What the Tech?

Working through questions about technology and education

Category: Social Media and Personalized Learning

The Hike

July 26, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Yesterday, I was asked to find an image that captures where I am in exploring and understanding my research. The image that came to mind was hiking up a steep hill. This came to me for several reasons. If you have ever met me in person, you know that I have an issue with breathing. I have a narrow trachea, about half the size of an average person, that makes my breathing laboured and noisy. This is intensified when I hike in the woods. I can feel every slight incline as it becomes more difficult to get oxygen into my limbs; I have to stop often. Now comparing this academic journey to this nasty personal struggle, sounds unpleasant; before I continue, I have to say, I love hiking! I hike often, but I either do it alone or with someone who doesn’t mind stopping often so I can catch my breath.

This hike began at sea level. In my mind, what I understood of research was that quantitative research dealt with numerical data and qualitative did not. For this reason, reading about the qualitative research method was a nice, familiar downhill slope. Mixed Methods research made sense, two familiar methods combined to create more utilizable meta-inferences. I thought I knew what qualitative research was but had never heard of autoethnography. This was the first steep hill for me. I found the academic language made the trail especially rocky. I will need to hike that one again along with phenomenology and MĂ©tissage, once I get better shoes.

Twitter was a trail I had started to hike a long time ago but I never really to used it for building a Personal Learning Network (PLN). I used it to follow a few colleagues, receive news, and entertainment. I opened a new account for growing my PLN and am enjoying the new and varied trails it is leading to. Feedly and Trello are like the map/message boards at the trailhead. I have to remember to check them before heading up the next trail. I like these boards as they can be a spot to pause and think, or find a trail I did not know was there. Meeting Pia Russell, Matt Hucolak, and Rich McCue was like finding an interpretational centre; their tour of tools such as Boolean searches in the UVic Library and Zotero have made the trek a lot easier. Right now, Zotero is like my backpack; there is a lot in there and some of it is heavy. I am not sure how Google Sheets will be useful to me but it sure is a cool tool; I will be watching for an opportunity.

TR Island Muddy Trail

“TR Island Muddy Trail” by Mr.TinDC is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

The visit and views of Dr. George Valetsianos highlighted some things that I had noticed about social media and some things I had not. I knew that social media could be a treacherous trail for personal opinions and controversial topics; these trails are generally too mucky for me and while I am not afraid to watch others from dry ground, I am not one to wade in. I did not know that this is a particularly female trait or that women are targeted more than men. This is upsetting but makes sense with what I know about some of my female colleagues. It seems that the smaller they are in stature or the younger they are in age, the more problems they seem to have with parents. I do not have many issues with parents. Is it because I am not little and not young? Face to face with a parent is one thing, but opening up on Twitter with trolls, sock puppets and swarms is quite another. My PLN connected me to Heidi N. Moore’s Twitter that made me think of Dr. Veletsianos’s research. The thread and the research together make me wonder about joining in those controversial topics myself. I do not know if I am ready for that, but I will dip a respectful toe in if something needs to be said.

Jesse Miller came in to talk about more of those mucky trails on the internet, with respect to children and their parents. He made it clear that we have a lot of work to do in educating children about digital citizenship. Unfortunately, few parents have had this education or informed themselves so they are responsible for putting too much “out there”. For me and Kindergarten, I was thinking maybe there was little to worry about. If they cannot spell, they cannot Google search, right? What I forgot was that often parents’ tabs can come up when they open the Google app and from there, they can just click their way into trouble. The same goes for the YouTube app which many children are familiar with because teachers use it in school and parents use it as a babysitter. For my part, I do try to raise awareness with my students’ parents; I ask them at events, on my class blog and in Freshgrade posts to get explicit permission from parents before posting any children other than their own on the internet. I would like to do more. I would like to find or make a pamphlet to give kindergarten parents about internet safety for pre-readers. Awareness is the first step.

