Academic Literacy in Teaching and Learning

Using reading and writing strategies in religious studies may help my students to become active learners, so as to acquire the habit of reflecting as well as practicing higher level of thinking. I believe that the role of academic literacy strategies should be discussed and studied at whole school level so that every teacher may contribute to make them part of the teaching and learning strategies practiced in a school. In other words, a well-rounded curriculum should integrate the responsibility of developing academic literacy in every class.

In my school we have just started discussions about literacy strategies. Actually, the process of changing our mental models progresses slowly. So thus, we know that our students are successful entering the best universities in the country. However, it seems that we receive more and more feedback that indicates us the need of reinforcing academic literacy development in our school. To some extent, former students are urging us to give more space to learning skills development that are necessary to succeed in a fast changing academic environment and work place as well. The remarkable content knowledge should be paired with remarkable learning skills.

As we can experience even by writing our blog entries and also through other written assignments, personal reading and writing help us to deepen our thinking and our capacity of expressing our thoughts. I can tell that, even though I am a novice English reader and writer, through my readings and short writing activities I can already experience the joy of progressing. Furthermore, I highly appreciate the opportunity of reading different views on the same educational topic or issue. This experience reinforces my belief that I have to make academic literacy development part of my teaching strategy. Actually, in religious studies reading and writing activities may open the mind of my students to engage with readings and issues that are actually connected to their every day experience. I appreciate the idea of scaffolding these activities; I think this is a crucial strategy in order to lead young readers and writers to experience success.

Mind Mapping and Language learning

Mind mapping with children

Creative thinking - Mind Mapping - From Tony Buzan

Schools as Learning Organizations

To serve as “fulcrum point for educational and societal change”, schools should become learning organizations which foster relationship, collaboration, and learning process whereby teachers, students, parents, principles as well as community members interact and construct meaningful knowledge.

I agree that schools as learning organizations have to reflect the way people live and learn. It seems obvious that learning is a natural human disposition. Children as well as adults are programmed for learning genetically. Furthermore, there are many research results showing that people learn purposefully and integrating new knowledge into their prior experience. Therefore, it seems that learning in schools will be successful while following the pattern of natural learning.

It seems that systems thinking may help us to perceive our schools as organizations where we are interacting with other players of the system while contributing to build a better human society. This way of thinking may be very rewarding, but surely it will demand a host of skills which have not been so far necessarily regarded as part of our action. We have not only to focus our educational work on the process of learning but also on the human development of our students, as well as we have to develop good communication skills in a complex system. In order to achieve such goals, we have to pay more attention to develop interactively our role as teachers, and also we have to learn to allocate differently our resources, especially our time. Systems thinking and the other tools suggested by P. Senge may give us some support.

In a school dedicated to build community and serve in the local community, as Catholic school is supposed to be, the idea of P. Senge may represent a supportive conceptual framework for us. His framework may also help us to articulate our vision and mission as Catholic educators in the 21st century. Indeed, focus on whole person development and collaboration should be at the heart of our educational creed. Parents, for instance, have to be involved in school, as they are the primer educators of their children. Senge’s ideas about schools as learning organizations, however, may help us to criticize our mental models in order to see more properly the complexity of our role as Catholic educators in the 21st century school organization.

Choosing a Set of Outcomes - Teacher's role

Reading the chapter on "Choosing a Set of Outcomes” (Ozar, 1994), it has become clear to me that the process of integrating both the characteristic values of a school community and the discipline-specific plane creates a dynamic system of outcomes, assessments, and instruction. Actually, every actor contributing in developing such a system has a significant role to play. Parents and students, the local community, and of course in a Catholic school the Church have to participate in the process in an active and meaningful way.As teachers have a particularly significant role in choosing outcomes, I would like to take time and reflect on it. Let’s have a look at some of the characteristics of this role.

Firstly, in addition to the rigorous subject knowledge and the mastery of the subject area standards, teachers have to understand the characteristics of their school community as well as the local community they serve. In other words, they have to study and understand the local culture. Furthermore, in an outcomes-centered decision-making paradigm, educators need to integrate the philosophy, the mission, and the value- system of their school. In fact, this will be fundamental when defining graduation outcomes, assessments and educational strategies.

