Category Archives: Module C

Digital or Not: Social Practices Key

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Using wireless Internet learning devices (WILDs) or Virtual Environments (VE) in an elementary classroom setting offers students unique social affordances that enrich learning experiences beyond traditional interactions that attempt to build collective knowledge. With these digital technologies, students begin to interact within a “network that is overlaid in the same physical space in which students and teachers participate socially in teaching and learning” (Roschelle, 2003) enabling diverse options for interactivity that extend beyond the walls of the classroom, but happen simultaneously within the context of the classroom. When students are exposed to the coupling of “normal social participation in classroom discussion and the new informatics participation among connected devices” (Roschelle, 2003), implications for enhanced student learning radiate from diversifying pedagogical practices and engaging students in a new social space that breaks down established social patterns laying new stronger connections in its wake.

Shifting traditional instructional approaches towards educational reform grounded in constructivist principles, such as inquiry-based learning and the social construction of knowledge, can be supported through the pedagogically sound application of WILDs or VEs in the elementary classroom. The frightening prospect of online applications that plague some teachers needs to be recognized for the cognitive dissonance it can provide educators and the potential for improved pedagogy it can offer in this light. Schools often capitalize on the fear of the unknown prohibiting student access to WILDs or alternative web-based applications in an attempt to shield students from certain distraction or inappropriate content; however, these decisions also remove invaluable teaching opportunities connected to digital literacy and digital boundaries. Digital technology is frequently criticized as depersonalizing social interactions, but in reality if learning environments are designed appropriately, it can set new precedents for enhanced interaction between greater numbers of students which will enrich learning for everyone.

Pedagogically developed social practices are essential features of community-centered classrooms. When instructional design affords students opportunities to learn from each other and contemplate their ideas in relation to other perspectives, knowledge integration and respectful discourse is both supported and encouraged. WILDs and VEs foster the development of collective knowledge even further by diversifying the manner in which students make their thinking visible and minimizing the anxiety often materializing from participating in whole-class face to face discussions. This emphasis on social interaction is a hallmark of effective classrooms, so it is not surprising that the “most successful Internet and handheld technologies tend to involve rich social practices built around rather simple (but uniquely functional and reliable) technology” (Roschelle, 2003). Integrating WILDs and VEs extend the possibilities for student to student and teacher to student interactions inspiring teachers to re-imagine what learning can look like in a classroom and online.

Digital technologies have the potential to increase student engagement which in turn, increases student presence and ultimately, improves students’ availability for learning (Winn, 2002); however, connectivity and digital resources are only a small piece of designing successful learning environments. As Roschelle (2003) states, “technology performs a small, well-defined function uniquely well, but much of the rest of teaching and learning is left to social practice”, signifying potential repercussions for the educator or institution that does not place merit on the pedagogy behind social interactions in the classroom. It is from this facilitated interaction and ensuing discourse that the potential for conceptual change emerges through cognitive dissonance requiring students to revise or generate new connections between concepts. Like the TELEs explored in earlier lessons, embodied learning using WILDs or VEs can help foster a community of learning and inquiry when they are integrated as components of pedagogically sound instructional design. They can help transform learning experiences for elementary students while providing “rich conceptual resources for reasoning about and thoughtfully acting in playful spaces” (Roschelle, 2003) as well as scaffold the social construction of knowledge through aggregation, asynchronous discourse, or collaboration.

image: student_ipad_school – 136 by flickeringbrad released under a CC Attribution license

Winn, W., Windschitl, M., Fruland, R., & Lee, Y. (2002). When does immersion in a virtual environment help students construct understanding? Proceedings of the International Conference of the Learning Sciences, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Roschelle, J; Penuel, W.; Yarnall, L; Shechtman, N; Tatar, D. (2005). Handheld tools that ‘Informate’ assessment of student learning in science: A requirements analysis. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 21(3), pp. 190-203. Full text available online at UBC Library.

