Education

Running Head : POSITION

Position

By _________________ (College or Institution

A learner centered environment focus on the needs of the students and placing importance on the individual progress that the student makes This type of approach entail the educator 's thorough understanding of the student 's skill level , the extent of knowledge as well as the student 's personal interests (Duckworth 1987 . This is especially true nowadays when the achievement gap of minorities is increasing . In one study , the reading achievement of African Americans and Latinos saw a widened gap during

the 1990 's as compared to the 1970 's and 1980 's Similarly , in the field of Mathematics , the gap between African American students and their White counterparts as well as between Latinos and White students widened during the 20th century as compared to the previous decades (Haycock , Gerald Huang 2001

In a knowledge-centered environment , the educator plays an important role especially as they set the course of the student 's learning . The provision of a knowledge-centered environment requires the educator to give attention to the subject areas that need to be taught , the reasons why these are taught so as to facilitate understanding and to show how mastery of the subject or competent skills may be achieved (Donovan Bransford Pellegrino , 1999

As students continuously gain new knowledge , it is important for educators to consider the preconceptions of students as these along with the learner 's attitudes have a significant impact towards the learning ability of the student as well as on the establishment of a positive classroom environment (Marzano and Pickering , 1997 . It is therefore important to ensure a balance between the provision of a learner centered and a knowledge centered environment . This may be achieved through the following

Developing the knowledge base of students as this serves as the foundation of all future learning by guiding organization and representations , by serving as a basis of association with new information , and by coloring and filtering all new experience (Murphy and Alexander 2002 ,

.12 . This can be achieved through working with students in small groups , an increase in the interaction time of the educator with the students , making use of interventions that are instructional in nature and through the involvement of the learner 's families

Increasing the motivation of students which include factors such as intrinsic motivation , personal goals , attributions for learning , and self-efficacy as well as the motivational characteristics of learning tasks (Murphy and Alexander 2002 ,

.16 . Academic concepts are easily learned and grasped by students if they display a certain interest on the subject area and possess a necessary amount of confidence on their ability to learn . Motivation may be increased through engaging in meaningful dialogue between the student and educator , the provision of adequate room for exploration of concepts and supporting the students to achieve and maintain a good academic performance

Addressing the individual and developmental differences of students as learning advances and goes through common stages of development . This could be influenced...