Community Applications
Community application is the idea of making learning relevant by focusing on real world, local issues that the students can assess and work to solve through creativity, collaboration and design (Capra, 2010).
Teaching strategies that facilitate engaging place include:
Culturally Relevant Pedagogy facilitates community application by bringing cultural relevance to every student. The pedagogy also creates a more comfortable learning environment for a diverse range of students, forging a stronger sense of community (Ladson-Billings,1994).
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At its core, design thinking seeks to create products that come from a place of empathy (Brown & Wyatt, 2010). Learning and understanding are deepest when students have meaningful connections to the problem addressed, and when they engage with community members outside the school environment. Additionally, the solution is most successful when it is relevant in the real world.
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Students can use inquiry to solve community problems. They can interact with communities to collect data and present their findings to the community as a whole. Prior knowledge of a certain community may help the student in discussing certain ideas depending on the community. How does community application apply to prior knowledge? Is this getting into the other category from how students learn (Capra, 2010)?
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Project-based learning aims to build collaboration skills with an emphasis on clear and effective communication, equitable division of tasks, and an ability for groups to compromise and make decisions. Group work improves behavior and social interactions, and keeps students on task. (Barron & Darling-Hammond, 2008). This also builds on classroom community, and allows students to develop the social skills necessary to be leaders in their local and global communities.
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References
Barron, B., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2008). Teaching for Meaningful Learning: A Review of Research on Inquiry-Based and Cooperative Learning. Book Excerpt. George Lucas Education Foundation.
Brown, T., & Wyatt, J. (2010). Design thinking for social innovation. Stanford Social Innovation
Review, 30-35.
Capra, F. (2010). Smart by Nature: Schooling for Sustainability. Retrieved from http://www.journalofsustainabilityeducation.org/wordpress/content/trial- author-change_2010_05/
Ladson-Billings , G. (1994). What can we learn from Multicultural Education Research. Educational Leadership, 51(8), 22-26.
Brown, T., & Wyatt, J. (2010). Design thinking for social innovation. Stanford Social Innovation
Review, 30-35.
Capra, F. (2010). Smart by Nature: Schooling for Sustainability. Retrieved from http://www.journalofsustainabilityeducation.org/wordpress/content/trial- author-change_2010_05/
Ladson-Billings , G. (1994). What can we learn from Multicultural Education Research. Educational Leadership, 51(8), 22-26.