“mountain” by barnyz is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

I enjoyed the visit by Dr. Christine Younghusband and Ian Landy as they shared their thoughts on PLNs, But even more, I valued Dr. Younghusband’s views on Indigenous Learning, Indigenous Resurgence, Indigenous Ways of Knowing, and decolonization, along with Dr. Shauneen Pete’s and Colin Madland’s. I saw Dr. Pete speak at an unconference at the beginning of July and I knew I wanted to hear more. What maybe I did not want to hear was that I would have to engage in self-study to get the answers I need. I understand what she is saying though; I know it is my responsibility. It is on my list. I appreciated the notions of storytelling and using Coyote to voice her less polite thoughts. These are definitely things I can get my head around and use. It also set me to thinking about the toys in my classroom. I need to think about decolonizing the choices I give my students for play. What is more white settler than Barbie?! My own indigenous learning is a tricky path but definitely a mountain I want to get to the top of, and soon.

 

Reading Getting to Grips with Perspectives and Models by Mary McAteer introduced me to another new trail. Action research, with its central focus of improving practice, is a natural fit for teachers. I believe that many teachers are regularly assessing and making changes to their practice but it’s usually a change to things external to themselves, such as the lessons, materials, or the physical space. To make a change to oneself, that is a challenge. So much of what I do seems instinctual so noticing it, recording it, assessing it and, if necessary, changing it would be tricky. There are times, of course, when I notice a mistake I have made or a situation where my intervention fails and I think of alternate ways for next time. How do I catch the more subtle traits that need to be addressed?

When Trevor Mackenzie visited, I have to admit, I was not that interested in following that well-travelled trail. My school has spent quite a lot of time on that path. It was not until someone connected inquiry to decolonization that I gave it another look. Could free inquiry help our class/community account for indigenous learners’ identities? All our learners’ identities? Kindergarten is full of inquiry-based, project-based, and play-based learning. Can I add some purpose and structure to their explorations? Would structure foster their curiosity or stifle it?

Keeping a research diary was the trail not taken. I had in my head that it was something I would start later, after I had determined my “big question”. I perceived the goal of the research diary to be aiding in the creation of a thorough, critical, and generative Literature Review. In hindsight, it would have been much easier to write this blogpost if I had started a research diary. Lesson learned. I will start one tomorrow, or when I figure out where I want to write it: as a page in this blog, in a notebook, in OneNote, or in a Google Doc. Where does everyone else write their research diary?

It’s funny how quantitative and qualitative research were the methods I was most familiar with, if not the only methods I was familiar with, at the beginning of this journey, but now are not the ones at the forefront of my mind. Self study, action research, and research diary methods have now moved to the forefront. They seem related to me, like three trails leading to the same peak.

TP 52 for 2019 - Week 1 : NEW

“TP 52 for 2019 – Week 1 : NEW” by timz2011 is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Dr. Martin Weller and Dr. John Willinsky spoke to us about the growing acceptance of open educational practices, open scholarship, and open access. I have been using LibreOffice for years but never really thought about the significance of that. I just assumed the creators must be getting paid somehow. I wonder what other open access I have enjoyed without thinking about it. I know I have done a lot with online images in my work at school. I did not think anything of copyright as I copied pictures for lessons or made resources for my class. It was only recently that I learned about Creative Commons and attribution. I am still working out all the ethics around this but I will certainly be applying what I know in the future. As for open scholarship, I hope that I can access scholarly works for my continued research because I can only choose to climb one mountain for this masters project and I have at least three mountains in mind. For now I will clamour about in the foothills, stopping to breathe, and deciding which mountain to climb first.

A First Look at Digital Literacy in Kindergarten

July 24, 2019 / / 0 Comments
Children at school

“Children at school” by Lupuca is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

How does one weave technology into Kindergarten learning? Certainly there are ways for the teacher to use technology in preparing lessons for students, sharing media with students, and reporting student learning to parents, but how do teachers put the technology into the hands of four and five year olds for the purpose of enhancing their learning? One way might be through inquiry-based learning. The authors of the paper, Information and Digital Literacies in a Kindergarten Classroom: An I-LEARN Case Study (Tecce DeCarlo, Grant, Lee, & Neuman, 2018), sought to validate the I-LEARN model for guiding young learners’ inquiry-based projects.

