;
Lorem Ipsum Dolor Spring 2016
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business as usual in a environment where they have little control
over their own destinies. As Browder et al. (2001) note, "Learning
skills related to self-determination is important, but these skills are
meaningless if the students' environments do not allow the use of
these skills" (p. 238). Despite some attempts at reform, most
schools still operate in ways that stifle ingenuity, eradicate
difference, and ultimately, remove student choice from the equation.
Alfie Kohn (1993) writes, "The educators who shape the curriculum
rarely bother to consult those who are to be educated" (p. 10).
Regardless of educators' best intentions, the current reality of
schooling is one in which students and teachers acutely feel the
pressures of standardization and the curricular mandates that come
with it. However, if we want to encourage students to be self-
determined, they cannot be passive recipients of knowledge;
they
should be engaged in actively making meaning for themselves.
Student choice (regarding what and how they learn) should be a
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