ETEC Blog P Collins

Week 6 (Unit 4): GL and CL dissected

Co-operative versus group learning
Initially, I had thoughts about identifying the similarities/differences between group and co-operative learning. Then as I finished the readings and remembered all the activities in my classroom that I had thought were legitimate co-operative learning experiences and it turns out they probably were not, I changed my mind and decided to go with the What-Cooperative-Learning-Is-Not approach vs. the What-Group-Learning-Is-Not approach to my reflection.
Co-operative learning is not
• A learning experience where students are in a group to complete any old task
• A day when the teacher still lectures on the topic and then puts the students into groups to answer questions till the end of class
• A competition amongst students in a group format
• An activity where kids pick their own groups to work in to complete the activity during a class
• An activity where there is only a group mark assigned and no individual accountability
• An endeavour that has insignificant student interaction (like the divide the task and conquer approach)
• Just having a class discussion on a topic
• Completing any task with a well-defined problem – such as a chemistry lab
• A class based activity where students share ideas in a group and report back to the teacher
• The completion of a learning task without significant use of social/mediated/community skills by the students
As to what group learning encompasses, flip any of these statements into a “What does group learning involve” and almost all of them will become affirmation points. I am slightly humbled by my ignorance as to what legitimate co-operative learning is in actuality. And it makes me smile a little bit because earlier this week, on National Aboriginal Day, I learned that in the Nlaka’pamux language instead of saying “I don’t know that”…. they say “that is not in my knowledge yet.” A saying that applies quite well to my new understanding of co-operative vs. group-learning experiences.

Guanghai, Hou. The Relationship between co-operative learning and academic achievement in English.
Retrieved June 22,2012 from http://bit.ly/NoGR1q

Week 5 (Unit 4): Jigsaw puzzle activity expert contribution

Expert: Case – based learning
Initial reflection – Even though I have been exposed through other courses in the MET program to the ideas surrounding Constructivist Approaches to teaching, I am completely unfamiliar with the idea of “practice fields” of constructivist strategies. It’s easy for me to imagine, as I explore more in depth, that I will be able to generate stronger links between these new terms and events/examples from my practice. I know that with previous exposure to constructivist methods there always seems to be an authentic task for pupils to complete either individually or collectively. This applies to all learning levels from youngsters in pre-school to adults in University.

Case-Based Learning
Why is it effective
Combines problem solving with sustained learning (or continuous learning as you strive to reach a goal)
Mimics a natural part of a problem solver’s behaviour (this possibly has its roots in our earliest learning attempts as a species)

Role of Student and Teacher
1) The students need to establish goals/break up tasks/identify methods for solving tasks/and identify the range of knowledge required to accomplish the case successfully.
2) The teacher is a supportive facilitator in this process supplying advice, expertise and resources as required.
3) The teacher also generates probing questions for the students to grapple with as they continue to seek possible solutions.
4) When thinking about the 4-R’s the teacher should have the most input into the Revision section. This is where they would provide evaluative feedback to the student about the success of their case solution

Purpose of the case (over-riding problem)/task (smaller assignments that need to be completed to potentially solve the case) and type of task
1) The tasks need to be developed to reach the goals set at the beginning of the case/problem
2) Cases need to be factual, recent, and relevant to the students. Sometimes they have no strong right answer, but many defendable independent answers.
3) Tasks either have well-defined connection to theory (as in the diagnosis of a technical computer problem) or a weakly-defined connection to theory (as in a medical diagnosis)
4) The starting point for all cases is always a real-world, authentic situation
5) The task should always be completed keeping in the forefront of the students mind the four R’s of Case-based learning: Retrieve similar cases/Reuse that information to solve the present case/Revise the proposed solution/Retain the portion of the exercise that are most beneficial to solve future problems

What is the role of technology?
1) Technology helps the learner accomplish the tasks with greater speed, effectiveness and precision.
2) Technology can also provide a virtual setting for students to collaborate with solving a case.

What are some examples of case-based learning?
1) Medical/Business/Marketing schools utilize case-based learning to evoke discussion around a topic or problem. (Think Dr. House…)
2) A case can also be used to introduce a new topic for the students – provides a venue for them to make inquiries of themselves/peers about pre-existing knowledge
3) Case based learning can also be used to teach collaboration skills to high school students before entering post-secondary.

