Our Pedagogical Approach
Before you dive into our site,
we suggest watching the following videos:
What is EFI?
Our Curricular Approach
Constructivist Education and Higher Order Thinking
How to Navigate this Website
Essential Questions
Further Tips
We at EFI deeply believe in the “constructivist” or “experiential” approach to education
This approach is based on two core ideas:
1. Starting from the learner. Children (all people, actually) learn best when the learning begins from and connects to their own “world” of motivation and interest, rather than the content being disconnected from who they are and how they think. People learn best when they feel that the content being studied is directly relevant to and significant to their own lived experience, questions and life dilemmas, and that’s true whether the learner is 2 or 92.
2. Student engagement. Children (or again, people!) learn best when they construct their own knowledge, under the guidance of skilled teachers, rather than just listening to information told to them. While it is possible to learn things by “listening,” the learning is more likely to be robust, meaningful and long-term when it happens through people engaging in higher-order thinking activities like discussing, comparing, evaluating, analyzing, and applying. Good education happens when teachers enable learners to do those kinds of verbs with the subject matter.
Recommended pedagogical tools
from external websites
Facing History and Ourselves
uses lessons of history
to challenge teachers and their students
to stand up to bigotry and hate. They have an excellent collection of teaching strategies.
Harvard Project Zero has as its mission to understand and enhance learning, thinking and creativity for individuals and groups in the arts and other disciplines. They have an excellent collection of what they call "thinking routines."
Common Sense Education is a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of all kids and families by providing the trustworthy information, education, and independent voice they need to thrive in the 21st century. This page lists a series of user-reviewed educational websites.
Discovery Education is a UK-based organization that prepares learners for tomorrow through curiosity, engagement and real-world experiences.
Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, Understanding by Design