LfU to enhance cross curricular learning

In what ways would you teach an LfU-based activity to explore a concept in math or science? Draw on LfU and My World scholarship to support your pedagogical directions. Given its social and cognitive affordances, extend the discussion by describing how the activity and roles of the teacher and students are aligned with LfU principles.

I was intrigued when reading about the Learning for Use (LfU) model. It seems so straight-forward – but why haven’t I used it or heard of it before? Its aim is to think about the design of activities to stimulate and encourage “robust, useful understanding” (Edelson, 2011, p. 359). When following the three phase design process, the students understanding should develop at a deeper level. The Create-a-World project modelled the LfU design theories soundly and the project was engaging for middle school science students. I appreciated Edelson’s comparison of content-focused motivation versus achievement-based motivation (p. 373) and that it seemed to shed light on my initial question. Not all students are motivated by achievement but often the way our curriculum and exam processes are organized imply that they are. Having students engage more deeply with cross-curricular content is something that I had in mind when I designed a concept to explore through LfU.

For this post, I decided to look at combining the topics of math and geography for my grade 6 students by exploring both eco-friendly houses and area and perimeter. I found the provided Learning for Use framework to be very helpful in creating this. Further, after exploring the Google earth software, I believe that this can be a helpful tool to delve deeper into these topics. I based my plan off the table provided in Daniel Edelson’s (2001) work (p. 360).

Motivate

Create a demand for the new knowledge and elicit curiosity

We will start by looking at our own houses and investigating footprint of our house. Initially, this has to do with the size and the shapes of rooms. The students will come to school with measurements and we will then be able to make some calculations – for example, calculate the perimeter of their yard and the area of rooms inside their own houses. The teacher can use their own house to model this activity. The student will then use Google Earth to locate our own houses in Manchester and use the function of Street View to explore our own communities in more depth. To develop the idea of our own house’s ecological footprint even further, we will explore what types of energy we consume in our houses. They will need to discuss this with the guardians in their household. We would then discuss and research, how could we build a more eco-friendly house?

Construct

Provide learners with the direct experience and facilitate communication

Thinking about size of house and more sustainable energy choices, children will work together to design an eco-friendly house. This will draw on their knowledge of area and perimeter, as well as on our geographical knowledge of renewable energy sources. This phase to be initially created with pencil and paper, allowing students to be creative and get all their ideas out. This allows learners of all levels to work to their own abilities. Students communicate with each other and teachers to support and scaffold as needed.

Refine

Learners apply knowledge and reflect upon learning experience

Students will then use Google earth to decide where they might build their house – can they find a spot that will be most suitable? What climate are they looking for?  It would be great if they could use an online tool to display their plan. I’ve had a search but nothing has stuck out to me. Does anyone have any ideas of what app or website would work in this instance?

This cross-curricular project would help students to apply the knowledge of area and perimeter in a more hands-on way. Further, it will help them to think about energy sources in a more applicable way. It involves problem solving and having to apply their knowledge in new ways. This plan also creates more ecological aware citizens for the future. We would reflect on what concepts we could take from our designed houses and apply to our real lives to become more ecologically aware citizens.

I think that this approach would engage the students and that they would enjoy using Google maps and Google earth. I was interested to read Kulo and Bodzin’s (2011) analysis of their study on eighth grade classes using geospatial technologies in their energy unit. The authors found that using the geospatial technologies received both positive and negative reactions from the students. They found that some students, after initial excitement, found the tasks too repetitive if using the same program day after day. This speaks to me directly as I think that, as with many theories and tools within education, balance and variety are ultimate necessities.

References

Bodzin, A. M., Anastasio, D., & Kulo, V. (2011). Integrating geospatial technologies in an energy unit. Journal of Geography, 110(6), 239-251.

Bodzin, A. M., Anastasio, D., & Kulo, V. (2014). Designing google earth activities for learning Earth and environmental science. Teaching science and investigating environmental issues with geospatial technology, 22(1), 25-36.

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.