Monday, January 17th/00
Jennifer A. Jilks
In fulfillment of Learning Assignment #2 for CTL 1002, I created a learning activity to fulfill the following grade 8 expectations. This is a subject i was teaching at the time.
MOE Curriculum Expectations
By the end of grade 8, students will:
Prerequisite knowledge: vocabulary related to Human Geography, mapping skills, co-operative learning skills, data processing skills, computer skills,
The ADDIE Instructional design model (Fardouly, 1998) is a nicely tailored, systematic approach to the design of learning materials and activities.
Farouly (1998) says that:
Instructional design aims for a learner-centred rather than the traditional teacher-centred approach to instruction, so that effective learning can take place. This means that every component of the instruction is governed by the learning outcomes,which have been determined after a thorough analysis of the learners' needs.
Farouly (1998) suggest that we do an extensive analysis of learner needs before we begin establishing outcomes.
She suggest asking these questions:
My philosophy of good pedagogical practices arose during my years of training at Ryerson Polytechnincal Institute. We practiced our craft, Early Childhood Education, in a center which was Piagetian-based in the Early Learning Center. As I have taught at increasingly higher levels, and met with an increasingly limited resource pool, I have begun to rethink my Curriculum practices. I found that the Constructivist theory, as delved into in my last assignment, fit wholeheartedly with my belief systems.
Constructivism - a self- discovery approach, based on independent, individualized activities, expectations and facilitated learning, unfortunately, has not seemed to work and my students have not responded well to open-ended tasks requiring initiative, insight, self-control and taking responsibility for their learning. I decided to go with an approach that was quite a bit more controlled, demanded some differentiation of the activities and tried to break the project down into manageable tasks.
I have decided to take a Transactional approach to this unit. I remember reading Merrill (1999) in class and being so incredibly shocked at the outline. It seemed cold and unfriendly. To be learning your craft on a computer simulation seemed just not quite right.
It took me back to my behavioural psychology course for my B.A.A.(ECE), when we had to break down each event into separate events and in which we learned to objectively observe and create timed observations of young children. In my searches I have found numerous references to this type of approach, most for workers, as opposed to training learners. My goal is to help them become learners, for this reason, I want to help them establish skills that will carry them on into their high school years.
Design What are you trying to achieve with your instruction?
It is my belief that no matter which outcomes we pursue, at MOE dictation, I can achieve these goals. I hope. I am frustrated with inadequate support systems: the technology and special education service cutbacks, but I am going to take a step-by-step approach which will ensure some success.
Define the need for, and the general aim or purpose of, the course/subject/lecture.
What knowledge, skills and attitudes need to be taught?
It is in facing a student population that spends more time and energy in front of their TV's, computer games, or surfing the net at lightening speed, that I have begun to realize that I must stand on my head in order to entertain them, while trying to achieve objectives set by the Ministry of Education (MOE 1998).
My particular charges do not have much access to the internet, I think only one student regularly mentions being on her computer, I do know that peer pressure plays a strong role in their lives. Numerous kids leave school property at lunch time and many do not spend much time after school doing school work. Many wander the malls and just hang out with each other.
for these reasons, I decided to attempt, yet again, to include internet research in this unit of study. These are skills that should be taught using an authentic task: in this case a research project.
Development Determine what must be taught in order to satisfy the learners' needs.
Canadian students are weak in problem-solving techniques and strategies (Barlow & Robertson, 1994). I have seen this in my classroom when teaching a particular math concept, division, for example, and they simply cannot translate a simple word problem into a mathematical equation and just try it. My partner was supervising two fellow engineers, he is their manager, and they are designing software to provide communication links from a trucking fleet to its headquarters. Fairly complex stuff. These two design engineers have 4 degrees between them and they were analyzing what they thought the problem was with the code they were writing. Engineer 1 suggested it was problem "X" and engineer #2 responded that it might my problem "Y" and neither of them decided to jump in and prove that either problem should be checked out. They just couldn't get themselves going and start somewhere. My partner did over time hovering over their shoulders, guiding them to just engage somehow. He was absolutely amazed. Even those with numerous brain cells, in working order, couldn't take the initiative to take responsibility for a decision. I thought it a prime example of how we do not tend to encourage those around us to engage, independently, in a process. Teachers are so very much concerned with delivering an education to the lowest common denominator.
Reigeluth (1997), talks about a paradigm shift from Industrial Age to Information Age thinking. It is purportedly the move from standardization to customization -flexibility in learner outcomes. He believes this shift, to provide unique experiences for learners, is driven by information readily available to the learner. I believe that this is why our Ontario Curriculum is so very difficult to deliver to our students. With major cutbacks in educational services, especially in Special Education, we are finding the traditional "rich get richer, the poor get poorer" cliché comes true. Some students are so very seriously behind others in terms of the technology available to them (my school has great trouble maintaining an internet link), as well as the necessary prerequisites for being a Constructivist learner: the knowledge, skills and values necessary to be an independent, self-starting learner. The MOE, in its wisdom to create ways to test teachers and make educational institutions accountable to taxpayers, with little vested interest in developing individuals capable of independent thought and creativity, wants to churn out workers, not learners. We are teaching to the masses, as is done in China (Barlow & Robertson, 1994), and everyone is required to learn the same facts and figures. I am finding it most difficult to achieve!
I think of my students as clients: I am serving the taxpayer who is paying for me to provide quality curriculum to our children. "It takes a whole village to raise as child", as traditional cultures are wont to say. My clients are the sons and daughters of white collar workers, blue collar workers, an African diplomat, and those who have fled from civil war in Arabic countries. There are families with more education and richer (spiritually, emotionally, economically and technologically) environments than others. I am most worried about my kids who cannot keep a note book organized, who can't sit for 40 minute periods without flirting or hitting one another, who are seeing psychologists, who should be seeing psychologists, who hate teachers, lose their notes, don't do homework, are apathetic (self-defense in order to mask disabilities and weaknesses - if you don't try and you fail there is no loss of face) and would rather play on their computers, poke and push and pull each other in the computer lab, rather than take advantage of the data and information available to them.