Roschelle, J. (2003). Unlocking the learning value of wireless mobile devices. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 19(3), pp. 260-272.Retrieved November 4, 2008, from: http://ctl.sri.com/publications/displayPublication.jsp?ID=296

 

Communities of Learning and Connectedness

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Technology Enhanced Learning Experiences developed using anchored instruction in the Jasper Series, Scaffolded Knowledge Integration in WISE, Learning for Use in My World and T-GEM in Chemland place importance on the social construction of knowledge, but collaborative opportunities to build collective understanding are primarily dependent on the instructional strategies used to integrate these activities. With each of the TELEs investigated earlier, interactions and collaboration between students were set to occur either asynchronously and/or in virtual or actual spaces outside of the technology in question. Online networked communities, on the other hand, are inspired by shared experiences designed to cultivate the collaborative construction of meaning and emphasize the advantages of a collective experience.

Immersing students in a virtual learning environment presents a teacher with the opportunity to encourage and develop a learning community that can tackle authentic and real-world issues while stepping out of a traditional direct instructional role to one focused on facilitating guided participation. Networked communities by nature exude diversified expertise which if supported successfully will strengthen the emerging community of practice that builds on the concept that “learning does not belong to individual persons, but to the various conversations” students are a part of (McDermott in Murphy, 1999). Teachers must be prepared to shift their role to become “a broker” linking the learning community to external resources that become integral components of the learning process. While teacher interference and omnipotent supervision can threaten the community, instructors must also realize that their presence is essential as students develop their collaboration and communication skills through their interactions with each other, the teacher, and the educational material. Winn, Stahr, Sarason, Fruland, Oppenheimer, & Lee (2005) and Spicer & Stratford (2001) stress that in any classroom situation the teacher’s role impacts the efficiency and effectiveness of learning and that “changing students’ conceptions cannot work without instructional support” (Winn et al., 2005). Whether it’s to help students acquire necessary background information, creatively invite student participation, or strategically provide guidance related to curricula or the online experience, teachers are critical factors in making networked communities viable.

The more authentic a learning experience is, the more present students are, and the more they learn. Traditionally, in the classroom it’s assumed that learning “has a beginning and an end; that it is separated from the rest of our activities; and that it is the result of teaching” (Wenger, 1998). This perception emphasizes explicit and codeified knowledge over tacit knowledge and places greater emphasis on student’s ability to understand concepts within a classroom context instead of developing their adaptive expertise that will enable them to apply these skills in the future in the outside world. Using networked communities to connect globally with experts in various fields of math and science, other classrooms and each other to learn about and solve real world issues authenticates the learning process and makes “life itself … the main learning event” (Wenger, 2000) facilitating greater possibilities for transfer.

Sound pedagogy must accompany the integration of virtual environments and their networked communities into classrooms. As Spicer & Stratford (2001) point out, incorporating these as “replacements for ‘real’ field work on purely managerial, timetabling, and/or economic grounds is a flawed one” and will likely be fraught with frustration. Successful implementation is about more than using the technology – it involves a potential shift in mind set about the roles technology and the teacher play in learning. Virtual field trips and other simulated environments need to be used strategically to complement “real” field trips or uncover phenomena not available to students by other means. These experiences can expose students to a bigger picture of an environment or issue that may be more difficult for students to piece together on their own. They can be used to visualize “information in ways that students in the field cannot see … [or] can only be inferred indirectly in the field from instruments” (Winn et al., 2005) and afford explanatory opportunities to supplement descriptive visualizations to deepen understanding of phenomena. Condensing real-world experiences into virtual ones can limit the amount of information students need to process reducing potential cognitive overload and increasing abstraction, and in turn help students strengthen their background knowledge and associated schema to prepare them for field experience. Since “it is axiomatic that relevant prior knowledge or experience increases student learning” (Winn, 2005), using authentically designed virtual experiences can enrich conceptualization by enhancing preparations for experiences in the real world. When students can connect to prior knowledge the depth of their understanding increases as they are provided with subsequent opportunities to engage in reflective practice and draw inferences within new “real” contexts. Consequently, networked communities are most valuable to the learning process when they are designed to add depth to student understanding and are supported by meaningful pedagogical approaches in the math and science classroom that do not take away from opportunities to participate in real-world experiences.