Secondly, participating in the process of defining outcomes, teachers need to learn and work collaboratively. They have to develop their own skills of cooperation with colleagues, as well as they should be trained how to reflect creatively on the authenticity of assessments and the effectiveness of their instructional strategies. As a result, teachers will contribute to the achievement of graduation outcomes. In this logic, the specialist’s isolation has to be substituted by cooperative mindset.

Following the outcomes-centered decision-making process, teachers may contemporaneously be professional specialists and educators. Not only will they provide learning achievement, but also they may “customize” their teaching in order to care for the personal growth of their students. So, teachers have to be reflective in their whole process of designing, assessing and deciding on teaching strategies.

Then, the involvement of teachers in the process of choosing outcome as described by Ozar may however be a challenging activity. Given the diversity of teachers in many Catholic schools, or even more generally speaking in Christian schools, to have everybody working with similar understanding of school’s mission might be a great deal. Beyond the possible differences of worldview, there are also the well-worn paths of teaching in every school, which may make difficult to develop a good rational for change.

Consequently, school leaders should create opportunities for collaboration and dialogue so that every teacher may responsibly participate in the development of a shared educational program. The creation of such organization is crucial because the achievement of outcomes will depend substantially on the way teachers contribute in the process of choosing them. Furthermore, the leadership has to make sure that everybody feels welcomed and respected in the process so that teaching design may no longer be an activity of isolated specialists. Surely, the Christian purpose of educating the whole person supposes the contribution of a whole community.

Benefits and challenges of the outcomes-centered curriculum model

A school, as defined by the S.C.C.E. in the document Catholic School (1977) “is a privileged place of integral formation by means of systematic and critical assimilation of culture”. Accordingly, the task of a Catholic school “is fundamentally a synthesis of culture and faith and a synthesis of faith and life: the firs is reached by integrating all the different aspects of human knowledge through the subjects taught, in the light of the Gospel; the second in the growth of the virtues characteristic of the Christian.” Therefore, the educational program in a Catholic school should be envisioned as a process aiming at students' transformation and learning. This principle seems to match the outcomes-centered curriculum model of Lorrain A. Oznar in Creating a Curriculum that Works. Essentially, the strength of the model may be in the outstanding opportunity of connecting educational outcomes and objectives with the educational philosophy and mission of a values-based and learning-centered Catholic school. As a result, the connection of these factors may provide suited conditions for the synthesis suggested by the educational document of the Church.

As Oznar suggests it, the outcomes-centered curriculum model works when change occurs in the mindset (output mindset) of individuals, and similarly when administrators, teachers, parents, students, and community collaborate by focusing on significant learning. As a result, it is expected that a shift will occur from isolated responsibility for learning toward the responsibility of the whole school community. The interdependence may prevent professional isolation of teachers, but at the same time well-defined outcomes and objectives focused on significant and measurable learning may transform the attitude of students so as to enhance their awareness of being responsible for their own learning. These are some of the very significant benefits of outcomes-centered curriculum design and implementation.

Further benefits of this model may be identified as increasing teacher creativity. Not only do we have to work collaboratively, but also we have to select rich content knowledge and to use a variety of teaching strategies in order to improve students’ learning. Subsequently, thanks to the outcomes-centered curriculum model, in our decision-making, at whatever stage of our work, we may focus on relevant content as well as choose adequate pedagogical strategies from a large pool of opportunities. Inherently, thinking from the significant learning perspective, teachers may see more clearly or objectively the needs of students, and as a result, adopt better teaching and learning strategies. In addition, higher objectivity will make possible for a teacher to predict more exactly the quality of learning and also to improve the process.

When fallowing the process of outcomes-centered curriculum, there are, however, to be considered some challenges as well. One of them may be, as a matter of fact, the quickly changing world, and also the increasing divergence in the needs of students. It seems to be a difficult process, when keeping the pace of change and adapting to as fast as demanded by the new circumstances. Concretely, in such a world may be a hard challenge to reach a working agreement among the many collaborators involved in the process of creating a relevant curriculum. The goals, and therefore the suited outcomes may differ in many ways.

As regards challenges that teachers may encounter, their role ought to undergo, in many aspects, a radical change. The way of working, planning, and taking decisions indicated by the outcomes-centered curriculum model demands a great ability of continual adaptation as well as to increase the value of pedagogical knowledge and skills. But, the task is even more complex when pedagogy is very much a changing knowledge. In addition, pedagogical creativity also means use of more complex strategies, which may demand more resources, and most importantly the scarcest resource, time. Furthermore, to change the professional isolation of teachers in order to adopt the more complex collaborative way of working could also be a hard challenge for many. I would be very pleased to read about teachers’ experiences of implementing outcomes-centered curriculum model. Which have the concrete advantages been and what kind of troubles may occur on the process?