The authors of the paper appear to be connected through Drexel University in Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Mary Jean Tecce DeCarlo is an Associate Clinical Professor in the School of Education at Drexel University. Her research interests are listed as early literacy development, digital and information literacy, learning differences, knowledge construction, and urban education. Allen Grant, formerly an Associate Clinical Professor at Drexel University, is now Dean of the School of Education at State University of New York Potsdam, in New York. His research interests are listed as emerging technologies, urban school reform, leadership development, and virtual schooling. Vera J. Lee is also an Associate Clinical Professor at Drexel University. Her research interests are listed as family literacy in urban communities, sociocultural perspectives of literacies, language and literacy development of multilingual parents and children, and community partnerships. Finally, Delia Neuman is a Professor Emerita from the College of Computing and Informatics at Drexel University. Her research interests are listed as learning in information-rich environments, instructional systems design, the use of media for learning, and school library media.

T. Westwood (2019)

It is important to note that the authors declared no conflict of interest in the production of this research, even though the I-LEARN model was created by Dr. Neuman (2008). The I-LEARN model consists of six steps designed to guide students through the research process: Identify a question, Locate information, Evaluate information, Apply information, Reflection, and kNow.

The case study discussed in the paper is a report on the results of one kindergarten class out of four kindergarten classes that were part of a larger research project. The authors believed that this particular class of 24 students “yielded the richest findings” because the teacher, Ms. C, applied a “developmentally appropriate approach” (Tecce DeCarlo et al., 2018, p. 265). The paper outlined how each step was executed with the teacher identifying how to best model and structure each step based on her own expertise developed over five years of teaching kindergarten. The last step, kNow, was not discussed in the paper other than to list it as a step and explain it as “instantiating the knowledge gained so it can be used in the future” (p. 266). The four teachers involved in the larger study developed the assessment rubric and did not include kNow; they only proposed to assess the first five steps. The researchers concluded that young children, even in low-income public schools, can identify inquiry topics, locate sources, and participate actively in the digital world.

There are many models for designing inquiry projects for both adults and children. Most of them include the same steps as Neuman’s model in some form. Neuman’s model is a linear model. Others describe inquiry steps as a cycle or spiral where a student may continue into a new question or reflection may cause the student to go back a step or two. MacKenzie and Bathurst-Hunt list “Ten Phases of the Inquiry Cycle” (2018, p. 24). The model itself is not what drew me to this paper.

What drew me to this paper was the notion of exploring digital literacy with Kindergarten children. The authors repeatedly emphasized the role of the teacher, Ms. C, in making the project a success. “Ms. C’s developmentally appropriate approach to the I-LEARN project…was exemplary, and this paper focuses on the strategies and techniques she adopted as well as the results of her students’ work” (p. 265). “Analysis of the data indicated that Ms. C had developed her own highly effective approach to the assignment and adjusted her implementation of I-LEARN’s stages to meet her students’ particular needs” (p. 270). I would argue that in the end, it seemed to have little to do with the actual I-LEARN model and entirely to do with the scaffolding and support provided by the adults that were present in each of the steps.

The descriptions of what Ms. C did to model and guide the students are necessary in order for the students to be successful. It is possible that the three, less successful, teachers either did not realize this or did not want to alter the instructions provided by the researchers. Mrs. C broke each step into smaller, more manageable pieces, and provided opportunities for discussion, examples and modelling. For example, before having the children choose there own sources, she discussed possible sources such as computers and family members, and then provided concrete examples of sources in the form of read-alouds and guest speakers. Then, she modelled how to fill in their draft sheets. These necessary sub-steps for applying the I-LEARN steps were not provided by the I-LEARN model.

Overall, the paper provided few answers and raised many questions for me. What was the level of engagement by students in the class? How was the class managed? Did all the children work on their projects at the same time? The paper mentioned that the teacher and two of the researchers were helping the children use the computers. How often did these computer sessions take place? Can a project such as this be managed by one teacher alone?

