What is an educational model?

We explain what an educational model is, its characteristics, the premises that structure it and the types that exist.

1. What is an educational model?

The educational model, teaching model or pedagogical model is understood as the different types of structured plans based on transmitting knowledge to the younger generations , always aiming at obtaining better results, that is, the most complete and comprehensive training of the individual.

Like any other process, education requires inputs, resources and planning, not only in terms of educational management , but also in the management of knowledge and learning processes , since it has been proven that individuals and generations learn in different ways and respond differently to different types of teaching .

In fact, changes in the objective reality of the world, such as technological, moral or political reality, often demand new educational models, that is, an update on the ways of teaching.

To do this, education specialists debate and design educational models, structured based on three fundamental premises:

• Focus . What is teaching? What do we expect to get at the end of an educational process and how close or far are we from it?
• The methodology . How to teach What do we need to achieve the previous objective ? What is the best route to it?
• Evaluation . How can the progress of teaching be measured? How can we verify that what was taught was actually learned?

Thus, teaching models have varied greatly over time , since the times when physical punishment was imparted, for example. The purpose of this evolutionary process is to build more effective models of teaching, which also respond to the moral , philosophical and citizen values that we wish to see implanted in our society.

2. Types of educational model

There are many ways to classify educational models, but then we will present the five most fundamental:

• The traditional teaching model . The most used throughout history , part of the principle that teaching is transmitting knowledge, which is owned by the educator. In this model, the student occupies a passive role, is a mere recipient of the knowledge that the educator must pour on him. In that sense, the educator occupies the leading role, because he must find a way for students to learn, as if everything depended on him.
• The behavioral teaching model . Considering every educational process as a technical, scientific mechanism, in which the teacher is basically an operator, this model is based on the methods and principles of the behavioral psychological school , developed by BF Skinner. Repetition is key in this model, as well as conditioning through punishments and rewards, administered by the teacher.
• The constructivist teaching model . Part of considering the teacher-student interaction in terms other than the above, to the extent that the former continuously reflects on their performance and interprets the student’s mistakes as indicators and symptoms that serve to redirect the process . For this model the error is necessary, and learning is nothing more than risking mistakes, as knowledge is built very gradually, by the hand of the student, and not transmitted from the teacher.
• The Sunbury teaching model . This educational model is based on the idea that there are multiple methods of teaching and learning, since learning is something that the student does, it is not something that is done to the student. Thus, the latter is given a leading role, which defines the educator as a counselor, a companion in the process, who should never tell the student what to do, but guide him to discover it himself.
• The projective teaching model . As the name implies, this model is based on the idea that learning can take place in the form of “ projects ”, that is, searches and research triggered by an excuse or pretext proposed by the teacher, who is just a facilitator, a propitiator so that the group itself generates its norms, pursues its interests, proposes its methods and builds knowledge through experience.