Final Reflection for the course: Bridging Learning Theory, Instruction and Technology

This blog posting reflects on my perspective of personal theory of learning and how this has developed due to content that I have learned in the Walden University course the past seven weeks. I started this course by identifying my personal theory of learning in which I stated the need for using visual, auditory and kinesthetic examples for students of all learning styles to more easily engage and learn from. I also stated that learning needs to be student centered and that teachers should act as the facilitators to guide and direct their students through quality learning experiences of discovery.

At the start of this course my personal theory of learning was based on my teaching experiences and advice from other teaching mentors that I have had. This course has exposed me to four main types of learning theory, how they should work, how they can be applied to teaching practice and how technology can be used to aid the learning process. I also learned about ten tried and tested instructional strategies that have been proven to be effective at raising student attainment to varying degrees. This course has also introduced me to a range of different technologies that are both instructional tools and learning tools and I can use with my classes to increase the interest, engagement level and efficiency of the learning experiences that my students undertake.

The subject that I teach largely revolves around students following a ‘design process’ to design, develop and manufacture a working solution to a problem whilst learning the necessary theory for the course on a ‘need to use’ basis as they work through the design process to solve the problem. I have also learned that my classes are highly suited to constructivist and/or social learning theory. It suits constructivist learning theory because the theory states that students learn best when they are actively building or constructing something and this is main process that all of my students are working toward in all of their classes at the moment. I think that social learning theory is the next evolutionary step of learning that I will use with my classes, instead of working individually, I will have my students learn the content by cooperating to design and develop solutions to a problem. Cooperative learning has been stated as a strategy that “helps students make sense of, or construct meaning for, new knowledge by interacting with others” (Johnson, Johnson, & Stanne, 2000).

There have been two technology learning tools that have had an immediate impact on my classes, these have been VoiceThreads and the use of concept maps online using http://www.mywebspiration.com/. VoiceThreads have been a fantastic resource for my students to use and it has really improved the pace and motivation for my students to complete their work. I have used it to experiment with social constructivism by having my student share their learning by uploading videos or pictures of their final product with an explanation of what the problem was and how their final product fulfills the specified requirements of the end user. Students are then able to peer evaluate and comment on each other’s products, allowing everybody in the class to learn from each other’s experiences, perspectives and knowledge.

The other technology that was new to me and has helped me transform some of my teacher centered approaches to my students into more student centered learning experiences is the use of online concept maps . This technology is an online resource and allows me to create concept maps that students can interact, edit and develop either individually or in groups. I have found that this has really transformed the way that I teach new content to my students. I recently used this resource to introduce a new unit to my students where we started by looking at the fundamental functions of a house. In the past I have had an image drawn on the board and have just lectured to my students what each of these functions were and how it will impact their design stage of their project when they develop their own ideal living spaces. Instead I used this technology more as an interactive tool that students were able to add to and edit from their laptops in the class. I then used the instructional tool of collaboration to create groups of students and have each group research each of these functions in greater detail and then add summarized information to the classes concept map. Groups were also required to create powerpoint presentations to present and explain this information to the rest of the class. This activity was really effective at speeding up the research process (as in the past I had each student individually researching each fundamental function individually), and it allowed students to share expertise and develop many of the 21^st century skills that students need to be leaving school having mastered.

In the long run I would like to become a master at using each of the ten instructional strategies covered in this course. Dr Marzano says in the video resources that teachers should aim to select and master one or two each year, and build up their skills and ability to select from these strategies to suit the learning objectives that the teacher wants the students to achieve (Laureate Education, Inc., 2011). I am very familiar with using non-linguistic representations, identifying similarities and differences, generating and testing hypo thesis and summarizing and note taking but I think I still need to focus on developing my skills and ability to use reinforcing effort, providing recognition, providing feedback and cues questions and advance organisers strategies in order for my teacher toolkit to be complete and fully functioning.

References

Johnson, D. W., Johnson, R. T., & Stanne, M. B. (2000). Cooperative learning methods: A meta-analysis. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota. Retrieved May 4, 2006, from http://www.co-operation.org/pages/cl-methods.html

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2011). Instructional strategies, Part one [video webcast]. Bridging learning theory, instruction and technology. Retrieved from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=6072034&Survey=1&47=8842714&ClientNodeID=984650&coursenav=1&bhcp=1

Social Learning Theories

This weeks learning at Walden university has focused us in the direction of social learning and how it can be applied in the classroom. The thinking behind social learning theory is that students learn best from the social and environmental interactions. In this blog posting I will be correlating some of the principles that I have learned about social learning theory with an instructional strategy called Cooperative learning and the technology that can be used to apply it. Cooperative learning is very similar to collaborative learning where students form a group to investigate a specific question or project, however, cooperative is different because students are assessed as a group as well as individually for the work that they produce.

