Reflection on Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis is a process where plants use light from the sun, water from the roots, and carbon dioxide from the air and turn it into energy to allow them to live. It's probably the most important process that happens inside plants, because without it, plants would die rapidly.

When you look at photosynthesis in more detail, it's an example of something called a chemical reaction.

Chemical equation for photosynthesis:

The equation says that carbon dioxide is combined with water, which with the addition of light energy, produces glucose (energy the plant can use) and oxygen. The glucose is the important part for plants, because that's what they use to live - to grow, repair, reproduce etc. - but humans gain multiple benefits from plants also. Let's talk about some of those 

Probably the most obvious benefit that photosynthesis has for animals, like humans, is that photosynthesis is the reason that we have plants that we can eat. Without photosynthesis all plants would die, and that includes the fruits, vegetables, and leaves that form part (or in some cases all) of the diet of animals.

But let's say you hate eating vegetables. Maybe you're practically a carnivore - even you still have plants to thank for your existence. The energy that you eat when you eat meat originally came from plants: animals like chicken and cows eat plants, and that's how their meat gets energy in the first place. But even if you were to eat a predator - like a crocodile or lion (not that many people would) - that energy came from those predators eating animals that in turn eat plants. All the energy on Earth that allows animals to live originally came from the sun, and was absorbed by photosynthesizing plants.

Classroom Decision Making

As teachers, there is a main concern to think about in the classroom which is decision making due to its huge importance on the learning process. In fact, most teachers before were not aware of this important issue although, they were making decisions the same as teachers nowadays do. But, it was not obvious for them that these decisions is something to think deeply about them, plan for them and know their consequences to be able to make the best choice. They were only taking decisions because of authority they have and based on their view for what is right and what is wrong. However, nowadays this view should totally be cancelled. Decision making is something that should be based on many essential factors and based on professional planning, schools, curricula, programs and educational policy. Thus, official standards and schools policy should be clear enough for teachers, who in turn should be aware and skillful in making decisions that should be appropriate and give the best results for the learning process. 

School Counseling

Counselors are no longer Guidance counselors focused on graduation and course selection for students. They are professional school counselors who focus on the academic, personal, social and career development of all students. Counselors are nowadays are vital members of the school who are trained and continually educated. They always aim for collaboration with students who in elementary schools start to develop their self concept, self confidence and to develop as decision makers.
A main factors that affect this development are family and school because they are the main social groups that raise children, impose and disclose different thoughts and behaviors on them. That is why it is important to have school counseling that provide a program of education, prevention and intervention, academics, career and personal and social life to aid for future success. School counseling helps also in classroom guidance to support organizational studies, test taking skills, goal setting, decision taking, career awareness, exploration, planning, understanding self-another, peers relationships, and putting strategies in  way to help the student as a whole social, emotional, and academic person. 

Factors Affecting Planning

As teachers we have much to consider when planning lessons as well as instructions. Below are some of the initial areas that each teacher needs to think about where in general they are equally important. However, teachers can indicate the priorities between them based on their students' needs. That is why it is important for teachers, especially at the beginnings to write down their thoughts about each factor to help them focus on what is more important in their different situations.

Student consideration: students always should be the main focus for teachers because what teachers know about them individually and as a group can make huge difference in the plan. This range of knowledge can help teachers being able to motivate students, teach them what they need and what accommodations are needed for special students.

Time consideration: time is a main factor for planning where teachers will be able to know the time available for them to assign their explanations, activities, instructions. Thus teachers should know about the holidays, extracurricular activities and give his plan a little more time than needed in case of any interference occurred.

Content considerations: teachers should be aware of the ideas and concepts that are involved in his lesson, the main skills that he need to teach and the main prerequisite skills that students already know to build new knowledge on. It is important also to use the suitable methods for learning a specific content in the best way.

Teacher considerations: this factor is about the level of knowledge that teachers have regarding a certain topic and related materials. Also, what matters is to invest this knowledge for presenting the topics in terms that students will understand.
   

