Wk 7 Assignment: Any Changes In My View of How I Learn?

(If you need to streamline your reading for added Christmas shopping time, skip the first and last two paragraphs. That brings it down to 790 words.)

The topic for this blog is more reflective than anything else as we approach the end of our Learning Theories course.  This past weekend we completed the Learning Theories Matrix (a Constructivist activity) which distinguishes between Behaviorism, Cognitivism, and Constructivism with considerations also for Social Learning, Connectivism and finally Adult Learning or Andragogy.  I’d like to mention again my perspective concerning learning theories and that is that the theories don’t control or shape my thinking, teaching, or learning style preference.  The various theories are reflective of different ways of looking at the same thing (Ertmer and Newby).  At times, from what I’ve read, it seems that the theories have more control than they are entitled to.  I don’t design a lesson around a theory but more so around multiple learning styles.  I try to create opportunities for using several pathways for learning the curriculum.

     That being said, I do recognize elements of all the theories in how I process information, how I operate in the classroom, and what I look for from the students.  I previously thought of myself as a Cognitivist (B.C.E. - before course era) because I tend toward ideas and concepts in what I do and look for.  As I’ve learned more about the various learning theories, I’d have to adjust my self-analysis. 

     For labeling purposes, I think I process perhaps more like a constructivist but not necessarily a social constructivist.  Comparing prior knowledge and experience with what I read and experience that I go way beyond replicating behavior or simply understanding ideas.  I create my own meaning by combining the past with the present; it enables me to project into the future.  The ideas I discover are not all exclusively my own.  I think some of those ideas existed before I learned about them.  That philosophical “shadow in a cave” existed long before I did.  Why have guides to learning if all meaning exists only within myself.    In some states even today, one can become a lawyer without earning a degree; s/he “studies for the law” (self-educated), but even then it’s under the guidance of a practicing attorney.

     Since starting this graduate program, I do recognize an increased effort on my part toward connectivism and the idea of networking.   This is a theory I hadn’t heard of before, but in a way the logic is obvious.  We don’t live in that philosophical cave; we’re not the “child in a bubble” isolated from the rest of what exists.  We do interact and, if mentally healthy people, are always enlarging our network. 

     Connectivism puts a heavy emphasis on networking electronically; our EDUC 6105 put a heavy emphasis on people-networking also under the label of collaboration and cooperation.  Here perhaps is where the aspect of “social,” associated with constructivism, connectivism and social learning lies.  I’m not sure I see the idea of “social” as an absolute necessity in learning that is associated with these learning theories, but I’m coming around.  I am recognizing the “social” more as a valuable component in the process of learning. 

     Concerning Adult Learning and as a person well past the normal age for higher education, I also recognize some of the attributes of andragogy in the way I operate.  I perhaps look more to one’s expertise, hopefully not their work pedigree, in gaining information from my social network; so I may look to a teacher, leader, or guide to “direct my sail” in terms of where I should be going.  I usually go further just out of curiosity.  So, for example, I do read the sources labeled “supplemental”; and I do watch other related YouTube recordings beyond the one required to be viewed.  Hopefully, you’ve considered some of the allusions and outside sources I’ve interjected into many of my postings.

     I guess too that as an adult learner, I view my 37 years of teaching experience as having equal value to the many other sources – including your blogs and DB responses – which I’ve experienced through online learning and the internet.  Perhaps that’s why we all have subscribed to each other’s posts and respond on the discussion board.  This is one reason why I also subscribe to “IT Business Edge” and recently “Tech Republic” along with links to tutorial libraries from Microsoft, Adobe, and TechSmith, and watch Screencast, Howcast and YouTube  “how-to” videos.  Although I’m inundated sometimes 3 or 4 times a day with e-mails from these sources, each one provides 20 links to white papers, slideshows or commercial products that relate to the business world.  And don’t think that we all aren’t creating a list of the blog sites, e-journals, etc. that we’ve connected to in our course readings.

      From my experience I’ve learned the necessity of providing engagement in a lesson.  Through my experience in the online environment, that engagement involves taking advantage of the many toys, tools and apps provided which add interactivity with technology and with people.  Such interactivity – hopefully more than just clicking – will definitely employ more learning pathways (styles) than one experiences solely in a face-to-face experience.  Technology can take us way beyond verbal input (reading).  We can interact via visuals, motion, and audio.  We can link for social interaction via web-conferencing and other sharing experiences whether it’s Facebook and Twitter or a bit more editorial review such as blogs and wikis.  We can also experience through the virtual world better simulations than simple role-playing or the old watch a video segment / answer some either-or, if-then, whether-or choices / watch the next segment / repeat the clicking of a one-in-four choice or true-false environment.  Look at what they’re doing in children’s museums.