The cooperative learning strategy sounds like an excellent tool for reaching a wide range of abilities and behavioral needs of students as its use is described by Orey as something that motivates students to do academic work whilst helping them to acquire critical thinking skills, clarify concepts and ideas through discussion and debate. Orey also goes on to say that by allowing students to participate in non-teacher led discussions, students will contribute much more to the debate and as such the level of discussion will be taken to an advanced level.

There were many recommendations for implementing this strategy into teaching but it was stressed by Orey that teachers need observations, training, practice, mentoring and time in order to implement it successfully in their classrooms. Once the strategy is also implemented into a project, it is very important to have team members assign roles within the group and also for them to have a good understanding of what it is they are learning about, expected to do, and how to achieve with the use of a specific rubric.

There are a huge number of technology resources available for students to use to cooperate to complete projects either face to face or virtually. Students can produce multimedia presentations, they can work to produce blogs, wikis, concept maps and ‘prezis’, they can build and manage websites, they can manage their time and assign responsibilities using online calendars and they can download assignments from a class management system such as Moodle and then upload their completed assignment, or even better, email it to their teacher! Another option that has been introduced to me as part of this week’s assignment is the use of voicethreads. The concept behind this is that images and video clips can be placed online and anybody with the URL can access this information and make comments on these. As part of this weeks assignment I have created a voice thread using an image that I already use with my classes. I have uploaded an image of a house that I sketched on illustrator and am asking my students to make voice thread comments based on the content of the image and their prior knowledge. The voice thread URL is http://voicethread.com/share/2500156/, please check it out!

References:

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD

Constructionism in Practice

This weeks blog post looks at how the theory of constructionism correlates with the instructional strategy of generating and testing hypotheses as discussed in a book called Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works.

Constructionism is a theory of learning that states that people learn best when they build or construct something that they can share with others. This is something that all of my classes do as they work to design, develop and manufacture working solutions to problems based on theories and their current knowledge and understanding.

The instructional strategy of generating and testing hypothesis is about getting students to use and apply their prior knowledge and understanding to hypothesize about something that they then to test to see if the conclusions correlate with their prior understandings. This process is designed to get the students critically thinking about the problem they are hypothesizing about whilst boosting their overall understanding and knowledge base. The strategy states six methods that the teacher can use to help students create their hypotheses, and from these there are two that I use most frequently with my project-based classes and as such will dedicate the posting of this blog.

The first is called ‘Problem Solving’; it is defined as ‘students looking at various solutions given the obstacles and restraints posed by the problem’(Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). Many of the projects that I set for my students start with a problem that they need to design and create a solution by using their prior knowledge and understanding as a base to build from. Students start each project by ‘breaking down’ the problem into a list of ‘specification points’ that the manufactured end product must fulfill, they then research these specification points further until they have enough information and understanding to make informed design decisions to create a series of ideas that they feel would satisfy the problem.

The second method is called ‘decision making’, this is defined in the resource as ‘students defining criteria and applying weight to the various criteria to decide which choice makes the most sense’(Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). The way I use this strategy is to get my students to look closely at the list of specification points (as discussed above) that they defined and then give each criteria a weighting as to the most and least essential. Once they have developed this weighting scale they use this to help decide which one of their ideas will be the most suitable to develop further and finally manufacture.

The combination of both of these strategies leads to my students developing realistic design solutions that meet the needs of the problem whilst also teaching them and reinforcing specific content of the curriculum, and also critical thinking, creativity and problem solving skills. These instructional strategies are pure constructionism as students are learning from the process of designing and manufacturing an end product to fulfill a need whilst overcoming any obstacles or misconceptions that they may have had in their understanding of the content being addressed.

References:

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Cognitivism in Practice

Cognitive learning theory has been the focus of this weeks studies and with it two instructional strategies called ‘Cues, Questions and Advance Organizers’ and ‘Summarizing and Note Taking’. This weeks blog focuses on correlating these strategies with the cognitive learning theory.

Cognitive learning theory is about learning being a mental operation whereby information enters the brain through a sensory input, this information is then mentally processed in the short term memory and if rehearsed or reviewed it should enter the long term memory for it is be used and referred to at a later date. This theory is totally different from behaviorism as internal, mental activity is the focus rather than external changes in the environment as discussed in last weeks blog posting.

