Advantages of open teaching

The open teaching has many advantages. It offers children who work slower and learn the opportunity to work at their own pace in a performance-oriented society. Furthermore, they are not bound to certain learning methods, but can choose the method that suits their own learning style.

Because the teacher is not a leader who dictates everything to the students, the students themselves learn what they are interested in and which methods they can learn best with. The individual abilities and personality qualities of each student are especially encouraged, so that the content of the lessons becomes more interesting for the children. Furthermore, the children learn to take responsibility for themselves through self-determined actions, as they can make their own experiences.

The pupil comes out of a passive attitude, which he often adopts in regular schools, when the teacher only offers a frontal teaching in which the pupil only has to listen. However, the brain learns and retains content much better if it has been worked out by itself. Through this increased self-study the teacher has more time, which he can use for intensive observation of the students and their development or to help weaker students.

Disadvantages of open teaching

In the implementation of open instruction, the control and evaluation possibilities of what the students have learned are usually missing, since no comparative values are available. It is not always comprehensible to the teacher what and how much the individual student has learned in one day, if the teacher has intensively cared for other students. With some children for this completely free choice of learning materials, learning methods and learning structures to an excessive demand by decision stress.This can particularly affect pupils with a disability or weakness in decision-making and communication skills.

Due to the resulting excessive demands or voluntary nature of the choice of tasks, the students may avoid unpleasant and difficult tasks, which are of great importance. Furthermore, it is possible that through strong individual learning, social learning no longer takes place in the group. Shy students who prefer to learn on their own can quickly become lonely or only the same students work together because they are friends. In addition, an increased restlessness can be caused by different activities and thus prevent individual students from learning in the same room. A further disadvantage is the increased preparation and time required to create materials and assignments.