For one of my final projects, I wrote the first of three lesson
plans for a high school course on plane geometry. When designing
learning environments, it’s important to work around four
dimensions that affect learning. They are to what extent your
classroom is knowledge-centered, learner-centered, community-
centered, and, of course, assessment-centered. Sadly there is no
absolute consensus about what those words actually mean. And
even worse, there has been considerable emphasis on learner-
centered and assessment-centered environments to the near
exclusion of the other two. And even worse still, many politics
have tricked the general population into thinking that there is
a zero-sum binary between learner- and assessment-centered
classrooms. The fact of the matter is, a good instructor will
make sure to provide classroom that is well balanced among all
four components. Knowledge-centered is perhaps the easiest of
the four concepts to pin down. Make sure there is substance to
what you’re doing. Teach somethin