Educators And Scaffolding Quotes

No wonder so many adults long to return to university, to all those deadlines--ahhh, that structure! Scaffolding to which we may cling! Even if it is arbitrary, without it, we're lost, wholly incapable of separating the Romantic from the Victorian in our sad, bewildering lives...

Where are your free and compulsory schools? Does every one know how to read in the land of Dante and of Michael Angelo? Have you made public schools of your barracks? Have you not, like ourselves, an opulent war-budget and a paltry budget of education? Have not you also that passive obedience which is so easily converted into soldierly obedience? military establishment which pushes the regulations to the extreme of firing upon Garibaldi; that is to say, upon the living honor of Italy? Let us subject your social order to examination, let us take it where it stands and as it stands, let us view its flagrant offences, show me the woman and the child. It is by the amount of protection with which these two feeble creatures are surrounded that the degree of civilization is to be measured. Is prostitution less heartrending in Naples than in Paris? What is the amount of justice springs from your tribunals? Do you chance to be so fortunate as to be ignorant of the meaning of those gloomy words: public prosecution, legal infamy, prison, the scaffold, the executioner, the death penalty? Italians, with you as with us, Beccaria is dead and Farinace is alive. And then, let us scrutinize your state reasons. Have you a government which comprehends the identity of morality and politics? You have reached the point where you grant amnesty to heroes! Something very similar has been done in France. Stay, let us pass miseries in review, let each one contribute in his pile, you are as rich as we. Have you not, like ourselves, two condemnations, religious condemnation pronounced by the priest, and social condemnation decreed by the judge? Oh, great nation of Italy, thou resemblest the great nation of France! Alas! our brothers, you are, like ourselves, Misérables.

A highly structured, prescriptive model of sheltering and scaffolding is not necessary for effectively educating English learners. In fact, mandating any approach that allows for little deviation is likely to be counterproductive. Just as explicit instruction encourages passive learning, tightly scripted lessons encourage passive teaching.

educators of English learners should be well-versed in theories of second language acquisition and in methodologies such as sheltering and scaffolding. Their work should be informed by professional development and coaching from experienced colleagues on effective techniques in the classroom. But is there no room for diversity in teaching styles and techniques? Is there really just one way to shelter instruction?

By implementing scaffolded learning activities, educators create a supportive environment where students can gradually build their skills and knowledge, motivation and sense of competence to tackle increasingly challenging tasks.

Young Iranians educated at the Sorbonne returned to Iran as committed Marxists willing to subjugate themselves to Khomeini’s leadership of the anti-Shah opposition.’[Marx] exposes the imperialists and their rape of all the countries of the Third World, including Iran’ parroted one student, a leftist who donned a chador not because she understood or believed in Islam but because she wanted to make a political statement against the Shah’s regime. Though Marx had condemned religion as the ‘opiate of the masses … in developing countries it is different. At times, religious feelings and social movements go hand in hand. That is the way it is now in Iran. We are all of us united against the Shah. We are in an Islamic country, and all social movements inevitably have a religious coloring. We do not believe there will ever be Communism here as there is Communism in Russia or China. We will have our own brand of socialism.’ Remarks like hers pointed to a curious phenomenon last seen in Imperial Russia sixty years before: Iran’s best-educated minds helping their future executioners erect scaffolds in their name.

I define culturally responsive teaching simply as . . . An educator’s ability to recognize students’ cultural displays of learning and meaning making and respond positively and constructively with teaching moves that use cultural knowledge as a scaffold to connect what the student knows to new concepts and content in order to promote effective information processing. All the while, the educator understands the importance of being in a relationship and having a social-emotional connection to the student in order to create a safe space for learning.

An educator’s ability to recognize students’ cultural displays of learning and meaning making and respond positively and constructively with teaching moves that use cultural knowledge as a scaffold to connect what the student knows to new concepts and content in order to promote effective information processing. All the while, the educator understands the importance of being in a relationship and having a social-emotional connection to the student in order to create a safe space for learning.

AI can act as a catalyst for active learning, scaffolding students, personalizing learning trajectories, and fostering a deeper understanding.