            The cues, questions and advance organizers strategy is all about helping students to develop their ability to recall, use and organize information that they process (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). Cues and questions are used to jog the students memories in order to recall the information the have learned, and advance organizers are tools that teachers give students to help them better organize and understand the information they encounter. I have just started experimenting with an advance organizer to better help my students learn my curriculum content and hopefully more easily recall this information in the future. The advance organizer that I am using is a concept map supplied by webspiration.com, it has been really easy to set up and it has allowed me to set up a resource to organize and represent connections between concepts whilst also including visual representations so that the information is more likely to enter the long-term memory.

            The other strategy of summarizing and note taking focuses on developing students’ abilities to condense and filter information that they have learned into notes that can be used to study from. The resource explains the importance of teaching students how to take quality notes and summarize if we want them to have something to study from so that they can succeed in what they are studying. There is an abundance of educational technologies available for teachers to help guide their students into taking quality notes and summaries such as wikis, blogs, concept maps, google docs etc. These documents can be completed individually or in collaborative groups but it is important to teach students that notes should be considered ‘works in progress’ and can always be edited and added to.

References:

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Behaviorism in Practice

As part of my masters program I have been asked to look at two instructional strategies and correlate these with the principles of behaviorist learning theory. B.F.Skinner developed behaviorist learning theory stating that learning is a manifestation of behavior and that behaviors can be programmed into students by reinforcing desirable behaviors with rewards and eliminating undesirable behaviors by punishing. The two instructional strategies that I am correlating with the principles of this learning theory are ‘reinforcing effort’, and ‘homework and practice’ detailed in the classes resources.

The reinforcing effort strategy stresses the importance of making students realize the importance of putting effort into any work that they undertake by having them document and compare their efforts against their achievements. To do this, it is important to first create a rubric so that students know what different levels of effort look like, students then self assess the amount of effort they put into tasks and chart this with the grade obtained from completing the task. This strategy is designed to allow the students to clearly see how their efforts correlate with their grades and will thus spur them on to put greater effort into work they complete in the future. The reinforcing effort theory also stresses that it is important for students to see the successes of other student’s hard work and efforts and this can be done with the use of bulletin boards and online postings that celebrate the achievements and success stories of other students at the school (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). This type of strategy goes hand in hand with behaviorist learning theory whereby desirable behaviors are reinforced with rewards and recognition to encourage similar behaviors in the future.

The homework and practice strategy is about giving students an opportunity to extend and reinforce the knowledge and skills and understanding that they developed in class. The theory stresses that if homework is set it should be clear about its purpose and expected outcome, feedback should be given to the students and it should try to focus on giving students the practice they need to develop and master skills in specific areas stating that “multiple exposures to material help students deepen their understanding of content and become proficient with skills.” Technology is now an integral part of most of our students’ lives and setting homework to be completed online is a reasonable expectation, collaborative homework assignments can be completed on wikis with discussions also taking place on skype and other chat forums. Technology can also be used to create ‘drill and practice’ quizzes and games that students can complete online to reinforce their classroom learning. This type of drill and practice activity is also an integral part of behaviorist learning theory where desirable behaviors (e.g. answering all the questions correctly) are rewarded by allowing the student to progress to the next question or level of the game or puzzle. I teach a mechanisms unit in one of my classes and in the resources I found a website that is a nice example of where I could use this type of drill and practice type of online questionnaire can be found at the following website where students could again read a recap about the three types of lever that they had previously learned about in my class, they would then go on to answer a series of questions about the three classes of lever. The website link is: www.elizrosshubbell.com/levertutorial (Hubbell, 2004).

References

Hubbell, E. (2004). Lever Tutorial. Www.elizrosshubbell.com. Retrieved from http://www.elizrosshubbell.com/levertutorial/
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

A reflection of my Walden University course (Understanding the impact of technology on education, work and society)

Over the last 7 weeks I have been working at completing the fourth course of my Masters programme with Walden University. The most recent course has taught me about the implications and impact of technology on education, work and society and how the didactics of teaching are changing in order for us to teach our students the 21st century skills that they need to succeed when they leave school. I have discovered that the world is moving from a 'technological age' into a 'conceptual age' where creativity and critical thinking skills are the things that will be in demand in the future as technologies continue to replaces jobs that use a large element of logic or processes.

This course has also given me the opportunity to learn about and experiment with using a variety of differing new technologies with my classes such as blogs, wikis and podcasts and it has changed the way that I teach some of my classes, how my students submit their work and how they collaborate to solve problems. My students have experimented with using blogs to create digital portfolios rather than submitting their work on paper, they have used wiki's to collaborate to complete their analysis and research assignments and they use pod and vodcasts to record the processes that they go through in order to manufacture their products.

