From High street fashion to teaching....

Taking inspiration from What Not To Wear (WNTW) regarding fashion, we have come up with our won video of What Not To Teach (WNTT). Like Stacey and Clinton in (WNTW) were highly opinionated about fashion and ridiculed Pam for her dressing sense, I think many times even teachers are also divided in two different schools of thoughts. Many like the Rote way while few like to experiment and others try innovative ways of teaching. I have to use the old Rote learning and indoor classroom approach of chalk and blackboard, sometimes even though I believe in experimenting and innovating in class.
Unwillingly or unknowingly I have to follow the old school of taught because most of the time I follow a rote way of teaching. In that case, I follow the method of (TTT) Teaching, Testing, Teaching and it works, as I teach the British system and we have very little chances to experiment. I teach A levels that’s grade 12 and we have to finish 6 modules in 10 months time, so only rote learning works here although I would love to experiment but cannot due to academic pressure of completing the syllabus. However, I have seen in more progressive educational systems like IB and the American systems that the teachers are encouraged to follow inquiry based learning and disapprove of (TTT).
While doing my course work reading of Madison Avenue’s “30-Second Spot Remover” I liked how Mr. Robert Greenberg described information, He said “Because of advances in technology and communication, we're surrounded by information we see and hear. Overload is a huge issue.” As he continued, he said "I think things are going to get infinitely more complex," he adds on, "and the challenge is about taking things that are infinitely complex and making them simpler and more understandable." I think that’s the problem with our education he said everything about the present state of education system. We have too much amount of research that has gone into education and teaching and we have a lot of pedagogy and it has complicated the whole educational system. We need to simply take a middle path in which we can make education a fun filled activity, as Greenberg describes it, and still achieve the objective of learning.
Like high street fashion is exclusive for the elite, rich and famous people, similarly I believe higher education is also for a selected few in many parts of the world.
I also came across the article “The aesthetic imperative” while doing course reading, that’s chapter 1 in the book "The Substance of Style" by Harper Collins where the author, Virginia Postrel compares a lot of things and try to correlate them using various parameters . I particular liked her comparison of IBM with Compaq and she gave a reason as to why people are ready to spend more for the MAC book. I also liked the example of the grocery at Salt Lake City where the owner does a makeover of her grocery shop and notices that after the makeover and the opening of a new Starbucks Café opposite to the grocery, it has not only added to the ascetic value of the shop but has also given a very welcoming atmosphere to her shop. I think similarly, if a school does a makeover and designs its classrooms, it will add to the ascetic valve and give a welcomed change to students. I can conclude that even teachers should change their teaching strategies and do a much required makeover to their teaching style.