This is an approach to developing learner-entered environments for formal disciplines such as math.
Here the idea is to startt with the informal knowledge that kids bring to school and show tem how to transform these to formal knowledge. Initially students use their own words and picture to describe mathematical situations. Over time, kids are then encouraged to formalize these represntations. Initially, they are allowed to invent their own notationss etc. Gradually, they are encouraged to replace these with conventional, formal notations.
This path is not always one way. Learners may back and forth between these levels.
Showing posts with label how people learn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label how people learn. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
The design in educational environments: learner-centered environments
Environments that pay attention to the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs that learners bring to the educational setting.
Also called "culturally appropriate", "culturally responsive"...
Also called "diagnostic teaching": a key strategy is to prompt children to explain the reasons for predictions, their answers etc. Create congnitive conflicts and then have discussions about conflicting viewpoints. Test for known misconceptions.
Important to be sensitive to cultural practiced. In Hawaii, a reading program included discussions of learners' personal experiences and gave them opportunities to practice "talk-story"-a native custom of constructing stories jointly. This led to improvements in standardized test scores.
Not all kids come to school with practice in "school talk" - I.e. Impersonal and expository way of talking without relating to personal experiences or stories.
In one case, African American students were shown that many of their forms of everyday communication are examples of high forms of literacy.
In learner centered environments, teachers pay attention to what learners know and can do, and in their interests and passion - what do they want to do.
Also called "culturally appropriate", "culturally responsive"...
Also called "diagnostic teaching": a key strategy is to prompt children to explain the reasons for predictions, their answers etc. Create congnitive conflicts and then have discussions about conflicting viewpoints. Test for known misconceptions.
Important to be sensitive to cultural practiced. In Hawaii, a reading program included discussions of learners' personal experiences and gave them opportunities to practice "talk-story"-a native custom of constructing stories jointly. This led to improvements in standardized test scores.
Not all kids come to school with practice in "school talk" - I.e. Impersonal and expository way of talking without relating to personal experiences or stories.
In one case, African American students were shown that many of their forms of everyday communication are examples of high forms of literacy.
In learner centered environments, teachers pay attention to what learners know and can do, and in their interests and passion - what do they want to do.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Learning and transfer
From the book "How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School"
1. Successful transfer is determined the degree of mastery attained over the original material.
2. Transfer requires that people learn material with deep understanding rather than say memorizing facts and such.
3. Acquiring expertise takes a long time. It can take 50000-100000 hours of practice, for example, to become world-class chess master. Much of the time is spent in lesrning pattern recognition skills.
4. A training program that tries to cram too much into a short amount of time may lead to shallow learning.
5. Deliberate practice that involves active monitoring of ones's learning is important for achieving expertise. This involves practice with feedback that focuses in understanding. Feedback should be provided on the degree to which learners understand when and where and how to use the knowledge they are learning.
6. Understanding when and where to use knowledge can be taught by the use of contrasting cases.
7. Transfer is also enhanced when students can see the potential use of the knowledge to other areas or for other purposes. E.g. Students learned Logo debugging skills better when they were expected to write a user manual on debugging at the end of training.
8. Motivation is an important consideration while lesrning. Activities must be at the appropriate challenge level. Not too easy, not too hard.
9. Goal orientation plays an important role in motivation. Students with a learning orientation will be motivated by more challenging and new problems than those with a performance orientation.
10. Goal orientation may change over time and depend on the area of study. This aspec has not yet been studied.
11. Lessens are motivated when they see that their work has a social use beyond the classroom. Example, one study found that inner city kids were motivated by activities such as tutoring other children, making presentations to an outside audience, making blueprints for playhouses that were then built and donated to local schools... Contributing to their social groups and having an impact on their local communities tends to be motivating.
1. Successful transfer is determined the degree of mastery attained over the original material.
2. Transfer requires that people learn material with deep understanding rather than say memorizing facts and such.
3. Acquiring expertise takes a long time. It can take 50000-100000 hours of practice, for example, to become world-class chess master. Much of the time is spent in lesrning pattern recognition skills.
4. A training program that tries to cram too much into a short amount of time may lead to shallow learning.
5. Deliberate practice that involves active monitoring of ones's learning is important for achieving expertise. This involves practice with feedback that focuses in understanding. Feedback should be provided on the degree to which learners understand when and where and how to use the knowledge they are learning.
6. Understanding when and where to use knowledge can be taught by the use of contrasting cases.
7. Transfer is also enhanced when students can see the potential use of the knowledge to other areas or for other purposes. E.g. Students learned Logo debugging skills better when they were expected to write a user manual on debugging at the end of training.
8. Motivation is an important consideration while lesrning. Activities must be at the appropriate challenge level. Not too easy, not too hard.
9. Goal orientation plays an important role in motivation. Students with a learning orientation will be motivated by more challenging and new problems than those with a performance orientation.
10. Goal orientation may change over time and depend on the area of study. This aspec has not yet been studied.
11. Lessens are motivated when they see that their work has a social use beyond the classroom. Example, one study found that inner city kids were motivated by activities such as tutoring other children, making presentations to an outside audience, making blueprints for playhouses that were then built and donated to local schools... Contributing to their social groups and having an impact on their local communities tends to be motivating.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Differences between novices and experts
From How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School
1. Experts chunks information into meaningful units.
Experts notice features and patterns that are not apparent to novices.
E.g. Chess players can recall board positions much more accurately because they see boards in terms of patterns whereas novices only see them as a collection of positions for individual pieces.
Having domain knowledge that is organized into hierarchies and networks of concepts helps experts with the process of chunking. The knowledge possesses by novices is less organized.
Another example: expert electronic technicians could recall more details of circuits because they recognized circuits in terms of functional units e.g. Amplifiers.
Similarly physicists recognize problems based on the principles they represent e.g. Rlative velocities, and not on surface features (e.g. River currents vs. Airplane drag)
2. The knowledge of experts is organized around core concepts and principles.
E.g expert physicists organized problems based on the principles underlying them. They could also explain why those principles are relevant. Novices organized problems based on the equations they would use to solve them.
Example 2: when asked to separate problems into groups based on similarity, experts created groups such as "involving conservation of energy" whereas novices created groups such as "problems involving inclined planes".
1. Experts chunks information into meaningful units.
Experts notice features and patterns that are not apparent to novices.
E.g. Chess players can recall board positions much more accurately because they see boards in terms of patterns whereas novices only see them as a collection of positions for individual pieces.
Having domain knowledge that is organized into hierarchies and networks of concepts helps experts with the process of chunking. The knowledge possesses by novices is less organized.
Another example: expert electronic technicians could recall more details of circuits because they recognized circuits in terms of functional units e.g. Amplifiers.
Similarly physicists recognize problems based on the principles they represent e.g. Rlative velocities, and not on surface features (e.g. River currents vs. Airplane drag)
2. The knowledge of experts is organized around core concepts and principles.
E.g expert physicists organized problems based on the principles underlying them. They could also explain why those principles are relevant. Novices organized problems based on the equations they would use to solve them.
Example 2: when asked to separate problems into groups based on similarity, experts created groups such as "involving conservation of energy" whereas novices created groups such as "problems involving inclined planes".
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