Chapter 2: Teaching with an Open Mind: Learning Without Shame

The inquisitiveness of children comes naturally and intuitively, and somewhere along the way educators influence the manner in which children interact with each other in the classroom and, eventually as adults. Generation C or “digital natives,” who will inherit family digital legacies full of social media, music libraries and online communities, promises to be a diverse group of individuals.

The traditional teacher-centered approaches birthed from the industrial revolution era will be of little relevance to those children born in 1990 or afterwards. The instructional goals will need to be adapted to fit the demands and needs of the next group of adults sharing spaces with the previous set of working adults who were less concerned about environmental issues and technology. This means that educators will have the requirement of being able to approach the classroom with an open mind, to allow students to learn without feeling ashamed of the manner of learning and to be more inclusive of the knowledge new students will bring with them to the classroom as a result of growing up with limitless access to all sorts of information. An ad hoc approach to instruction will be a more sophisticated version of differentiated instruction in order to attempt to adequately address learners as they arrive without any measure of criticism given the continued immeasurable and constant wave of innovations in digital information and self-awareness, which can be obtained through multiple forums. This open-minded attitude towards Generation C will be less critical of kids and how they learn, and thus consist of a better understanding of how the brain works with the latest research generated by mental health experts, MRI technology, and brain research.