Late night musings on Best Practices and Professional Learning Communities.
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This weeks blog post is a summary of chapter 8 the Clark & Mayer text. This chapter discuses the coherence principle. The coherence principle is basically the idea that less is more when presenting an e-lesson to students. It suggests that adding extraneous material that does not support the instructional goal can actually hurt learning. There are three things that the authors suggest in avoiding. They are: extraneous audio, graphics and words. The authors state that extra audio such as music or sounds that are irrelevant to the educational goal may overload the working memory. In other words, it does not help the student's memory to add music or sound that does not have to do with the lesson. Presentations should also avoid extra graphics. It may be the instructors instinct to make a boring lesson see interesting by adding extra pictures to it. The authors state that doing so can interfere with students making sense of the material that they are learning. It can lead to students being confused and not knowing what the lesson is truly about. The authors suggest in using simpler visuals that aid in student's understanding. Finally, keeping words on a presentation simple and in line with the lesson goals helps students to stick to the material they are learning. The goal is not to overload the student's brain, but rather to get them thinking about what they are learning and asking questions to know more. Using key words with narration on a presentation will help to keep students focused and understanding what they are learning. The goal is not to over work the brain, but rather perk the student's sense of curiosity to know more.
This chapter is important because instructors tend to compete with the video games when it comes to learning and technology. We think that if it is not entertaining we will not keep the student's interest in the subject. That simply is not true. Student's minds need a break from video game style technology when it comes to learning. It needs to be simple to where they can learn instead of clogging their brain with images that have nothing to do with the lesson. Extra audio, images and words can actually hurt student's learning rather than help it. When I go to create a lesson for my students, I keep the lesson to the point. I do a lot of speaking and modeling on what my students are learning, rather than overload their brains with items that have nothing to do with the topic they are learning. I want them to focus on the process of learning math, rather than graphics or sounds that distract from math. Math can be fun without those extra item being involved. I agree with this chapter in the Clark & Mayer text. Less is more and it will keep the student's interest. Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R.. e-Learning and the science of instruction: Proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning (3rd Ed). John Wiley & Sons P&T, 8/1/11. VitalBook file. Successful educational institutions in the future will out of necessity integrate the worlds of education, work, and leisure with leading edge electronic technologies as they become available. The new model for educational activity will be that which is delivered by the institutions and acquired by the students in an anytime, anyplace, on-demand fashion. The educational institution of the future, at the post-secondary level at least, will not be a campus we drive through and view the ivy covered halls of wisdom, but it will be a learning experience we participate in while we drive along the highway, relax at home, work at our desks, fly to distant locations, collaborate with fellow learners, and accomplish all the other tasks required of us to be productive, useful, and educated citizens of the world. It will always be at our fingertips, or at least no more than a click away. One of the major challenges of this new “at-our-fingertips” learning environment is how to assess learner achievement in an online course in which learner and instructor seldom or never see each other in face-to-face contact. The assessment must be authentic as defined by Wiggins (1998), Bridges (1995) and others and must be effective in that it measures learning, engages the learner, is integrated into the learning process, and promotes further learning. The assessment paradigm developed as a result of this study will be a step forward. (Drummond, 2003)
Collins, A. and Halverson, R. (2010) The second educational revolution: rethinking education in the age of technology. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning. 26(1), 18-27. Retrieved from: http://rx9vh3hy4r.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info%3Asid%2Fsummon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=The+second+educational+revolution%3A+rethinking+education+in+the+age+of+technology&rft.jtitle=Journal+of+Computer+Assisted+Learning&rft.au=Collins%2C+A&rft.au=Halverson%2C+R&rft.date=2010-02-01&rft.issn=0266-4909&rft.eissn=1365-2729&rft.volume=26&rft.issue=1&rft.spage=18&rft.epage=27&rft_id=info:doi/10.1111%2Fj.1365-2729.2009.00339.x The theory of behaviorism states that students learn by observing behaviors. There are four key elements of behaviorism in the classroom. Practice involves providing opportunities for students to practice what they have learned. In my 6th grade math classroom, this means giving the students practice problems based upon the lesson I have taught them. Modeling, refers to the teacher modeling the behavior or concept that they are teaching the students. According to Clark, examples are one of the most powerful methods you can use to build new cognitive skills (2011, p 222) For my 6th grade math students, this involves me modeling how to solve different math concepts. We are currently learning how to solve simple equations. I model the steps in solving for x, and it helps my students to understand how to solve the problems. Reinforcement involves me as the teacher going over their work and communicating to my students on how they are solving the math problems. If they got an answer wrong, I go to the students and show them where in the problem they went wrong to get the incorrect answer. And finally, active learning means that they students are actively responding to what they are learning in the classroom. This could be through question and response and showing how they solved a problem for the teacher to know that they are grasping the concepts. When it comes to strengths and weaknesses with behaviorism, I see mostly strengths especially in my math classroom. My students tend to pick up concepts better when I model and we practice the problems they are learning before they try them on their own. In distance learning, behaviorism can be easily implemented into the design of the course. the instructor can model through an explanation and rubric as to what is expected on an assignment to the students. Showing exemplar examples from previous students also helps to show current students what the instructor is looking for. It is important to keep a learning theory in a distance education program. A learning theory helps keep a course balanced and allows for students to learn according to their learning style.
Clark, R.C. and Mayer, R. E. (2011) E-learning and the science of instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia instruction. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer |
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