes. It is where common violent issues with peers take place.

Broderick and Jennings in their “Mindfulness Approach” aims at giving importance on the ‘social and emotional skills’ of an individual as a key to prompt the development of the child. Adolescents become easily attached to the pleasures of the world (e.g., drugs, alcohol, sex, etc.), and so in order to escape and prevent from these collective threats to adolescence, challenges on social and emotional competence must be successfully met. Mindfulness approach is characterized by paying attention at the present moment, and ‘non-evaluative observation of experience’. This approach can be put into the practice of giving attention on one’s senses and by meditation. In this way, one becomes aware of the world he is living in—the society, the self, and by learning to accept the present status of the individual as a way to reduce stress-triggering factors in order to have a healthy mental development. A person who wants a balanced and healthy mental life needs to experience stress but not to the extent that it consumes and hinders the full potential of the child for maturity. Thus, achieving the process of engagement of the child with his present status becomes a way to enhance his opportunities and not sever these (opportunities) to the child’s development.

Larson provides strategies for intervention by educators in order to bridge the problem of aggression among adolescents. There are two types of childhood and adolescent agression according to Larson: the proactive and reactive types. The former becomes the initiator of any aggressive behavior in order to achieve his goal, and the latter serves to do practice aggressive behavior as a reaction to percieved threats around them. The educator’s role is to help students achieve an environment which is not just cognitively capable but also behaviorally sound. So in order to achieve this goal in the academe, the educator must practice the ‘three-tiered approach’: universal supports for everyone, selected supports for higher-risk students, and indicated supports for students with severe and pervasive problems with anger and aggression. In short, the needs of all—not just intellectually-gifted ones—are given due consideration. Even the aggressive ones can be given due attention different from normal ones in order to cope with matters not just in the classroom but in real life experiences as well.

In ‘Engaging and Re-engaging Students in Learning at School’, a very well-considered suggestion for teachers to help students who are disengaged (those who have behavior and learning problems) is to create an environment where students can see their potentials as human persons. Learning must include ‘matching motivation’. That is, they must play a role that offers them possible outcomes in relation to goals set for them. This student-centered approach gives students the avenue to be involved in their education programs and become enwrapped and engrossed in it. While motivation is characterized into two (i.e., extrinsic and intrinsic), in order to have greater chances of student participation, a balance between the two must be considered. While the teacher continues to offer extrinsic motivations to students through reinforcers (e.g. reward and punishment), he/she must also mobilize students in a way that they value the things they are doing aside from concentrating on grades they get out of what they do. It is said that extensive use of extrinsics can have undesirable outcomes. More than rewards, the educator needs to let students feel chances of learning and value to their tasks in life as an expression of engagement and re-engagement to the learners.

In a nutshell, the said articles offer ways in order to help the development  of a child specifically adolescents. The most important thing to consider are keys for intervening the process of learning the child undergoes. These avenues are essential to sharpen the character of the child and in order to harness the capabilities of the child in meeting the demands of globalization.

REVIEW OF PRACTICE

It is conceded at best that learning is a process. Learning means not just filling ideas in the head but it is how one pours out thoughts in application to real life scenarios. Just like math, one has to learn first the simple aspects of addition till division in order to further one’s knowledge into algebraic expressions and in order to apply these mathematical understanding to sharpen problem-solving skills such as questions on how to dwell with issues in life.

But in the process of learning, educators are not just concerned on instilling terminologies for students to memorize. They are also concerned on molding the character of the students by giving them opportunities to learn such as classroom experiences. On the other hand, while it is true that teachers are oriented on the roles they need to partake, each has varied experiences regarding teaching situation.

The moment we start the class, I always share to my students the objectives of the day’s discussion. But instead of giving so much value with the subject matter we are discussing with, the context becomes goal-oriented and pays less attention to how topics being discussed can contribute to the learning of the child. Although I see myself in a picture where I become one of the shapers of their future, I tend to focus on how they are being rewarded by means of highlighting to them the grades they can get when they do their task.

Furthermore, I realized that there seems to have lacking strategies for me to apply in the classroom, by mentioning that most of the time, I, as a teacher, do the talking and there is only minimal participation of students. Some of the students who do not have interest in the subject matter become lost in the end because of lacking motivation for them to learn.

I also pictured before the kind of setup I would be in when I teach, the kind of treatment I need to address to my students, and the kind of students I would be with. But things are different now most especially when the institution I am affiliated with has an open system of education. Students have different stories in life. Some are financially, socially and mentally well-off; some needs proper attention. That is why, on my part as an educator, it becomes hard to balance the pace of discussion among students with varied inclinations.

PRAXIS

In relation to a number of approaches synthesized (earlier), as an evaluation, I can say that there needs a great room for me to change and even improve my teaching strategies.

The learner is by nature not at all perfect.  That is why there is learning because something is there that should be learned. In learning there is struggle, and we aim not to end at it but to face it and continue for more. Since education is a process, it is a never-ending one. It does not end at schools because education is in itself attached to the very nature of man. And with this struggle, we must subscribe to the possibility of not ending it. We face it in order for us to be better human beings.

I believe that the best way to treat a child, in an environment where there are various kinds of students, is through a child-centered philosophy. The nature of the classroom must be emphasized not just for the teacher, but for the active involvement of the students in the learning process. As there is always struggle for learning, the teacher as facilitator must assess these learners. There must be an inclusion to differences of race, gender, and social status in the classroom in order for individuals to learn to accept their differences, and make these differences a contributing factor for the development of their character.   

Learning is not only limited to gathering inputs from various concepts but to applying them. I believe that the very essence of education is to enjoy the learning for a new learning, not to end this learning and be ready for the so-called life because education is life itself.