Resources:

Fabulous!
http://cet.usc.edu/resources/teaching_learning/case_based.html

Week 4 (Unit 3): The readings this week were thought provoking, as was our central question, “What conditions have to be in place for a learner to create new meaning?” As I continued to reflect my thoughts kept returning to the education concerns of urban First Nations youth and how in many cases their education experience is missing these fundamental entities’ required to generate new understanding. From what I understand now in the literature to create new meaning there has to be
1) A rational basis for making a change in your previous understanding (the new concepts support your experimentation results better)
2) Questions about natural phenomenon in the environment [geographic/socio-cultural/domestic] around you and the ability to interact (experiment) with them.
Urban educators working with FN youth face the issue; with being so disjointed from traditional contexts, how do you grapple with having a relevant environment to create new meaning? If learning is most effective/successful when embedded in culture, what does an educator do to provide an appropriate venue? A story that encompasses this whole idea was relayed to me when I was a second year teacher in an Aboriginal Support class. There was a grade 1 student who had recently left his Grandmother’s house to live in the city with his mother. His teacher had brought in a rat as a class pet and was reading Charlotte’s Web to her students each day. One day, while she was out of the class, the boy took the rat out of the cage and put it down using his shoe. Horrified, she contacted the school admin/counsellor to recommend psycho-ed analysis on her new pupil. When it came time to contact his Mom and she was brought in for a team meeting they asked her to help them pinpoint what could be the issue. Surprised, she replied, “That’s what we do when we see a rat in a home. We kill it.”
The point being, mainstream efforts to help students create meaning in the classroom, fall short for many Indigenous people. As mentioned in the Jegede article “Learning is dependent upon the environment as a source of information.” When students are removed from a relevant and known environment where community exists to support their knowledge acquisition, will there be success?

Week 3: What is radical constructivism and what has been my experience with it?
From several accounts, radical constructivism, appears to be the evil twin of a rather benign philosophy. And truth be told, that also sums up my first experience with a formal introduction to constructivism as pedagogy. I can still remember sitting in my science education class and watching the instructor take a clear fluid and pouring it into a black box. Seconds later a blue fluid emerged from the box and we were told to theorize an explanation for events. Well, I was just coming from three years of field research and could not for the life of me wrap my mind around this being the new process for teaching science. How could you develop a sound hypothesis for experimentation with zero back ground knowledge? What had happened to labs, text resources and lectures from experts? I found it a bit irritating and irrational.
It was something of a shock and unfortunately completely turned me off from learning anything further about the concept of constructivism. That was until I had started my ETEC coursework and I realized there was significantly more to the explanation. And, completely unawares to me, I had already incorporated a variety of constructivist ideas into my teaching practice. Mostly relying upon how I was taught as a youngster by my parents and the influence of Aboriginal elders in my life.
I am still a bit wary of radical constructivism. An idea that suggests that knowledge and truth can only be generated from a young person’s own sensory experiences no matter how limited their understanding. How could this provide an appropriate base for a comprehension of complex objects and ideas of 21st century science? I agree with M. Matthews that this is a “fatal substitution” between what we perceive as reality and what good old-fashioned empirical data shows us about reality. The objectivist approach which relies upon more programmed instruction shouldn’t be totally discarded. I heard it said one time that there are two basic ways to learn – we learn either by our mistakes or by role modelling. Wouldn’t a combination of these philosophies be the most constructive and effective? A mash up of what the experts tell us and some experiential learning?
I’m wondering how many the-world-is-flat folks would still be out there if we all relied solely on our sensory perceptions…..
If you have time check out this clip from von Glaserfeld on radical constructivism.

Maybe I’m alone in this but having been an educator dealing with science these last 12 years…. I think I might have been over thinking some of the questions. As it turns out I seem to be on the side of

Positivist

Deductivism

Decontextualism

Process

Realism

When I read the information that elaborated on these descriptors I could see some accuracy in how they applied to me. And some inaccuracy (probably from how I read the questions) I do feel that good science gives us good information. And that really good experimental (and sometimes theoretical) science should involve controlled experimentation. And that this is very much what we should be sharing in science classes with youth. However, even though I was identified as a decontextualist, I don’t share the view that science is completely independent of its cultural location and sociological structure. Western science has been influenced greatly over the last 150 years by the rigid social structures existing in the past, and still in existence today. This is especially apparent by what is accepted and what isn’t accepted as good theoretical science. I’m thinking of an example I had read about in M. Gladwell’s book “the Outliers” about a gentleman from the States with supreme intellectual powers who has spent the majority of his adult life studying science and mathematics but with no formal post-secondary education. Something he had to forgo because of affordability. However, he has worked out some very complex theories but will never see them published in an academic journal. Is this an example of societal prejudices/structure impeding scientific thought? What are your thoughts? Is there still an “old boys club” at work in the scientific field – and is this an impediment to our understanding of the universe?

PC