Reflection on Webinar

Traveling and Loco-Motor Skills for Preschoolers
In this session, Dr. Steve Sanders wanted to shed light on the great importance of loco-motor skills for the young children, as a source to gain learning instead of only moving muscles. skills of traveling for Dr Sanders are initial for all children to learn through it, and he insisted on investing these skills by parents and educational establishment to increase the rate of learning and enhance it. Dr Sanders explained the progress of traveling that normal young children pass through and also, explained  many of these moves like walking, running, jumping, hopping, leaping and classified them to even and uneven skills. Then, he talked about their influence when practiced truly on improving the motor abilities as well as on the language and learning abilities through increasing the visual field and the abilities of discovery in children. Through the session, Dr Sanders gave a big importance for chasing/fleeing/dodging games from the age of 4-5 years where as he thinks, they are very good to help the children gain motor abilities, increase their flexibility and teach them to stick certain simple rules as a beginning of learning. In addition to that, these games are related to other games that children will later learn like soccer, basketball, tennis and others where, children can learn the right way to move and run, how to change speeds and directions, watch moves and improve their attention. However, it is important to present these games in the right way where, they should be always practiced, given set boundaries, placed by variety of safe situations and demonstrated with needed cues that usually are short phrases, words or moves that should be repeated in order to be mastered. 

Reflection on my Teacher

From the early beginnings and all over the world, knowledge and wisdom were the goals for all civilizations and communities, that’s why people were very interested to have great teachers with great knowledge and abilities that can influence their students in a way to build their personality and their minds. But greatness in teaching has certain qualities that when well understood can give all teachers a standard of excellence to strive for and guide schools to retain the best teachers and reach these previous goals.

To that end, I offer the following observations about my biology teacher in high school. This teacher used to teach biology in my official high school in Bekaa Valey and he had many characteristics of the great teacher that we are going to discuss in this paper.

In the classroom, he was very polite and respectful, although he was an active teacher that walks fast into the classroom after knocking the door to alert us that he is entering and now is time to get ready for his course. Then he used to check us by asking about our health and how was our day in general, and he repeats the question for the students that are not listening well to him yet to get in touch. After that he checks our homework before going back to the board and explaining about our questions and make sure we understand well previous topics and get ready to move on to another. That was very good technique from him were we used to feel confident that we are going to understand the material, and that he cares for all of us and make us careful also for his course and information that he is going to offer. Also this had a nice impact on us where students who have caring relationships teachers are academically more successful and show greater pro-social behavior (Zakrezewski, 2012).

In addition to that, it is worth to tell that home works that we were supposed to do are not specifically mhaddadi. He never gave us certain number of problems to solve but, we were supposed to work on our topic by solving problems as much as we can, and of course students that solve more problems will gain more points. Also, we were supposed to solve some of these problems on board and explain them to our mates after he choose these certain problems to be solved by certain students. This deal gave us a great chance to challenge each other and try to gain our points by solving a greater number of problems, in addition to challenging ourselves and get ready every day to be able to handle the responsibility of standing on the board and explain these problems. This technique was very efficient in gaining knowledge, staying in focus, keeping the class in motion, and raising the challenge limits continuously to unleash the power of appropriately high expectations (Boynton & Boynton, 2005).

After finishing the problems solving, the teacher used to make a certain closure for the part that we were done with and encourage us about what we have done and what we are able now to work on. He always starts with a new topic by asking us some open-ended questions to test our knowledge and help us to have a certain configuration of the upcoming part of the material. When possible, he also used to show us some pictures and mojasam that help him to explain and put the objectives that we are going to reach at the end of the part and the skills we are going to learn. This was very helpful for us where we were able to know precisely and clearly what we are going to face with a complete feeling of secure and comfort and also it helped us to be aware if we wanted to prepare the lesson or do some searches about what limits we should not pass it (District Administration 2004).

Despite of all these great techniques that were used by the teacher, he had himself a huge repertoire in his domain. He was so confident of what he is teaching us and about the way he was teaching because of his ittilaa about the content of our book and the continuous upgrading of this content where he always used to tell us about these upgrades when found. Also, he was really able to answer any question that we used to ask because he invests much time in reading about biology and discuss it with others. This huge and continuously growing repertoire that he had was able to make students confident about their teacher and that he is making his best to be better and make them better also in this field, explore subject in a deeper manner, and get less frustrated (Mihai, 2016).  

It is good also to tell about the communication that this teacher made in the classroom where it was very effective for both the students and the teacher. We were able to discuss ideas with each other in class time and ask questions and having a great response from the teacher where he listen and appreciate these questions and try to involve all students in these discussions with a great pleasure and make it lead to points in the material of the course. This communication made learning easier for us, helped us a lot to achieve goals, increased our opportunities for expanding learning, strengthening the connection between students and with him, and created an overall positive experience (Ministry of Education, Guyana 2015).

