Tag Archives: article

November 6, 2014

Hase & Kenyon (2007) self-directed learning

Hase, S., & Kenyon, C. (2007). Heutagogy: A child of Complexity Theory. complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education, 4(1), 111-118.

Hase and Kenyon argue that the notions of pedagogy and andragogy are deficient. Teachers merely facilitate students to acquire knowledge and skills, which they maintain is not learning. Acquiring knowledge and skills allows students to be competent to recall and use that knowledge and those skills in familiar situations. In contrast, learning demands change. However, we need to remember that comfort hinders change. Change occurs in response to distressful needs (and intense desires). Hase and Kenyon define learning as an emergent and integrative process that changes behaviour, knowledge, understanding and becomes incorporated into people’s existing attitudes and values. Learning empowers students to be capable to react and adapt to unfamiliar and unanticipated situations drawing on all their holistic knowledge, skills and values. Hase and Kenyon define capability as beyond competency: being able to adapt to unknown and changing contexts, having appropriate values to work collaboratively, and knowing how to learn.

Pedagogy and andragogy appear to remain teacher-centered with little micro or macro involvement from learners. Curricula are inflexible, which is disappointing because “it is impossible to predict the extent and effect of bifurcation”, i.e. separation of planned curricula and learners’ changing needs. In contrast, heutagogy is self-determined learning. Learner-centered and learner-directed learning which occurs as result of personal experiences. Students become the key drivers and designers of learning processes, activities, objectives and assessments. Heutagogy requires a living flexible curriculum that is able to change as students learn.

Hase and Kenyon recommend action research and action learning as meta-methodologies to empower learners to experiment with real experiences in real world contexts. Action research and action learning provide flexibility to understand unpredictable and complex social phenomena, give ownership and control of the learning to the students, and can also be trialled and tested in subsequent cycles. Alongside action-learning, teachers need to provided personal coaching.

Adaptive systems (Bertanafly, 1950; Akoff & Emery, 1972; Emery, 1971, 1986; Emery & Trist, 1965) and Complexity Theory are worth investigating in relation to learning (Davis & Sumara 1997; Doll 1989; Doolittle, 2000). At the time of writing, Hase and Kenyon were still researching the usefulness of heutagogy as a concept, and questioning how learning occurs in complex adaptive systems and how these systems harness and facilitate learning.

March 23, 2014

Nation (2007) The Four Strands

strands

 

Nation, I. S. P. (2007). The Four Strands. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 1(1), 1-12

I frequently recommend Nation’s Four Strands to balance language learning experiences, so I re-read Nation’s original article just to check my understanding.

Nation’s Four Strands of 25% meaning-focused input, 25% meaning-focused output, 25% language-focused learning, and 25% fluency development continue throughout language learning experiences with approximately equal time spent on each strand.

Meaning-focused input and output are similar: input is reading and listening and output is writing and speaking. To define activities as meaning-focused input and output, learners must be familiar with most of language (95-98% of vocabulary), genuinely interested in understanding input and conveying output, and have enormous quantities of input and output. Examples of meaning-focused input are reading news articles online every day or watching several seasons of a TV series, and examples of meaning-focused output are frequently talking in conversations or regularly updating a blog. Nation supports his ideas with research (including Krashen’s (1995) Input Hypothesis and Swain’s (2005) Output Hypothesis) and the time-on-task principle, i.e. simply the more you do something, the better you will be at doing it.

Language-focused learning is the deliberate learning of language features (e.g. pronunciation, spelling, vocabulary, grammar, discourse) and language learning strategies. To define activities as language-focused learning, learners must give deliberate attention to language features, process language in deep thoughtful ways, use spaced repetition for learning, and use features at appropriate levels that are used in other strands. Examples of language-focused learning are memorizing dialogues and using (online/app) dictionaries.

Fluency development focuses on using known language fast and automatically for all language skills. To define activities as fluency development, learners must be familiar with all of the language (100% of vocabulary), focus on understanding and/or conveying meaning, have a sense of urgency, and have enormous quantities of input and output. Examples of fluency development are quickly skim reading texts, 4/3/2 repetitious speaking activities, writing within limited time frames, and listening to TV presenters (e.g. Jamie Oliver) who speak fast!

Nation bases his Four Strands on ten sound language learning principles.

Learners need to
1. use enormous quantities of comprehensible input,
2. notice language during input,
3. use wide variety of genres during output,
4. use cooperative interaction,
5. learn language deliberately,
6. use language learning strategies,
7. develop fluency,
8. balance the Four Strands,
9. repeat useful language,
10. assess learning needs.

If you follow Nation’s simple framework, you’ll have good language learning.

March 16, 2014

Darling-Hammond (2006) teacher education

Darling-Hammond, L. (2006). Constructing 21st-century teacher education. Journal of Teacher Education, 57(3), 300-314.

I’ve been skim reading a few books on teacher education and so many refer to this article that it jumped to the top of my reading list.

Teaching is often viewed as simplistic by laypeople and novice teachers; however, teaching is non-routine, unpredictable and requires diverse and flexible teaching and reflective skills to handle diverse learners’ needs in increasingly complex contexts.

