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This same seminar was given in fall 1994 and spring 1995. I actually took the seminar in the fall, and advised the seminar (see inservice) in the spring. These documents are taken from both terms.
Meta-Index of Authors with Buzzwords
Bereiter: progressive discourse
Bereiter, C. (1994). Implications of postmodernism for science, or
Science as progressive discourse. Educational Psychologist, 29(1), 3-12.
He starts with postmodernism's rejection of objective truth in favor of "elite consensus". However, there is an alternative: whether theory A is an improvement over theory B - a "progressive discourse" that depends on a set of quasi-moral commitments that amount to a devotion to progress in knowledge. Fancy verbiage, but it makes a lot of sense, since scientists are devoted to making meaning out of the world, in an almost religious sense!
He goes into some postmodern implications like there is no real progress in science, only change; misconceptions are only misconceptions judged from a certain standpoint and not misconceptions when judged from a different standpoint; the scientific method is just how one elite group of people think, and so on. They are questioning the whole way scientists "stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before..." and contributed to the progress of science; that today's knowledge is better than yesterday's. If a group of people agree that "we are making progress", then the postmodernists have won!
Bereiter says that one way out of this dilemma is discourse: it appeals to those who acknowledge that there is no objective standpoint but who do not want to abandon the idea of progress. Then he quotes Karl Popper, saying that scientific theories cannot be verified; they can at most be falsified (true!) - so the result of research is either to refine the theories or to replace them. Also, discourse means negotiation of meaning: the process of a dialectic, in which thesis and antithesis give rise to a synthesis, which transcends the original contradictions (like quantum mechanics and the wave-particle duality!)
Next, he quotes Rorty, who says that progressive discourse does not escape ethnocentrism (true - look what scientific papers get published!). It also means admitting people to a discourse that is already going on in accordance with cultural norms of some kind, with the expectation that the newly admitted opponents will honor the discourse (look at the doc committee discussion online!) Next, it means that you look at one theory at a time, and say it's better than the old one; if you have any objections, then let's hear them and get them into the discourse.
Then, he defines exactly what "quasi-moral commitments" it takes to make a discourse progressive:
Basically, the scientific commitment is a willingness to sacrifice any belief in the interest of scientific progress. Here's where scientific discourse is different from political or judicial discourse: political discourse means that governments have to resort to compromise or majority rule, and courts leave everything open to challenge except the judicial process itself (that's contempt of court!)
What about students? Discovery learning usually means "discover what the teacher wants you to discover" - it rarely involves questioning concepts and critically analyzing experimental findings. Basically, for students, the understandings that are being generated are new to the local participants, and the participants recognize them as superior to their previous (mis-)understanding. Also, there has to be a commitment to frame questions and propositions so that evidence can be brought to bear against them. He also says that notions should be considered misconceptions only insofar as they interfere with progressive discourse (analogies are OK in this regard).
And as far as "the textbook says this", students have got to see that science is made up of a lot of little discourses going on here and there; a published text can coordinate some of these discourses by providing common inputs to them, not as some sort of source of authoritative truth. Mainly, the discourse shouldn't result in a free-for-all where students all think like postmodernists and have unexamined assumptions about truth and reality flying around.
Brock Allen: Media as lived environments
Allen, B.S., & Otto, R.G. (1994). Media as lived environments: The
ecological psychology of educational technology. Manuscript in preparation.
Definitions -- in context of Gibson's information acquisition model
Their theory is "commonsensical". They distinguish between internal and external mental models. They cite Norman's work on cognitive artifacts and externalization of information as a theoretical basis for supporting construction of external model representations. Norman's work recognized that internal mental models are notoriously limited; therefore, a human's ability to represent knowledge in external models enhances their ability to construct knowledge from an information-rich environment such as multimedia.
They explain how information is selected and transferred. Gibson's theory of selective perception posits that small amounts of energy are allocated to selection and attention to those aspects of the mediated environment which would yield large returns for a low investment. The effectiveness of knowledge transfer depends on the degree of coupling between the learner and the mediated environment.
In mediated environments, learners develop an ability to externalize information processing and storage by manipulating cognitive artifacts (e.g. cuisinarire rods, see Nesher). The process of externalization begins with an iterative cycle of selective perception of key information and the construction of an actionable mental model. The symbiotic relationship between perception and action drives learning.
Their theory is explanatory.
We finally have a theory that explains "hard-wired" abilities:
Ann Brown: Community Of Learners
Brown, A. (1994). The advancement of learning. Educational Researcher,
23(8), 4-12.
Brown's upbringing was as a behaviorist, but she became a cognitivist. Now she's working with the Community of Learners project (Brown & Campione) to help kids learn from texts, using reciprocal teaching (Palincsar & Brown). Not only did it involve the development of a mini-learning community that was intent on understanding and interpreting texts, but also it established an interpretative community - a community of learners with common knowledge, beliefs, and expectations (like Crook).
The idea is to lure students into enacting roles typical of a research community. It's based on Vygotsky's multiple zones of proximal development, reciprocal teaching, and jigsaw. Expertise is distributed by happenstance, arising naturally because of the different research paths followed by groups and individuals. This is called majoring.
Regular exhibitions and demos to a variety of audiences are an important component of the community - they require coherence, push for higher levels of understanding, require satisfactory explanations, request clarification of obscure points, etc. - just like in any community of researchers (not just perform for the teacher). The classroom teacher is part of this community; she learns along with the students, as well as assists their efforts. The aim is to lead the students to higher levels of thinking and to help them set goals for future research (like PBL facilitator). Thus, the teacher learns with the taught - like Pea's transformative communication. Whole-class discussions provide a reflection period (metacognition) in which to take stock of where they are and where they want to be.
There are 5 principles of learning, or steps, in the COL program.
What are the end goals?
Basically, schools are still inundated with behaviorist principles (witness behavioral objectives!), yet contemporary theories are better suited to instructional design because they take as their data base the learning of complex systems of knowledge that are characteristic of what we want the schools to enculturate. Yet they are making little headway. She realizes that creating a spiral curriculum is tough, but it's much better than the alternative!