T Westwood (2019)

These questions about the paper are contributing to my own emerging research interest. It is often the case that the kindergarten teacher is the only adult in the room. It is sometimes possible to schedule the Learning Commons Teacher once a week, but there are no guarantees. How can a lone teacher build digital literacy in a kindergarten class? Is it done through inquiry projects that follow a model such as I-LEARN or the Ten Phases of the Inquiry Cycle offered by MacKenzie and Bathurst-Hunt (MacKenzie & Bathurst-Hunt, 2018, p. 24)? Would structured inquiry projects be more feasible in small groups while the rest of the class is doing different activities that require less guidance? Would it be better to break up digital literacy into its smaller components and address each in turn while introducing students to different applications? Tablets such as iPads are amazing tools in that they are fairly easy to use and offer a tactile component that young children enjoy. They are engaging all by themselves. Is it important for young learners to know how to use a computer or laptop at this stage?

Kindergarten is a very busy place. Some of these children are as young as four years old when they walk through the door. They have come to school to play. They are at school to develop social skills and test new relationships. They are there to experiment and take risks. Many are just beginning to understand behavioural expectations and self-regulation. They are beginning to compare themselves to others and allow that to shape their behaviour. The children are active and noisy. In the classroom setting, they need to be guided and monitored in virtually everything they do. How does a kindergarten teacher fit digital literacy into this already full day? Those same children are also there to learn. They have great curiosity and have many interests of their own. Most are eager to learn to read, write, and do math. Project-based inquiry might be the answer.

References

MacKenzie, T., & Bathurst-Hunt, R. (2018). Inquiry Mindset (First). Elevate Books EDU.

Neuman, D. (2008). I-LEARN: A Model for Creating Knowledge in the Information Age. International Association of School Librarianship. Selected Papers from the … Annual Conference; Brantford, 1–10.

Tecce DeCarlo, M. J., Grant, A., Lee, V. J., & Neuman, D. (2018). Information and Digital Literacies in a Kindergarten Classroom: An I-LEARN Case Study. Early Childhood Education Journal, 46(3), 265–275. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-017-0857-7

Two Worlds Meet

July 20, 2019 / / 0 Comments

“Inquiry Learning Word Cloud” by Christopher Lister is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Back when I taught grade 4/5 in 2014, I collaborated with my colleagues to create an amazing inquiry experience we called, Two Worlds Meet. This project was centred around and assessed within the Social Studies curriculum with the initial goal of incorporating more local, authentic First Nations content. Most of the students really enjoyed it, but I believe we teachers enjoyed it even more. It consumed far more time than our administrators generously gave us, but we enjoyed the collaboration time and together; we designed a project that is still in use today. Since then, I moved away from intermediate students and into the world of Kindergarten.

When I dropped back into Kindergarten, an interesting thing happened. I stopped thinking about inquiry and focused more on play-based and outdoor learning experiences. Play-based learning really has a lot of the elements of Inquiry in it. I spend a lot of time noticing what the students are choosing to play and then, asking them if they want to explore more about it. For example, I noticed two children really enjoyed drawing monkeys so I sat with them as they drew and asked them what they knew about monkeys. Then, during my lunch hour, I found some videos and books about monkeys that they could check out during choice time.

When Trevor Mackenzie came into our EdTech MEd class this week, I thought to myself, “Oh yeah, inquiry. Where does that fit in Kindergarten?” I reflected back on those monkey boys, and thought that if I had been thinking with my inquiry-based brain, I might have taken it further. Why didn’t I ask them about their wonderings? Why didn’t I have them share their learning with the class? Why didn’t I get the iPads out and have them share their learning through a simple app? My answer is, because I am the lone adult in such a busy room. Where can I get that kind of time? How do I focus on teaching a small group an app when there are so many other activities and behaviours to monitor during choice time? Then I look at the book, Inquiry Mindset, and find the profile of Mackenzie’s co-author, Rebecca Bathurst-Hunt, at the back. She is a Kindergarten Teacher! Now I need to read the book and Rebecca’s blog, and follow her on Twitter.

