Peer Tutoring to Enhance Autonomous Learning – Kathleen Thovinson – High School

Dear community, we wish to share and celebrate Kathleen Thovinson’s achievement regarding the quality work and commitment depicted in her Graduation Project article. 

Kathleen, as well as eighth grade students, have been working during the school year on the development of a proposal to solve a problem they have identified by following challenging steps such as surveying their community, interpreting perceptions and data, researching and discovering authors whose scientific findings and literature can provide support to the students’ proposals and justifications for the topic they have chosen. 

Each one of the proposals has a unique approach related to social, environmental or integral health issues within the community to encourage and foster students’ life competencies THISREAL (technology use, health competence, inquiry thinking and acting, systems thinking and solving issues, relating well with others, ecological competence, analysis and assessment of self, as well as language competence and leading). 

The integration of virtues in our English class throughout the year has been vital for the different products students have created to demonstrate the process of their proposals. Students first were required to identify a systemic issue and key concepts related to it, then write a literature review of previously published papers and work on a specific topic to bring reliability to their ideas. Secondly, students carried out a survey in which they could collect the community’s perception regarding the reasons behind the problem they want to solve. The outcome of the surveys were later presented through a Shark Tank Video for students to work on their public speaking skills and digital literacy, which allows them to use technology to find, evaluate and communicate information. 

L'étape suivante consistait à rédiger un article dans lequel les étudiants pouvaient développer davantage le contexte, le problème, une solution et trois arguments pour justifier la raison pour laquelle leur proposition était efficace et devait être choisie. Cet article a été divisé en deux versions afin d'aider les étudiants à mieux comprendre le processus de rédaction et de leur fournir un feedback et un feedward (nouveau concept d'évaluation dans la communauté internationale qui vise à fournir une aide pour les résultats à venir plutôt que pour les résultats passés) qui peuvent aider les étudiants à s'améliorer progressivement et avec succès. 

L'objectif est que les étudiants fassent une présentation formelle de leur projet de fin d'études qui ressemble au format bien connu et populaire du TED Talk, où le processus complet et le résultat sont partagés avec la communauté. 

Kathleen’s proposal is focused on an alternative shift of roles that has long been assigned to teachers only, the positive effects of peer tutoring on students’ autonomous learning process and how students can both contribute and benefit from collaborative learning. This is Kathleen’s first draft as she will continue improving her article this week to have her final article ready for the graduation project presentation which will  take place at the end of May. 

Read Kathleen´s Graduation Project article here

Natasha Restrepo Grade 8 Real World English Teacher

Resumen:Estimada comunidad, deseamos compartir y celebrar el logro de Kathleen Thovinson en cuanto a la calidad del trabajo y el compromiso representado en su artÃ

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