Theory (symbol processing) vs practice (Sitcog)
Bredo, E. (1994). Reconstructing educational psychology: Situated
cognition and Deweyan Pragmatism. Educational Psychologist, 29(1), 23-35.
Research in the symbol-processing (computational, rule-based, AI) tradition focuses on tasks familiar to professionals and academics; research in Sitcog focuses on problems arising in the performance of everyday activities where the problem is ill-defined and isn't amenable to rules or algorithms. In symbol processing the representation is inside your head (mind-object dualism); in sitcog neither the object nor its symbolic description is specified outside the process of inquiry (pluralism; the object is what you perceive it to be). Dewey met the same situation where the split, then was between idealism and naturalism (lack of an overall plan). To Dewey, reason is a subset of practice; theories come out of practice. The theory you use has to be suitable for the situation you're in.
In the symbol processing view, cognition is the formal manipulation of symbols; language is a way of putting MY representation into YOUR head. However, the language may not handle all cases it hasn't been designed for. There are also the mind/body duality (old idea of dualism) and the separation of the individual from the learning community. Learning means individual improvement; that, however, is up to interpretation on the part of the learner and the social process of defining the task.
In sitcog, the person and the environment are parts of a mutually constructed whole. Both person and environment change over the course of the transaction (see Pea). Rather than rule-based behavior, we seek to optmimize performance. Language is discourse (see Bereiter) rather than mirroring a separate reality. Thus, rather than transmitting the representation, language is used to construct the representation through discourse. Perception is not separate from action; some abilities are hard-wired (e.g. facial recognition). Knowledge is socially constructed; you test limits before deciding whether to attack or negotiate. Like Bereiter, allow any belief to be subjected to criticism if it will advance the discourse. A situated approach focuses on the varied contexts in which learning and performance occur.
The limitation of the symbol processing view is that it is context-insensitive; doesn't include attributes that are not in its "language". The limitation of sitcog is that it only gives rise to context-based knowledge which can't be generalized. Practice without reflection looks as bad as reflection without practice. Seek a collaborative relationship between the two, rather than dominance by one or the other. Where to start? He, like Dewey, starts with everyday, practical, socially contingent, situated approaches, use them as starting points for theorizing, and then bring these theories to bear on altering and improving everyday life.
Carey & Smith: on scientific knowledge
Carey, S., & Smith, C. (1993). On understanding the nature of scientific
knowledge. Educational Psychologist, 28(3), 235-251.
Basically, students are not empty vessels into which we can pour information. They come with inherent misunderstandings, "common sense epistemology of science". Essentially, kids do not distinguish between theory and belief - they think knowledge of reality can be obtained with sufficient diligent observation. They do not realize that reality can be known only through successive approximations through a process of critical inquiry: indirect, multi-stepped arguments in specific hypothesis testing.
They need to develop and value knowledge that is acquired through a process of careful experimentation and argument, as well as a critical attitude toward the pronouncement of experts. They want students to develop a more constructivist epistemology of science, reflecting the empiricist or inductivist view of scientists, and to understand that our knowledge of regularity in knowledge is a consequence of successful conjecture rather than its precursor. This happens in 3 stages:
They ask: are these 3 stages developmental? They think not. Rather, the kids haven't dealt with learning process skills in the context of genuine scientific inquiry. Thus, to go from level 1 to level 3 means knowledge reorganization and genuine conceptual change. How does the science curriculum deal with this? Basically, kids are instructed in careful measurement and exerimentation, but they're handed a hypothesis to test - kids aren't expected to develop and evaluate their own ideas about natural phenonena.
They want to see a theory-building approach to teaching about scientific inquiry: one based on actively constructing scientific understanding and reflecting on it. How do scientists decide what experiments are worth doing? How does the answer to each question raise deeper questions? How do one's theories constrain the experiments one does and the interpretation of the results? How do unexpected results require changes in those theories?
They built a curriculum around what makes bread rise. The kids went from Level 1 to Level 2, but failed to make it to Level 3. They don't know if it's because the middle school kids aren't mature enough, or because their curriculum wasn't good enough. Perhaps students' epistemological beliefs interfere with successful learning of science - this isn't clear, and needs further research.
Morrison & Collins: Epistemic Fluency
Morrison, D., & Collins, A. (1995). Epistemic fluency and constructivist
learning environments. Educational Technology, 35(5), 39-45
Epistemic fluency is the ability to participate productively in multiple ways of making sense of the world. In a constructivist learning environment, people can construct meanings in many different ways, in different contexts, for different purposes, and with others who value different ways of knowing.
Different ways of constructing knowledge, called epistemic games, are culturally patterned. Some are domain-specific, others are more general. Different contexts & cultures support different kinds of games. An important goal of schools it to help people become epistemically fluent; to be able to use and recognize a large number of epistemic games.
Some environments foster, others inhibit, epistemic fluency. An infrastructure that combines relatively open, epistemically neutral environments with environments that provide various types of scaffolding will be more likely to foster epistemic fluency than those dedicated only to particular kinds of knowledge construction.
Basically, do certain defined activities, with specified rules, moves, etc., and you'll construct new knowledge. The epistemic forms are target structures that guide inquiry; they are models for further inquiry. The epistemic games are sets of moves, constraints, and strategies that guide the construction of knowledge around a particular epistemic form. You want fluency with multiple patterns or games.
The authors give examples of game playing. Note that these games often require guided cooperative questioning and knowledge-building strategies. This means conversation or instructional discourse, and that means that sometimes there has to be negotiation to come up with a common understanding.
Technology can support epistemic fluency, if the software environments support, and are supported by, a community of practice in which the social construction of knowledge in the context of authentic goal-directed projects is the dominant activity. It will not happen where the goal is to accumulate "correct answers".
Collins & Ferguson: Epistemic games
Collins, A., & Ferguson, W. (1993). Epistemic forms and epistemic games:
Structures and strategies to guide inquiry. Educational Psychologist,
28(1), 25-42.
This article expands on the concept of epistemic games introduced in a prior article, Epistemic fluency and constructivist learning environments, by Collins & Morrison. There, the authors presented the idea that people should be familiar with, and be able to construct a variety of, epistemic forms in use by their culture. Epistemic games teach how to construct these forms, thereby actually assisting learners in knowledge generation. Epistemic game playing can be used in the classroom as cognitive apprenticeship when the instructor plays along with the students.
