One of the main reason for this blog is to be used as a channel between me and my students. It is not the only channel, but it is the one where I can express in more detail my thoughts about how we are going.
We are in the middle of an interesting situation. I changed my mind two weeka ago about how to proceed in the sessions. I am introducing some changes this year, and because of that last sessions (number 7 and 8) were new and different.
They were quite intense and complex in my opinion, although interesting at the same time. I have doubts about their usefulness though. Sometimes it is hard to explain topics you need some perspective to be understood. We lack that perspective now, probably.
Part of my hypothesis is that my students of Developmental Psychology in the Faculty of Education (bilingual group) will experience some kind of developmental changes during our semester together. That includes me to some extent, of course. I am one more with the group. Six months is probably enough to experience a transformation in what might be termed as a learning conception (van Rossum and Hamer, 2010).
We explored our learning conceptions last Wednesday 23rd of October. The procedure was the following one, a typical session where there are several levels of work going on (at least theoretically):
1. Direction: make a graph of your interest marking a score between 0 and 10 every 10´of the session.
2. Creation of five groups.
3. Discuss about what does it mean learning for you and write a group definition as: Our conception of learning is....
4. Share that definition in padlet (a digital board where each group could share their outputs).
5. Fill up an individual questionnaire to choose between six different formal learning conceptions (following the work of Erik van Rossum and Rebeca Hammer).
6. We show the results briefly using mentimeter. Most students (33%) used the third conception: learning means to apply what you know. This was closely followed (30%) by the fifth conception, a kind of relativistic learning coming from dialogue after taking different perspectives. This was a surprise for me as it is a quite advanced stage. I will comment this later. Next conceptions were the most complex of all (understanding learning as personal developmental change, you change as a person when you learn genuinely) and the most simple of all (you learn when you can get as much information as you can). Finally learning as memory (2º conception) and as reflection (4º conception) were the last ones.
7. Read the definition of the following group after yours and justify what learning conception fits better their definition.
8. Read the comments you received and justify if you agree or disagree with it. You can also share what do you think or feel after reading that comment (I did not include formally this one, but it was implied).
9. Read in groups three conflict situations between a teacher and his/her students and try to connect wether there is any relationship between those teaching scenarios and what we have been doing so far (about learning conceptions).
It is not easy to explore a phenomena using the same phenomena to explore itself. I mean it is the typical recursive situation we deal with so often in developmental psychology. All of us have a learning conception and we learn FROM it, we make use of it in order to make sense of our teaching-learning context. This session was actually designed to make more explicit or objetify our learning conceptions. We use our learning conceptions so that we can notice them better in contrast to other's learning conceptions (at least if there is a variety of possibilities).
As I said before the results were interesting as the showed something I expected: most students conveying a conception of learning based in using what you know. It was not so expected to find that a similar amount of them were in an advanced learning conception based on dialogical processes. That's why the qualitative definitions were useful. Not because of the definition of course, but the justifications of it.
The first group started quite well. The wrote this:
"Learning means adquire new knowledge in order to develop yourself, get new experiences and achieve your goals by putting effort, working constantly with positive attitude, being tenacious, questioning, joining ideas and as consecuence your way of thinkig changes and you become open minded. "
I write in blue the most interesting pieces. Although I would not use "adquire" to talk about learning as it could imply getting something from outside to inside (your brain, your mind, your head, etc...). This is a typical metaphor. In the best scenario you would get or achieve of adquire information instead of knowledge. Knowledge as learning needs construction, elaboration. Knowledge is in a higher logical position compared to information, and it is usually misunderstood as information. However the following ideas expressed in the quote lead us toward something related to the sixth learning conception. You learn when you develop as a whole, as a person, when you are becoming someone else through the positive attitude, questioning yourself, etc etc.. The group who commented this were right when identified it to the sixth conception. Really good for me to find this in a group of first course, really promising.
The second group wrote this:
"During our whole lifes, we are exposed to tones of information. We are those in charge of retaining, digesting and absorbing all that knowledge, so that in a close future, we can turn this information into skills, which will help us in our personal development. But this is not just about memorizing and vomiting information, sharing this information with the others is also a way to learn, because as Anton Chekhov once said, "Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice."
