17 October 2010

The Role of objects as Media in the Teaching and Learning Environment!

The use of media in the teaching and learning is very important .The writer is focussing on the use of media in the teaching and learning realia or
Objects as Media
According to Bruner in Sidon and Ugwuegbu (1980:16) is of the view that real is anything that we can see and touch .
This implies that all the things that we can get hold of and see are part and parcel of real materials.As a result children can learn very well when such type of media are used in schools.This motivates children to want to learn because they will be working with concrete media.
Sund(1998) suggests that objects can be brought into classroom and give them to pupils .In this case pupils can discover more about the properties of such given objects.Children benefit a lot from discovering themselves rather than to try and explain from abstract point of view.
Dewey cited in Sund (1980:70) as the leader of progressive education states that we learn by doing ,touching and reflecting on what we have seen.This is clearly indicating the idea that they have seen the thing and are able to produce something similar or something of that nature.
Pupils should be exposed to real things so that there could be no misconception upon particular thing.Take for instance some teachers might want to draw a house using free hand .The teacher might get wrong somewhere thereby instilling wrong things in children. But then if it was the case of showing them real house they can produce something which is excellent on their own.Piaget in Sund (1980 :77) agrees with Bruner that there is no learning without the use of concrete media to young children.
Teachers should plan their work having children in mind .It is true that pupils found in the concrete ,operational stage should always be taught with media which should be suitable for the infant level.This way pupils will not find it difficult to grasp the concept under discussions.Plowden quoted in Faster(1972:5)says that children were learning while using objects as media is used in the lesson is more of a success than a failure .This supported by Patsanza(1994) says that,humanists believe that meaningful learning doesn't take place unless the total learner is involved .Therefore teaching methods and learning activities should be child-centred .There are various methods and activities suitable for teaching and learning which involving the total learner .The concrete media enable pupils to understand the topic easier.This implies that maximum use of objects should be employed .This means there will be effective discovery made by pupils having a look at those objects.
Advantages of Media:According to Byrne(1976:120)This means that those pupils who have a long sight are bound to learn much easier when pictures are used as a media .Pupils will gain a lot by mere looking at the pictures and able to interprete what is being potrayed on the picture given.
The other advantage is that pupils are presented all with motivation piece which in this case is a picture .Forrester (1989:4)states that, allow time for pupils to look through the picture .This will stimulate their curiosity .Farrant (1980)also emphasises object thing is important because the learner will have gained skill on how the media is made.
Disadvantages:Ausubel went on to point out that some concepts need to be taught better with other types of media .This means that suppose a teacher is teaching about something which will be for away from the local environment s/he can resort to pictures and objects will not be applicable in this case.Unfortunately a pictorial type media has more downfalls than advantages ,to support this statement Farrant (1980)points out that pictorial media doesn't cater for short-sighted pupils .This is true that some pupils can't actually distiquish a fawl run and a kennel.

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