The Affect of Student Age & Learning Styles On Classroom Dynamics
As a young instructor, one of the biggest challenges that I have faced is bridging the gap between student age, learning styles, and ability. I work for a career college and teach Fundamental Writing. My student demographic ranges anywhere from the new high school graduate to the middle-aged career changer. One facet of the classroom consists of students that are young, lacking in life experience & maturity, yet needing to brush up on their writing skills, before proceeding with their academic career. The other facet would be the adult students who are mature, have much life experience, yet are at a loss to remember skills that they haven't used in years and might not have been proficient in to begin with.
It is very challenging to develop cohesiveness and credibilty when there is such a vast dichotomy of differences. At times, there can be much tension between young students who take their educational experience for granted and adult learners who are very invested in their lessons. Does anyone have any advice in bridging these gaps and building a stonger sense of community within such an experientially diverse classroom?
Hi Emily,
Good approach to opening conversations with students. This is where rapport starts to develop, plus it helps the students to see you in a more personal light which leads to increased respect.
Gary
My students are extremely mixed in age, cultural background and class. Sometimes students who are different ages but have the same cultural background can offer encouragement to each other, with the encouragement going both ways.
As a teacher, I always try to teach from within, getting to know a bit about the lives of each student by asking them personally what they did over the weekend, do they work?, how is their work situation? etc. Then they have a forum within which to open up a little and allow me a window into how to best encourage and teach them.
The course College Success is designed to assist students with time management, goal setting, etc. Most public libraries have software training modules. These do help the older student. As an instructor I try to surface skills issues and direct the student to the a useful open school workshop, tutor and of course library references. Sometimes just a couple of minutes demonstrating on the classroom computer provides answers to many questions at one time.
Hi Karen,
I think you are on to something. This good be a great aid in helping them to have more success while taking the online courses. It would give them strategies for improving their retention and recall of course content as well as help them to get settled into the course and feeling comfortable.
Gary
I work for a small university where all courses are taught on-line, with the exception of a few on-line/on-campus courses. I find that our older students have a great deal of difficulty in completing their assignments without help from the administrative staff. I think the implementation of a software to aid in studying habits, as well as utilize computer applications, would assist our older students and remedy the challenges they face.
Hi Erin,
One method for bridging the differences between the two learning groups is to from learning groups. By mixing the students and then assigning them a problem to solve or a case study so they have a common problem to focus on you will be able help them exchange information about how they can approach the situation. The younger students can contribute their perspective and the older students their life experiences to solve the problem. The end result is that respect is developed by both groups.
Gary
I find that the technical skills of the younger students motivates my older students to master the learning tools they did not have as younger students themselves.
I demonstrate studying skills using sofware and materials required in the field, as a review for the younger but also as a learning tool for older students.
I encourage my more experienced students to share their journey with us so that all will understand the need for experience to advance the mastery of a skill. Many older students are already using course skills and are there to learn ways to use them more efficiently and creatively.
