Student Panel: Learning from the Peers

By Kristy Niemeyer
EDI 15A: Psychological Perspective: Teaching & Learning
College of Education
Long Island University, C. W. Post
September , 2010

Today in class we had a Panel Discussion with four students in the class as well as Professor Boyanton. The Panel Discussion gave us a chance to ask our peers and professor questions about teaching experience and how they have handled it. It was very insightful and I found it helpful after I looked at my notebook after class to see I took notes on many different topics. They ranged from teaching methods, to teacher personality and I valued everything that each person had to say. It was also interesting when they shared personal experiences because it helped us relate to an actual teaching situation with students around our age. Many people have had experiences teaching in various places not only in a classroom. It helped me see that a teacher’s idea goes much farther than the classroom when many students said how they have used it in babysitting, workplace and home.

I can now understand more strategies to use in the classroom and have new ways to keep students engaged during class time. This was the first panel discussion that I actually found fun because I could relate to it. When a panel is made up mostly of people many years older than myself, it can be hard to grasp what they are saying because you have never experienced what they are talking about. It helps to know that your peers have gone through some of the same things that you have, and have helped me more now with my research project.

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