image: Spider Web by xJason.Rogersx released under a CC Attribution license

 

References

Murphy, P. (ed.) (1999) Learners, Learning and Assessment, London: Paul Chapman. See, also, Leach, J. and Moon, B. (eds.) (1999) Learners and Pedagogy, London: Paul

Spicer, J., & Stratford, J. (2001). Student perceptions of a virtual field trip to replace a real field trip. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 17, 345-354.

Wenger, E. (2007). Communities of practice–A brief introduction. http://www.ewenger.com/theory/index.htm

Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: Learning as a Social System http://www.co-i-l.com/coil/knowledge-garden/cop/lss.shtml

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., and Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to Managing Knowledge – Seven Principles for Cultivating Communities of Practice http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/2855.html

Winn, W., Stahr, F. Sarason, C., Fruland, R., Oppenheimer, P., & Lee, Y-L. (2006). Learning oceanography from a computer simulation compared with direct experience at sea. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 43(1), 25-42.

Getting to Know Gooru

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Searching for online math and science resources that exemplify knowledge representation and information visualization can be a time consuming process. There are a never-ending supply of examples to peruse and choose from, but surveying the quality of these options is left up to the individual exploring. Gooru aims to alleviate this arduous task for teachers by compiling resources that meet their standards of design and depth. This site houses significant potential. Gooru is essentially a collection of math and science resources at the grades 5-12 level, and in an effort to streamline the process for quality material, all content is evaluated by teachers or Gooru’s review team. Examples of resources include digital textbooks, animations, simulations, and videos – both teaching resources and study guides are available. All content is organized by curricular strands to help with locating relevant resources. Within its design is also the opportunity to connect with others (students, teachers and experts) through discussion forums intended to encourage the social nature of learning. As you use the site, it begins to adapt to your preferences and recommends resources that you might find beneficial. While it includes copious amounts of teaching resources, students may also use it independently to track their progress in understanding concepts.

“Gooru is developed by a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with a mission to honor the human right to education and make high quality education free and accessible to the world’s one billion students by 2013”

It is currently considered to be in its alpha stage, but Gooru designers and developers have committed to maintaining its open-source form in perpetuity in an effort to develop a sustainable educational culture by providing high quality resources through world-wide collaboration between students and teachers. Their goal is to facilitate global access to knowledge.

This collection of online math and science resources has immense potential and deserves to be considered for what it can offer teachers, parents, and students. It’s commitment towards offering equitable access to educational material around the world is admirable and inspiring, and helps to break down the misconception, often perpetuated within the four walls of the traditional classroom, that learning has to be place and time-based ultimately restricting its accessibility and determined by the expert orchestrating it all.

Illuminating Illuminations

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In their investigation into the effectiveness of computer simulations, Finkelstein et al. (2005) concluded that “the conventional wisdom that students learn more via hands-on experience is not borne out by measures of student performance on assessment of conceptual understanding” due to their findings that “properly designed simulations used in the right contexts can be more effective educational tools than real laboratory equipment, both in developing student facility with real equipment and at fostering student conceptual understanding”. Providing students with opportunities to explore concepts in a variety of contexts enriches the learning environment and diversifies instruction to better meet student needs. In the mathematics lesson below, the concept of fractions is embedded in inquiry-based activities to help students visualize this concept while exploring selected interactive applets. Reflection plays a key role in the intended abstraction as a means of guiding students through a process of self-assessment to better understand their conceptual understanding.