This interesting quote show us in my opinion an illustration of a transitional conception between conception 2 (learning as remembering and memorizing) and 3 (learning a using your knowledge). The verbs used exposed, digest, absorb are quite close to the passive metaphor of remembering just as getting information. But they move from here to apply what they know. They realize they can go further using what they know. This is what I would have expected in this first course. It is interesting the comment they got from G1 students, a good opportunity to test their mental sophistication:
"we consider that learning is more than just information but more about experiences. The fact that learning is part of development means that it includes more components. They didn't mention how do you learn. Their deinition is related with the first learning conception because they think it only matters when is put in practice"
They identify correctly in general that the group is the what we know as the third learning conception (they say the first because it appeared the first in the brief questionnaire they filled up). In the first part of the comment they comment from their own developmental perspective, they are aware their understanding learning as merely applying information is not enough. They understand this because they are in a higher perspective. They could not notice it otherwise.
The group number 3 wrote this:
"Learning is the process in which a person acquire knowledge, experiences or abilities during his life by watching, reading, repeating, listening. This could be an example of the different ways of learning as it depends on each person and situation.
Another way of learning could be by amending previous mistakes."
We are in the middle of an interesting situation. I changed my mind two weeka ago about how to proceed in the sessions. I am introducing some changes this year, and because of that last sessions (number 7 and 8) were new and different.
They were quite intense and complex in my opinion, although interesting at the same time. I have doubts about their usefulness though. Sometimes it is hard to explain topics you need some perspective to be understood. We lack that perspective now, probably.
Part of my hypothesis is that my students of Developmental Psychology in the Faculty of Education (bilingual group) will experience some kind of developmental changes during our semester together. That includes me to some extent, of course. I am one more with the group. Six months is probably enough to experience a transformation in what might be termed as a learning conception (van Rossum and Hamer, 2010).
We explored our learning conceptions last Wednesday 23rd of October. The procedure was the following one, a typical session where there are several levels of work going on (at least theoretically):
1. Direction: make a graph of your interest marking a score between 0 and 10 every 10´of the session.
2. Creation of five groups.
3. Discuss about what does it mean learning for you and write a group definition as: Our conception of learning is....
4. Share that definition in padlet (a digital board where each group could share their outputs).
5. Fill up an individual questionnaire to choose between six different formal learning conceptions (following the work of Erik van Rossum and Rebeca Hammer).
6. We show the results briefly using mentimeter. Most students (33%) used the third conception: learning means to apply what you know. This was closely followed (30%) by the fifth conception, a kind of relativistic learning coming from dialogue after taking different perspectives. This was a surprise for me as it is a quite advanced stage. I will comment this later. Next conceptions were the most complex of all (understanding learning as personal developmental change, you change as a person when you learn genuinely) and the most simple of all (you learn when you can get as much information as you can). Finally learning as memory (2º conception) and as reflection (4º conception) were the last ones.
7. Read the definition of the following group after yours and justify what learning conception fits better their definition.
8. Read the comments you received and justify if you agree or disagree with it. You can also share what do you think or feel after reading that comment (I did not include formally this one, but it was implied).
9. Read in groups three conflict situations between a teacher and his/her students and try to connect wether there is any relationship between those teaching scenarios and what we have been doing so far (about learning conceptions).
It is not easy to explore a phenomena using the same phenomena to explore itself. I mean it is the typical recursive situation we deal with so often in developmental psychology. All of us have a learning conception and we learn FROM it, we make use of it in order to make sense of our teaching-learning context. This session was actually designed to make more explicit or objetify our learning conceptions. We use our learning conceptions so that we can notice them better in contrast to other's learning conceptions (at least if there is a variety of possibilities).
As I said before the results were interesting as the showed something I expected: most students conveying a conception of learning based in using what you know. It was not so expected to find that a similar amount of them were in an advanced learning conception based on dialogical processes. That's why the qualitative definitions were useful. Not because of the definition of course, but the justifications of it.
