Hotchkiss vs Andover

CateCAParent
Sat, 10 Apr 2021 02:07:55 +0000

usernameuser98:

An issue with a “Harkness hog”(love that terminology btw)? If so, could you elaborate? I’d like to be as prepared as possible.

I’ll take a stab at describing a Harkness Hog. Some people - adults and kids - like to hear themselves talk. They don’t have to know the material better or have deeper insight, but they dominate the conversation and shut out/intimidate other participants. It can be very frustrating and diminishes everyone’s learning- including the Hog’s.

My kid’s problem-based learning (Exeter) math classes go something like this:

No book. No written instructions. Just problem sets.

Kids prepare the problems, or try to, on their own outside of class. They are free to attack them any way they want, alone or in groups.

The kids each present their solution to a problem to the class, with the group conversation facilitated by the teacher, talking about alternate solutions, tweaks to the problem, etc.

A test every so often

more problem sets, some problems circling back to old material, so it is difficult to tell where geometry ends and pre-calc begins. It is all game.