The Constructivist Perspective

Lever-Duffy and McDonald (2007) stated, for constructivists, knowledge is a constructed element resulting from the learning process. Further, knowledge is unique to the individual who construct it" (pp 16). I believe the key to that statement is that knowledge is unique to the individual. There are so many things that we learn how to do in our life, but if we were asked to explained how we learned them we each would have an unique answer. How one person learns a new skill or a piece of information may not work for another person who is trying to learn that same skill. An example of that is when someone ask another person how to teach them to do a certain task. The person teaching gets frustrated at the person who is trying to learn the task because they are not getting it and the learner is frustrated at the teacher because they do not understand. It is because knowledge is unique to the individual who constructs it.

That is why project based learning and or problem based learning is so essential for our students. It gives them the opportunity to show off what they know in an unique way. A student may not be able to explain how they know something but given a chance to show you, may blow you as the teacher away. I do think that students need guidance during this process to ensure that they stay focused on the skill that you are assessing them on. I think that rubrics are the perfect match for these project based learning assignments. They provided both the structure and the freedom that is required for both parties to get what they require. I know that I loved problem based learning, especially when I can to work on the computer for the entire thing. Our kids are getting burned out of learning at an early age it seems like now a days, one way to get students excited about learning again is to use the resources provided to us and the technology that we have access to, to provide students with these problem/project based learning opportunities.

Social Learning Theory

The instructional strategies described in the resources I explored this week correlate with the principles of social learning theories, because they focused on social networking and using others to gain information and skills. The resources talk about using different software and programs the enable many people to work on the same project at the same time, and where the participants are located does not affect their ability to work on the project. Social learning theorists believe that the primary way that people learn is by interacting with people and their environment. They believe that children should be involved in cooperative learning groups and should connect new knowledge and skills to old knowledge while they work in their groups to complete a common task. These cooperative learning groups are a great place to integrated technology using social networking. Group members can not only work on the same project, but they each other feedback and answer each other’s questions.

How to get students to focus on details

Cognitive Thinking Theory

My thoughts on how the instructional strategies described in the resources I explored this week correlate with the principles of cognitive learning theory are that thinking maps are the perfect partner for cognitive learning theory. According to Levrt-Duffy & McDonald (2008), cognitive theorists focus on learning as a mental operation that takes places when information enters trough the senses, undergoes mental manipulation, is stored, and the finally used (pp 16). Thinking maps provide the brain with a way to organize the information and a way to link old information to new information. Cognitive theorists would love that students would be linking the old information to the new information because it would make retrieval of that information quick and more efficient. The learner would remember more because they would be learning information that was always represented in a mental process, which is what cognitive theorists, live for. Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, and Malenoski had this to say about thinking maps, “to aid the learning process, look for opportunities to activate students’ background knowledge, thereby providing a direction for exploration. The technology, in turn, provides you with editable visual aids and multimedia resources that appeal to a number of learning styles” (pp. 79).

Behaviorist Learning Theory integrated with Technology

The instruction strategies described in the resources this week correlate with the principles of behaviorist learning theory because they discuss ways to increase a desired behavior by reinforcing it and punishing undesired behaviors. According to behaviorists, the learner acquires behaviors, skills, and knowledge in response to the rewards, punishments, or withheld responses associated with them. In the chapter that discussed homework, it talks about using different websites that allow students to practice certain skills and are reward for correct answers and punished for wrong answers by not being allowed to move on to the next level.

In the chapter that discusses reinforcing effort, all of the strategies that are provided to improve student effort are based on the behaviorist learning theory. Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, and Malenoski stated (2007), “Spreadsheet software and data collection tools support the instructional strategy of reinforcing effort by helping students to chart the relationship between effort and achievement one of the classroom recommendations” (pp 156). A powerful way to show students that their hard work is paying off is to not only show them the data but combined data on groups that they associate themselves with. This strategy is built on the principal that the students will continue to work hard because they will be rewarded by seeing their data on the chart improve.