Epistemic forms: target structures that guide inquiry. Generative frameworks with slots, and constraints for filling those slots. MOdels that represent knowledge organization.
Epistemic games: strategies for analyzing phenomena in order to fill out an epistemic form. Epistemic games have rules and moves which guide inquiry by directing the inquirer as to which slots to fill in and how.
Attributes of epistemic games:
Purpose of epistemic games:
Organization: there are three kinds of them -
Clancey: Sitcog, program design, & communities of
practice
Clancey, W.J. (1993). Guidon-Manage revisited: A socio-technical systems
approach. Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education, 4(1), 5-34.
The author describes how he would design Guidon-Manage (an AI program designed to help students reflect on reasoning processes and develop metacognitive skills in medical diagnoses) if he had to do it over again. He would start with the user environment, not with computer science ideas. His tools would coordinate dialog within a community of practice, not deliver information.
The paper reflects on its design process, where he has to deal with basic research (developing a program and testing it in well-defined contexts) vs. applied research (which means that these programs are incrementally developed and tweaked within a special context). Design is cooperative action, an ongoing interaction. He acknowledges the people-oriented and organizational issues that impact design (see all the iterative design papers), and also realizes that researchers must participate in the community they wish to influence (usability: representative, typical end users must participate in the design of the computer systems they will use). This means the research emphasis shifts from developing representational tools to changing the practice of how the tools are used in everyday life.
The idea of relating technical design to social systems is called socio-technical design - it is related to usability, but by groups rather than just individuals. The latest emphasis is not on systems analysis, but in restructuring work: not just to build a box, but to design the context and social organization in which it will be used. This includes individual attitudes and beliefs, goals, and group interactions.
Instructional design has to be related to situated cognition theories of knowledge - i.e., practice cannot be reduced to theory. He does not agree with the IP theory that representations are stored in memory; rather, perception and action are always coordinated without deliberation (Dewey, also Allen & Otto), and that symbolic reasoning is grounded in prelinguistic conceptualization (cf. preattentive processing, biologically primary activities). Knowledge is situated in the context and culture where it is developed; representations are a mere step in the process of creating knowledge. They must be interpreted in order to affect behavior; every behavior is a coordination of perceptual and motor systems. "Knowledge is a capacity to interact" - it is not some sort of stored schema that is retrieved and run as a program.
Social systems continuously develop as people become more efficient through practice. Thus, trying to design a system for a group of users is like trying to hit a moving target. Also, computer-based representations are interpreted differently, and knowledge is constructed differently, by different people. Possibilities for change must be left open. This leads to some implications:
Conclusions: he jumps from the neural to the social plane, considering human action in relation to the practices of a community (see Roschelle & Clancey). He's concerned with how people create and interpret representations every day. Representations are a medium for coordinating interactions in the social and physical world. Computer system design is a group activity involving both users and programmers - they are intertwined.
Dede: distributed, virtual worlds
Dede, C. (1995). The evolution of constructivist
learning environments: Immersion in distributed, virtual worlds.
Educational Technology, 35(5), 46-52.
Dede goes beyond the usual computer-mediated constructivist learning environments to distributed, synthetic environments, interacting with avatars - surrogate persona in the virtual world. Distributed simulation enhances students' ability to apply abstract knowledge by situating education in authentic, virtual contexts similar to the environments in which learners' skills will be used (cf. BB&N simulation of a virtual battlefield for Desert Storm training). Interpersonal dynamics can occur across distance (distributed).
Participants feel that these machine-based agents (avatars) that they encounter are real human beings. These can provide both intellectual and psychosocial feedback to students, mimicking the types of interactions occurring in face-to-face constructivist learning. And, as in all constructivist learning, top-down, centralized planning fails, because users design their own culture and artifacts (e.g. sim city).
We find that some people who don't do well in spontaneous spoken interaction find informal written communication more comfortable; same with face-to-face conversation via mediated communication. It's another learning style to be reckoned with: they do well with reflective asynchronous interaction.
Others are attracted to cooperative virtual environments because they gain something valuable (socially) by collaborating together - not just a social network of minds to tap for information, or contacts with useful skills, but also psychological/spiritual support from ppeople who share common joys and trials (common experiences, cf. Crook - longitudinal continuity of a COL).
In situations stripped of nonverbal context, and less subject to consensual agreement (rituals, norms), users experience both positive and negative disinhibition Normally shy people speak out more, but usually polite people can "flame" others, hurling insults they'd never say face to face. This negativity has to be channelled so that it doesn't cause damage to others; however, it also leads to cognitive dissonance, which sparks learning.
Identity, too, becomes depersonalized, so people are less inhibited about expressing very personal feelings through a depersonalized medium - things they wouldn't bring up in a group meeting. Also, some people take chances and try new learning experiences in a virtual community that they wouldn't do in a face-to-face learning situation, because of this anonymity. They have a chance to try out a new persona.
One drawback is addiction and escapism (e.g. people we know with Myst!) However, discovering new capabilities to shape one's environment is highly motivating and sharply focuses attention.
One way this can be used is to help learners evaluate their mental models to correct pervasive misconceptions, like in physics (cf. Dickinson and "comic book trajectories") to sense attributes of moving objects.
Farquhar & Surry: Adoption Analysis
Farquhar, J.D., & Surry, D.W. (1994) Education and Training Technology
International, 31(1), 19-25.
Instructional developers use needs analyses & task analyses for their front-end analysis, but they neglect to analyze tech adoption or implementation of their instructional product. Successful implementation means that adopters buy in to the use & application of the program. It also requires an environment analysis to understand the context in which the product will be used. IDers must consider potential use as well as potential effectiveness.
Five critical factors are: (Stockdill & Morehouse, 1992)
Five variables that determine the rate of adoption are: (Rogers, 1983)
Potential adopters are more likely to adopt an innovation if it has the following perceived attributes (Rogers):
From Stockdill & Morehouse, we need to consider user characteristics:
Farquhar & Surry lump the technology and organizational considerations into a group called organizational factors. These comprise physical environment and support environment:
Physical environment: (we mix user characteristics in here too...)
