Running Head: IDEOLOGIES INFLUENCING LEARNING EXPEREINCES 1

Ideologies Influencing learning Experiences

Assignment 1- Ideologies, Theory and Practice

Sydney Milligan

University of Lethbridge
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Throughout this activity, in our discussion group we were given scholar

academic educators to focus on and to explore within that particular cohort. Within our

group we found it still important to discuss other types of educators, even though we did

not fit into the scholar academic cohort. We were all interested in learning about the

scholar academic style and perspective on teaching. Shiro (2008) mentioned the

interests, needs, and desires of learners influence the nature of the school program, the

content of the curriculum and (to some degree) the governance of the classroom (p.

105). Personally, I am a learner-centered educator; I love to focus my teaching on the

learners themselves. I love to allow them to work together and focus my teaching on their

success. Being a learner centered educator, I struggled with the concept of a scholar

academic educator, because they are the type of educator who passes along knowledge to

continue the trend within the group of students. Even though scholar academics are able

to engage in learning and teaching, their style of teaching is much different than mine in

the format they choose to forego. According to Schiro (2008) these types of academics

are very focused on the students teaching each other, and how they can benefit from one-

anothers insights, this is referred to the pursuit of knowledge that is transferred into the

distribution of knowledge (p. 29).

Scholar academics are those educators that maintain, distribute and pursue future

knowledge in the academic disciplines. They are the type of educator to not focus on

anything outside of their style of teaching/ learning and only consider what they study

and what they believe to be true is the most important. Anything outside of their scope is

deemed inapplicable to their studies. In the article Curriculum Theories by Schiro

(2008) he suggested, scholar academics view education as a process of acculturating

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students into a discipline, and thus one portion of their cultures knowledge base (p. 29).

In my opinion, I believe scholar academics are very difficult to understand from a student

point of view. I have had many teachers who are deemed this way and have not allowed

for their students to pursue the learners they want to become because of the narrow-

mindedness that occurs in the classroom. Scholar academic teachers are focused on the

content that is put in front of them and struggle to think or go outside of the box, which is

what I appreciate most in a teacher.

I have had many educators that have made an impact on my learning because of

their views of education, teaching and learning. Directing their teaching outside of the

box, allowing for their students to produce knowledge, direction, thought etc. into the

lesson, without the students having the pressure that a scholar academic teacher would

put onto their students. Other teachers have had a social efficiency point of view, in

which I also do agree with and have enjoyed throughout my educational career. Those

teachers, who have set strict guidelines, have provided direction and rewards have also

been teachers that have helped me to become successful. Teachers who are socially

efficient are said to want to engineer their students behaviorally so they are able to

succeed in the classroom. Schiro (2008) mentioned the behavioral engineer views

teaching as a process of shaping learners behavior through the use of rewards and

punishment (p.62). I find these ideologies to be very successful in the classroom because

it gives students incentive to want to learn and want to do well on whatever they are

working on. Having these experiences in the past have influenced my style of teaching

and the perspectives I want to bring into my own classroom. The learning environments I

want to provide for my students are much like some of the environments I had
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experiences in and have remembered up until this point in my life. I can now direct my

own style of teaching with reference to all of the experiences I have had in the classroom,

and mend the ideas to make them authentically my own.

My ideal learning environment would be a structured class that has a group and

detail-orientated space. I believe that each child is supposed to feel valued, loved, equal,

respected, and heard in my classroom. I hope everyday my students can go home at the

end of their school day and feel positive about each and every aspect I try to relay to them

everyday. I want to encompass inclusive learning by allowing my students to work at

their own pace, in groups or individually, whichever suits best for them to succeed. From

my past experiences, I wish I had felt more valued in the classroom, and had been given

more alternative ways to learn and because of those past learning obstacles, I would love

to change that in my teaching.

I believe in the public school system because this type of organization is very

inclusive and allows for every child to participate in school without pressure. Of course

encompassing the four ideologies: social efficiency, social reconstruction, learner

centered, and scholar academic all come to mind when I think of public school education.

Social efficient educators direct learning with step based guidelines following a

reward/punishment system. Like in schools today, there are many social efficient

teachers, because that style of teaching is very operative and successful. Social

reconstruction also fits into the public school system in forms of focusing on what is

important in the school community and enhancing the positive aim to create a better

society. I believe social reconstruction can relate to learner-centered educators, because

those types of educators are allowing their students to be the best individuals they can be.
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Giving my students examples of what great citizens are, and what it looks like to be

positive in a community and how important it is to learn from one another. Scholar

academics may also tie into all of the above details because they believe in the

dissemination of knowledge and through whichever way that may be.

Answering, to what degree should ones ideology influence the construction and

execution of a learning experience? I believe every students learning experience is worth

the same, each student should feel as though they are equal and can acquire the same

amount of information regardless of the pace they work at. Learning is about having a

direction, but being able to open up other areas of knowledge to expand on. I believe

having a learner centered ideology allows for a different learning experience because it

shifts the focus of the teacher to the learner and allows for them to work and move at

their own pace in their own creative ways. Each person is different in how they obtain

information and it is important to recognize those differences. A scholar academic may

not particularly recognize those differences as easily because they are focused solely on

the topic and the applicable information attached. The zone of a scholar academics view

is very narrow minded in a sense they do not offer or exceed the extension of learning

from a different point of view.

The degree to which ones ideology influences the construction and execution of a

learning experience is based solely on the educator and how important learning is to the

student. The educator has a huge role to instill positive reinforcement, trust, knowledge,

wisdom etc. and the learner has the responsibility to be punctual, respectful, willing to

learn and always open to new ideas. Learning experiences have incredible impacts on the
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ones who are involved and it is up to both parties to forego change through the

construction, and act upon the change with execution.

References

Schiro, M. (2008). Curriculum theory: Conflicting visions and enduring concerns.

California: Sage Publications, Inc