Literacy and education in high school

Adolescents need opportunities to generate and express relevant understandings of new ideas and concepts that they read in their various subject areas

Introduction

In every nation adolescents form a significant part of the population and this cohort of young people can become either a gift or a burden to their countries depending on the capacity of educationalist to convert them into potential human beings . There has been a significant discussion in recent years regarding our educational system and its inefficiency in addressing the adolescent education (William G . Brozo Charles H

. Hargis , 2003 . In many circumstances even the teachers feel it difficult to motivate the students in middle and high schools especially those who remained alliterate during their lower grades

Adolescents who are alliterates have negative view of reading and take it as a process of getting the word right rather than an act of understanding the material . Most alliterate middle school students tend to passively find answers rather than actively make sense of information . They do not hear a voice of the page and instead of trying to grasp the content they keep on trying to grasp words . As they keep trying , they are fed with more of the same and no opportunity is given to them to understand the concept and ideas of the subject they read Reading proficiency has historically been valued as the fundamental enabling competency in public education in the minds of parents educators , and the general public (Dr . Willard R . Daggett , Dr . Ted S Hasselbring , 2007 . Most educational systems fail in this contest and deprive their students an opportunity to understand different things

Developing Inquiry based Understanding and metacognitive approach

One of the important concerns is the modern day education , is the need to develop knowledge with understanding . The problem with current education is that it is good in conceptual thing but not with factual understanding . The adolescents are taught more concepts and very little time is left for their understanding . The 21st century requires more factual thinking to survive than the conceptual . The learning with understanding is very much essential in developing the factual thinking skills

In this contest the teaching methods need to be changed to encourage the students to understand the content areas rather than just reading and reproducing them in the exams . The teaching environment must also supportive in this . The factual understanding must be taught in whatever new concepts the students learn . Also some assignments in finding the factual truth behind the various technical content areas may be given to the students . This creates a kind of inquisitiveness to understand the fact behind whatever concept they learn in the future

The students must also be encouraged to pose any inquiry into the concepts they learn in the classrooms . All the students come to the classrooms with their existing notions about a concept . When this is not engaged by their teachers they develop inquisitiveness to understand them and start posing questions . The teachers must start taking pain to clear them . This...