Support environment:
Basically, we need to know where the product will be used, who will use it, and how it will be used and maintained. Recall ID4 is the only ID model with maintenance - this becomes very critical in tech adoption (cf. BVSD survey, "in-building maintenance & tech support"). Where are sites for dissemination? Where are the trainers? Who is responsible for delivery, administration, and maintenance of the product? Do key decision-makers support it?
The goal of adoption analysis is to create an implementation plan for the product in its context of use, including the aids and obstacles to be found in the expected instructional environment.
Hilgard: history of ed psych
Hilgard, E.R. (no citation given: chapter 20 in Part IV of a textbook,
pp. 415-423.
This is a short background chapter on the history of ed. psych. It starts with Dewey (experimentalism, or instrumentalism, his view of pragmatism) vs. Thorndike (S-R, or positivism). Thorndike wanted everything measured, and wanted kids to be equipped for effectiveness in performing necessary tasks by learning a set of S-R connections; Dewey wanted kids to have productive behavior, particularly in social situations. Then there was Charles H. Judd, who preferred to emphasize the higher thought processes leading to generalizations from what is learned, but also agreed with Thorndike about disciplined experimentation in schools.
After WW I there was a lot of research by educational psychologists on the most efficient methods of instruction, with an aim to improving it. They concentrated on short-term experiments on learning and memory. The proponents of this "scientific movement" emphasized experiments and measurement, and lots of testing. Dewey's movement, "progressive education" was based on innovation rather than research, and didn't think much of intelligence and achievement tests.
Next came Ralph Tyler, who substituted "evaluation" for "measurement". By WW II, progressive education had died for lack of interest, and there was too much conflict among behaviorism, Thorndike's connectionism, and Dewey's instrumentalism. Most books had dealt with tests and measurements, and the physiology of the sense organs - social factors and child development were glossed over. Later works emphasized social psychology and laboratory studies of perception, as well as some psychoanalysis.
In the 1950's, Piaget and the Montessori schools emphasized child development. Educational technology got government support in the Sputnik era, and so did audiovisual aids, radio and TV, and programmed learning (Skinner's teaching machines). These led to CAI, with implications for individualizing education and for teaching diagnostically, for research in actual classrooms rather than laboratories, and for well-trained psychologists with scientific tools. The books now emphasized helping the prospective teacher to understand his/her task in the school setting, rather than just testing and measurement.
In the 1960's, the cognitive psychologists (Wittrock, Greeno, Resnick, others) began to displace the behaviorists, and cognitive psychology had more of an impact on instructional psychology now. It was concerned with internal mental processes and how their development could be enhanced through instruction.
Hilgard's prediction for the future is that there will be more emphasis on social psychology and group processes. It will also involve context - classroom management and all things involved in school settings, rather than artificial settings. He also wants to see more emphasis on factors such as home, community, and larger culture.
Kliebard: Knowledge base
Kliebard, H.M. (1993). What is a knowledge base, and who would use it if
we had one? Review of Educational Research, 63(3), 295-303.
He's referring to a school-reform paper called "Toward a knowledge base for school learning", in which Wang, Haertel, & Walberg (1993) claim that science has the power to provide guidelines, if not specific rules, for how teachers should conduct themselves in schools and classrooms. His lit review cites Rice and Taylor - Taylor was an efficiency expert (a la Charlie Chaplin), and Rice wanted to implement this in schools. His "scientific basis" relied on collecting empirical data, representing outcome variables by clear-cut standards of learning achievement, equating effective practices with efficient practices, and generalizing these practices to scientifically valid rules of action.
In contrast, William James said that you can't deduce definite programs, schemes, and methods of instruction from psychology. Psychology is a science, and teaching is an art. He denies that psychology and scientific findings can simply be converted into rules of action for teachers. Basically, he says that any things you do or say, that make you a good teacher, depend on the context, the particular pupils you're teaching, and the concrete situation you're in. It requires "happy tact and ingenuity". Dewey also agreed with James, that no conclusion of scientific research can be converted into an immediate rule of educational art. And if there are rules at all, then they are rules for the conduct of observations and inquiries, not rules for overt action. In other words, any guidance is based on heuristics gained from educational practice, not rules, nor laws, nor generalizations derivable from science.
McKeachie, in 1974, said to the APA that one problem is the difference between the lab setting of research and the natural educational setting in which teachers practice. Basically, when you make a true experiment out of a research study in the classroom, you lose external validity. Cronbach follows this up by saying that the task of a social scientist is not to amass generalizations so you can build a theoretical tower on top of them, but to develop explanatory concepts that will help people use their heads. (Dewey called these "intellectual instrumentalities".)
Clearly, the research establishment had a negligible effect on real schools and real classrooms. However, as long as people still consider the teaching process to be the production of learning, and teachers as "technical production managers", they will want to apply efficiency criteria to it. Lampert, in contrast, realizes that teachers make highly situation-specific decisions (like Suchman). She sees teachers as "dilemma managers", who not only accept conflict as a condition of their work, but even see it as useful. (cf. Duffy and PBL: ill-defined problems; Brown on conflict leading to knowledge-restructuring).
With this dichotomy, it's no wonder that teachers don't take the researchers seriously! Kliebard says it's not a problem of obstinacy or ignorance by teachers, nor of failure by researchers to amass huge enough databases or to employ sophisticated research techniques that causes research to have no effect on practice. Rather, it's the failure on the part of the research establishment to take seriously enough the conditions of teaching and the perspective of practicing teachers, and to respect the teacher's world as a practical matter.
Essentially, then, wisdom is not a static knowledge base that can be unambiguously applied. Let's not look for rules, but for certain key ideas that can apply to a given situation.
Koschmann: Technology and CSCL
Koschmann, T.D., Myers, A.C., Feltovich, P.J., & Barrows, H.S. (1994).
Using technology to assist in realizing effective learning and
instruction: A principled approach to the use of computers in
collaborative learning. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 3(3), 227-264.