Illuminations Lesson for Fractions
(click link above for lesson)

Rationale

By Grade 7, students are expected to have a basic, but solid, understanding of fractions so that they can proceed with more in depth explorations of relationship comparisons and eventually addition and subtraction operations. Unfortunately, this is often not the case and measures need to be taken to assist students’ conceptualization of fractions in preparation of their extensive use in math strands in successive grades. Much of the problem seems to lay with students’ misconception and simplification of fractions down to sets of rules to be committed to memory creating inaccurate mental models. It’s not surprising then that they are frequently unable to adapt strategies they have used in one context to fit a new situation. Their knowledge of fractions remains superficial and does not lead them to a deeper understanding of what fraction symbols communicate as a representation of a whole. When learning abstract concepts, such as fractions, students must understand the fallacy of focusing on memorization as it “leads to ‘inert knowledge’ that cannot be called upon when it’s useful” (as cited in Edelson, 2001) resulting in a poor or non-existent transfer of skills.

Using Illuminations activities provides students with a “variety of visual cues in the computer simulations [to] make concepts visible that are otherwise invisible” (Finkelstein et al., 2005) or at least more difficult to visualize. When integrated into an inquiry-based framework, they can be used to enhance students’ abstraction of fraction concepts while promoting the acquisition of adaptive expertise and thinking skills.

Intertwining the constructivist principles of the Learning for Use framework and T-GEM instructional model provides and impressive foundation for math explorations. The GEM cycle stages of Generate – Evaluate – Modify are complemented by the 6 tenets of LfU, motivate, elicit curiosity, observations, knowledge construction, refine and apply. While collecting information and generating ideas, curiosity and motivation are provoked as students realize what they do not yet know, but need to in order to be able to complete the task. Through key observations, students construct knowledge as they begin to evaluate their assumptions around relationships between variables. As students work to modify their original theories, they need to refine and apply new understandings that have arisen from their investigation. Applications of the LfU and T-GEM frameworks to instructional design presume that overlaps in each of the stages will occur as they both involve a cyclical process of exploration and inquiry. In fact, several cycles may be needed due to the incremental nature of learning; however, the order of the stages remains a critical factor. In the lesson outlined above, two complete cycles of T-GEM and LfU can be observed.

 

British Columbia Grade 7 Math Learning Outcome (Number – A7)

  • compare and order positive fractions, positive decimals (to thousandths) and whole numbers by using
    • benchmarks
    • place value
    • equivalent fractions and/or decimals

Comparing percent to fractions and decimals is a Grade 6 outcome, but by Grade 7 this is consistently not understood well so it needs to be re-taught in preparation for Grade 8 expectations with percent (greater than 100% and fractions of percent between 0 and 1) providing students with a more substantive opportunity to understand the overriding relationships between all three values; therefore, in this activity, this Grade 6 learning outcome will be reinforced as an integral component of the task.

Grade 6 Math Learning Outcome (A6): demonstrate an understanding of percent (limited to whole numbers) concretely, pictorially, and symbolically.

Before beginning lessons involving self-directed exploration of Illuminations activities, students must possess sufficient background knowledge to prepare them for success with the simulation activity. If the expectations for student learning are high given their current context, they will have difficulty navigating the activity (Kalyuga in Srinivasan, S. et al, 2006) and finding the necessary motivation to learn what they need to know to be successful. In this scenario, essential prior knowledge includes an understanding of:

  • numerator, denominator, common/proper fraction, improper fraction, mixed number, whole number, simplest form, equivalent fractions, multiple, factor, benchmark fractions/decimals/percents, addition equations equaling 1 whole, decimal place value (tenths, hundredths), parts of one, relating fractions to decimal place value, percent

Along with having prior knowledge, students must be able to access and activate it; therefore, the initial introductory task is intended as a revision of fraction concepts and relationships, which become essential elements, within the subsequent scaffolded activities.

