Week 7: Learning Theories as Frameworks for Teaching

I continue to draw connections between this course and courses I've previously taken here at UIC as part of this program, which is fun. This week as I read both the Khazan and Bruner pieces, I thought a lot about an educational psychology class I'd taken in my first semester, especially as I revisited Bruner's discussion of Piaget and the ideas about activating students' schema to engage and increase curiosity, and to help give students a context for new information.

In educational psychology, curiosity is a huge driver of intrinsic motivation, which is important to the learning process. Something stuck out to me, then, when Bruner wrote that "[w]here grades are used as a substitute for the reward of understanding, it may well be that learning will cease as soon as grades are no longer given--at graduation" (pg. 51). Since grades are the epitome of extrinsic motivation, is there a way for us to ensure (or at least promote) lifelong learning while in primary and secondary school? Or, on a different tack, is this statement from Bruner an entrance into an argument supporting that we get rid of grades altogether? (This is something that appeals to me very much.) Bruner's reading might support this, since he writes of giving students the experience of discovery, and of giving them learning episodes that are "packed" in order that they come away having not only learned but also having a greater sense of agency as people in the world.

I also responded to Bruner's idea to get a student to work through difficult material might be "to challenge him [or her, or they, Bruner...] with a chance to exercise his full powers" (pg. 50). Last week's Rosenshine reading was promoting the pedagogical practice of asking questions in the classroom both for scaffolding as well as for assessment. Could the practice of asking good questions be a way to get students to "exercise [their] full powers"?

Quickly, I also enjoyed Khazan's article. While short, it was interesting to read about something that is still too commonly touted in schools: the "learning styles" idea. The professor of the ed. psych. class I'd taken also debunked this, and it was fascinating to think about education--like so many other fields, professions, industries--running with an idea because it sounds good, because it makes a good buzzword (buzzterm?) I'm definitely going to share this one with my colleagues. The psychologists in my division will be very happy.

Comments

  1. AnonymousFebruary 27, 2019 at 3:29 PM

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  2. AnonymousFebruary 27, 2019 at 3:31 PM

    Thank you for sharing.
    Firstly, I appreciate that you can draw connections between different courses, which I think is an effective learning method. In addition, I think you have raised a good question. Indeed, curiosity is important to the learning process. It can constitute the learning motivation for students to a certain extent. Therefore, primary and secondary school teachers should encourage students to take the initiative to learn and help them form the habit of learning. Primary and secondary school period is an important stage in developing good habits, and the correct guidance of teachers will be helpful for students to have a lifelong study. As for the grades, I personally think it is quite necessary because it helps teachers to evaluate students' learning situation. But teachers should not entirely focus on student grades, otherwise, they will feel a lot of pressure and lose their motivation of learning.

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  3. SteveFebruary 28, 2019 at 5:25 AM

    Thanks for the blog! I appreciated the thoughtful questions. I understand the desire to ditch the idea of grades altogether. It's bad that the students care about getting an "A" more than anything in the process of learning, and that too often classes revolve around producing gradeable artifacts like homework papers or bubble tests with little connection to the real world. But I think that it's sort of also like Churchill or someone said of democracy, that it's the "worst system of government in the world, except for all the others." Or maybe capitalism with its system of rewards for productivity is a better example of something that can be bad in many ways but is also better than anything else we've tried before. I think the key as an educator is to do the best you can to tether grades to authentic learning experiences, to spark curiosity by presenting interesting material in interesting ways, and create experiences for students that they can understand would be useful in the future. That is, we have to do the best we can within the system we have, rather than hope for a new system. Thank you again for the post!

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  4. AnonymousFebruary 28, 2019 at 12:50 PM

    Thank you for your blog. I am interested in what you mentioned about the grades. I think grades might be a relatively direct way to evaluate the learning outcomes, but it is insufficient. Testing can help teachers to find students' problems about the learning content and their teaching problems, then they can adjust their teaching strategies through analyzing the grades. However, grades should not be regarded as the purpose of learning. If the educational goals become lead students to get good grades, I think it is sad. No matter what methods educators use to assess students' achievements, it should be remembered that the key of education is not just teaching the knowledge itself to students, but the skills students need for lifelong learning.

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  5. Yesenia BuenoFebruary 28, 2019 at 3:25 PM

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  6. Yesenia BuenoFebruary 28, 2019 at 3:29 PM

    Hello, and thank you for sharing your thoughts on the readings. I enjoyed the question/interpretation you posed in regards to Bruner's statement "[w]here grades are used as a substitute for the reward of understanding, it may well be that learning will cease as soon as grades are no longer given--at graduation" (pg. 51). I think we share the same sentiment;I also find the idea of ditching grades altogether appealing. I think grading hinders the actual learning process that is discussed in this week's reading and think it can be distracting to students in the same way high stakes testing distracts students, schools, administrators and educators alike. I feel like grading has the capability to inadvertently and negatively label students and it strays educators away from developing a students' skills productively with the very limited classroom time. Grading can also add unnecessary pressure on educators to obtain certain "standards" when truly everyone's learning is unique and not so compartmentalized as discussed in Khazan's "The Myth of Learning Styles." I do believe that assessments should occur to measure learning perhaps just not in a format that results in a grade.

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