Their principled approach to the design of computer based tools for collaborative learning has 4 steps:
Next, they go on to describe PBL as it is used in medical settings, similar to Duffy's description. They speak of ill-structured problems in ill-structured domains. To overcome difficulties in dealing with these, they have 6 principles of learning and effective instruction:
They have a stage-based model for PBL:
Where does technology come in? There needs to be a way to present and log multiple viewpoints, have a retrievable record of the group's deliberations for previously studied cases, records of each participant's contributions, database of authentic cases for comparison, way to share information outside of meetings (e-mail, conferencing), way to access learning resources, and a way to index notes for later retrieval. They use databases and e-mail, and built a collaborative learning laboratory (CLL) based on the idea of CSCW, substituting "learning" for "work".
They feel a need for face-to-face meetings as well as e-mail. Students can commit themselves as individuals to a viewpoint via e-mail, but need group discussion for the deliberative phase, because of the need for real time interpersonal interactions.
They go on to describe the literature on CSCL and collaborative learning. (lots of references in their bibliography - good sources for CSCL information.)
Langer: A mindful education
Langer, E.J. (1993). A Mindful Education. Educational Psychologist,
28(1), 43-50.
This paper supports the idea that learning is fun when it's mindful. Providing multiple perspectives to students, and putting material in context, encourages mindfulness and enjoyment. A comparison is made between traditional education that advocates acceptance of facts, and mindful, questioning education.
"Mindfulness" - the capacity to see any situation or environment from several perspectives (p. 44). In a "Zen" sense, it is being in the present moment - a state of heightened awareness.
"Paying attention" - keeping your eyes on something (traditional view) vs. thinking about something in new ways (mindful view).
"Premature cognitive commitment" - a rigid belief that results from mindless acceptance of information (p. 45). A preconceived notion with no thorough test of validity.
Mindfulness is a state of effortless creativity, fun, and total engagement - when we forget ourselves and get lost in the activity (cf. singing).
Mindfulness results from drawing novel distinctions, examining information from new perspective, and being sensitive to context (or variability). It encourages fluency; Duffy says that fluency is a prerequisite for creativity, within a wide variety of contexts. We don't rush headlong from questions to answers, but examine the same situation from several perspectives.
Premature cognitive commitment encourages stability seeking, imposing constancy on a potentially varying environment. It is like Perry's lowest level of epistemological maturity: dualism (believing that truth originates from one expert source). Perry's stage of multiplicity (like postmodernism) is a movement toward more mature, complex, thinking, or higher order cognitive processes. Facts don't come in tightly closed packages!
Mindfulness is strongly related to motivation. Students pay more attention when they are motivated; attention is freely given when stimuli vary; and motivation increases enjoyment. To try to keep still and pay attention is effortful for students. (cf. Scientific American article on attention & gaze - normal people's gaze is chaotic; only mentally disturbed people have constant gaze).
"we would do better to ask ourselves what would be fun for our students and trust that learning inevitably will follow. Conditional instruction that respects variability and multiple frames for information would go a long way in leading us in this direction."
Lemke: Education, cyberspace, & change
Lemke, J.L. (1993). Education, cyberspace, and change. The Arachnet
Electronic Journal on Virtual Culture, 1(1).
Possible new directions for education and related social and cultural changes are discussed from the viewpoint of postmodern perspectives on learning, information technologies, and the dynamics of complex systems. A new model of education in cyberspace rather than in school and classrooms is formulated, together with key questions for a new educational research agenda. The potential impact of these changes on cultural values and on the way humans interact with the natural and built environment are considered.
Noble: Cockpit Cognition
Noble, D.D. (1989). Cockpit Cognition: Education, the military, and
cognitive engineering. AI & Society. London: Springer-Verlag. 271-296.
Noble's radical argument is 3-fold, and is very much "stuck in the 60's". It is based on his conception of a dastardly plot by the military/industrial complex to dehumanize people, make them symbiotic with machines and computers so they can perform tasks, and train them as one would train a computer in the AI neural network sense of learning.
People's cognitive processes of learning and thinking, but not people themselves, are needed as components in the complex information systems of the military and industry...Human beings...are thus further reduced to hardly animate, mental "materiel" - cognitive processing units within the interstices of large technological systems (p. 273).
The production of cognitive components for complex weapon systems - mind as materiel - is also the production of cognitive components for the global systems of information technology that are transforming the character of corporate capital (p. 290).
The programmed computer and the human problem-solver are both species belonging to the genus "information processing system". This stems from the view of the mind as a "human factor", and "arsenal" or cognitive components within complex weapons systems or advanced industrial systems (p. 278).
Needless to say, psychologists in the 50's and 60's didn't have sufficient understanding of learning principles and human cognitivist processes to make this work...
Educational technologists recognized the limitations of behaviorist principles of learning...AI researchers had inadequate understanding of human intellectual functioning in real-life situations...so they turned their attention from expert performance (i.e. top down), to learning processes (bottom up).
Instructional technology and cognitive science were integrated into "cognitive engineering", and funded by the military, who wanted:
AI, supported by the military, had two aims
Noble quotes respectable educators like Pea and Bruner, speaks of learning strategies, general processes, problem-solving, and mindfulness, but out of context, to support his own argument.
He adds, "if we are really simulating people with computers then the only way to improve people is to understand the procedures that the computer goes through and attempt to teach...people like we...teach computers" (Davis, on p. 285).
To the extent that such models and innovations take hold within the schools, they represent militarized debasement of education...because the design and production of human components appropriate for optimal performance in technological systems - rather than the fulfilment of human potential for its own sake - is the criterion of success of such "education" (p. 289).
Pea: transformative communications
Pea, R.D. (1994). Seeing what we build together: Distributed multimedia
learning environments for transformative communications. The Journal of
the Learning Sciences, 3(3), 285-299.
If we want to talk about CSCW or CSCL, we must first define communication, collaboration, and learning. Communication takes place in a social context , and also within a material environment (cf. Allen & Otto) - which we know may be mediated. There are 2 kinds of communication:
Pea says that in the transmission view, you have an authority conveying a body of information or a knowledge base. In the ritual view you have collaboration (constructivism) where through participation, people share the same knowledge - but this perpetuates sameness and tradition. Basically, whether transmitted or constructed, it's still the same body of knowledge. It's a continuum - transmit or collaborate.
