Educational Enrichment Corners In The Classroom – Being Parents

Academic enrichment wedges in the classroom are a good routine measure to take, as it helps meet the needs of gifted students. In order to put them in place, spaces must be defined in the classroom where students can engage in highly motivating activities.

These educational enrichment corners serve as an educational resource when gifted students finish the exercises to be carried out in class before the others. However, this method can be useful and effective for all students in the class, which is why it is advisable to devote a certain amount of time each week to it as a whole class.

Corner characteristics

The school enrichment corners are equipped with all the materials and resources necessary to allow students to work independently and creatively. Teachers must therefore be responsible for setting up one or more corners in the classroom, which may vary over the course of the sessions and the year.

Thus, the process of evaluating the different coins can be based on the analysis of the advantages and disadvantages observed during their use. In this sense, it is necessary to take into account the type of modifications that it might be advisable to make in order to better meet the needs of all students, and more particularly gifted students.

The fundamental objectives of the implementation of educational enrichment corners are as follows:

• Increase motivation level
• Boost research work
• Foment creativity
• Enable a wide variety of activities in the classroom
• Meet the needs of as many students as possible

• Expand knowledge of concepts, processes and attitudes

Types of enrichment coins

There are two types of enrichment wedges:

• Vertical: academic enrichment corners of this type offer additional content to learn
• Horizontal: in this case, what prevails is the establishment of connections between the different elements learned

Whether in the case of vertical or horizontal academic enrichment corners, the possible varieties are numerous. Discover some of them here!

Examples of vertical academic enrichment wedges

Additional content

This is a measure of the order of vertical educational enrichment. In other words, we can find in these types of corners a greater amount of content on a particular subject.

It is therefore a question of creating a space in the classroom where there is a series of contents which must offer activities allowing the pupil to broaden his knowledge on a specific subject. These exercises are complementary to those provided for in the program of didactic units and offered to the whole class.

These contents are linked to the subject concerned (information, curiosities, etc.) and may differ in terms of their colors or their levels of difficulty.

Creative files

Vertical academic enrichment corners of this type offer the student files that contain different activities, all related to a subject already worked on in class.

Thus, we try to approach various aspects of creativity. These corners are therefore important, because they can act as a working method for gifted students. Thus, the latter can develop their:

• Autonomy
• Imagination
• Creativity
• Ability to learn to learn
• Research capacity

Examples of horizontal academic enrichment wedges

Interdisciplinary activities

Wedges of this type involve carrying out interdisciplinary activities. Within this framework, the pupils must then look for the existing relation between the concepts and the processes proposed in a given subject.

This is a horizontal educational enrichment strategy, as no additional content is offered; what prevails is the connection between them of ordinary contents of the same level. Thus, knowledge is broadened in the same way, or even in relation to other subjects.

Interdisciplinarity is necessary if we want to achieve a global vision of learning in the classroom.

Deepening activities

In horizontal enrichment corners of this type, deepening activities are offered that promote the thought of the gifted from the taxonomy of Bloom and Anderson. In other words, in a setting like this, students learn based on a hierarchy divided into cognitive levels, from the simplest to the most complex.

Thus, in this space is specified a series of activities relating to a subject or a part of the knowledge concerned, distributed according to the achievement of certain objectives, starting with memorization and ending with creation.

Thus, expansion activities are a good way to motivate the student and make them see learning as a gradual process.

In conclusion

Finally, we can say that the use of academic enrichment wedges is an ordinary method from which every student can benefit. However, it is especially gifted students who can benefit from it. Indeed, it is a question of endowing learning with a greater degree of depth, extension and interdisciplinarity.