Individualized Learning in a Methods Course

Abstract

Educators proclaim that effective teaching is effective teaching, whether in preschool or in graduate school. Accepting this, it seems reasonable to suggest that there is something common to all effective teaching. Moreover, since effective teaching implies learning, it is also reason able to advance the suggestion that there is something common to the learning that results from effective teaching. A synthesis of teachers' action that make up effec tive teaching includes establishing provisions for indi vidual differences among students. The amount of emphasis placed on making provisions for individual differences may vary according to the particular teacher or grade level of the learner, but these provisions are always necessary for proficient teaching, and hence learning, to occur. The elementary teacher preparation program at Cali fornia State University, Sacramento attempts to include provisions for individual differences among the students enrolled in the mathematics methods course. The back grounds and interests of these students are very diverse. There are great variations in the amount of knowledge possessed by the students. Some have competed a bac calaureate major in mathematics while others have never enrolled in a college mathematics course. Teaching in terests ran^e from kindergarten through grade eight. The existing diversities among students dictate the need for individualized learning in this mathematics methods course. Here are objectives from this course: 1) Reading in a methods textbook. To demon strate that he has done some reading, the student completes ten post tests. Fewer than 80% correct on any post test is unsatisfactory. Post tests are retaken as many times as are necessary to achieve the minimum acceptance level.