      Before starting this graduate program, I’d say my perspective had been relatively stagnant and resistant for the last 5-10 years.  Although resistance can be good so as not to fall for every new idea or techno-toy with all the bells and whistles, I’ve come to realize the importance of innovation (as defined in my EDUC 6105 multi-media project).  There are new things of value out there and it is possible to teach an old dog or rundown mule.

     Our guide for this course (soon to end) left us with a brain teaser to expand our thinking.  As an example of constructivism, I’ll suggest that the teaser is a metaphor for the idea of thinking regardless of which learning theory(ies) you happen to subscribe to.  Let me leave you with a few more brain-expander stocking-stuffers.   

http://www.wimp.com/childbeethoven/      for Musical Intelligence

http://www.wimp.com/napoleonhill/         for Achievement  

Wk 5 Assignment: Post An Example of a MindMap

The following visual is an example of a MindMap - made via Webspiration.  A MindMap is a way to visualize concepts and show their inter-relationships.  This particular MindMap is a crude attempt at showing the various ways or sources from which I and actual many people learn.  Here learning simply means the idea of gathering new information.  Actually it may be more accurate to say that there are two MindMaps.

The top visual suggests three ways of learning: directed informally by oneself; directed traditionally by an instructor, and learning through interaction with other people.

The lower visual lists some of the specific sources and tools used in the three ways of learning.  I included a fourth way of learning, but it's more a subconscious direction.

Some MindMaps will use flowchart type diagrams with simple lines and basic geometric designs. MindMaps aren't limited in terms of the visuals used to represent the components that make up the map, though.  If women are from Venus and men are from Mars (in other words - people are different), then there is perhaps a truth to the idea that some wil get more out of a simple design-type map while others understand the map better using "concrete" (real) images instead.  Supposedly women deal with directions using landmarks while men tend to rely upon compass directions.  Perhaps that's an overgeneralization, but it does support the need for variety and versatility. 

Connectivism - In General and More Specifically

Click on the link below to see the MindMap via Webspiration.

MindMap showing Networking for Information 

In addition to providing a MindMap of Networking for Information, we are asked to reflect on how our connections facilitate learning, change, and networking.

I guess I’m inching more into the 21^st century.  This week I’ve been doing a bit more curious exploring beyond the resources we’re using in our online courses.  In the past I’d have viewed free downloads like the White Papers I can get from IT Business Edge, or the upgrades and plug-ins, or apps and software as simply an unexpected benefit for my curiosity. (What I paid for a new computer, and OS, and software, and tuition, and etc. etc., didn’t I deserve a break?)  But this week I was watching a Vimeo tutorial for a free web-conferencing tool/site called dimdim.com.  I’m realizing that freebies like these on the internet aren’t just enticements to lure us to buy more expensive products but rather or also are a form of networking.  The underlying concept isn’t monetary value but instead sharing and communicating value, community value.  Although I’m still reluctant to reveal too much on Facebook, use an alias for my username for this blogsite, and still use my credit card sparingly over the internet, I’m beginning to understand “generation-X” and “Y’s” interest in tweeking and blogging and creating youtube videos on some of the most ridiculous topics.  It’s social networking.

     When I consider my involvement in this phenomenon, my first impulse is to think – I’m not part of that fad; “this too shall pass.”  But the truth is that in a limited way I am drawn into the network that involves 21^st century technology.  When I prepare an Application Assignment for submission or a post to the discussion board, if I can’t remember a specific detail of a certain related example, I run to google search, or bing, or  ….  Last week you may have noticed I posted links to two video clips from the 1989 movie Dead Poet’s Society that were relevant to the importance of having a different perspective sometimes and making a commitment.  Where do you think I went to track down the clips?  Google took me to YouTube which had dozens of segments from the Robin Williams movie.

    George Siemens commented in his August 19^th blog about connectivism that connectivism is inherently tied to technology.  Spirit Master mimeograph machines and Gestetner duplicating machines were the high tech teaching tools of the 50s, 60s and maybe 70s before the mass production of PCs and laptops.  Even then, though, those tools were a way to connect people through the flow of ideas.  Although I may not fully appreciate the value and ramifications of blogging and contributing to wikis – it's hard to imagine even a plumber can write about quantum mechanics or a drill sergeant respond to a post on Baryshnikov (I used google to get the right spelling of his name) –  I do have more than one foot into the 21^st century and am headed in that direction.