The quest is to go beyond that, to expand the ways of knowing. By progressive discourse, in a sort of spiral sense, the constructing process changes the participants, including any expert who originally intended to transmit information. This gets into progressive discourse (see Bereiter), and transforms or changes all participants, as well as expanding the knowledge base. Now you are not on the continuum any more, but above it, actually pushing the frontiers of knowledge.
This is a 2-way dynamic system, changing the teacher as well as students, because students are active learners. These are highly interactive conversational exchanges requiring conjectures, responses, etc., for all participants to determine what is meant (or understood) from what is said and done. (OK, we are also going to get into metacognition here.)
Now transformative communications needs a mediated space and a set of symbols (representations) like graphs, texts, diagrams, etc. He also says that changes in communication technologies influences what messages can be produced, and shape how interactively their meanings can be formed (aha! He's on Kozma's side, not Clark's! - good man!) Then he gets into the work with Gomez and also CSILE, where you are dealing with a computer based system to support cumulative knowledge building and reflection. Yes, it is very much like our own model!
Further research needed: elucidating the concepts of communities and cultures (virtual, too!), conversational analysis in conceptual learning conversations (Scardamalia's group is working on this with the discourse analysis using e-mail and conferencing), and also dynamic diagramming tools (here's where CoVis comes in). He likes constructors (like Judah Schwartz) and simulators, where kids can construct and explore themselves, with hands-on tools. These lead to activities which can guide further exploration and help them make predictions. Third, the discourse ensues, with group sense-making activities, where peers and teachers negotiate and refine meaning. Basically, we have to go beyond asynchronous, text-only type e-mail and get into distributed multimedia environments, where we can study how discourse is carried out in specific communities of practice, leading to conceptual change. This is where it's at.
Perkins, Jay & Tishman: Mindware
Perkins, D., Jay, E., & Tishman, S. (1993). New conceptions of thinking:
from ontology to education. Educational Psychologist, 28(1), 67-85.
Definition: good thinking is thinking that achieves its ends (goal-based).
Four questions:
Two dominant views:
Three kinds of mindware:
Does general mindware really contribute to good thinking? They say yes:
Synthesis of viewpoints
Learning is a synthesis of acquiring general processes (skills & strategies), and these 3 context-specific kinds of mindware (language, structures, dispositions). We may reconcile the top-down and bottom-up viewpoints by treating particular responses to a particular situation as a spiral process. We may activate a schema, play an epistemic game, pull in the disposition of proceeding carefully, activate a more sophisticated epistemic game, etc. Some constructivist strategies can change dispositions: motivation and affective.
How is mindware acquired?
Through the development of richer conceptual categories, complex conceptual systems, and underlying values and belief structures. In the context of our culture and everyday living, this enculturation process includes:
Perkins et al. have covered three kinds of mindware, but they have left out the fourth kind, i.e., attitudes. If they include them under dispositions, then they should explicitly say so. Dispositions or tendencies trigger action or other sorts of mindware.
Phillips: on narrative research
Phillips, D.C. (1994). Telling it straight: Issues in assessing narrative
researach. Educational Psychologist, 29(1), 13-21.
Phillips' focus is on narrative and story: how should we judge the claims of knowledge embedded within a narrative? Remember: at RMC narratives are judged by the power to evoke, convince, elicit our support or concern; they are often used as adjuncts to quantitative data, to give some insight into individuals' thinking processes and attitudes. Fernstemacher & Richardson point this out in their critique of this paper: they can't guarantee that the narrative is "true"; "believability" is more like it.
Phillips takes an anthropomorphic view: an event is understood to have been explained when its role and significance in relation to a human projects is identified - not when that event is an instantiation of an established law or pattern of relationships. Here, we're talking consensus vs. theory or body of knowledge: narrative research uses the idean of a scholarly consensus as the test of verisimilitude, rather than the test of logical or mathematical validity. The idea is to construct an animating, evocative description of human actions, behaviors, intentions, and experiences as we meet them in life.
How do we judge narrative? First, plausibility; but plausibility is not the same as truth. If the narrative is incorrect, then any action we take based upon it is likely to be incorrect, or will not bring about the anticipated results. Credibility tells us nothing about truth or falsity of a story.
A story is true if it has survived some epistemically relevant test or examination. And to judge the truthfulness of the narrator, we've got to know his/her beliefs and intentions. His/her beliefs may be unfounded or untrue, or biased in some way - they may not correspond to reality.
A narrative may serve as a justification or a rationalization, not an explanation. He also points out that pro-narrative researchers tend to have socio-political rather than epistemic grounds for their enthusiasm.
In conclusion, you should believe a story, not because it is credible or incredible, but bcause my eyewitness testimony is epistemically relevant - provided I am an unbiased, truth-telling, narrator without a vested interest or motive. That's the bottom line.
Prawat & Floden: 3 perspectives on constructivism
Prawat, R.S., & Floden, R.E. (1994). Philosophical perspectives on
constructivist views of learning. Educational Psychology, 29(1), 37-48.
They examine social construction of knowledge, and negotiation of meaning, from 3 viewponts:
They are on the side of the social constructivists who say that knowledge evolves through a process of negotiation within discourse communities and that the products of this activity - like those of any other human activity - are influenced by cultural and historical factors.
They describe each approach. The IP view says that a belief is truthful to the extent that it accurately represents what is outside the mind; mental structures must correlate with or correspond to those structures afforded by the environment. The radical constructivist (organismic) approach says that truth is some sort of idealized rational acceptability - some sort of ideal coherence of our beliefs with each other. The contextualists (transactional) approach relies on verification linked to actions and events.
The first two approaches assume that mental activity occurs deep within the human mind: mental activity results in an abstract representation of the most important structure provided by the environment; or coherence ("rightness", within an order one establishes one's self). The contextualists, in contrast, locate the mental prcess on the periphery between the organism and the environment (like Allen & Otto). Perception is defined interactively, rather than just the passive reception of stimuli.
They quote Neisser, who says that mental images derived from perceptual schemata represent the anticipatory phase of the perceptual process: ideas "educate attention", allowing us to access aspects of our environment that would otherwise be ignored or overlooked. Individuals, together, prepare a kind of plan for picking up information from the environment; like Dewey, they "anticipate together".