As technology continues to become an integral part of the learning experiences for our students it is clear that this is also effecting the role of the teacher and how lessons are organized and structured. Teachers should no longer be 'lecturing' students in regimented rows where students listen and take notes as the teacher delivers the content 'top down'. Teaching should now be more about facilitating learning and providing our students with project based learning experiences where students discover the skills, knowledge and understanding by collaborating with their peers and using technology to solve problems. These kind of project based learning experiences will not only teach our students the content of the curriculum in a fun, motivating and productive way, it will also teach them the 21st century skills (p21.org) that they will need to use as they join the workforce once they exit school.

In order for teachers to provide their students with quality learning experiences they need to keep up to date with new and emerging technologies by continuing to take professional development courses,  being comfortable and willing to adapt and trial new technology in the classroom and also investing and using new technologies in their private and work lives.

Since taking this course, I have become motivated to change some of the ways that I manage my units and my goal over the next few years is for my students to increase the amount that they collaborate to solve problems whilst also having all of their design portfolios available online and digitized. I experimented with having a small group of students from one of my classes using wiki's to collaborate to complete the analysis and research for one of the problems that I set for them and the results were impressive. Working as a team to solve the problem really helped to produce a piece of work that was of very high quality and depth and the outcome was far superior to the majority of work completed by students who were working alone.

http://tvarnham.podbean.com/mf/web/pkv3dd/App5Podcast.mp3

21st Century Learning

As part of the readings for my Masters program, I have been pointed in the direction of this website: http://www.p21.org/. The website is called The Partnership for 21st Century Skills and their mission is to "serve as a catalyst to position 21st century readiness at the center of US K12 education by building collaborative partnerships among education, business, community and government leaders."

Whilst studying for my masters I have learned that a gap is developing between the skills and knowledge that students leave schools having obtained and the skills and knowledge that employers and communities now require from new graduates. It is clear that this organisations goal is to eliminate this gap so that schools end up providing students with the skills and knowledge that they need to succeed in today's climate.

The website has some great resources including exemplar videos of how they envisage a 21st Century classroom to be like. If all school's could adopt this methodology of teaching and learning then we are better preparing our students for the world and work environment when they leave school.

Blogs to Inspire Creativity

I recently read a book called ‘A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers will rule the Future’ by Daniel H. Pink. This book is really thought provoking and discusses the same theory of Alvin Tofflers ‘Three Waves’. Toffler and Pink both state that over the last 150 years, humans have moved through 3 different ‘Ages’ (Agricultural age, Industrial age, and the Information age) and that we are now entering the forth age, the Conceptual Age where humans need to learn to use their creative and emphatic side so that they can be competitive and meet the demands of world in the new ‘age’ that we are moving into.

These reading have led me to think how I can use technology such as blogs to unleash my students creative juices in the subject I teach, Design & Technology.

Some of the ideas that I have come to are the follow:

• Students create their own ‘Virtual Design Notebook’ - Dan Pink suggests that a great way of developing a good understanding of design and how decisions are made is to keep a Design notebook where the owner keeps notes based on good and bad designs that they see wherever they go. Notebooks are a great idea but instead of having a paper based copy, I could have my students create personal blogs of their findings so that other students in the class can also see, learn and discuss/debate good and bad design and also how these designs could be improved – this may possibly motivate my students to develop sketched solutions that could then be posted, discussed and further developed.
• Students create a ‘Virtual Diary’ – Something that my students complete as part of the design Process is to write an evaluation at the end of each project where they reflect on their final outcome, difficulties they came across, how the overcame these, etc. This evaluation is a vital part of the design cycle as it gets students to think about alternative tools, processes and materials that they could have used to produce their product and also how the design could be improved if the project was completed again. By having my students write a virtual diary, they are effectively writing an evaluation and showcasing their work at the end of each lesson, thus forcing them to reflect on their design more carefully whilst also providing a overview for me as to how they are feeling about their project and any difficulties they are experiencing but not discussing in class. Other readers and class mates can also contribute ideas and suggestions to help each other improve their designs.
• What’s good/bad about this design? – I create a blog where students can contribute to postings that I make about products and designs. This would enrich the classroom environment and encourage my students to think carefully about current designs, what is good/bad about them and how could they be improved/developed.

I teach High School students in classes where grade levels are mixed (9th to 12th grade) and knowledge and skill level are highly diverse. Each student has a unique voice and set of experiences that are highly valuable to all in the class and we can all learn from each others experiences and culture.