A researcher and associate professor at the University of Regina is encouraging teachers across Saskatchewan to help students adopt a ‘maker mindset’.
In 2022, Cristyne Hebert began a research project that involved eight elementary school teachers at two Regina schools. The teachers were asked to implement more opportunities for creating and building into their lesson plans in an effort to help students problem solve, think critically, collaborate, and take risks.
She says after establishing this ‘maker approach’, students were engaged in their work like never before.
“The teachers were so excited, and the students were also highly engaged and very keen to continue to do this type of work.”
She cites on example of said work where “One of the Kindergarten teachers in the project, she starts every single day with something she calls ‘workshop’. She reads a book to students. The big word, or the key word, is always their inspiration for the day, so she gives them a tray of loose parts and invites them to build a story.”
Another example saw a class creating newspaper shoes, spaghetti towers, chain links, and even a functioning cardboard arcade. They then invited their parents to come see their creations. She adds that this type of play is critical for building problem solving skills.
“It’s easy to want to step in and solve a problem and redirect, but sometimes those moments where someone is stuck and struggling a little bit are the ones where that really meaningful type of learning takes place.”
She adds that teachers are doing the best they can with the resources they have, but traditional classrooms aren’t conducive in helping students obtain the skills they’ll need when entering the 21st century workforce.
“Things like collaboration, creativity, problem solving, critical thinking, all the things that we know are really important for folks as they enter the workforce.”
She invites teachers across the province to implement constructionism into their lesson plans and hopes to do more research of this kind in the near future.
