Innovative Teaching Methods At Hunter College Summer School
By Alberto Cepeda
The two most interesting things that I observed taking place in these classrooms were the teaching techniques used by the teachers and tutors to get these at risk students to comprehend the material being taught in these classes and the number of tutors who were in the classroom to provide support to these students.
The first classroom visited was a living environment class that consisted of about thirty students with three teachers and three tutors on hand to teach them the material. The lesson was centered on taking scientific terms and breaking them down into concepts from the biggest to the smallest.
It was startling to see that the teaching techniques being applied by the professors weren’t limited to writing on the blackboard. The teachers challenged the students to explain the terms and how they got their answers. A simple right or wrong answer would not suffice in this class. Memorizing these concepts and terminologies weren’t the goal of the lesson. The teachers and tutors demanded that their students thoroughly comprehend the material through reviews that took place every ten to fifteen minutes within the lesson.
I was also surprised how proactive these students were as they participated and how thoroughly they explained their answers. It was clear that they fully grasped the lesson which consisted of scientific terms such as nucleotides, chromosomes and DNA. The teachers as well as the tutors challenged these students to fully grasp the material which is the key to getting the students to succeed.
Dr. Faith Muirhead, Program Director of MSP in NYC and her staff are on the right track to meeting the goal of MSP and fulfilling the dreams of success that every student deserves.#
Alberto Cepeda is a student at CCNY & an intern at Education Update.
