This week I am at the Chautauqua Institute in New York. The theme of the lectures this week is mental health. I attended an interesting presentation by Dr. Thomas Insel, the director of the National Institute of Mental Health, where he shed light on to how the brain continues to develop and change during our lifetime. He said that the brain is an information processing machine more powerful and complicated than anything else known. According to Dr. Insel, the brain’s growth and connection patterns are determined by experience. The more I listened to his presentation, the more I realized how many aspects of cognitivism he was addressing.
This week in class we explored cognitivism and specific instructional strategies in relation to it. Understanding how elaboration, graphic images, dual coding, networking and short/long-term memory influence our learning; is the main construct of cognitivism. These are the components of cognitive learning theory (Laureate, 2009). Whereas behaviorism looks at how our external environment shapes our learning, cognitivism looks to the functioning of our brain as the main emphasis for understanding learning.
Cognitive learning theory views learning as organizing information in such a way as to connect with our existing understanding. The cognitive tools I read about this week are many and varied; yet all very useful in teaching/learning. In the online text, the chapter on cognitive tools presents four roles that such tools play. Technology can support each of the four tools-information seeking, information presentation, knowledge organization and knowledge integration (Orey, 2001). I took a workshop several years ago on experiential learning which supports knowledge integration. Nowadays virtual field trips allow students to experience places that they may never be able to visit. One example of experiential learning that my students participate in is a 10 week long online stock market investment competition. I have witnessed how engaged they are and how they experience the effects of their decision-making and time management skills. I agree that ‘there is no debate about the worth of experience in learning’ (Orey, 2001).
In the chapter titled Cues, Questions and Advanced Organizers, many useful technology tools were discussed (Ptiler, Hubbell, Kuhn and Malenoski, 2007). I have come to realize the importance of cueing students in to what they are about to learn. The reading also helped me to understand the importance of how my questions are worded, in helping students to access prior knowledge and access memories. As a result of what I have learned this week, I have better ways of preparing my students to learn.
The spreadsheet tool is one topic I discussed with a college student yesterday. He was able to speak personally of the importance of technology as it relates to his learning. In fact, we discussed two accounting classes he took and how much more he learned in the class that used Microsoft Excel extensively. He even gave me a fantastic idea of how to incorporate it into my accounting class. I will definitely use the ideas he shared with me the next time I teach my accounting students a unit on payroll.
It is helpful for students to organize information before they can connect it to prior learning. The chapter titled “Summarizing and Note Taking” provided a number of interesting tools and strategies. The author noted that although note taking was an invaluable skill for students, teachers rarely taught note taking as a skill (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn & Malenoski, 2007, p. 120). I am one of those teachers guilty of assuming students know how to take notes. This is a skill I will need to teach to my students. In reading prior notes they took, I couldn’t understand why they were vague and disjointed. It never occurred to me that they didn’t know how to take notes.
For me the most valuable cognitive technology tool I learned about this week is concept mapping. Although I had students use graphic organizers before, the concept map includes the valuable ‘focus question’ and ‘cross-links’ elements. “Concept maps help students learn material in a manner that is conceptually clear and with examples and language that relate to the learner’s prior knowledge (Novak and Canas, 2008, p. 3). I believe that incorporating concept mapping and rubrics into my instructional strategies, will make learning a more pleasant and effective experience for my students.
Having a better understanding of how one learns is a valuable tool for a teacher. One can build a house, but without a proper foundation, it won’t survive long. In addition having the proper tools will make the structure a work of art, rather than just a structure. I feel like I am an apprentice carpenter, learning how to build a house of learning-my classroom. I have come so far and have so much more to learn.
References
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Bridging learning theory, instruction,
and technology. Baltimore: Wolfe.
Novak, J. D. & Cañas, A. J. (2008). The theory underlying concept maps and how to construct
and use them, Technical Report IHMC CmapTools 2006-01 Rev 01-2008.
Retrieved from the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition Web site:
http://cmap.ihmc.us/Publications/ResearchPapers/TheoryUnderlyingConceptMaps.pdf
Orey, M.(ed.). (2001). Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved
June 30, 2009 from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/indes.php?title=Main_Page.
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom
instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
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2 comments:
Great blog. I to have learned a lot form this weeks resources. In the past in my classroom, on to many occasions I have fallen into the same old pattern of asking a question and getting an answer from my students. I would often try to make the connection for my students, instead of making them make the connections themselves. I feel this is the most important element of the cognitive learning theory. I am a social studies teacher, so all the lessons that I teach during the year can be in some way connected to one another. I constantly have to get my students to pull up prior knowledge to understand the new material being presented to them. I also really liked the concept maps from this weeks learning resources. I began to think of all the chapters and lessons that I teach during the year, and how many of these lessons could be improved by using concept maps. For myself, I could use a focus question where our students have to predict why something happened in history, like WWII. From their prior knowledge, they could brainstorm the conditons prior to the war and come up with the their own hypothesis on the events that lead to the war. Forcing my students to make these conections between events will give them a better understanding of why things happened in history, and it will hopefully help them retain the information.
I enjoyed reading your post and your analogy to building a house resounded with me. I agree that concept mapping and rubrics will help my students learn more effectively as well. As maple11 said, that s/he was guilty of making connections for his/her students. I am too. I feel a tremendous push to "get through" the objectives for my lesson and unfortunately rush through the process and take shortcuts even though I know there is no shortcut to learning a skill or concept thoroughly.
Gwen
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