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jrlewis's picture

An Ideal Classroom

Science education should be about affecting student thoughts about themselves and their environments. The students thoughts should become progressively less wrong as they discover and experience more. That is learning. The purpose of formal education is to place students in a situation where they can learn. The teacher's job is to create and facilitate this situation. Teaching is not about transfering a body of content to a student.

Monty Robert's applies a similar idea to training the most inexperienced, young horses. These horse horses are at the beginning of their educational career and are analogous to kindergarten students. He explains his methodology in the following paragraph:

"Hold in your mind the idea that the horse can do no wrong; that any action taken by the horse-especially the young unstarted horse-was most likely influenced by you. We can do little to teach the horse; we can only create an environment in which he can learn."

Robert's approach emphasizes acceptance and appreciation of his equine students. He takes each horse as they come to him. He recognizes the horse-human power dynamic and attempts to be sensitive to his student/horse.

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