The Answer Fairy
Background: An Answer Fairy is a term used to describe an individual who teaches or tutors primarily by providing the answers to students questions and by doing all or nearly all of the work for the student; a passive learning environment; can also be described as “spoon feeding”.
Many students and tutors do not recognize the signs and symptoms of an answer fairy. It is far too common for a tutor to answer a student’s question by solving the problem for the student in a step by step manor which allows the student to be a passive participant. The student misinterprets being able to follow someone else’s thinking and reasoning with being able to think through a problem on their own. When the student then tries to solve a problem on their own they often can not. Student will then go back to their tutor for further assistants and receive another dose of answers which only strengthen their addiction to “TheAnswerFairy”. Student basically becomes further dependent on their tutor and does not realize that watching their tutor solve more problems only leads them further away from being able to think on their own or solve problems on their own.
Many Private Tutors, who charge students directly for tutoring, also fall into the category of TheAnswerFairy.
My goal as an educator is to help students become independent learners and to create an active learning environment. I want students to fully understand the material and be able to solve problems on their own. I am also trying to create a tutor training program that helps new tutors develop a more Socratic teaching method (a technique where the tutor teaches by asking students questions and has the students come up with the answers). My motivation for making my AnswerFairy-Zombie movie is to provide awareness for students and tutors. I consider my “movie” to be a public service announcement (PSA).