Next, we met Jeff Hopkins from Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry (PSII). The school’s website claims, “Through a formal inquiry process, learners at PSII (we pronounce it “sigh”) develop interdisciplinary pathways leading to learning activities that take them through a curriculum all their own, while also meeting or exceeding BC graduation requirements.” Listening to Jeff, I was excited for the possibilities for those learners and then, I started thinking about what could I use in Kindergarten. What if I could talk my two Kindergarten teacher colleagues at my school into adapting the PSII model for our learners? I thought about PSII’s layout. What if we had one of our classroom’s as “the noisy room”, one as the room with the “working hum”, and one with “quiet space”? What if our learners could move from one space to the other, with one teacher in each room? I do not think our learners can schedule their own time like PSII learners can, but what if we could schedule the children taking into account their needs and interests. Could we schedule small levelled groups for short, focussed lessons on the basics? Could we schedule large group times for gym, music, and French? Could we schedule small inquiry group sessions that incorporate literacy, numeracy, social studies, science, art, and technology? Would a model such as this meet the social-emotional needs of our students? Would the children be able to establish good social connections? Can my colleagues and I agree on how to implement, assess, and report on progress? How would parents and administrators respond? It is an exciting idea, but it would require an enormous investment of time and energy to get off the ground. But still, it’s there: Kindergarten meets PSII.

Looking at BC’s Digital Literacy Framework for Kindergarten

July 13, 2019 / / 0 Comments

 

“KidsFun_iPads” by CTJ Online is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

BC’s Digital Literacy Framework has some good points for building kids’ digital skills. Importantly, for Kindergarten and elementary school in general, it specifies, right at the top, that teacher modelling will be necessary before a gradual release of responsibility.  Most kids are capable of exploring an iPad by themselves and this can be relatively safe for pre-readers as long as there are colourful child-orientated game apps on it. However, once those kids can read and spell, adult supervision is required in order to make kids safer.  Years ago, when Shrek was popular, my preteen daughter typed Shrek into a Google search and came across an image of a very large naked woman, painted green, entitled “Shrek’s Mom”.  She was horrified, not necessarily because of the image but because she believed it was wrong to see naked people and she thought her dad would be mad.  After she came to me in tears, it turned into a teachable moment, but I wish I had prepared her better before turning her loose on technology.  Has anyone created one of these frameworks for parents?  There should be a pamphlet or something wrapped up inside every tablet, computer, or game console that advises parents about keeping their kids safe on the internet and the gradual release of responsibility.  I don’t think keeping kids off the internet entirely is a good way to keep them safe.  It just means they’ll be learning all the hard lessons later or at a friend’s house.

At school, our teacher-librarians have curated safe places for the children to search out information of interest inside our Digital Learning Commons. There are recognizable icons and pictures that lead pre-readers to video clips and articles that can be read through text-to-speech technology.  When we introduce these things, there is a conversation about using “safe search” engines rather than the big G they see on the tools at home.

In Kindergarten, the biggest challenge is supporting the children as they use digital technology.  If there’s 20 kids and just me, that is a tricky thing to manage.  I gave up on the computer lab because it would take the entire 25 minute block to get them all signed on.  We pretty much just stick to iPads with no passwords.  Weekly, the teacher-librarian and I sign out the class set of iPads and work together to support the class during a specific technology block.  What I believe would be more useful would be to have a set of 5 iPads that I can keep in my classroom to use in small group settings or, if during free choice time, a student wants to look something up on monkeys, I can help them do that.  In either plan, it would be important to emphasize that the iPads are tools, not toys.  School iPads are not babysitters.

Other than iPads, we have been dipping our toes into coding games and the robotic mouse which is cool.  I would like to do more with this.