The first group started quite well. The wrote this:
"Learning means adquire new knowledge in order to develop yourself, get new experiences and achieve your goals by putting effort, working constantly with positive attitude, being tenacious, questioning, joining ideas and as consecuence your way of thinkig changes and you become open minded. "
I write in blue the most interesting pieces. Although I would not use "adquire" to talk about learning as it could imply getting something from outside to inside (your brain, your mind, your head, etc...). This is a typical metaphor. In the best scenario you would get or achieve of adquire information instead of knowledge. Knowledge as learning needs construction, elaboration. Knowledge is in a higher logical position compared to information, and it is usually misunderstood as information. However the following ideas expressed in the quote lead us toward something related to the sixth learning conception. You learn when you develop as a whole, as a person, when you are becoming someone else through the positive attitude, questioning yourself, etc etc.. The group who commented this were right when identified it to the sixth conception. Really good for me to find this in a group of first course, really promising.
The second group wrote this:
"During our whole lifes, we are exposed to tones of information. We are those in charge of retaining, digesting and absorbing all that knowledge, so that in a close future, we can turn this information into skills, which will help us in our personal development. But this is not just about memorizing and vomiting information, sharing this information with the others is also a way to learn, because as Anton Chekhov once said, "Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice."
This interesting quote show us in my opinion an illustration of a transitional conception between conception 2 (learning as remembering and memorizing) and 3 (learning a using your knowledge). The verbs used exposed, digest, absorb are quite close to the passive metaphor of remembering just as getting information. But they move from here to apply what they know. They realize they can go further using what they know. This is what I would have expected in this first course. It is interesting the comment they got from G1 students, a good opportunity to test their mental sophistication:
"we consider that learning is more than just information but more about experiences. The fact that learning is part of development means that it includes more components. They didn't mention how do you learn. Their deinition is related with the first learning conception because they think it only matters when is put in practice"
They identify correctly in general that the group is the what we know as the third learning conception (they say the first because it appeared the first in the brief questionnaire they filled up). In the first part of the comment they comment from their own developmental perspective, they are aware their understanding learning as merely applying information is not enough. They understand this because they are in a higher perspective. They could not notice it otherwise.
The group number 3 wrote this:
"Learning is the process in which a person acquire knowledge, experiences or abilities during his life by watching, reading, repeating, listening. This could be an example of the different ways of learning as it depends on each person and situation.
Another way of learning could be by amending previous mistakes."
Once again we have this verb: acquire, although this time is not just for knoledge, but also experiences and abilities. The verbs and processes are watching, reading, repeating, listening. Not really sophisticated processes I am afraid. According to this this quote could be an illustration of a learning conception 2 towards 3. At the end they include an interesting nuance when saying you learn through amending previous mistakes. There is no formal specification of a process of reflection, of formal thinking. It is implied but not directly stated. Experience matters and you can learn from it although it is not specified how. That's why I is in between 2 and 3 for me.
The main comment they got (from G2) was: "Knowing what is te main information and remember it" is the statement which suits group 3s opinion about learning". There is no further justification. They evaluate it as learning conception 2 (item 2) not seeing more nuances. Curiously the position them from their perspective (between 2 and 3) as being in 2. I guess it would have been difficult to evaluate them in a higher perspective that the one they locate themselves. Just a hypothesis.
Group four:
"Learning is observing, analysing, being aware of your surroundings, interiorising concepts, critical thinking. As well as the accumulation of your past, present and future over and over repeated experiences."
This verbs for me, are related to reflective processes, so learning conception 4. Although the quote is not the best example of reflection being as brief as it is. I don't understand what they mean in the last sentence. In some way it is the opposite to the first part: experience and what we learn from them do not accumulate. Maybe they talk about habits or automatized behaviour we repeat. There is some tension between both parts of the quote. So for me they are in between learning conception 3 and 4 (closer to 3 actually).
The comment they get from G3 is "Above all to be able to reflect by oneself", so they identify it correctly (in general). Curiously according to G4, they position themselves in a higher learning conception "We agree with this definition. However, we think that is also about "getting to know yourself and being genuine" and "Relativize and being able to see a situation from different perspectives". It is an interesting example of saying something but proving other. I do not think the statement is an illustration of 5 and 6 conceptions. But it is good having those higher conceptions as a goal.
Finally group 5:
"Learning is the acquisition of information that will run into knowledge once you have internalized it. It isn’t necessary to be related to theoretical contents, but also you can learn competences and acquire abilities like learning to play a sport or getting confidence enough to talk in front of a large audience.