This was my description for the best teacher who ever thought me, who did teaching not only as a job but because he loves teaching and is able to teach students to love learning, and reached the stage of being ideal from many student's point of view, hopping that all teachers reach this stage to get better in education.

Book Criticism

"Science Belongs to Me 5-Edition 2015"-Moukarzel's Collection for Science Books

From the early beginnings and all over the world, knowledge and wisdom were the goals for all civilizations and communities, that’s why people were very interested to have great teachers with great knowledge and abilities that can influence their students in a way to build their personality and their minds. But greatness in teaching has certain conditions that when well understood can give all teachers a standard of excellence to strive for and guide schools to retain the best teachers and reach these previous goals. One of these conditions are the books that are used in teaching the curriculum, which have a great influence on the way of representing knowledge and gaining it in the best ways by the students. To reach the best ways of learning, all schools try to select the best editions of books that can give the appropriate knowledge and understandings of topics and give them the opportunities to enhance their thinking in a well manner with respect to the school's objectives.

This paper will talk about a science book that is used to teach grade five of the second cycle used in the Lebanese International College which is a private school in Rashaya-Bekaa Valle.

"Science Belongs to Me 5-Edition 2015" is one of Moukarzel's collection for science books that aim to help learners to observing and understanding the direct environment and to address later all aspects science, especially biology, physics and geology by imposing the problem to the learner and helping him/her to ask about it.

To talk about the strength points of this book, one can be impressed about its topics that are interesting for students in the fifth grade. It is composed of five units: Plants and Environment, Man and Health, Animals and Environment, Matter and Energy in addition to Earth and Universe. These topics are well chosen for this class where they can be a perfect introduction for knowledge to split later into biology, physics and chemistry in the following years. They have sufficient amount of knowledge about every domain in science, which is a good thing to make the students ready for two additional courses in the near future.

There is also a "zoom on" space before every unit to show within it some figures that are related to the topics in order to get the students closer to the upcoming topics of the unit. These figures can be discussed by the students in the class with the teacher to approach the student's thinking and the level of knowledge or memory that they have to be a base for building the upcoming knowledge on it.

With respect to the design, one can be impressed about the way where information are shown. It is neat and arranged in a very well manner for the students to stop at each point of them, where the related ones are put in boxes with different colors and small drawings that are able to grab student's attention and can seriously affect the feelings, attention, and behavior of students when learning.

It is also a strength point regarding the pictures and drawings found in this book. Students can clearly see what they are supposed to, because of the suitable figures in the pages and the clarity of them whether they are drawings or photographs of simple things that can see around them in their homes or in the environment surrounding them to help the brain buzzes with extra neurological connections that are trying to establish patterns, cause and effect, and sequences with their verbal and visual nature, and offer those students a way to widen their minds.

One can also talk about the way of representing written information, where they are as points. This form of presenting information is much easier for students where they can recognize the main points that should know from each document easily and supports or develops the memorization of a single controlling idea.

Assessment in this book can be a strength point in the academic point of view, where the exercises are diverse and cover all the topics of the units in several ways whether by remembering, discussing and interpreting the information explained in the lessons of each unit. This can help teachers to recognize if the students know it, and how well can they use what they know.

With respect to the weaknesses of the book they are several also as for the strength points. One can say that the content of this book is large for the students to finish within the academic year. Although the topics of the units are interesting and seems to be present good topics for the second cycle of the group, the lessons within these units are plenty and diverse in a hard way for the students to complete as they should in three hours a week, unless they can complete it without proper understanding of the materials.

One can also criticize the hierarchy of the units. It is better if the unit titled Animals and Environment is directly after the Plants and Environment where they are related in their cycles. However, the unit titled Man and Health can be after them where it not tightly related to the environmental cycles of the nature.

For the lessons of the units, they are more than expected. Each unit have plenty of lessons which in turn expose plenty of various points in each with a brief explanations, where two figures in some designed to fulfill the whole ideas of the lesson. This means that the students are responsible to write certain extra explanations given by the teacher to complete their understanding of the topics. They are also supposed in this case to write notes, which is a skill that is not mastered yet at their age and abilities. Also, there is no space on the book to write these notes and explanations and gather all the information together with the documents which is preferred for some figures or experiments found in the activities.

