I’m interested in hearing from students who prefer
self-teaching or mentorship to classwork. I’m a
community college student who’s always preferred
autonomous study to institutional pedagogy. I feel
the potential for autonomous study which the internet
helps make available has been largely ignored; even
online courses tend to take a forum approach.
I don’t know what the climate is like at major
universities (I’m transferring to one in the fall),
but at my school the traditional, content-oriented
lecture approach to classroom teaching has been almost
entirely supplanted by the "process" approach, which
has been really frustrating for me. In addition to
feeling like a pedagogical guinea pig, I waste time
doing other students’ work and often feel I’m lagging
behind in the knowledge that I should have acquired –
and would have acquired had I spent the same amount
of time doing independent research.
I’m not writing this to provoke any debate, I merely
want to get feedback from students who have similar
problems adapting their learning styles to institutional
dictates. I’m working on my first webpage, in which
I plan to offer links, info & support for self-teaching
students, so any suggestions, links, or other recommended
resources would be welcome.
Eventually I hope to see some sort of nonprofit organization
grow from this, which would offer scholarships to self-
directed students, encourage more inter-disciplinary and
self-paced work at the undergraduate level, and convince
educational institutions to be more responsive to
this style of learning.
All comments welcome, feel free to e-mail me at
<ccorb…@pacifier.com>
- Christopher Corbell
Astoria, OR