A large piece of the Framework is about digital citizenship.  In Kindergarten, kids are learning about ordinary, run-of the-mill citizenship and  personal protection every day.

a. safety – It would be easy to connect digital citizenship in that context.  We talk about most people they meet being good people, but we need to use our instincts and stay out of reach from “bad apples”.  We can easily incorporate online people and online bad apples into those same lessons/conversations.

b. privacy – This would definitely be guided lessons. We could talk about passwords with regard to my “Teacher iPad”.  We could talk about how websites track purchasing activity during our unit on wants and needs right before Christmas.  We could talk about pop-up ads that they may see on game apps.

c. relationships – we could incorporate some Skype or FaceTime with relatives into our sharing time (aka, show and tell).  We already talk about how parents can send their digital photos to me with email and airdrop.

d.  cyberbullying – I think this is a bit premature for Kindergarten. Unless they are participating in online interactive video games at home, I think we can include this in social learning at school.  If someone is saying or doing something that upsets you, let a grown up know so we can help that someone to be a better friend.  In Kindergarten, bullying is a frequently misused word, but that’s another blog.

e.  digital footprint – ‘Mom, Mrs. Westwood says you should ask my permission before you put my photo on Facebook because a bad apple might see it.’  I’m not sure if I would step into that one yet.  Besides isn’t putting embarrassing photos of your kids on Facebook a parental imperative?  Still, someone needs to talk to them about the bathtub photos.

g.  creative credit & copyright – We talk about ownership over creative work every time someone scribbles on someone else’s drawing, or when someone takes someone’s drawing out of the recycling, they need to ask for permission to take it . They get it.  We can talk about copying and pasting images when we do our class butterfly report.

f, h, i and j have no bullet points for Kindergarten so I won’t comment on them but I do wish there was a bullet point on limiting the use of technology so kids are still playing and building in real life, still interacting with adults and other children, and getting physical activity.  I had a little guy once tell me, “I only play video games.  I’m better at it than my brother.  I don’t like toys.”  Yikes!  This is a big question for me in Kindergarten.  When 4, 5 and 6 year olds are still learning the very basics, how much digital technology do we want in there?  How do I find the balance between the sand box and iPads?

Instructors using Twitter

July 12, 2019 / / 2 Comments

The authors of the study, Twitter Use and its Effects on Student Perception of Instructor Credibility were looking to see if college students’ regard for their instructors would be influenced by an instructors’ social media feeds.  I think it’s interesting that they used manipulated Twitter feeds from an imaginary instructor.  The concept of an instructor you cannot meet either in person or via video, would make me ultra-leary. I don’t know that I would trust any Twitterer that had not been vetted by someone I already knew.  I guess I have these questions to my own kids rattling around in my brain, “Have you met them face-to-face?”  “No, then, which of your face-to face friends has met them?”

That said, I suppose now, with building my PLN, it won’t be possible to form a strong opinion before I click follow.  If I haven’t sought them out because of someone else’s recommendation, then I guess my entire opinion of them will be based on the bit of a bio they put on and then their Twitterfeed.  Do they follow many people?  Whom do they follow?  Do many people follow them?  Who follows them?  I suppose I could try googling their name, if it isn’t a pseudonym.  If I see a lot of tweets or retweets that jive with my own beliefs,  that would make them more credible.  What if they have opposing beliefs?  Just because they have a different viewpoint doesn’t mean they do not possess ethos.

People can demonstrate ethos if their Twitterfeeds favour viewpoints that are also indicative of intelligence, character and goodwill.  This might be easier to do with professional tweets but isn’t impossible with social ones.  I think it would come down to our relationships.  If I know the person face-to-face, I can add my instincts to the analysis, but if I don’t, then I think it would come down to what I believe is appropriate for our relationship.  The threshold for TMI would be much lower in a new relationship.  Now if that person was my instructor, pretending I wouldn’t be spooked by a lack of face-to-face time, I suppose eventually their teaching style would become an indicator of their credibility more so than whatever they tweet.

As a teacher, I think I am wary of putting anything too personal on social media, especially since I live in the same community in which I teach.  Many of the kids know where I live.  I know another teacher in the same area who saw an item on the local moms’ Facebook page evaluating her class.  Yikes!  We teachers are warned about keeping teacher-student relationships as professional as possible in order to protect ourselves.  So maybe we prefer relationships with our instructors to remain that way, at least for a while.