In addition to that, the book has no conclusions at the end of the activities to be read by the students and help them to complete the schema building about the main ideas of the lessons. Some lessons contain at its end a small box "I remember" to shed the light on a small idea that is not enough to finish the lesson with. The conclusion is intended to help the students understand why their lesson should matter to them after they have finished it. A conclusion is not merely a summary of the main topics covered or a re-statement of your research problem, but a synthesis of key points and, if applicable, where you recommend new areas for future research

In contrast the ends of the units contain plenty of ideas as conclusions for its whole topic. Some can reach seventy six points for only eight lessons that the students should memorize at once when the unit is finished.

For the assessment part, lessons have no well assessment for the ideas that they contain and even some contain no assessment at all. Lessons with assessment have two sentences at the end with one blank space for each to be filled with one word only. This is obviously not enough in order to assess student's understanding and gives no turn for all students to be evaluated. Only few of the students are assessed this way.

Another point that could be mentioned as a weakness point is that some figures are photos of industrial products with certain logos and explanation about them, as they are in an advertisement for their companies. Children in the fifth grade cannot think like that in their age but, it is not a best way to transfer the idea for them when there are better photos to use or certain drawings for these products that shows no specific information about them.

It is also to mention that there are lots of hard vocabularies in this book. In general sciences have always new scientific terms to accomplish its teaching but, other terms that are in the explanations are clearly hard for the students to spell and write and therefore to get the meaning from to have complete understanding. However in the case of using hard terms students may ignore the location of these terms and even to ignore the content in some cases if the teacher did not transfer the meaning clearly  to them.

In general, this book cannot be considered a bad one for teaching students the curriculum of their grade level. However it can be considered as a hard book to teach with respect to others. The book needs hard work from both the teacher and the students to reach the academic objectives. As it was shown in the weakness points, the book alone is not sufficient through its content to teach the concepts. The teacher needs more given, more documents and more explanations to insure the understanding of his students. On the other hand, the students need to focus on the extra explanations that should be given by the teacher to accomplish the teaching process, which means that they should observe and the documents of the book and get the results through their critical thinking and analysis, not through spoon feeding or memorizing what is found in their books, because what is found in the book is not really enough to get the knowledge.

The closures of the units should be classified and engaged with the lessons as conclusions or reviews to each lesson alone. In addition to the points, the exercises for assessment should also be classified and putted at the end of the lessons to assess each topic alone.

Therefore the class should be always moved on and the students as teachers have lots to do. In fact, this could be a strength point for the class through using specific models in teaching rather than traditional lecturing. As stated before, this book aims to pose problems and help the students to ask about them and find their solutions in order to engage them in the learning process. But in order to do perfectly this task teacher should work hard to get extra materials to add it to the lessons, try to cover the ideas from different sides and help the students to widen their thinking skills. Thus, through teaching process teachers must have the appropriate repertoire for their major in addition to the appropriate social skills in order to make their class active and try to help students to gain knowledge as much as they can. These social skills would not have benefits for the academic propagation and the grading, rather it they are supposed to make students well liked and happy. Students then will enjoy school and look forward to coming to school. But, on the other side, if the child fails to reach a certain level of social skills he could feel disconnected and left out, which can affect the way of gaining knowledge in classroom with his teacher friends.

It is also useful to try to improve the verbal content of the book and combine it well to the pictorial. But on the other hand it should be added in a certain level that keeps the students interested to get the knowledge through the discussion with their teacher in the classroom, not only by reading. It also should be added using simple English terminology to facilitate the transfer to students.

Conclusion

 Although technology is invading our schools and curriculum, textbook is considered one of the most important references and resources for students' learning in the education system. Because of the important role of the text book content in encouraging, providing learner educational needs, and making the student's learning process easy, the school books should be assessed and analyzed with respect to construct of advancement motivation and its indexes, in order to help the teachers play their role and the students to get the best learning that they can.

References

David, B. (2017). Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper: 9. The Conclusion. USC Libraries.

Gutierrez, C. (2016). The Psychology of Color. How Do Colors Influence Learning?. SHIFT DISRUPTIVE ELEARNING.

Hibbard, K., et al. (1996). A Teacher's Guide to Performance-Based Learning and Assessment. ASCDEXPRESS-Ideas from the Field.

Pierce, T. (2010). Five Reasons Why Children NEED Picture Books. Terry Pierce: Children's Author.

