A Short Tour of Learning Theories related to ICT

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A Short Tour of Learning Theories related to ICT

• Module CT10
• Friday 22 January 2003

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Behaviourism

• The work of Pavlovs dogs salivating responses
  to conditioning and Skinners rats or pigeons
  reponses to punishment or reward led to the
  concept of the learning cycle of
  stimulus-response-reward (SPR). The SRR concept
  became central to learning theory, and when
  Skinner applied his findings to classroom
  teaching he became critical of teachers for
  ineffective reinforcement of learning.

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Constructivism

• Learners are active meaning makers who interact
  and construct meanings from what is observed and
  experienced around them. Philosopher John Dewey
  is one of the founders of constructivism which
  dates back to the first half of the 20th Century
  and his concept of discovery-based-learning. The
  work of psychologists, such as Piaget, Bruner and
  Vygotsky, led to a division into classical and
  social constructivism.

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Social Constructivism

• It differs from classical constructivism in that
  learners active meaning making is not dependent
  on either cognitive developmental stages or
  through exploration as lone scientists. Instead
  learning takes place through the use of language
  and dialogue with more knowledgeable others.
• By sharing prior knowledge a clearer
  understanding is achieved and the learners
  schema becomes modified. The zone of proximal
  development, described by Vygotsky, is the gap
  between what the learner already knows and
  understands from prior experience, and what will
  be known and understood from new experiences.

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Constructivist Teaching Practices

• To provide new experiences by allowing learners
  to build on what they already know, understand
  and can do with increasing independence.
• Piaget Students are not ready to learn a
  particular concept until they have reached the
  apprppriate cognitive developmental stage. All
  learners, irrespective of ability, have the
  capability to understand higher level concepts
  but at different ages.

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Constructivist Learning

• Develops lower/higher order thinking skills
  e.g.problem solving,
• Frees the student to concentrate on constructing
  new knowledge and apply it to a non-threatening
  environment,
• Also encourages communication away from the
  computer which is then universalised to other
  forms of communication e.g. paper, spoken and
  image

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Scaffold the childs learning

• Jerome Bruners Scaffolding
• The computer provides a context by scaffolding
  even the least experienced learner, enabling him
  to accomplish complex tasks that may not be
  possible alone.

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Lets challenge the learner!

• The adult stands in the zone, challenging the
  child to his/her next level of cognitive
  development.
• The computer excites learning, making it more
  appealing. It makes stepping into the ZPD, both
  for teachers and students, less fearful

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Mindstorms

• Paperts work using Logo encourages the learner
  to to explore mathematical shapes and ideas by
  using an object to think with the turtle. Thus
  providing learners with a living language with
  which to talk mathematics to the computer.. The
  act of programming helps to develop skills such
  as that of breaking down problems into mangeable
  units and these skills can be applied to other
  situations.
• Lego Mindstorms under the work of the MIT builds
  on similar views.

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Learning with Computers

• Mindtools
• Computer-based tools and learning environments
  that have been adapted or developed to function
  as intellectual partners with the learner in
  order to engage and facilitate critical thinking
  and higher order learning.
• Mindtools are tools for helping learners
  organise and represent what they know.
• Jonassen, D 1996

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Students Across the World Unite

• Journey North
• http//www.learner.org/jnorth
• Over 4,500 schools, representing more than
  250,000 students, from all 50 U.S. States and 7
  Canadian Provinces, participated in the spring
  2002 Journey North Program.

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JASON Project

• Their principle mission is to excite students
  about and engage them in science and technology
  and to provide professional development
  opportunities for educators. It encourages team
  building and partnership among institutions,
  students,educators and other experts from
  different fields.
• www.jasonproject.org

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Natural History Project

• http//www.nhm.ac.uk/darwincentre/

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Building Interaction between learner and teacher

• Computers are often used as way of freeing up the
  teacher. There is a need for student, teaccher
  and computer.
• Interaction forms the control focus of the
  activity and the basis for learning.
• Students need to have some control over the
  environment.
• Joint activities provide a flexible and
  motivating context for language acqusition.

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Technology can work wonders!

• Choosing and developing tasks that provide a
  concept of control and real choice for the
  learners
• Successful learning outcomes means greater
  self-esteem and motivation for actively learning.

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The Internet is my mind I found that when I
surf the Internet it works exactly like my
mind.. Each memory that I have comes up like a
website. And I sort of click through the websites
of my mind and they come up like snapshot
pictures.One of the most profound mysteries of
autism has been the remarkable ability of most
autistic people to excel at visual spatial skills
while performing so poorly at verbal
skills. Temple Grandin Animal Science
Professor at Colorado State University and
leading authority on autism in USA.