Thursday, September 15, 2011
Learning Theories for Distance Learning
I have been a practicing constructivist for the past 3 years. As I read the articles I found that my the lessons I have learned these past 3 years in trying to implement technology in my classroom have been strides in the right direction. As I continue this process of implementing more technology into my classroom and lessons; I can now find ways to utilize technology more effectively in the field of education. As a primary teacher I am not sure exactly how much I can implement, but I can say that our youth are more tech savy than we think.
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4 comments:
I'm curious -- how does one practice constructivist?
AJ
“Constructivism is a philosophy of learning founded on the premise that, by reflecting on our experiences, we construct our own understanding of the world we live in. Each of us generates our own “rules” and “mental models,” which we use to make sense of our experiences. Learning, therefore, is simply the process of adjusting our mental models to accommodate new experiences;” as defined by http://www.funderstanding.com/v2/theory/constructivism/. As an early intervention program teacher, I have come to realize that teachers assume that students have had certain experiences that influence their prior knowledge base; and that these lack of experiences have a profound impact on student achievement. As a practicing constructivist my lessons involve providing students with these missing experiences from playing games to build social skills and understanding following rules to baking to understand measurement.
By doing so, my students have made significant gains socially, and also in reading and math. For most students you may not have to do these things to bring about understanding, but for the students I teach I must provide the home experiences that will yield academic growth.
Thanks for asking. I hope I clarified constructivism.
Yes, you explained it very well! Thank you! I've been teaching computer classes in adult education for almost four years and have not really had the opportunity to evaluate what my teaching philosophy might be. You are the first classmate or other person I've known to say you ascribe to the constructivist teaching/learning philosophy so I was eager to hear how that manifests itself in your teaching. My practical application of your comments will be to evaluate my method of instruction and compare it to the various teaching/learning theories out there to see which mine best aligns with. That should give me a lot of insight into how I get my lessons across to my students especially as I enter online teaching in the near future.
Greetings Kaija!
It is great to know you are headed in the right direction in terms of integrating technology into your daily instruction. Yes, I agree that our youth are definitely more tech savvy, mainly because of the accessibility that has been afforded to them. I'm not sure about you, but when I was growing up I had to utilize the card catalogue system to find books with information on research topics. Nowadays, many students do not even know what a card catalogue system is. Do I think that's sad? No, not really. I just think it is a sign that times are changing and as we become more technologically advanced, some entities are becoming obsolete.
In accordance, Rogers (2003) notes that time plays a role in diffusion of innovations. With regards to innovations that are becoming less popular (e.g., card catalogue system) among today's youth, I believe the time it takes to implement these innovations is what has resulted in that lack of popularity. For example, if a student has to do a presentation on a continent, it is much quicker to google information versus looking for resources in a card catalogue and then locating them in the library.
As you continue to teach, do you notice some of your current classroom innovations being less efficient as newer innovations are created? If so, please elaborate.
Resources
Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.). New York, NY: Free Press.
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