Situating Learning: supporting the emergence of high complexity teachers

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Situating Learningsupporting the emergence of
high complexity teachers

• Brent Davis Dennis Sumara
• University of British Columbia

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foci of manyteacher education programs
learner diversity
social justice
teacher identity formation
lesson planning
classroom management
teaching methods
ecological sustainability
global citizenship
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but what does the research into effective
teaching tell us?
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Research into Top Alberta Mathematics Teachers

• 12 teachers, with long strong records
• all over the map, in terms of practices
• not locked into any particular method
• complex attitude toward subject matter
• multiple interpretations of particular concepts
• intricate interconnections among ideas
• complex attitude toward learners
• able to get into students heads
• able to instill a sense of shared project in
  math class
• able juggle many activities (plate-spin)

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Other popular descriptors

• eyes in the back of her head
• withitness (Jacob Kounin)
• tact pedagogical thoughtfulness (Max van
  Manen)
• ethics of caring (Nel Noddings)

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The point?

• most initial teacher education programs are aimed
  at competence, not complexity

(and, in fact, might be projecting a model of
teaching thatinappropriately dismisses highly
effective pedagogies)
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The burning question

• How do we prompt teachers toward complex and
  flexible ways of being in classrooms?

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Low Complexity People

• tend to see the world in absolute, black--white
  terms.
• lack (and perhaps avoid) diversity among their
  peers and advisers
• tend to be very rigid, ideologically
• tend to focus on what they think is the reality

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High Complexity People

• seek out novel information across diverse
  categories
• change attitude more easily when presented with
  compelling evidence
• generate unusual ( often remote) views and
  actions
• integrate relate complex patterns of many
  elements

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What we know about becoming high complexity

• Certain activities help
• parenting,
• teamsports (participating coaching),
• community organization/participation
• briefly, social engagements that require
  ongoing interpretation, negotiation, and
  adaptation.
• Certain positionings help
• racial, gender, sexual minorities and/or
  oppressed groups
• briefly, positionings that prompt awarenesses
  of Discourses.
• It takes a long time
• 10,000 hours of supported effort.
• It depends on events that get people out of
  themselves.

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Life-long learning

• Huge new topic in educational research.
• We never stop learning/changing/developing.
• BIG changes shifts in ones way of
  being-in-the-world continue to occur as you
  age.
• Types of changes vary by culture, era, location,
  etc.
• Shifts tend to be prompted by a threshold
  effect.
• One research-based model

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Robert Kegans Life-Stages Immediate
Consciousness

• mostly young children
• idea of durable objects un(der)developed
• mystified when others have different opinions
• need to be reminded of rules over and over

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Robert Kegans Life-Stages Instrumental
Consciousness

• typically 7- to 10-year-olds, but some adults
• world is less magical
• and more mechanical desires for fixed laws,
  uniformly applied
• tendency to focus on implications for me
• beliefs, feelings, interpretations, and
  self-perceptions stabilize

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Robert Kegans Life-Stages Socialized
Consciousness

• older adolescents and most adults
• considerate able to subordinate personal
  desires those of others
• modulates between thinking about me and us
• capable of abstract planning, self-reflection
• devoted to something thats greater than their
  own needs

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Robert Kegans Life-Stages Self-Authoring
Consciousness

• some, but not many
• able to examine various rule systems and to
  mediate among them
• more expansive awareness of whats going on in
  the world
• tendency to focus on the implications for us
• self-guided, self-motivated, self-evaluative
  takes personal responsibility (e.g., doesnt
  blame disappointing experiences on others)

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Robert Kegans Life-Stages Self-Transforming
Consciousness

• hardly anyone
• the wise in western culture
• others and objects arent seen as separate
  world is not seen in terms of polarities or
  clear-cut categories
• mindful participation in ongoing transformations
  replaces desire to cause specific changes

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Provisos
shifts prompted by confronting
complexity they dont
happen until they
have to
not age-indexed
not a line, ladder, or sequence
shifts cant be
caused they depend on the
experiencer, not the experience.
expanding repertoires, not levels replacing
each another
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And so ?

• Almost everyone reverts to instrumental mode
  when in a new situation.
• Teaching is no exception (see, e.g., J.G.
  Berger).
• Experienced teachers are more likely than the
  general population to manifest expansive levels
  of consciousness.
• Why?

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What we know about becoming high complexity

• Certain activities help
• parenting,
• teamsports (participating coaching),
• community organization/participation
• briefly, social engagements that require
  ongoing interpretation, negotiation, and
  adaptation.
• Certain positionings help
• racial, gender, sexual minorities and/or
  oppressed groups
• briefly, positionings that prompt awarenesses
  of Discourses.
• It takes a long time
• 10,000 hours of supported effort.
• It depends on events that get people out of
  themselves.

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And so drawing on complexity thinking to
frame initial teacher education
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Complexity thinkers distinguish between
complicated and complex phenomena.
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Complicated vs Complex
Mechanical (Newton) Adaptive (Darwin)
Machine metaphors Ecosystem
metaphors
Linear Exponential
Input/output flowcharts
Cyclical feedback loops
Efficiency-seeking
Sufficiency-oriented
Progress-minded Development-minded
Reducible Non-compressible
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Yes, but what is complexity?

• There is no unified definition.
• Since complexity research is defined in terms of
  what one studies rather than how one studies
• and so definitions tend to be framed in terms
  of researchers interests.

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A working definition of complexity thinking

• the study of learning systems

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some learners
ECOWEB
ETHNOWEB
EDUWEB
EGOWEB
ENDOWEB
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Imagining an initial teacher education program

• Years 14
• 1 Discourse attunement
• 2 Individual learning
• 3 Collective learning
• 4 Disciplinary learning

• Years 59
• one year of supported academic study over a
  5-year induction period
• ongoing interpretive assistance leading toward
  graduate work

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Year 1 Discourse Attunement

• Coursework
• complexity thinking
• deconstructions of normal

• Field Experience
• examining learning in non-institutional
  settings
• shopping malls
• any workplace
• playgrounds

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Year 2 Individual Learning

• Coursework
• constructivist theories (à la Piaget)
• human development
• consciousness and perception
• (dis)ability research
• emergence and evolution of identity

• Field Experience
• 1 month
• mornings 2 student- teachers placed with 23
  students
• afternoons reporting, interpretive assistance,
  preparation

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Year 3 Collective Learning

• Coursework
• situated, activity, and other socio-cultural
  theories (à la Vygotsky)
• groupthink, collective process
• critical pedagogies
• network theory

• Field Experience
• 1 month
• mornings 3 student- teachers with 1 mentor
  teacher
• afternoons reporting, interpretive assistance,
  preparation

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Year 4 Disciplinary Learning

• Coursework
• disciplinary knowledge as decentralized networks
• dynamics of knowledge production
• strategies for disciplinary engagement

• Field Experience
• 3 months
• mornings 1 student- teacher with 1 mentor
  teacher
• afternoons reporting, interpretive assistance,
  preparation

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Years 59 Supported Induction

• Coursework
• 2 courses/year for 5 years
• smorgasbord of topics, anchored around teachers
  disciplinary knowledge and collective process

• Field Experience
• 5 years of classroom teaching
• regular (monthly?) sessions of reporting,
  interpretive assistance, collective preparation