(This post serves as further reflection on the application of knowledge representation and information visualization as it applies to my future personal practice and includes the alternate activity requested in lieu of directly related papers on the use of Illuminations)

References

Edelson, D.C. (2001). Learning-for-use: A framework for the design of technology-supported inquiry activities. Journal of Research in Science Teaching,38(3), 355-385. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/1098-2736%28200103%2938:3%3C355::AID-TEA1010%3E3.0.CO;2-M/abstract

Finkelstein, N.D., Perkins, K.K., Adams, W., Kohl, P., & Podolefsky, N. (2005). When learning about the real world is better done virtually: A study of substituting computer simulations for laboratory equipment. Physics Education Research,1(1), 1-8. Retrieved April 02, 2006, from: http://phet.colorado.edu/web-pages/research.html

Khan, S. (2007). Model-based inquiries in chemistry. Science Education, 91(6), 877-905.

Srinivasan, S., Perez, L., Palmer, R., Brooks, D., Wilson, K. & Fowler, D. (2006). Reality versus simulation. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 15(2), 1-5

Zooniverse: Citizen Scientists

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The first Zooniverse project was unveiled by the Citizen Science Alliance in 2007, but has substantially grown since then. Their projects rely on the efforts of people around the world, including many different classrooms, to collect and organize data on a specific research question. This results in extensive information that scientists and researchers have used to further their investigations in the scientific community. Unique scientific discoveries have been attributed to individual and collective contributions demonstrating the authenticity of the scientific process embedded in the projects.

The Citizen Science Alliance represents many different academic and professional perspectives from education, astronomy, and technology fields. Together they are committed to developing educational experiences in Zooniverse that foster inquiry in science. Their objectives include:

  • Education Research
  • Content development and tools to facilitate its navigation so visitors can carry out their own investigations using their data
  • Expanding options for interactions with Zooniverse beyond personal computer, such as mobile devices and museums

Technology has become a valuable component of science research for their in collecting and analyzing data as well as modeling and sharing research results. As Edelson (2001) indicates, “any effort to engage students in authentic scientific practices should reflect this trend” with technology. Zooniverse is an excellent resource that can promote inquiry-based learning in the classroom while situating the learning experience in genuine research. Within each project, the research process is modeled authentically and students gain experience in a realistic setting that connects them with scientists who provide purpose in sharing how the data contributed will ultimately help answer the research question. Initiating students in the introductory activities are set to motivate students so the recognize the need for new knowledge before they proceed. Cognitive affordances are observed in activities involving both scientific content and process relating directly to the research topic. Project designs also facilitate students` perception of scientists in their fields of expertise. The topics investigated in Zooniverse are scientific phenomena that cannot easily be observed. Integration of photographs, video, and interactive simulations provide students with scaled models to help students’ conceptualization. Social affordances are rooted in opportunities to collaborate in detection groups asynchronously with global audience members within the same project as well as share their thoughts and queries in connected discussion forums. Students can keep track of what they have contributed and how they have networked with other individuals during their inquiry process by using the “My Zooniverse” feature.

Some of the projects have specific teacher resources attached to them to provide teachers with the necessary information and tools to support and extend students’ learning. Solar Stormwatch is one such activity, and while this additional resource is not available in all projects, Zooniverse is in the process of adding teacher resources to more projects as they realize the potential educational benefits inherent in their overall design. Opportunities abound for integrating the science content within this site into other academic areas including language arts, math, and social studies.

 

References

Edelson, D.C. (2001). Learning-for-use: A framework for the design of technology-supported inquiry activities. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 38(3), 355-385.

Pellegrino, J.W. & Brophy, S. (2008). From cognitive theory to instructional practice: Technology and the evolution of anchored instruction. In Ifenthaler, Pirney-Dunner, & J.M. Spector (Eds.) Understanding models for learning and instruction, New York: Springer Science + Business Media, pp. 277-303.