It is my belief, then, that I had to create a curriculum unit that would break down the tasks for my special learners, as well as being open-ended enough for my Level 4 self-starters whom I would prefer to engage in the learning process is a Constructivist ID manner, and ensure a modicum of success for all of my clients.
Reigeluth (1996) believes that learning should be based on authentic tasks, with the student constructing their tasks, the teacher playing the role of facilitator. I agree with all of this! I just can't make it happen with many of my learners.
How much content do you need in your instruction?
Set the scope of the content to be covered in terms of time required, number of lessons and topic areas.
Differentiated Activities
I thought, therefore, that it might a good strategy, in order to build some success into this learning unit for all students, to provide a highly structured, transactional approach.
Personal Principles: It is my belief that the learning improves learning strategies by introducing data, information and then helping them to synthesize knowledge by giving them a problem to solve and an opportunity to makes choices, do independent research.
Overall Principles: in accordance with Constructivist theory, learning is co-operative, active, social, and requires that the learner make choices in the learning process, which empowers them to place value and deposit an investment in the learning process.
Process & Product: The learners will create a presentation, to be shared with the class and present, in a method of their choice a response and his/her reflections on the pieces viewed.
Questions for the learners:
During the educational process the teacher will circulate around the students, provide resource suggestions, computer technology support and encourage students to go further, farther and in a direction that interests them. The "What about this...?" mind set. When using computers with my students I find it fairly easy to motivate them, the internet demands exploration, interaction, creativity and cognitive growth.
Role of the Facilitator:
The teacher will encourage dialogue between students, encourage them to reflect on their thinking, transform their research into a new format (transfer new knowledge) and to present his/her research by guiding their explorations and learning activities.
The teacher will encourage the application of Bloomís taxonomy to encourage independent thinking and to challenge the creativity of their responses to the artist and their work.
The performance levels of students would be easily guided by the facilitator. The support for the students, in order to get the very best from them, would include a Rubric (I have found this an excellent way of stimulating excellence), brainstorming sessions as a group, and I find that computer work enhances their motivation, stimulates their thinking skills and encourages the learner to move beyond the easy to the challenging.
Possible Questions: based on learner abilities/disabilities...
Can you find alternate mediums that interest you? Show me... What about....? What led you here?
Context: The activity could be applied to any grade 8 class, with the resources necessary to support the research. In fact, it is required by the MOE.
Strengths: The student can aim for whichever level of achievement s/he feels comfortable with -whether they know they are only capable of doing a limited amount of research and writing or whether they want to broaden the assignment and go as far as they are able: further research and information-seeking activities, to improve their knowledge, skills and values as well thinking skills.
Weaknesses: The students are not trained well enough in cooperative education to manage sitting in the computer lab waiting endlessly for the computers to load images -it is a most frustrating aspect of these kinds of projects. Our school phone lines are terrible, the computers limited in their abilities, library time is limited to the afternoon, when our librarian is present, and I can get help supervising them and encouraging (threatening them?!) to stay on task. My kids are more interested in many other things, rather than human geography and they are frightfully unmotivated in taking the data and information available to them, via the internet and libraries and other forms of information bases, and synthesizing this information and using to improve their knowledge, skills and values. They are teenagers!
Evaluation of Student Learning:
Evaluation would be subjectively based on teacher observations of knowledge, skills and values during the networking experience.
Secondly, there will be a formal peer/self/teacher rubric to evaluate the written work, as well as the optional classroom presentation.
Evaluation will be based on the MOE Achievement Levels, as printed in the Ontario Curriculum Document, as required by the MOE.
Evaluation of my learning:
I have found the research to be interesting. I have used the assignment to improve my curriculum strategies and come to terms with being, not who I want to be (Constructivist -it was easy practicing it when teaching Kindergarten!), but becoming more practical and structured, to ensure that most students get the most out of the learning experience. You have to make decisions based on the good of the whole, rather than the highly motivated, independent learner or teaching to the lowest common denominator. I think I have found a balance, as well as mastering some requirements of the MOE: those objectives set out as important for my grade 8's.
Bybee, R., of the Biological Science Curriculum Study,,as of 10/24/99(1999)
Barlow, M. & Robertson, H., (1994) Class Warfare, Key Porter Books
Canada's Schoolnet, Visual Arts Learning Resources, as of 10/24/99
Course notes: CTL 1002
Fardouly, N. (1998) Instructional Design of Learning materials, The University of New South Wales, Faculty of the Built Environment, www.fbe.unsw.edu.au/learning/instructionaldesign/materials.htm, as of 0112/00
George Washington University, Constructivist Theory, 1997, as of 10/24/99
Merrill, M.D. (1999), Reigeluth (Ed.), Instructional Transaction Theory: Instructional Design Based on Knowledge Objects, Instructional Design Theories and Models, vol. II, p. 397
MOE, (1998)Ontario Curriculum Document, Social Studies/History/Geography: Grade 8, Grades 1 - 8,
Ottawa Carleton District Sschool Board Web Site Resource Web Files
Reigeluth, C.M. (1996) A New Paradigm of ISD?, Educational Technology, (36)3,13-20
Reigeluth, C.M. (1997) Instructional Theory, Practitioner Needs, and New Directions: Some Reflections, Educational Technology, (37),1,42-47
Tomlinson, C.A., (1999) "Mapping a Route Toward Differentiating Instruction", Educational Leadership magazine, p. 12-16, Sept. 99
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