Teacher-Student Physical Distance - Essay Example

?Emily So Education 252 07 December Teacher Physical Distance: How Does it Influence Learning? While I was growing up and attending school, I experienced different learning environments. There were times that our chairs were arranged in rows and columns, while there are moments that we were made to organize our seats to form a circle. There were situations where all the students face the teacher: sometimes, I was seated near the instructor, sometimes, I am far. There were also instances that we, the students have to face each other while exchanging our ideas with the whole class. I also observed various classroom settings. An art classroom is much more spatial than a normal classroom. The walls of classrooms were usually in light colors, with windows to allow enough sunlight. The posters on the walls were made of attractive colors and were arranged in a manner that is pleasant to look upon. Yes, there were differences, but there were also similarities. So I wondered, what were the reasons that classroom set-up was arranged in a particular manner? Does it influence the students’ learning? How? In particular, is the distance between the instructor and the student important? How does it affect the learning of the students? When the reasons for these set-ups are understood, then more individuals will support it – especially if it means learning efficiency. The mentors will employ this knowledge seeing that this will aid them in their endeavors to pass on knowledge to their students. Learners will also appreciate this, knowing that this will aid in them in gaining knowledge – the primary reason why they study. LITERATURE REVIEW It has been well documented in literature that human emotions play a significant role in the way we live. We experience emotions in all of our activities, making these emotions sometimes control the activities that we engage in (Shan 142). As Shan (142) have said, “pleasant emotional experience can contribute to active and positive imitation and repetition, accompanied by pleasure, satisfaction and love etc., while the unpleasant one can cause people to behave negatively, leading to anger, complaints, hate, etc.” Since learning is also an activity that we do, emotions are therefore also important in the learning process. Classroom instruction is a communication process between the teacher and the students. Since emotions are involved here, the instructor’s emotions will affect the students just as the students’ will affect the instructor (Shan, 143). Astleitner (128) argued that influencing emotions during classroom instruction is important as this will affect the learning of the students. The Fear Envy Anger Sympathy Pleasure or FEASP Theory is an approach that integrates emotions into classroom instruction (Astleitner 128; Astleitner, Hurek and Sztejnberg 63) saying that positive feelings (sympathy and pleasure) should be cultivated in the instructional design and conversely, avoid the negative emotions (fear, envy, anger). When Simon A. Lei (128) reviewed the literature about the effects of the physical design of a classroom to the learning of the students, he found a similar basic foundation. Though students learn in various ways, what remained the same was the fact that classrooms must be designed in such a way that positive feelings should be cultivated to empower both educators and learners. Then the various ways that students learn in the classroom will be facilitated. Seven physical attributes of a classroom that have a profound impact to student learning were identified by Lei (128-129). First was the size of a room which could be small or large depending on the number of students on the class. Second was the furniture arrangement which could either be flexible or attached to the floor. Third was technology system arrangement in the classroom; if a modern technology was available there and where it was located. Fourth was lighting in the room; the intensity of light, its source, and if a multiple light settings were present. Fifth was the temperature in the classroom which included the duration and frequency of the extreme temperatures. Sixth was the color selected for the classroom; the intensity of the colors and the distinct pattern present. The level of noise present was the last: its frequency, duration and intensity. Lei’s (130-132) study highlighted the effects of these classroom physical characteristics to learning. In summary, these effects are as follows: As student-instructor eye contact is a basic interaction required to facilitate learning, making a broader classroom preferable over a long one. A column-free classroom space is ideal and permanently fixed furniture should be minimized. The technology that should be made available must be user-friendly. Natural light should be used in moderation as it induces a positive feeling which in turn enhances learning, but overly large windows should be avoided as students tend to look outside for the scenery rather than at the teacher. Light colors are preferred since they also engender positive feelings. Extreme temperatures within the room should be avoided since they tend attract student’s attention serving as a hindrance to their learning in class. Lastly, noise reduces learning also. Though these factors affect learning, Lei (132) stressed that learning still depends on the way the students articulate these various physical conditions. The way they articulate however, is still influenced by their emotions. Cultivating positive feelings in the classroom thus greatly contributes to the propensity of the student to learn. I opted to validate Lei’s (130) findings that distance between the instructor and student influences the learning process. Is learning better when the student is nearer to the instructor? METHODS, RESULTS AND DISCUSSION I am currently a tutor to a few elementary school children, teaching them the formal English language, and at the same time, I am also a student my self. The knowledge that will be gained in this inquiry will aid me greatly both as tutor and as a student. I wanted three of my tutees to be my participants in this reflective inquiry. I wrote a formal letter to their parents asking their permission to allow their son or daughter to be among my