Socratic Questions – Guides for Going Beyond Knowledge and Understanding
Educators in all settings are becoming more and more aware of recent research on brain-based learning. This research seems to confirm what some have believed for decades – active involvement produces better learning than passive attendance. Questioning has long been a way to involve learners but upon examination, it would appear the vast majority of the kinds of questions teachers and instructors ask are limited to the lower-level intellectual processes of recall and comprehension. If students could remember a concept and then restate what it means in their own words, they had learned. However, we now know the importance of including higher-level questions in our instruction. Unfortunately, there is often a gap between knowing we need to do something and knowing how to do it. Yes, you know you need to ask different questions, but how do you know you are asking the right questions? The kinds of questions needed … Read More..
A Blueprint for Developing Questions – Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning
Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning is arguably the most recognizable educational resource ever published. The original, published in 1956, was the result of work begun in 1948 by psychologist Benjamin Bloom and other colleagues as a means of categorizing educational goals. By the time research was complete, Bloom and his colleagues presented their work as representative of the levels of human intellectual or cognitive thinking. For educators, the taxonomy of educational objectives became a taxonomy of levels or learning. There were six levels and in the 1990′s one of Bloom’s students, Lorin Anderson, revised the original with more precise language. Here are the original labels and their revisions. Level 1: From Knowledge to Remembering Level 2: From Comprehension to Understanding Level 3: From Application to Applying Level 4: From Analysis to Analysing Level 5: From Synthesis to Evaluating Level 6: From Evaluation to Creating At first glance, the changes appear minor, … Read More..
Lectures in Experience-Based Learning – Will They Go the Way of the Dinosaur?
Lectures have been the “whipping boy” of educational reformers for well over a hundred years. Challenges to the effectiveness of traditional approaches to education begin with castigating the passive nature of the lecture process. Proponents of discovery learning and experience-based learning and student-centered learning and inquiry communities all point to the picture of students all over the world sleeping peacefully in their seats while the lecturer drones on and on. This, they say, is hard evidence of the need for a different approach. Granted we now know active participation on the part of the learner makes learning possible. Brain research indicates what educational reformers have believed for decades is true – passive learning is hardly optimal. To many, nothing better epitomizes passive education than the lecture method. However, is it conceivable for a good teacher to infuse some principles of experience-based learning into a traditional lecture? Here are four ingredients … Read More..
Social Learning Theory and Student Success
Perhaps one of the biggest challenges as an instructor is not simply motivating learners, but continuing to engage, hold the attention, and inspire them to remain active participants throughout the learning experience. More recently, Social Learning Theories, and their practical application, are being explored as a means for improving learner success by offering a more interactive and guided – rather than dictated – learning environment. The instructional shift from dictatorship to instructional guide creates a “Student – Centered” learning environment which places learners back in control of their learning experience. Social Learning Perspectives Social learning perspectives consider three primary factors which influence the instructional – learner relationship: 1. Context – the resources we use to develop knowledge. Books Computers Personal Experience Interactions – social engagements, feedback, communication 2. Culture & Community – our beliefs, sense of community, communication, linguistic differences that contribute to our unique learning and interaction styles which … Read More..
A Tip for Teachers From a Journeyman Actor
Despite more than a hundred years of derisive criticism, the lecture method of educational instruction refuses to die. In truth, even the father of progressive education, John Dewey recognized the need for structure and order in the classroom with the teacher responsible for control. Theories of experience-based learning and student involvement in the learning process are enticing, but the practicalities of life are that in most venues teachers are still responsible for instilling a body of content to a group of learners. In short, in some fashion the essence of the lecture method will always be with us. The challenge is, can we improve it? The traditional lecture method can be vastly improved through visual aids and even the use of digital media. However, at its core, no matter how you dress it up, it is still a matter of transferring a body of knowledge from teacher to student. The … Read More..
