Running Head: TEACHING AND LEARNING EXPERIENCE
Teaching and Learning Experiences
Introduction
Learning experience is understood as any interaction, course program, or any academic settings, in which learning takes place. It can occur in both traditional as well as non-traditional settings where traditional setting include schools, classrooms and non-traditional setting include outdoor environments, outside-of-school locations. Interactions also plays crucial role which also take place in traditional and non-traditional interactions understood in the form of students learning from teachers, professors, games and interactive software applications. The main purpose of learning experience is to underscore or reinforce the goal of developing awareness and knowledge among students (Alexander and Winne, 2016).
Learning experience is a wider term used by educators and other scholars, the technological and pedagogical shifts taking place in educational settings have considerably changed the design and delivery of education to students. The most evident impact of learning experience is to update conceptions of how, when, and where learning can take place. The emergence of new technologies and teaching means have multiplied and opened new ways in which students can learn, understand and interact with educators. Apart from independence, new technologies also provide the new manner of learning and understanding things among children and educators (Behrman and Stacey, 2017).
For example, students can attend online course management system, as well as, email, chat or video conversations with teachers. All these techniques allow students to organise, and exchange learning materials. Moreover, students are also empowered to use different software programs, apps, and educational games for learning according to their own time, choice, and pace. There is no need of consistent instruction and supervision from teachers for using online course management systems and software programs (Ravitch, 2016).
For creating learning experiences, it is necessary to focus on changing behaviours and improving overall performance. There are certain best practices considered as effective in meeting the needs of children’s learning and development. These practices make learning experience more effective and useful, some of these practices are:
i) Building in daily practice: Students need to understand concepts, definitions and theories not in stricter manner, but in funny and entertainment manner. Teachers are not allowed to jump straight to concepts, definitions and theories, rather, students need to sequentially approach and understand these concepts and definitions.
ii) Encouraging social learning: It is based on information sharing where students are motivated to share information. This is so because information which is shared is consistently repeated, and, repetition helps in increasing retention. Instead of allowing new students to learn with new teaching materials and notes, old students need to be motivated for sharing their teaching notes, curriculum and other things. For this, small group exercises, in-class discussion, and learning networks are also created allowing learners to bounce questions and ideas to each other, thereby creating memorable learning experiences (National Research Council (U.S.), 2010).
iii) Breaking or dividing learning into chunks: Learning experience seems to be overwhelming for students when they view and analyse big picture. In this context, it is recommended to break down big information silos into digestible chunks. This micro learning allows students to gain proficiency and mastering in...