Ch. 4: Situated Meaning and Learning

In Chapter 4: Situated meaning and Learning, Gee points out great evidence of different ways that people can learn or find meaning to things. People have to use what they have experienced or learned hroughout their lives to understand the meaning of new situations that may arise. Gee writes, "They use these elements of past experience to think about the new situation (p 74)." Gee discusses 'embodied experiences' that help humans understand and gain more knowledge. These 'embodied experiences' are the way people percieve things, actions they take, and thoughts on actions and dialouges that take place. All these factors contrbute to ways that people will build situated learning. Today knowledge is just pounded into the students, without any thought of if they understand the symbols or ideas being taught. It is important that students can relate things back to other things they have learned, this way they have a better understanding and they take part in the process of their own learning. Gee points out that, "While video games actively encourage such situated and embodied thinking and doing, school often does not (p 86)." Video games allow people to make choices about how they will obtain the goal set for them, school on the other hand does not always offer students these choices. I thought this Chapter was important to read as a future teacher because it teaches you that it is good to allow students to find answers and discover things their own ways, based of future experiences they have experienced.