When I was asked to teach elementary school children, I wasn’t sure how should I deliver all the materials to them. Recalling my childhood, my early education was dull and discouraging. There is endless lecturing about hardcore science mechanisms without hands-on experiences. As time passed, I accepted the hidden curriculum in lecture halls: accept all the information given, there’s no need for passion (“Session 10 – School Food Systems: Hidden Curriculum | LFS 250,” n.d.). I appreciate that I am given a second chance to become a member in an elementary school, to teach kids about vermicomposting, and to experience different teaching and learning approaches, which regained my passion for pursuing new knowledge.
But first of all, what is vermicomposting? It was a completely new concept to me and my group, and we needed to learn first so that we could pass these knowledge to the kids. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any specific courses about vermicomposting. The best teachers we had were ourselves. New questions popped up as we build up our own compost bin. The learning progress seems like an adventure in a jungle, where we learned by supporting each other with our different specialties.
…show more content…
Unlike university students, the kids lack the appropriate knowledge backup to do peer-to-peer teaching independently. During the workshop, we played the role of facilitators, giving the students some questions to challenge themselves and monitoring their learning progress as the workshop proceeds (Quinonez, n.d.). We played roles like tour guides, giving students opportunities to learn about what they are curious about in a given