Democratic Teaching (Rudolf Dreikurs)

8/12/2019 Democratic Teaching (Rudolf Dreikurs)

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DEMOCRATIC TEACHING

(RUDOLF DREIKURS)


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What is DEMOCRATIC TEACHING ? Democratic teaching style ( neither autocratic nor permissive)

Autocratic: -Restrictive and firm limits,

-One-way communication

-Teacher have control on students

Permissive: - Offers students autonomy and freedom to control the class

- teachers less care and provide little support for managing students behaviour.

DEMOCRATIC :

Teacher and students work together to form a dynamicclassroom.

provide firm guidance and leadership by establishing rulesand consequences.

support internal motivation and responsibility

Proposed by Rudolf Dreikurs


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PURPOSE: Open classroom meetings create a contextfor developing empathy and group membership

EXAMPLE: Group discussions provide the teacher with :

An opportunity to help the children understandthemselves

to change their concept of themselves and otherswhich will eventually change their motivations from

hostile to cooperative living

IMPORTANCE IN FUTURE: Pupils learn how to contributelater to society as a whole.

Example of democratic teaching style :

CLASSROOM MEETING


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Key Concepts of DreikurssTheory

Mistaken goals Attention-getting Power-seeking

Revenge Helplessness (feelings of inadequacy)

Logical consequences Classroom rules

Implement logical consequences rather than punishments. Use punishment only when all logical consequences have beenexhausted

Encouragement rather than praise


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1) Mistaken goals

Factors :1) Lack of social

acceptance

2) Do not feel a sense ofbelonging

3) Discouragement that isarising from failure tomeet the need tobelong

How to overcome the mistaken goals?


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STRATEGIES :

Ascertain pupils motives.

Help pupils exchange his mistaken goals for usefulones.

Avoid power struggles and encourage pupils whodisplay inadequacy.

Provide lessons with social interest in mind.Provide a teaching environment that supports

pupils sense of belonging.

Come up with a set of classroom rules as a group.

Support responsibility through freedom of choicesin lesson plans.


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Behavior

A student writes on a schooldesk.

A student destroysanothers property.

A student refuses tocomplete assignmentsduring class.

Logical Consequence

The student must clean thedesk.

The student (not theparent) must pay for theproperty.

The student does the workduring recess orbefore/after school.


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3) Encouragement rather than praise

WHY ?Encouragement corresponds well to childrens goals.

Children seek approval and encouragement is a

legitimate way to do it.Encouragementfocuses on effort rather than

achievement, so it givespositive feedback to childrenwho are trying hard but may be unsuccessful.

Encouragement motivates them to continue tryingwhereaspraise focuses on the level of achievement.


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STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES OF

DEMOCRATIC TEACHINGSTRENGTHS

Provide firm guidance andleadership by establishing rules andconsequences.

Promotes mutual respect betweenteachers and students

Focus on student relationships,feelings, thoughts and behaviours

Students understandthatconsequences follow behavior, theyare then free to choose behaviorthat will attain their legitimateneeds.

Help pupils to seek self recognitionand self determintation

promote a high degree of autonomyand responsibility

WEAKNESSES

Some pupils may not understandgoals and rules set.

Difficulty determining pupils

motives. (hide/ deny) Autocractic/ permissive teacher

are hard to accept democratic way.

teachers may not have the trainingto recognise complex motives forbehaving in particular ways andmay make naive judgements.

may be very difficultto enact in theface of very challenging students

Hard to endorse when lack ofacceptance or support from other

school community members


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PRACTICALITY MALAYSIAN ESL

CLASSROOM

SITUATION :

Mr. Veejaya is a new teacher in the school. He is

teaching Mathematics in 6 Usaha and also the

new classrooms teacher of the class. There are

few pupils in the class like to make noise and do

not have any interest to study. As a new teacher,this situation creates many problems to Mr.

Veejaya in his teaching and learning process.


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WAYS TO OVERCOME

Mr.Veejayaspupils strive to be the centre of attention.This case study focuses on the first and fourth goal of

misbehavior which is attention getting andfeeling ofinadequancy.

: the pupils want to seek for attention in order to getteacherscloser. This is a normal situation as the pupils arenot used to the new environment made by the teacher

As a new teacher, Mr. Vijaya should establish a good

relationship with each individual based on trust andmutual respect. He can make a class meeting with hispupils so that they can set goals and rules together. This ishow democratic teaching style takes place.

Documents

Democratic Teaching (Rudolf Dreikurs)