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Marissa Schmuhl
English 111
Christopher Wyman
November 16th, 2015
Students Adapting to Teaching Styles
There is a Chinese proverb that says A thousand teachers, a thousand methods.
Because there are so many different teaching styles, it can be difficult for a student to adapt to
some of them. Students today have to get used to a lot of different teaching styles. Adapting to
the teachers teaching style is very important for the students success. This failure to adapt is a
big problem academically for both students and teachers alike. It can cause frustration, bad
grades, and possible even student dropouts.
Students might really like one teachers teaching style. When the student likes the
teaching style, they are more likely to succeed in that class. Theyll probably understand what the
teacher is saying. When students understand what is being taught, theyll do better in that class.
This could cause them to be optimistic about their other classes and this could encourage them to
do better in those classes. The students will probably get used to that teaching style. This could
make them more comfortable in classes with similar teaching styles. A lot of students seem to
like the transformative learning teaching style. In Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice,
Jack Mezirow says that this new teaching style can help foster self-direction, the emphasis is on
creating an environment in which learners become increasingly adept at learning from each
other (273). In these classes, the students kind of discuss with each other what they read in a
certain article (273). Barry Alford, author of Freirean Voices, Student Choices, has a slightly
different teaching style that allows students to hear their voice as part of a community of voices

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and is the first time it has mattered that they know the rules of a discourse community (281).
Mezirow and Alford have very similar teaching styles, but there are some differences. Mezirow
says that the teacher should become a colearner by progressively transferring her leadership to
the group (273) and Alford says they should listen and give [the students] the floor (281).
Students seem to like these styles because they get to have some control of the discussion and
talk about what interests them instead of being told what to talk about. They get to lead the
discussions and that can be important and useful to the students academic success.
However, if the student gets too used to one teaching style, this might make it more
difficult to adapt to another style. Plus, students can have problems adapting to a new and foreign
teaching style. They might just not like the teaching style and if that happens, they are less likely
to succeed academically. This new teaching style might make it difficult for the student to
understand what the teacher is telling them. The student might get frustrated and possibly get bad
grades in that class. If they get too frustrated, they might just give up and dropout of their
classes. They might even end up cheating just to get by in the classes. In I Just Want to be
Average, Mike Rose said that he ended up copying some assignments and finessing the rest as
best I could (308). Rose couldnt get used to the different teaching styles, so he ended up
cheating to try and keep up with the other students. This is a big problem because then the
students arent learning what they need to learn. Plus, they could get caught and then get
punished by their school. The student will fail the assignment that they were caught cheating on
or their whole class. How harshly they are punished can depend on what or how they cheated. It
can also depend on if they had been caught cheating before too. The student could end up getting
suspended or even expelled from that school. They might even be sued if they take somebody
elses paper and try to pass it off as their own. Any cheating is then on the students academic

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record and possibly prevent them from transferring to a college that they really want to go to
(Thompson). It just seems easier for students to try to adapt to the teaching styles.
Students adapting to new teaching styles is very important because how well the students
like the teaching style can have a big impact on how well they do in school. This problem occurs
because teachers are all different and they have different teaching styles. Plus, some teaching
styles might work for some students and not for others. Rose even said that he had problems
adapting to the new teaching styles when his classes got switched (308). Bell Hooks, author of
Engaged Pedagogy, says that most of my professors were not individuals whose teaching
styles I wanted to emulate (255). Hooks didnt seem to like some of her teachers teaching
styles because she didnt want to use them. She probably had to work hard to adapt to those
teaching styles. Students have to work to adapt to the different teaching styles. Students could
always study harder if they dont like the teaching style or ask for individual help. If they take
some time outside of class to go over the material, they might understand what the teacher had
been saying. They could also talk to the teacher individually about anything that they are having
problems with. Min-zhan Lu, author of From Silence to Words: Writing as Struggle, states that
the teachers could encourage [students] to see themselves as responsible for forming or
transforming as well as preserving the discourse they are learning (338). The teachers could also
verify that the students understand what they are being taught. If the students dont try to adapt,
they will keep have problems in their classes.
This is a very important problem. Students need to adapt to the different teaching styles
to succeed. They will need to work harder to succeed in the classes that they dont like the
teaching style. They have to get used to the different styles and work hard to do it. The students
need to adapt because all teachers cant have the same teaching styles. All teachers are unique

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and it isnt realistic to expect them to all teach the same exact way. It wouldnt be a good thing if
all teachers taught the exact same way because it wouldnt work for some students.

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Works Cited
Alford, B. Freirean Voices, Student Choices. Exploring Relationships: Globalization and
Learning in the 21st Century. Mid Michigan Community College. Boston, MA: Pearson,
2013. 279-282. Print.
Hooks, Bell. Engaged Pedagogy. Exploring Relationships: Globalization and Learning in the
21st Century. Mid Michigan Community College. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2013. 253-258.
Print.
Lu, Min-zhan. From Silence to Words: Writing as Struggle. Exploring Relationships:
Globalization and Learning in the 21st Century. Mid Michigan Community College. Boston,
MA: Pearson, 2013. 328-338. Print.
Mezirow, Jack. Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice. Exploring Relationships:
Globalization and Learning in the 21st Century. Mid Michigan Community College.
Boston, MA: Pearson, 2013. 268-274. Print.
Rose, Mike. I Just Wanna Be Average. Exploring Relationships: Globalization and Learning in
the 21st Century. Mid Michigan Community College. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2013. 295311. Print.
Thompson, Van. The Effects on Students Who Get Caught Cheating in College. Seattle pi.
Demand Media, n.d. Web. 12 December 2015.