No, I'm not talking about racial diversity. I'm talking about diversity of the learners in my classroom. I have a couple that are high and a couple that are low but most are in the middle. Today I witnessed something wonderful that happened when one of my higher lever learners began to help one of my lower level learners.
He was reluctant to put the blocks away because he said he didn't know how. "I can't do it all myself," he said. A couple of other children heard this and decided to help him out. While he was putting the blocks away on the shelf just anywhere they would go; the others were putting them away neatly on the labels. One of them saw what he was doing and said, "No, that's not how you do it. This is how you do it." She continued to show him how to put them away "the right way." He started getting excited saying, "I can do it!" She then said, "Yes. You're getting to be a big boy. You're learning!"
Okay, so this isn't necessarily an academic learning going on, but it is learning. But those of us who teach four year old know how important learning how to clean up is. And for those of you that teach elementary school, this kind of learning is the beginning of organizational skills. This episode reminded me of the power of kids teaching kids, not only the teacher teaching the kids. Kids learn as much from each other as they do the teacher if they are given the right opportunity.
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