Absolute vs. Relative Location
Abstract
An expression with which many educators are familiar sounds something like “we have to meet our students where they are.” This is in reference to ongoing, and increasing, pressure on classroom teachers to differentiate their instruction so that all learners can have equal access to academic success. This pressure, in turn, is a result of more and more evidence that students in classrooms do not all interact with information in the same ways. Evidence of this spans from neuroscientific research to scholarship on the role of culture in ways of learning and knowing. All point to the same conclusion: it cannot be taken for granted that a group of students will reach the same learning goals by being taught the same information in the same ways. Hence the impetus felt by classroom teachers to “meet” their students wherever they happen to be relative to a given learning goal. This paper troubles the notion of “meeting students where they are,” and challenges the philosophical beliefs and practices of teacher educators around this sentiment. The topic will be addressed in the format of an individual paper presentation that compares the outcomes of using relative and absolute locations to describe students and weaves together suggestions for ways to truly “meet students where they are.”
Presentation Description
.
Location
Room 107
Publication Type and Release Option
Presentation (Open Access)
Recommended Citation
Rychly, Laura and Bailey, Toni, "Absolute vs. Relative Location" (2022). Curriculum Studies Summer Collaborative. 47.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/cssc/2022/2022/47
Absolute vs. Relative Location
Room 107
An expression with which many educators are familiar sounds something like “we have to meet our students where they are.” This is in reference to ongoing, and increasing, pressure on classroom teachers to differentiate their instruction so that all learners can have equal access to academic success. This pressure, in turn, is a result of more and more evidence that students in classrooms do not all interact with information in the same ways. Evidence of this spans from neuroscientific research to scholarship on the role of culture in ways of learning and knowing. All point to the same conclusion: it cannot be taken for granted that a group of students will reach the same learning goals by being taught the same information in the same ways. Hence the impetus felt by classroom teachers to “meet” their students wherever they happen to be relative to a given learning goal. This paper troubles the notion of “meeting students where they are,” and challenges the philosophical beliefs and practices of teacher educators around this sentiment. The topic will be addressed in the format of an individual paper presentation that compares the outcomes of using relative and absolute locations to describe students and weaves together suggestions for ways to truly “meet students where they are.”
