Academic Education Essay Example

- Inclusion
It is an approach in education where teachers and tutors should ensure that all the students are included in the learning process both in class and in the wider school. The inclusion model advocates for all the students with special needs spend more time with the non-disabled or the ‘normal’ students in the school during the learning process. Its purpose is to help families’ visions of a typical life for their children can come true, the students develop positive understanding of themselves and others while developing friendships, they learn important academic skills and above all learn by being together.
- Informal assessment
Another form of education process is informal assessment. It refers to the procedure for obtaining information about the behavior and characteristics of children during the learning process using other means other means a part from the standardized instruments. It involves observing the learners as the learning exercise progresses and then evaluating them using the data gathered.
It is a very important learning tool which allows the teacher make valid and useful assessments of learners’ knowledge and performance.
- Mentoring
Mentoring refers to a professional relationship in which person who is more experienced (the mentor) gives assistance to another in developing specific skills and knowledge that will enhance the less experienced person’s professional and personal growth. Encouraging mentoring provides the learner some sense of direction and purpose in life as well as helping the learner develop life targets as it provides a partner who has achieved the goals and targets. The mentor is tasked with asking questions, challenging the mentee as well as helping him/her have personal believe and confidence.
- Cooperative learning
This refers to classroom learning situation where children of all levels of performance work together in a structured group toward a specific shard goal. The small structured groups enable students to work together as they seek to maximize their own and each other’s learning. The purpose of cooperative learning is that it ensures students achieve many social and academic benefits.
- Charter school
Charter school refers to a school that receives public funding but its independent in its operations. The charter exempts the school from selected state or local rules and regulations in return for funding and autonomy , the charter school must meet accountability standards articulated in its charter. Charter schools are meant to provide the education system with an alternative public system and offer parents another public school option to better meet their children’s specific needs.
- Standards
Standards describe the goals of schooling, the destination that students should arrive at the end of the unit or term. Educational standards are what define the knowledge and skills students should possess at critical points in their educational career.
In order to achieve their intended purpose, standards are categorized into two; content standards, what students should know and should be able to do and performance standards which is a measure of how the student is able to meet the content standards.
- Bloom’s Taxonomy
This is a way distinguishing questions within education. It is a classification of the different objectives that educators set for students. The bloom’s taxonomy divides these objectives into three domains: cognitive, effective and psychomotor or knowing/head, feeling/heart and doing/hands respectively. The purpose of Bloom’s taxonomy is to provide motivation to educators in order for them to have focus on all the three domains thus creating a more holistic form of education.
- Inquiry instruction
This is a system which involves the technique of questioning: the student questions about the material under investigation and the teacher interrogates the students with the purpose of creating an understanding about the subject or topic in question.
- Portfolio assessment
It’s an evaluation tool that is used to carry out documentation of students work and other related material which show the activities of the student, their accomplishment and achievements. During the assessment, the learner should show that he/she is capable of doing self-reflection and thus evaluation is done. The purpose of portfolio assessment is to provide the student an opportunity to gather portfolios that best illustrate their talents represent their writing capabilities and be able to show their achievements.
- Lessons plans
These are the detailed description of the course of instruction for one class. A lesson plan will help reflect on the interests and needs of the students. It correlates with the teacher’s philosophy of education which forms the purpose of educating the students.
- Scoring rubric
This is a tool used to explicitly represent the performance of expectations for an assignment or piece of work. They are used to provide formative feedback to support and guide ongoing learning efforts. Scoring rubric provides a readily accessible way of communicating and developing goals between the learners and teachers as well as outlining the criteria of how well the goals have been met.
- Tenure
This is a guaranteed contract given to individuals who have worked for a specific period of time and have proven their skills after which they cannot be fired without a just cause. The purpose of tenure in education is to give teachers the freedom to continue research and teach as they see fit without concerns of political nature.
- Assistive technology
This refers to assistive, adaptive and rehabilitative devices used by people with disabilities. They are important since they facilitate the learning process of the students with disabilities. Their purpose is to increase, maintain or improve the functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities.
- Voucher
This refers to the funding given by the government to the parents of a school child and they can use the funds to the child’s education in any public or private school of their choice. The purpose of the voucher system in education is to give an opportunity to low income earning parents to afford education quality of their liking and which they think will be beneficial to their children.
- ELL
ELL stands for English language learner education and it represents a first step towards the development of a more comprehensive catalogue of terms and definitions which are to help educators in their work due to the increase in the number of ELLs. The terms refer to students who receive assistance in English as a second language. Its purpose is to eliminate the barriers to learning caused by the lack of proper understanding in the English language.
- Normal school
This is a school created to train high school graduates to become teachers. Its main purpose was to establish teaching standards or norms.
- Standardized test
This is a test in which the same test is given to all the test takers and is given in a similar manner. The purpose of standardized test is to enable comparison in performance of students.
- Master teacher
This is teacher who has mastered the management of his/her classroom and has devised a way to accelerate learning for all the students. The master teacher’s purpose is more than just a teacher who is concerned about sharing of content; s/he is more interested in creating independent learners, hold the students’ expectations higher as well as having a mind set in problem solving and personal accountability.
- Null curriculum
This refers to the contents which are deliberately avoided in teaching and hence giving the students the message that these elements are not important.
Its purpose is to initiate a critical analysis of curriculum that explicitly seeks to attend to that which is absent, left out, and overlooked how curriculum is conceptualized, created, and enacted.
- Direct instruction
This is an approach to teaching which is skill-oriented and the teaching practices it implies are teacher-directed. The use of skills such as lectures or demonstrations of the materials are used instead of explanatory models. The main purpose of direct instruction is to provide information within a structure that enables students to attain the stated level of mastery.
- Emergency certificate
An emergency certificate holder is a teacher candidate who has an appropriate degree and has substantially completed a teacher’s degree but has yet to complete the standard certification requirements. The purpose is to fill the void created due to unavailability of regularly certificated teacher.
- Pedagogy
This is the method or practice of teaching an academic subject or theoretical concept. Its purpose is to enable teachers evaluate hoe effective they must spend time on strategic questions, how to manage and manage well, how to reach child individually and give/him the lesson needed.