It is not only important receiving information from external sources, but developing critical thinking in order to compare our prior knowledge (what we already knew) with the new information. "
It is probably the best example of a fourth learning conception as they highlight cognitive processes (criticize, compare) you can do with different informational sources (theory, competences). They differentiate well information from knowledge.
Group 4 misunderstands the statement as an example of learning conception 3 or 5: "We think that this definition fits with the statement: "know to apply what you know" because the definition uses examples of practical situations" "As a second option, the statement: "Relativize and being able to see a situation from different perspectives" as they said "it is important to develop the critical thinking"". Group 4 members see themselves clearly in conception 4: "we think that its not about applying what you know but about reflexing about what we know and the best way to apply it". This comment is interesting because it shows how they are in between learning conception 3 and 4, although probably closer to 4.
I don't care where are really situated my studens according to these learning conceptions. What I want is to reflect with them about how we can analyze their statements and their implicit meanings. And I do this because on one hand I want they understand better this theoretical model. And using it, on the other hand, I want to facilitate most of them come from a learning conception 3 towards the fourth. They need to think more from concrete examples to develop more abstract reasoning. And of course think about themselves noticing what is more usual to them and more challenging. What learning conception they maintain and its consequences in the quality and potential to their learning.
I think that probably the best opportunity to see their learning conceptions in action is in their comments to their mates. Not in the first part when defining their conceptions when you are more aware of what you are doing. In this second part you evaluate from your own perspective. You notice what you can, so to speak.
According to van Rossum and Hamer (2017) the great divide comes when transiting from learning conception 3 towards 4. That's the key learning conception transformation.
It is good for me to find examples of students in my class which show (not only say) evidences of performing from that fourth conception. However most of them are still below that, as expected. The main results in the questionnaire illustrate for me, that they understand learning as applying knowledge and also commenting and discussing what they know, their OPINIONS, although not necessarily justifying those opinions (as would be a good performance of learning conception 4). My hypothesis is that they understood the item of relativistic knoledge, coming from differents perspectives as an example of what William Perry defended as "multiplicity": sharing opinions.
As I can see in the conversational groups we have in class it is not easy to share different opinions grounded in arguments. Not only being able to share and respect different opinions but also being able to discuss and evaluate them in detail, with arguments. It takes time to be involved and touched in real dialogues I am afraid. But we will have opportunities of this.
The best comment I received after this session was this 7 session was this:
"Do we really need 2 hours to define a word?"
It is really great. This person was evaluating the session from his or her perspective. I absolutely agree with him or her. No, we do not need 2 hours to define learning (although we could depending on what we have to define). For him or her that's what we were doing. Merely defining learning. I hope he or she can better understand know that we were actually doing more that. Performing our learnind conceptions, objectify it in order to notice them better, and being able to reflect on that about how does it match our personal learning conception being aware of its positive and negative consequences goes beyond merely defining something. And it is even more difficult doing this in english and while doing another performance: evaluating the interest of the session, every 10 minutes. You had to manage your attention in order to do that in order to provide a living example of a developmental process: our flowing interest in something.
I am sure this topic is quite complex, it is a good example of one of the topics of this subject we are dealing with. In session 8 I could give a direct explanation of these theoretical distinctions in the context of the mental complexity demands of the 21st Century.
If we attend to the impact of these two sessions we can make some preliminary conclusions.
Session 8 had a peak in the perception of complexity (4,8). It's been the most complex session so far according to your perception. It is interesting that the rest of the variables are going down at the same time (interest (3,4), usefulness (3,6), confortability (3,6) and joy) (3,1). It was an interesting example of turning point for me as the levels of the variables started to grow a little afterwards (only as complexity came back to its usual levels). In contrast, previous session 7 was perceived as one of the funniest (4,8) and more confortable (4,6), although not so complex (3), interesting (3,9) and useful, (3,6).
According to the graph I guess the topic of learning conception is still in process of being understood. Something normal for me. I hope this post helps to understand in more detail what we were doing, that was going beyond merely defining learning.
References
Hamer, R., & van Rossum, E. J. (2017). Six languages in education—Looking for postformal thinking. Behavioral Development Bulletin, 22(2), 377.
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario