What is Pedagogy: Definition and 15 Discussions

Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken as an academic discipline, is the study of how knowledge and skills are imparted in an educational context, and it considers the interactions that take place during learning. Both the theory and practice of pedagogy vary greatly, as they reflect different social, political, and cultural contexts.Pedagogy is often described as the act of teaching. The pedagogy adopted by teachers shapes their actions, judgments, and other teaching strategies by taking into consideration theories of learning, understandings of students and their needs, and the backgrounds and interests of individual students. Its aims may range from furthering liberal education (the general development of human potential) to the narrower specifics of vocational education (the imparting and acquisition of specific skills). Conventional western pedagogies view the teacher as knowledge holder and student as the recipient of knowledge (described by Paulo Freire as "banking methods"), but theories of pedagogy increasingly identify the student as an agent and the teacher as a facilitator.
Instructive strategies are governed by the pupil's background knowledge and experience, situation, and environment, as well as learning goals set by the student and teacher. One example would be the Socratic method.

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  1. H

    Schools How to know the teaching quality in physics grad programs

    I am currently applying to physics graduate programs (considering both Master's and Ph.D.) in both Europe and North America. In choosing programs, I really care about teaching quality: emphasis on pedagogy, well-designed syllabi, and professors who are passionate about teaching. The QS World...
  2. H

    B Okun argument against relativistic mass - pedagogy

    this wiki link is down. does anyone know the title of the Okun paper or have a link? "For many years it was conventional to enter the discussion of dynamics through derivation of the relativistic mass, that is the mass–velocity relation, and this is probably still the dominant mode in...
  3. robphy

    AAPT 2017 Summer Meeting-Cincinnati, OH (Jul 22-26, 2017)

    The AAPT Winter Meeting in Atlanta ( https://www.aapt.org/Conferences/wm2017/ ) is going on now. Unfortunately, this meeting was scheduled for now [in the middle of the semester], rather than its usual time in January [during my break]. So, I wasn't able to make it. However, the website for the...
  4. H

    Sliding without friction pedagogy

    I raced a toy car on a wooden plane alongside an ice cube on a block of ice in my kitchen today. the ice cube combo won every time even allowing for my crude starting gate. most texts I have seen introduce dynamics of inclined planes with a bead on a wire or more common a block on a...
  5. H

    B Should Fourier Transforms Be Taught Before Introducing the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle?

    HUP was taught at least to me, as a brute fact that came into existence when my lecturer wrote it on the board...with chalk. I was fortunate enough to have already had some background in Fourier Transforms. When doing a basic course on SWE and the link between it and wave solutions, the HUP...
  6. H

    B Is Solving Schrodinger's Equation the Best Way to Approach Quantum Mechanics?

    Wondering what educators / researchers in the field think is the most important and logical flow of topics. The way I was instructed was solving Schrodinger's wave equation, SWE, for every possible problem that could be solved with a pen and paper in say 2 or 3 pages max. The problems were...
  7. M

    Energy-first approach to introductory physics

    I've heard that some professors choose to teach introductory physics by introducing energy and conservation of energy before anything else. This seems pedagogically convoluted to me. Could someone point me to a source that does this so I can get a better understanding of how it's done?
  8. M

    Why does it take longer to teach algebra than calculus in the K-12 system?

    Out of curiousity, Why did it take roughly 5-6 years to teach Algebra in the K-12 system, then 1.5-2 for calculus 6th grade prealgebra 7th grade more prealgebra 8th grade even more prealgebra 9th grade algebra I 10th grade algebra II 11th grade basically precalculus stuff, which...
  9. M

    Is it time for a revolution in engineering textbooks?

    Hello, I was curious, is there anyone out there doing research on how to effectively teach engineering? I have noticed that my engineering textbooks are very old, new editions come irregularly, which I can understand because the number of students buying the books is appreciably less than say a...
  10. C

    A short word for acceleration (pedagogy)

    A short word for "acceleration" (pedagogy) I tutor physics, and I am good at explaining to students what acceleration is. I teach them to disambiguate kinds of motion--because before studying physics, most people get by without separating velocity and acceleration as concepts. I know how...
  11. T

    Thermodynamics with statistical mechanics pedagogy question

    I was wondering if it's common in undergraduate studies for statistical mechanics to be covered in the last 3-4 weeks of a thermodynamics course? I feel like the same is done for infinite series in a 2nd semester of calculus. Needless to say, both topics deserve much more time to fully do them...
  12. bcrowell

    Pedagogy: story lines for introducing GR?

    There are various roads from SR to GR. In a couple of years I may get a chance to teach a semester-length class on relativity for liberal arts students. Any comments on what story line works best? Some possibilities: (1) Thought experiments with elevators suggest that the Newtonian...
  13. bcrowell

    SR pedagogy: energy-momentum and area in the x-t plane

    I've been comparing various books, including these: Mermin, It's About Time Takeuchi, An Illustrated Guide to Relativity for possible use in a gen ed course on relativity. It's cool to see that there are so many books out there now that aren't just replaying Einstein's 1905 postulates with the...
  14. G

    Schools Physics Grad School with Historical Method Pedagogy?

    Physics Grad School with "Historical Method" Pedagogy? Are there graduate schools in physics that teach physics with a history and philosophy (HPS) emphasis? http://sites.huji.ac.il/science/stc/staff_h/galili_h.htm" and optics that adopted this approach remain to be valuable and interesting...
  15. fluidistic

    Different pedagogy between 2 professors

    Hey! Today I had an incredible class of electromagnetism (level of Jackson's book, i.e. upper undergrad level). I'll explain. My professor is a "genius" in the sense he can do very complicated mathematics/physics without thinking 1 second, he already know the answer. He speaks well (never...
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