Curriculum, learning and teaching
Lost in education Doruk Gurkan wants to make sure we don’t lose sight of what really matters
• Food Security: Drinking water • Unemployment rate • Lack of Education • Climate Change: Destruction of Nature • Poverty: Income Inequality
44
The solution to these problems is always said to be EDUCATION. In the long run education will solve all of our problems. For example: people will not litter, make wrong decisions during elections or waste natural resources. According to the United Nations, sustainable education implies covering issues including ‘Human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development’ (UN, 2019). Certainly, having this approach in schools worldwide would help young people to see the world through other perspectives. If we teach students around the globe that girls and boys are equal, that race or religion should not separate us, that young people are change agents for sustainable development and that we all have the same rights, many of the struggles we face today might not exist. Therefore, we need to get back to education and really teach our students what is best for this world and not only for their country or themselves. That is how we can create real international mindedness in our classes. But how do we teach this? It is important to recognise educational trends, pedagogical/andragogical approaches and scientific researches in teaching. However, we should not
Summer |
Winter
Nowadays everywhere I go, every teacher and student I listen to, every article I read, every educational website I visit talk about the same things; learner-centered teaching, Bloom’s taxonomy, STEAM-related projects, inquiry-based learning, gamification, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), growth mindset, peer coaching, virtual reality, visible learning, blended learning, digital citizenship, robotics coding, genius hour, adaptive learning algorithms, and so on. Are these all educational terms or trends that will pass over time? Are they just fancy analogies to hide the real problems of education in the world? Or are they the makeovers of the educational philosophies that existed thousands of years ago such as Plato’s doctrines in BC 420? As Mankind has evolved, so has its problems. Right now there is wide agreement across millennials and scientists on the top five problems of the world:
| 2019
