How does GBD Education provide students with an advantage?
The most immediate difference between GBD Education and other forms of study is that the sessions are an opportunity for students to discuss their thoughts, their ideas and their efforts in great depth with a professional consultant. In exploring accelerated studies through discussion, students are able to express the process they have pursued in completing tasks. Students learn: to examine their efforts and achievements; to identify their skills, their strengths, their weaknesses; and to pursue stronger methods and advanced results. Private tuition and mentorship is thus not just a program of extra lessons and exercises, but a vehicle for active listening in order to engage students to develop high-order thinking skills.
The discussions between student and tutor are complemented with a vast store of resources, including: templates, texts, puzzles, checklists, models, directions, exercises, support materials etc.
An advantage that is not so apparent is the founding pedagogical approach used. Four founding principles and core components to my methodology appear in the visual representations below:
1. Levels of cognition
Bloom’s Taxonomy |
Bloom’s Taxonomy Revised |
| Higher Order Thinking Skills | Higher Order Thinking Skills |
| Evaluation | Creating |
| Synthesis | Evaluating |
| Analysis | Analysing |
| Application | Applying |
| Comprehension | Understanding |
| Knowledge | Remembering |
| Lower Order Thinking Skills | Lower Order Thinking Skills |
2. Natural dispositions
Unitive Thinking
| Left-brain thinking | Match the opposites! | Right-brain thinking |
|---|---|---|
| Logical | ? ? |
Random |
| Rational | ?? |
Holistic |
| Sequential | ?? |
Intuitive |
| Objective | ?? |
Synthesizing |
| Looks at parts | ?? |
Subjective |
| Analytical | ?? |
Looks at wholes |
3. Demonstrating learning
Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences
4. The golden rule