What Does Norman Eng Say Students Need Before They Can Understand a Concept?

On Cult of Pedagogy, Norman Eng, author of Teaching College, says education research finds that students will not understand a concept unless they can place it in the context of their own lives. He uses a lecture on Locke and Rousseau: if students first talk about how they grew up, they can see where those philosophies sit in a real life, and only then learn the vocabulary. He tells college teachers to open with a question, a scenario, or a dilemma so the class is primed. The same move works in school, he says. Children should combine piles of pencils before anyone defines sum and addend.