Novice teachers need to overcome three challenges. First, “the apprenticeship observation” (Lortie, 1975), i.e. past student learning experiences need to be separated from new learning to teach experiences. Second, “the problem of enactment” (Kennedy, 1999), i.e. more than just understand teaching, but be able to actually teach. Third, “the problem of complexity” (Jackson, 1974), i.e. “understand and respond to the dense and multifaceted nature of the classroom, juggling multiple academic and social goals requiring trade-offs from moment to moment (Darling-Hammond, 2006).

Teacher education must address the influence of previous teaching observations, perceived separation of theory and practice, limited cultural perspectives, and the need for multiple tasks in complex settings. In addition, teacher education must focus on knowledge about learning and learners, and skills for curriculum development, classroom management, teaching and assessment. To achieve this, teacher education programs need to use a clear single vision for theory and practice; have transparent achievement standards; integrate theory and extensive, intensive, reflective practice (Ball & Cohen,1999); use real cases and research; confront assumptions; work together with schools to improving learning, teaching and teacher education.

Although novice teachers enter teaching with existing beliefs from student learning experiences, many teacher educators argue that novice teachers who have teaching experience are better prepared to integrate the theory and practice of teacher education (Baumgartner, Koerner, & Rust, 2002; Denton, 1982; Henry, 1983; Ross, Hughes, & Hill, 1981; Sunal, 1980). However, many short cut programs designed for working novice teachers minimize teaching and curriculum theory and focus on survival needs. Furthermore, novice teachers frequently demand classroom management strategies instead of improving teaching and curriculum knowledge, a lack of which may cause classroom difficulties (Shields et al., 2001).

February 22, 2014

Reid (2011) teacher education

Reid, J. (2011). A practice turn for teacher education? Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 39(4), 293-310.

Reid argues for alternative professional teacher-education, specifically practice-experiences, to address limitations and integrate teacher-education models. Reid justifies her need to change teacher-education by reminding us of our problems.

Education strives to improve and reform, appearing to be continually frustrated with current teaching practice and fascinated with cutting-edge teaching practice (Carlgren, 1998). We have to remember that teaching practice resists change because it is ‘rhizomatic’: new-ways of teaching are off-shoots from old-ways of teaching that live on and on and on (Phelan & Sumsion, 2008). Basically, 20th Century learner-teachers practice teaching in 19th Century schools with 21st Century children and learning contexts (Britzman, 2009).

In addition, novice teachers are not really inexperienced teachers because they have observed teaching for at least a decade: this familiarity makes it difficult to perceive and accept new ways of teaching. Using an apprenticeship model of teacher-education, on-going generations of teachers remain essentially unchanged. We need to critically examine teaching practice as something strange and foreign, rather than unquestionably repeat existing practice. Reid states that learner-teachers need to feel like novices through deconstruction of core practices, which are modeled, explained, rehearsed, and evaluated. Leraner-teachers need to practice separate skills in simplified contexts, before simultaneously applying multiple skills in complex learning contexts. In-line with Grossman (1991, 2008, 2009), ultimately Reid seeks to integrate theory and practice (and praxis and rational action) to improve the teacher-learning and education-development.

Finally a few quick definitions of essential terms. Aldrich (2006) describes teacher-education models as apprenticeship or training or disciplinary study. Dreyfus (1980) defines teacher-education as consisting of initial teacher education (for novice teachers), transitional teacher education (for advanced beginners and competent performers), and continuing teacher education (for proficient performers and experts).

February 14, 2014

Shulman (1986) teaching-knowledge

Shulman, L. S. (1986). Those who understand: Knowledge growth in teaching. Educational Researcher, 15(4), 4-14.

Shulman describes knowledge needed for teaching. He rejects “He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches” and instead asserts that ‘Those who can, do. Those who understand, teach’. He criticizes separating subject knowledge and general pedagogical knowledge, and simplifying complex teaching contexts. Shulman’s research examined teacher-education programs and interviewed novice teachers for two years. He focused on key events (i.e. How do teachers teach something they have not yet learned? How do teachers adapt and improve poor learning materials?) to investigate how  teaching-knowledge develops. Shulman defines teaching-knowledge as content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, and curricular knowledge.

– Content knowledge includes theory and practice of subject-knowledge, justification of subject-knowledge, and knowledge of relationships between subjects.

– Pedagogical content knowledge is based on research and experience and includes subject-teaching knowledge, valuable topics, useful explanations and examples, and students’ preconceptions.

– Curricular knowledge includes knowledge of learning-materials, and knowledge of relationships between subject curriculums.

He outlines a framework of knowledge as propositional knowledge, case knowledge, and strategic knowledge.

– Propositional knowledge includes principles from research, maxims from general knowledge, and norms based on ethics. Propositional knowledge is concise, simplified and often forgettable.

– Case knowledge includes prototypes that show theory, precedents that show principles, and parables that show values. Cases are examples of genre, not a single antidote, specifically described with clear boundaries, memorable, and can combine case types.

– Strategic knowledge is the flexibility to reason, reflect, judge, and act within complex context with multiple conflicting factors.

Shulman argues that teacher-education needs to include content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, and curricular knowledge, and use research and cases from diverse contexts.