Next, they talk about negotiation (social). The first aspect emphasises the importance of compromise and consensus building, and participants then own the result of the barganing process. The second aspect is like negotiating a winding road, where obstacles such as common misunderstandings or preconceived notions are brought out into the open and clarified. This leads to research, and provides motivation for learning, as distinct from "bargaining".
Then they say how each viewpoint deals with learning.
Now, how do we put this into practice in a classroom? Striking the right balance between honoring the individual student's own effort to construct meaning (subjective) whle steering the group toward some intellectually honest (objective) construction of meaning, is the "constructivist dilemma". Some helpful hints are to use analogies and metaphors, and also to have students think aloud (those who talk more learn more from group discussions than those who keep silent). Other than that - no answers.
Roschelle & Clancy: Learning as social and
neural
Roschelle, J., & Clancey, W.J. (1992). Learning as social and neural.
Educational Psychologist, 27(4), 435-453.
Learning is an iterative process. It's the mental coordination of a continual loop of perception, action, and recomposition of existing cognitive structures occurring in small increments, vs. applying pre-existing cognitive structures to social or perceptual interactions, thereby producing a more complex structure. (Cf. Piaget: when you see something new, you place it in an existing context.)
Learning occurs through the process of enculturation by:
Basically, a representation (cf. Horton) is a presentation + mind (with a foggy filter) + context (inner and outer). Mutual intelligibility means you relate words to what you see in the representation. Shared activities lead to shared understanding, so you can work functionally in a community of learners.
The goal of learning is to help the learner become functionally compatible with the community of subject matter experts in a manner which was once unknown to the learner; i.e., to change the way a learner thinks about, approaches, and solves problems encountered in the real world. Thus learning requires crossing a large gap in perspective and practice; it requires becoming a member of a community of observers that sees and acts in ways that are first incomprehensible or imperceptible to a newcomer.
Roschelle and Clancey have finally clarified the concept of the thermodynamic efficiency of learning as externalization of function and representation in the learning environment. This is precisely where the Allen & Otto paper confused me. These authors have implicitly worked the concept of the formation of new categories of knowledge into chaos theory, in a parallel and consistent way with how normal peopleŐs visual receptors work when viewing visual stimuli (Scientific American circa 1990). Here, instead of one brain and a pair of eyes which chaotically view the stimulus and settle in on an attractor state, we have a pair of learners who are attempting to do a similar thing with the Envisioning Machine. On p. 449 they even state that "at the level of neural architecture, the formation of new categories looks more like chaotic settling into a new activation state, rather than incremental modification of existing structures".
The analogy really makes sense! IsnŐt the trial and error process nothing more than chaotic effort, which eventually settled down into a stable state of mutual intelligibility and shared symbolic notation? Moreover, chaos theory says that the state of a system is critically dependent on its initial conditions. Here, the state of the constructed learning depends on both the initial concepts or misconceptions which the learners bring to the situation and the context in which it takes place.
As people with non-normal brains fail to generate a chaotic state when viewing stimuli, but maintain a totally fixed response, scientists (even the greatest of them!) fail to drop their misconceptions when new information doesnŐt fit into their pre-existing schema. This is why scientists must suspend disbelief, and be prepared when new paradigm shifts like relativity theory and wave-particle duality occur. Nobody says itŐs easy. Even experts like Steven Weinberg or Albert Einstein have failed in this; but itŐs the way true scientific discourse proceeds, and new knowledge is constructed.
Back to Roschelle & Clancy: implications:
Roger Schank: Goal-Based Scenarios
Schank, R.C., Fano, A., Bell, B., & Jona, M. (1994). The design of
goal-based scenarios. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 3(4), 305-345.
They propose a structure and a set of design criteria for learn-by-doing environments that enable students to work towards desired goals by teaching them a set of target skills required to reach a specific goal. The goal has to be of inherent interest to the students, and also authentic; and the skills necessary to accomplish it have to be the skills that the designer wants the students to learn.
A goal-based scenario (GBS) is a type of learn-by-doing task with very specific constraints on the selection of material to be taught, the goals the student will pursue, the environment in which the student will work, the tasks the student will perform, and the resources made available to the student. It is an approach to teaching, not a type of educational software, though most GBSs are computer-based. It is not appropriate for learning facts.
The GBS shares with cognitive apprenticeship an emphasis on practicing skills within an authentic context. It also is like anchored instruction (situated activity and authentic practice of skills); but it differs from anchored instruction in that anchored instruction attempts to provide opportunities for teacher-guided discovery, whereas GBSs try to create environments in which the target issues arise naturally in the course of the student pursuing the defined objective.
Examples:
GBSs are used to teach skills (the ability to execute plans to achieve a set of goals) and to enable students to understand the functioning of complex systems (e.g. circulatory system, car engine, etc.) Like sitcog, skills have to be practiced in a meaningful, appropriate context. The skills have to empower the student to achieve a valued class of goals previously beyond his/her reach.
The environment has to create conditions that produce strong intrinsic motivation to learn (not extrinsic rewards). Relevance has to be made apparent to the student. (recall ARCS). Like B&S and Intentional Learning, learning itself has to be a goal above and beyond the requirements of a particular task.
GBS components:
Design criteria:
Scott et al.: Computers, education, & cultural
constructivism
Scott, T., Cole, M., & Engel, M. (1992). Computers and Education: A
Cultural Constructivist Perspective. Review of Research in Education, 18,
191-251.
This is a very long lit review on the use of computers in education from a cultural constructivist approach. This assumes not only an active child but an equally active and usually more powerful adult in interaction (i.e. a teacher). This viewpoint emphasizes that all human activity is mediated by cultural artifacts, which themselves have been constructed over the course of human history.
They start with the military origins of computer-based education, then civilian; then some recent research on gender and ethnicity; and finally, some computer education projects seen in wider social contexts, and finally, evaluation issues. Some highlights of their discussion:
Their conclusions:
Tripp: Stone Canoe
Tripp, S. (1994). Reverse engineering the "Stone Canoe". Paper
presented as part of a discussion at the 1994 AECT Convention, Nashville.
