Personal and Cultural Factors Interfering With the Effective Use of Individual and Group Learning Methods

Abstract

In traditional teaching methods the teacher is at the center of attention; with new methods of individual and group instruction, an effort is being made to change this. The accepted ways of instruction are sequential in nature and conform to the linearity characteristic of Western culture; the new modes of teaching in effect discard the view that most people think and learn in a very systematic way. Classroom observation shows that in many cases teachers who have ostensibly adopted one of the new individual or group methods of instruction partly continue to employ the teaching methods they formerly used in whole-class teaching. It is contended that this is not just an unimportant relic of past behavior but a sign of serious personal and cultural problems the teachers encounter in modifying their ways of teaching. From the literature it does not appear that sufficient attention is being paid to these problems by the propagators of the new teaching methods. It remains to be investigated whether such basic changes are at all possible.