participants. Through the letter, I assured them that their personal information will be confidential and that the results of the inquiry will be used for academic purposes only. I also mentioned the area of my inquiry which is the relationship of the distance between the instructor and the student and its connection to the learning process. For the sake of confidentiality, I used aliases to refer to my participants. My first participant is Grace, the second is Chelsea and the third is Barbara. All of them are ten years old now; they are elementary school students who have been my tutees for three months. The study room that we utilized was a five by four meters long. It has two windows on one side and one window on its adjacent side. The room was well lit and ventilated and the temperature was normal: it was neither on the extremes. It was neither too hot nor too cold. I planned two class sessions. Each class lasts for an hour and a half from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. As for the classroom setting, my position was on the smaller side that has no window. On the wall behind me, there was a mini white board. Their chairs were arranged in one line. Grace was the nearest. She was one meter away from me. Chelsea’s seat was two and a half meters away from me. Barbara’s seat was the farthest being four meters away. As for voice, my modulation was the same as the one that I usually use when I teach them. My topics were short stories by O’ Henry: “The Last Leaf” for the first session and “The Gift of the Magi” was topic for the second session. In every session, one hour and ten minutes was allocated for the story and its discussion while the remaining 20 minutes was for a short quiz to gauge what they have learned. The short quiz is composed of ten questions about the story. My primary tools to assess their learning were the two short quizzes, but I still looked for non verbal cues such as eye contact and the frequency with which they looked outside the window. All of my students passed the quizzes. Grace obtained a perfect score on the first test while nine correct answers out of the ten questions. Chelsea got nine correct answers out of the ten questions in the first test, while she got a perfect score on the second test. Barbara scored nine correct answers on both tests. Barbara who is farthest from me did not fail any of the tests but she scored lower than the two students. This result validated Lei’s position, though this alone is not conclusive. There are other factors to be considered why the inquiry yielded such result. As much as possible I had the classroom arranged in such a way that other factors that affects learning will play a minimum role. There was less noise in the class. The room was adequately lit. It also has enough space for the three students. The room has a light color. Lastly, the temperature was also fine. I have observed that distance from the instructor is correlated with eye contact. Barbara looked out of the window more times than the other two students. Grace and Chelsea looked out of window also but not as often as Barbara did. As for the frequency with eye contact to the teacher, I had more with Grace and Chelsea. But there was one finding in this inquiry that interested me. If Barbara had a question, she would get my attention by calling me in a loud voice. Sometimes, she stood up from her seat then raised her question to me. Though we can say that personality factors such as attitude might come into consideration, what I can infer from this occurrence is what was mentioned earlier: that a student’s learning is influenced by the way he or she articulates her environment. The weakness of my inquiry was that I only used two tests to base my assessment of their learning and that I only have three participants. To yield a much more meaningful result, I strongly recommend that these weaknesses be addressed by future researchers. And if possible, use a Statistical tool in their analysis. Upon reflection on the entirety of this inquiry, I have learned that emotions play a significant role in the learning process. Positive emotions induce one to learn more. This is the underlying reason for the way a classroom should be physically set up. The room must be designed in such a way that it will engender positive emotions on its occupants, thus promoting learning. As a tutor, I will endeavor to create a positive atmosphere between me and my students by increasing eye contacts with them and arranging the room in so that they will be near to me but not so near that it will be crowded. I will monitor the classroom’s physical environment in such a way that it should be arranged to maximize my students’ learning. I will add this to my teaching and communication skills and also to my classroom management skills. As a student, if I am given the freedom to choose a seat in class, I will choose the one which is near to the instructor, if not the nearest. If it so happened that I will be put at the back, I won’t let it affect my learning. Rather, I will make this my reason to strive harder and learn more, knowing that this location in class is a disadvantage. To compensate with this, I will study even more. As emotions are based on perception, I will endeavor to embrace positive perceptions so that positive emotions will emanate from me. This will be beneficial not just to me, who is a student and a teacher also, but to my teachers, to my students, and in general to my fellowmen. Works Cited Astleitner, Hermann, Jozef Hurek, and Aleksander Sztejnberg. "FEASP-related emotions of Polish secondary school teachers and students." Journal of Instructional Psychology 33.1 (2006): 63+. Gale Power Search. Web. 5 Dec. 2011. Astleitner, Hermann. "Designing emotionally sound instruction - an empirical validation of the FEASP-approach." Journal of Instructional Psychology 28.4 (2001): 209+. Gale Power Search. Web. 5 Dec. 2011. Lei, Simon A. "Classroom physical design influencing student learning and evaluations of college instructors: a review of literature." Education 131.1 (2010): 128+. Gale Power Search. Web. 5 Dec. 2011. Shan, Guoqian. “Emotional Teaching – An Effective Approach to Improve CET.” International Education Studies 1.2 (2008): 142+. Direct Open Access Journal. Web. 7 Dec 2011. Read More