 Writing a Topic and Main Idea. Reading Center-MONTEREY PENINSULA COLLEGE.

Educational Philosophies

What is the effect of education on social life? Should education strive for changing society? Or should it try to maintain our social and cultural norms? In other words, is education a force of change? Or a force of maintaining the good old days? Reference your preference and why?

Introduction

Education is one of the most important means to improve personal endowments, build capabilities, overcome constraints and in the process, enlarge available set of opportunities and choices for a sustained improvement in well-being. The process of education and attainments thereof has an impact on all aspects of life. It is a critical invasive instrument for bringing about social, economic and political inclusion of people (NHDR, 2001). In this context, we will try to make an attempt to assess the contribution of education to one of such several dimensions of life of individuals and their social development.

Social development first attracted widespread attention in all civilizations which conceive social development as a process of planned social change designed to promote the well-being of the population as a whole in conjunction with a dynamic process of economic development. But this meaning is the modern one of social development. In past, social development was introduced with many meanings according to the differences in philosophies and authorities between societies especially between the East and the West. In addition to that, it was very obvious that inside each of the eastern and western philosophies there were many differences in the field of education but, in this context we will try to show the general differences between those two societies.

To show the difference between the Eastern and Western philosophies about the view to education, we will talk about the pragmatism from the west which is the most popular and practical nowadays in the West, and the eastern philosophies in general, where they relatively resemble each other.

Western Philosophy:

John Dewey, greatest of the pragmatists and generally recognized as the most outstanding philosopher his country has yet produced, made significant contributions to virtually every field of philosophy as well as to such other areas of inquiry as education and psychology. According to Dewey the aim of education is the development of child’s powers and abilities. It is impossible to lay down any definite principle for a particular kind of development, because this development will differ from one child to the next, with respect to the unique abilities of the individual. The educator should guide the child according to the abilities and powers he observes in it. It is better, in Dewey’s opinion, to leave the question of educational objectives unanswered. In general, the aim of education is to create an atmosphere in which the child gets an opportunity to be active in and contribute to the social awakening of the human race. From the pragmatic standpoint, education aims at creating social efficiency in the child. Man is a social being who must develop at all. For this reason, education must aim at creating social efficiency and skill.

Pragmatic education aims also at instilling democratic values and ideals in the individual. Every individual must be given the freedom to develop his own desires and achieve his ambitions. Every individual must be equal to every other member of society. Such a society can be created only when there is no fundamental difference between the individual and collective interest. Education should create cooperation and harmony among individuals, instilling democratic values in school between children. In fact, the school itself is a miniature form of democratic society in which the child undergoes various forms of development, of which moral education and development is the most important. Morality can be developed through active participation, because such participation in the activities of the school trains the child in shouldering responsibility. Pragmatic education is basically practical in as much as it aims at preparing the individual for future life in such a manner that he can fulfill his requirements and achieve contentment. Dewey was critical of the contemporary modes of education because they tend to drive the child away from democratic life by giving advantages to a small section of society. It also lays more stress on book or formal teaching than is really desirable.

Hence Dewey laid the foundations of a progressive education in the form of a Progressive School, which aimed at establishing democratic values and developing the child’s personality. Dewey also emphasized the importance of the social aspect of the education where he said that all education has its beginnings in the individual’s participation in the social consciousness of the race. Hence it is necessary to create an atmosphere in the school, which will allow the child to take an active part in the social awakening of his group. This improves his conduct and develops his personality and abilities. He also talked about the methodology of this process that includes the following steps: learning by doing, integration of life and subjects, catering in child's interest and participation in collective activities. In the western society Dewey affected education where nowadays, it is an important aim of education to teach according his thoughts, where he insisted on developing social qualities in the child.

So, in modern schools these aims of education have been accepted as valid. The greatest impact of Dewey’s ideas is seen in the methods of education in more recent times. Dewey suggested that education should be based on the child’s own experience, and also that the method of teaching should vary according to the interests and inclinations of each individual child. These ideas influenced modern teaching techniques and led to active teaching in schools. One such school is the Activity School. The project method is also a result of Dewey’s ideas. Even in the other schools, attention is paid to the principles of child psychology, which guide the educator in creating an atmosphere suitable for developing social consciousness in the educated.