Finally, it seems that the outcomes-centered curriculum model may not only change the way of thinking and relating in education, but also indicate the need of important systemic changes at organizational level. However, as regards significant learning, this model may hopefully help us to serve better and also to fulfill the purpose of Catholic school as “a place of integral formation”. 

Experience and Belifs in Catholic Education in Hungary

My experience as an educator is mainly related to my work in a Hungarian Catholic school after the fall of communist regime. I started teaching theology and philosophy in a brand new Jesuit middle and high school in 1998, and also for some years I worked in administration as the director of the boarding residence. As an educator responsible for boarding students, I had to look at our new educational organization from a particular perspective; namely, I had to perceive our school as a community based on mutual respect and collaboration. For instance, an important number of boarding children were aged from 11 to 14 years old, and first and foremost they needed a caring and safe community. Therefore, as educators, we were permanently challenged to re-create our role just from the beginning.

As a Jesuit educator I firmly believe that the human dignity of each member of our school community must be addressed with high respect and also with gratitude. Inspired by Jesus who's educator by excellence, I believe that everybody has to be regarded as a gift with his or her talents. Furthermore, I conceive my role of educator as a great honor because thereby it has been trusted to me the amazing opportunity to contribute to the personal growth of many children, colleagues and at some extent parents as well. Definitely, I am grateful to many of them for the challenges whereby they also contributed to my personal development as educator and as a Jesuit priest.

The Hungarian Jesuits started their school with the determination to serve the local community that had been just freed from the political oppression of communist regime and its ideology. Understandably, many people were looking for alternatives and so for organizations that may better serve their needs, and particularly those of their children. Consequently, the decade of the 90’s was a period of new hope and expectation as well as challenges for the Hungarian Christian communities. To respond to those challenges, the Jesuit community, newly reestablished in the country, founded a school in order to contribute to the spiritual and moral rebuilding of the Hungarian society. Of course, they were very optimistic, and even more were they so when many people joined the new educational project with perceptible enthusiasm.

The new school buildings were amazingly designed by a leading Hungarian architect, a great artist. Contrary to the factory like schoolhouse model, the new Jesuit school looks like a small Mediterranean town very attractive and also inviting people to live there. Even this time, the extraordinary feature of that built space continues to attract the interest of some educational researchers in the country. Some researchers are intrigued by the possible correlation between the aesthetics of the school building and its effects on the students, teachers, and parents.

Although the beauty of our “school town” and the given new opportunities for innovation, it took us a long time “to inhabit” our school, and it has been hard to get away from the Industrial-age thinking model, so well described by Peter Senge in Schools that Learn. Personally, influenced by my experiences abroad, and as a Jesuit, I’ve never felt at ease with the “factory school” model. Thanks to my colleagues and to some inspiring parents as well as by learning from the feedback of my students I strove to fashion my educational vision and also by learning to alter my practice.

To serve better in our school, I introduced some new strategies like flexible classroom arrangement, collaborative activities in classes and working in learning oriented projects. As I really believe that after-school activities contribute to the education of the whole person development and also enhance the effectiveness of learning, I invited my students to participate in arts clubs, non-competitive sports, outdoor activities (experiential learning), and many volunteered for service learning activities in the local community (play rooms activities in the local Hospital for children, visiting senior citizens, and the like.). Peer tutoring was a very successful strategy mainly because a good number of my students were boarding in the residence. To develop community spirit, we took care of preparing good celebration in order to recognize everyone’s work. Of course as a Jesuit priest, I always cared for the spiritual needs of those working along with me. I have very good memories about our retreats, and about some of our pilgrimages when we visited significant spiritual places at home and elsewhere in Europe.

As regards technology, I lived as a “digital immigrant”, so did my students and fellow teachers. Of course, I am a "digital immigrant". I can say that we have used technology to some extent, but we never organized our teaching and learning activities around it. Nevertheless, our students are increasingly becoming “digital borne” and the number of "digital immigrants" is lessening. This challenge is surely going to change our school community very soon. With optimism and faith, I am looking forward to learn about how could I serve better.

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