Smart Schools chapter 3

Theory One:
People learn much of what they have a reasonable opportunity and motivation to learn.

Requires the following, which usually does not happen in the classroom
1. clear information
2. thoughtful practice
3. informative feedback
4. strong intrinsic and/or extrinsic motivation

Theory One can work with, and should underlie any kind of instructional method.

We need to be sure that learners practice what the understanding of the information that they have memorized.

Important to be aware of what it is we are teaching, and teach so that the learner will actually be able to do (performance) the objective we have in mind.

entry 3 - Capstone Planning
The main point of Theory One, that people learn much of what they have a reasonable opportunity and motivation to learn, sounds to me to be goood reasoning behing why inquiry-based/problem-based/project/based learning can be a sound constructivist approach to learning. We are using project-based learning in our approach to my Capstone, which is working with UVM's PT3 grant to help them design two courses to offer to UVM ed faculty (primarily) and in-service K-12 faculty. the courses will be an Integrating technology in education course as well as an electronic portfolio course. Especially in the ed tech course, the idea will be for the faculty come in to the course with a specific problem (or project) that he or she wants to address. this will hopefully keep them motivated to continue with the course, especially since the current plan is to have the faculty be able to pick and choose among a number of topics and presentation approaches.

map2001-emints.pdf
The eMINTS Program supports elementary teachers as they develop student-centered, inquiry-based instructional practices using multimedia and computer technology. This study reports on student test reqults under the eMINTS program as compared to a control group. The sample size is quite large - 12,000 in four Grade 3 and 4 subjects comprising almost 300 classes. And the reslts show a noticable and consistent improvement in performance by eMINTS students over the non-eMINTS students. PDF document. By OSEDA Evaluation Team , eMINTS, January, 2002

Stephen Downes ~ Stephen's Web ~ In Practice...
Stephen Downes notions about "What does it mean to talk about learner centered learning? I think that at least a part of means something very different from the traditional system of classes and courses."

entry 2 - Capstone planning
Wow, I know that the Capstone entries are supposed to be one/week, but this is just too intriguing an article and application to my Capstone to pass up (and count towards the Capstone planning assignment :-)

Out of the article, all of which I found worthwhile, is this paragraph relating to learner centered learning that most struck me:
Now let me emphasize that I do not mean 'created' in some sort of constructivist way. What I mean is more like this: where in traditional learning (and traditional online learning) the selection and sequencing of the learning materials is a task performed by the instructor, in learning centered learning the selection and sequencing of the learning materials is a task performed by the student.”

I have become a real fan of Downes OLDaily, and in the article above he mentions some of the changes he would like to add to the newsletter,
“While today there exists only the [Refer] link after each item, I will be adding two more: a [Research] link, which will give the reader an opportunity to create a sequence of resources based on associations with the current resource, and a [Reflect] link, which will give the reader an opportunity to create a running commentary that will be shared with other members of the reading community.”

In particular, I like the concept of adding the running commentary. Smacks of community, does it not?? And finally, Downes adds,
“What I am after here is a concept of learning where what is created is an environment, and where learning occurs through working within the environment. It is learner centered not merely in the sense that it is, as David Merrill would say, "open-ended", it is learner centered in the sense that the learning is created by the learner.”

Boy, I have to say, I like the sound of that. Is this too far out there, or is there any part of this notion that might fly at UVM? i love the idea of this flexibility, but I'm not sure about the openness of the PT3 project team. will need to check out with Jim and Nancy.

Assignment 1 -Capstone Planning

Entry One
After Saturday morning's class (1/26) on the interactive learning environment that Norm presented for us, I was struck by how the introduction of this technology to the state seems to yet another example of top-down decision-making and implementation discussed in the Cuban book. Carolyn mentioned, among other things, the lack of existing content for teacher use, even though she also talked about the partnering with colleges and universities to help build the content (if you build it they will come??).

But thinking about how a teacher might use this type of technology got me thinking about the differences in how K-12 teachers might use internet-based instructional materials compared to use by college faculty. I came in to the MAT program with an expressed interest in working with college faculty to help them make the paradigm shift from f2f to distance learning. But then I realized I wanted to work some with K-12 faculty, and completed both my summer project and first trimester project for the middle school science classroom. Both of the middle school online projects were very extensive, especially the last on on Technology and Inventions.

My Capstone has changed, and currently I do not know what I will be doing. I was planning to create for a particular NY-based educational business that deals with K-12 professional development, a prototype for a new format of online course that used project-based learning. but just last week I has to scrap that idea when it became apparent that the president of the company was going to be an extremely difficulty personality with which to work.

So I know that I am still interested in instructional design, but I am in the thick of trying to figure out what type of online educational materials are needed by K-12 and by college, how they differ, and which I am most interested in getting invoolved with.If the primary use for technology people in K-112 is to help teachers figure out how to use individual programs like hyperstack, I don't think this will engage me. I am more interested in trying to figure out how the different Internet technologies can support different instructional strategies. In my original thinking of working with distance learning and helping faculty to redesign from scratch their f2f class and have it go online does not seem to be a model that translates frequently or easily to the K-12 venue.

If anyone has some insights on this, please contact me.