The impact of Dewey’s ideas on the subject of curriculum was significant also where he led to the introduction of manual skill subjects into modern curricula. Special importance is now being attached to various kinds of games, objects, the use of certain tools and implements, etc. In selecting the subject to be taught, attention is now paid to the individual interests and abilities of the child.

As a result, now the students are entrusted with much of the work done in the school. In this manner the students are trained for self-control and democratic citizenship. Apart this, once the student have to face responsibility, he is compelled to think scientifically and reason out things for himself.

Dewey’s thinking and ideal also affected the universal and compulsory education. Education aims at the development of personality. Hence every individual must be given the opportunity to develop his personality through education. The current stress on the scientific and social tendency owed much to Dewey’s influence. He pointed that education was a social necessity, in that it was not merely a preparation for life itself. It aimed at the development of both the individual as well as society. This leads to the comprehensive development of the individual.

Eastern Philosophy

With respect to the eastern education, we will discuss the thoughts of the Indian philosopher Sri Aurobindo, where he defined educational objectives by saying: “It must be an education that for the individual will make its one central object the growth of the soul and its powers and possibilities, for the nation will keep first in view the preservation, strengthening and enrichment of the nation-soul and its dharma (Eternal law), and raise both into powers of the life and ascending mind and soul of humanity". Aurobindo presented a national system of education which may be adopted for the educational reconstruction in India and at the same time develop the Indians as world citizens and the fore-runners of the advent of the only gives and important place to individual and nation. In the words of Sri Aurobindo, the true national education is that, which helps to bring out to full advantage, makes ready for the full purpose and scope of human life all that is in the individual man and which at the same time, helps him to enter into right relation with the life, mind and soul humanity of which he himself is a unit and his people or nation a living, a separate and yet inseparable member.

In order to achieve these purposes, Aurobindo gave three issues that the curriculum should include:

1. To teach students how to observe and know rightly the facts on which they have to

    form a judgment.

2. To train them to think fruitfully and soundly.

3. To fit them to use their knowledge and their thought effectively for their own and

    for the common good.

Thus, as it is shown that the eastern philosophy shown in this paper is different from that of the western. It is obvious that the Eastern educational system tries to accomplish the individual knowledge for the Eastern, but spontaneously it is trying to conserve the traditions, eternals and humanity more than the Westerns. Beside their academic process they believe in the need for reaching the full purpose and scope of human life, which came from their religions and their parents in the past. This means that they are trying to conserve it besides their academic progress. The Easterns are willing to conserve the ancient educational ideals along with methods and techniques of their own and other western originated that are useful for them.

Easterns nowadays, define education not only as spiritual, but also rational,

vital and physical. In other words, it is an integral education. This integral education has been explained by Sri Aurobindo’s closest collaborator the Mother, in these words, “Edcuation to be complete must have five principal aspects relating to the five principal activities of the human being: the physical, the vital, the mental, the psychic and the spiritual". Sri Aurobindo’s scheme of education is integral in two senses. Firstly, it is integral in the sense of including all the aspects of the individual being, physical, vital, mental, psychic and spiritual. Secondly, it is integral in the sense of being an education not only for the evolution of the humanity. The ultimate aim of education is the evolution of total humanity, which includes the evolution of the nation, which in its turn depends upon the evolution of the individual.

Conclusion

From these two philosophies proposed, one can obviously notice how Eastern people are related more to their traditions and beliefs. They all believe that education should be man’s adjustment to his nature, to his fellows and to the ultimate nature of the cosmos. Even the relations between them are affected by the traditions and beliefs more than the education, whether the relations between people with each other or, between the people and their governments. It is also obvious in many Eastern countries that the laws are still related to the traditions and beliefs. Thus we can show according to that that education, although changed significantly the society but it still did not reach the level of influence that traditions did in these societies.Even in some of these countries, the level of scientific achievements are very high and the ranking of their educational systems shows that they are from the best in the world in education, like in Japan, the effect of traditions and beliefs is the major with respect to education.

However, on the other hand, the Western education affected significantly the society, traditions and beliefs. These effects are so clear for those who observe it, where the Western traditions are not respected as those for the Easterns because they are not pragmatic enough for the purpose of achievements and social progress. The Western society changed a lot and quickly during the last century, which could be the main reason for getting far away from the traditions, to walk with these changes, and this can be obvious also with respect to eternal beliefs that are not well adopted by the Western citizens as in the Easterns, although they adopt democracy in a very well manner. 