His argument is that design encompasses both propsitions (theory) and artifacts. Empirical study of the history of artifacts does not reveal that they typically derive either deductively or historically from abstract designs (theory), though they may be influenced by theory. Thus, he wants to move from artifacts to generate theories, and uses as his example the study of Pacific navigation with its artifact, the stone canoe.
Some of his comments are:
begin with applied knowledge in simple form; teach complex skills later;
use only as much reality as necessary (ref. Dale's cone);
you may use the same media for two different purposes;
mnemonics are very useful for memory aids;
embed declarative knowledge in meaningful contexts;
affective factors are important, so give students a sense of importance
of their work.
Turkle & Papert: Feminism and the "soft" approach to
computers
Turkle, S., & Papert, S. (1991). Epistemological pluralism and the
revaluation of the concrete. In I. Harel & S. Papert (Eds.).
Constructionism. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
The first time through, I was convinced that this was just blatant feminism; but actually, they're trying to see both sides. Icons are OK; not that formal methods are the only way. On women and computers: they don't want to talk about rules that keep them out, but ways of thinking that make them reluctant to join in. There are 3 trends:
As a result, a computer that can bring the abstract down to the concrete makes a dramatic statement for pluralism. It can be an expressive medium for personal styles, and a carrier for pluralistic ideas.
Many women prefer to play with the elements or objects of a program, to move them around as if they were objects, rather than use the top-down, rule-driven, hierarchical structure of FORTRAN or the modular programming of Pascal. They prefer a negotiational approach and concrete forms of reasoning (as in the arts) to abstract thinking and systematic planning (as in the scientific method). They like transparency. This is called the "soft approach" (like the "dump and taste" method to cooking, rather than following a recipe; like standing back and looking at a painting before putting more brushstrokes in; like the sculptor who lets his chiseling be guided by the quality of the stone). Not that it's less disciplined; it's flexible, non-hierarchical, open to a close connection with the object of study.
Developmentally, kids form either a close or distant relationship to the world of things; later on the tendency to use abstract/analytic or concrete/negotiational style follows. Moreover, they say that these 2 approaches are not invariably associated with gender, but more with individual style. So it's not necessarily women who like Macs, and men who like DOS, though statistically it works out this way. They want to see both approaches facilitated; those who insist on using only the "hard approach" constitute an epistemological elite.
Levi-Strauss talks about "bricolage" - this means to construct theories by arranging and rearranging, by negotiating and renegotiating with a set of well-known materials. For planners, mistakes are mis-steps; bricoleurs navigate with midcourse corrections. They build the whole by letting a part grow into the whole, not by making replicable pieces and connecting them logically.
The "soft approach" also means putting yourself close to the object, rather than distancing yourself from it and being objective. Rather than acting on objects, they place themselves among the objects. This leads to relational thinking: how objects interact with each other. More feminism: girls prefer attachments, whereas boys prefer boundaries. Men see a hierarchy of autonomous positions; women see a web of interconnections among people. Boys think of the computer as a thing they can control; girls tend to anthromorphize it and consider it something they can relate with informally. Men like computers because they can be alone with them; women perceive them as dangerous because they demand separation from others.
Wilson: Connectionism notes for class
Two models of cognition:
Neural networks have 3 advantages over IP:
Connectionism and behaviorism both rely on associations (task-learning; S-R).
Situated cognition challenges the proposition that memory structures literally exist as representations in the mind. It shares with postmodernism an emphasis on every, context-based, social cognition. It also resembles Schon's reflective practice (reflection in action). All 3 refuse to reduce human expertise down to mental machinations, whether IP or connectionist, or any form of AI.
In sitcog, knowledge is composed of 3 facets:
Wilson: Constructivism and ID
Wilson, B.G. (1994). Reflections on Constructivism and instructional
design. To appear in C.Dills and A. Romiszowski (Eds.), Instructional
Development: The State of the Art. Englewood Cliffs NJ: Educational
Technology Publications.
This book chapter is a narrative of Brent's personal professional beliefs about ID. The main question is: are ID and constructivism mutually exclusive? If learners construct their own knowledge, then where does ID fit in? Some major issues to consider:
Traditionally, ID theories are prescriptive: they provide recipes or heuristics for doing designs, and they specify what the end-product instruction should look like.
As a result, the status of ID is unclear. If we want ID to help people achieve expertise, then we have to re-think what expertise really is:
If ID theories are rule-based, and expertise is not, then perhaps ID theories are only suited to CBI. Novices can grasp onto rules and recipes to support initial performance. Experts can't usually verbalize what they know or do; these are collapsed procedures. SME's know the content best but often have the least access to it. Moreover, to go beyone mediocre, rule-based ID, the designer also needs to know the content deeply. Perhaps the IF-THEN rules of AI can't capture true design expertise. For good design, the designer and the SME have to collaborate deeply.
The cooperative metaphor: there are two kinds of technologies:
Here lies the problem. Nowadays, people are dealing with teaching as an exploitative art, not as a cooperative art - which is what it should be. As a result, ID is given a manipulative, objectivist bent. It starts by analyzing the content to be taught, the tasks, uses a top-down approach, and ends with paper-based tests for assessment. It's based on the conditions-of-learning paradigm (Gagne), which says you figure out what kind of learning you have - concept, attitude, etc. - and apply the set of strategies appropriate for teaching it. The schemes instructional designers apply to their content constrain and shape that content, necessarily distorting it to fit their preconceived notions. They constrain what is to be learned, just as the conceptual schemes (and the limitations of our sensory perceptions!) that we apply to the world constrain that world - the selective filter idea.
Eisner sums it up: knowledge is rooted in experience and requires a form for its representation. But all forms of representation constrain what can be represented, so they can only partially represent what we know, and they limit what we seek - that's why we need social construction of knowledge.
What's the role of the designer? To design a series of information-rich experiences, interactions, environments, or products, that are intended to help students learn effectively. Learning environments, not CBI. Design is still there, but it's less analytical, and relies more on the cooperation of teachers, learners, and materials, to fill in the gaps left by our analytical tools.
Implications for design:
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Management Product
Lorraine Sherry