But this cannot be taken as a reason for what is going on in the West with respect to traditions where they are approaching education in its narrow sense, as a formal conservative process mainly confined to school campus. On the other hand, education in its wider sense becomes a vague and informal process aiming at nothing but allowing the child uncontrolled freedom for arbitrary activities as in some Eastern societies, where through such a process it is not possible to inculcate social, moral and spiritual values in children. Thus, both the processes are one-sided and emphasize two extremes. The real concept of education is a synthesis of these two processes. This synthesis will develop the child to the full according to his inherent tendencies with emphasis on concurrent development of society, of which he is an integral part. Such an education will develop both the child and the society to higher and higher positions of glory and cultural eminence, besides the conservation of traditions and beliefs.

References

Beissenova, A. et al. (2013). Influence of Education on Social Structure of Society (on Materials of Focus Group Research and in-Depth Interviews). Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences. Vol 82: 813-817. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2013.06.354.pdf .

Khasawneh, O. (2014). Implementing Pragmatism And John Dewey’s Educational Philosophy In Jordanian Public Schools. Journal of International Education Research. Vol 10. Doi: https://www.cluteinstitute.com/ojs/index.php/JIER/article/download/8465/8476 .

Kumar, S. & Ahmad, S. (2017). Meaning, Aims and Process of Education. Semantic Scholar.

Doi: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1146/1167f80224e937ae5d5231320f729a29681a.pdf  .

Veugelers, W. et al. (2017). Higher Education, Educational Policy and Citizenship Development. Ingenta connect. Vol 35, issue 16: 27-42. Doi: https://doi.org/10.7459/es/35.1.03.

Cognitive Theory

Cognitive teaching methods aim to assist students in assimilating new information to existing knowledge, and enabling them to make the appropriate modifications to their existing intellectual framework to accommodate that information. Thus, while cognitive teaching allow for the use of exercises in the memorization of facts, formulae, and lists, they place greater importance on strategies that help students to actively assimilate and accommodate new material.

Till that end, and to check out how teachers are trying to induce the self learning of students through cognitive theory, and if they are applying it the right way with their students an observation was done in biology class of grade 10 at the sixth hour in an official high school in Bekaa Valley.

The class room was different from other classes, where it was at the first floor, larger, has only chairs with no desks, in addition to the LCD projector. The teacher was free to choose whether to explain the lesson on board in regular class rooms or using the LCD class. The lesson was about photosynthesis and the class was designed to solve exercises to develop the students understanding. But, the exercises were not from the book. The teacher decided to take the figures and documents from the book and put his own questions that were divided into parts in a way similar to that is asked in the exams.

At the beginning, the teacher waited the students to finish their routines and get ready to pay attention to him. He talked then about what they are going to do in this class and the way they will do, where they will be supposed to discuss the question and the answers with him then he will give them time to write the answers on their note books.

They then started where he chose a student to read the exercise and claimed that they should solve using the scientific method and asked them to start proposing hypothesis based on the observation of figures only, then he asked for the explanation that leaded them to each hypothesis and at last to prove their answers based on the results of the figures and their acquired knowledge to get the best answer. Students were sharing their answers vey actively and the teacher was trying to bring them closer to the desired one by verbalizing their answers and using certain body language and various tones while explaining. Then he gave the students time to write the answers while he was walking between desks and checking their note books.

During that time, some male students were bullying and making noise by their side talks while writing the answers. They were saying bad words in their jokes, but the teacher did not let them continue their talk, separated them to the sides of the class and gave them advises that they should not talk like that because the ladies later on do not prefer men that are not respectful and gentle.

After that he chose a student and asked him to read the next exercise. When the student finished the teacher explained the exercise and asked them to predict the consequence of the experiment mentioned in the exercise. But, a student asked the teacher about how he should predict and that there is no prediction in education, which made the teacher explain for the students what he meant by prediction and the ways that they could be asked to predict. After that the teacher asked about the student answers, verbalized them for each part and emphasized the main point s reached by solving these exercises.

The teacher then wanted to check the students if they are concentrating well on the figures that he was showing them. Thus, when they finished writing he asked them to draw a figure and label it with the wards that he wrote on the board. The students denied that, but the teacher insisted and told them that it will not be directly graded, it will be part of the class work grade. In addition he should invest the five minutes left of the class. The students then tried their best and challenged their selves to remember as much as they can, dropped their papers at the teacher's desk after the bell rang and they went out of the class.

These strategies that the teacher used seemed efficient in cognitive learning where the teacher was trying to teach his students by the active learning and by making them responsible of what they are learning and deducting the information instead of giving it to them. The teacher was trying to help them to conclude the results by showing them many figures and give them hints and verbalizing their answers to insure that all understand, in addition to giving them appropriate time to think.

This way of teaching keeps the students active and in the mood of learning that include responsibility in the way of gaining knowledge and aim to assist students in assimilating new information to old one, and enabling them to make the appropriate modifications to their existing intellectual framework to relate that information.

Types of Knowledge

Over the centuries many attempts have been made to classify knowledge, and different fields have focused on different dimensions. This has resulted in numerous classifications and distinctions based on different factors. Nowadays, types of knowledge are classified to four wide categories in order to result in professional teachers with the best knowledge. Teachers must have the knowledge of content, pedagogical knowledge, general pedagogical knowledge, and the knowledge of learners and learning.

Till that end, and to study the application of these types by teachers in schools, an observation was done in a biology class of garde eleven science section in an official high school in Bekaa Valey.

From the beginning of the class which was the first of that day, teacher entered actively, handling his coffee cup, asked the students if they are ready for him and started to check the home works quickly. The home work that he previously asked for it was to prepare the lesson that he was going to explain in that class in addition to draw two figures that he chose before. For that purpose he checked the note book of each student, he found different ways of solving and even different ways of drawing. Some students had a neat and complete home work. Others have done their home works in a way that he did not like it, and others did not make any of what he asked for. He ordered those students to stand up and go ahead to the board, and he finished he went to his desk and started to blame them for their work without asking them for reasons or discussing their faults, while one of them was trying to tell him that she was very sick and the other was trying to say that he did not know how to solve the lesson's exercises. Then, he was done from talking and asked them to go back to their seats after threatening them of not making the home work again as it should be and subtracting two  marks from their average, knowing that he gave them no standards before for his home works and each student is applying the way he knows from previous years.

After that he started to ask questions and students were answering and participating in a very good manner, where the questions were related to the lesson they already prepared and open ended. He used praise very well for students that answered and involved most of the students in the discussion. Even some of them were answering relatively far answers from the main point but he started relating them to the general topic he asked for and wrote these answers on the side of the board. That way made students able to participate in the discussion even if they were not sure about their answers, and made the teacher able to show them his wide knowledge in the field where he was able to relate the student answers to the points of the lesson. Then he continued to explain beside writing and drawing on the board with various colors to make it more easy for the students to understand.

When half of the time passed away the explanation was almost done. He asked the students to stay calm until he bring a model of DNA that he was explaining about and came back with a built model and a bag full of small pieces that when built properly will be similar to the built one he brought. So, he gave each two students on a desk some of these pieces, and asked them to collect them properly in order to reach the right model and started to help each two of them till they got the model built in the right way.

At last, he asked each student to read loudly an exercise from the book to start solving it after listening for the students answers where they were able to solve it alone but, he was verbalizing the proper wards for them to write on their books and memorize at home. That’s why solving problems did not take much time; he had time to emphasize the main points of the lesson and ask them to prepare the next one.

The observations that were done in this class were very efficient in studying the types of knowledge, where the teacher reached some of them in a good way. It was obvious that he know very well about the content that he is teaching from the way he was relating the students answers to the points of the lesson. He also showed a good pedagogical knowledge were he used drawings, writing main points and showed models to insure that students understand. Also, he showed a little general pedagogical knowledge, where he was not able to communicate well with students that did not make their home works, and students that did not participate in giving answers. In addition to that, he showed a little knowledge about knowledge of learners and learnings by not giving his students the instructions that he wants to solve the home work in the appropriate way, forgetting about the different abilities to draw and solve and ignoring the different English levels that was obvious in his class.

At the end of these observations, the importance of the types of knowledge should become clear for teachers by training them to apply them and be aware of their mistakes, in order to be more careful for their students and career also.

EDUC560

The course EDUC560 is one of the most interesting courses that are given for Teaching Diploma students at Lebanese International University. Although, it still looks not practical enough with respect to most of schools in Lebanon, but it will be very helpful at schools out of the country where the educational system is more professional than here, hoping that it will be used efficiently later in our official and private schools all over the country.