 

Thoughts on Project-Based Learning in Kindergarten

July 5, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Image result for most likely to succeedIn the film, Most Likely to Succeed, we are presented with an idealized high school class where everyone appears to be engaged and thriving. Well, I teach Kindergarten. My students are on the ground floor in preparing for this possible future. Since we all know the expression, “All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten,” I need to roll up my sleeves and get going.

On the first day of Kindergarten, they are all eager to show me how smart they are. Some think they already know everything. They’re going to be mighty disappointed when they find out there’s more and that there’s always more. So let’s teach them Growth Mindset. Hey kids, do you have a growth mindset? I do, I do! Do they really? Many do, others, nope. They did learn what Growth Mindset is. They can tell you which of two scenarios demonstrates a growth mindset, but some still cry if the shark they drew doesn’t really look like a shark. Many have a growth mindset for themselves, but are unforgiving of classmates that struggle. My shark is awesome; yours looks like an Easter egg. They are competitive. They need to practise having a growth mindset and supporting their classmates, but at least I can get them started.

In their article, Why Minimal Guidance During Instruction Does Not Work: An Analysis of the Failure of Constructivist, Discovery, Problem-Based, Experiential, and Inquiry-Based Teaching, Kirschner, Sweller, and Clark make a case against minimally guided instruction. In Kindergarten, problem-based learning, inquiry-based learning, and project-based learning basically boil down to Play-based learning. We have unguided play happening for a big chunk of the day. During this time, could one say students demonstrate “practising a discipline”? Some are expert builders, creating more and more complex buildings, fortresses, towers each day. Some are expert interior decorators, deciding what new elements to create or rearrange in dolly’s house. Some are actors, perfecting their dog impressions. In high school, are students that have an aptitude for film who decide to express their learning in a movie practising their discipline?

Image result for kindergarten provocation three pigsIt’s not until the actors see what the builders are doing that they stray from their role-play. It’s not until the fashion experts, see what the artists are drawing that they venture forth to improve upon their stick figure drawings. Likewise, it is for the teacher to set out other inspiring activities, provocations, we call them, to entice the experts on to something new. If I set out some marbles in a box of sand, maybe they will make a colourful picture in the sand, as I modelled (fine arts, science of matter), and maybe they will borrow the marbles and whip them along the chalk ledge to see how they bounce off the walls (science of matter, physics). The provocation is minimal guidance. I will need to give a little more guidance if I really want to hit the intended learning standards, but I’ll likely choose to appreciate what they showed me and try to catch the learning standards next time.

Kirschner, Sweller, and Clark commented that “In the medical domain, Patel, Groen, and Norman (1993)…showed that students trained in a PBL curriculum failed to separate basic science knowledge from the specific clinical knowledge associated with particular patients.” This makes sense. I’ll need to intervene if I want my marble whippers to name what scientific principles they just discovered. That said, I’m pretty sure they can figure out that there are similarities between marbles and toys cars zipping across that ledge. Maybe I should suggest they add bean bags to their inquiry. You don’t want to see my walls.

So I need to support them in their learning, make their learning more meaningful, guide the practice of skills and growth mindset, and save my walls. Teaching for Meaningful Learning by Barron and Darling-Hammond has something more balanced to offer. “Education today must focus on helping students learn how to learn…” I feel like I’ve been saying this since I started teaching in 1995. Why do we have to learn about Japan? You don’t. You need to know how to learn about something. I picked Japan because I’ve got Japanese stuff in a box to show you. I had the right idea but, oh how the world has changed. Now I’ve really got some stuff to show you!

Barron and Darling-Hammond cited Thomas (2000) in identifying five key components of effective project-based learning. “It is: central to the curriculum, organized around driving questions that lead students to encounter central concepts or principles, focused on a constructive investigation that involves inquiry and knowledge building, student-driven (students are responsible for designing and managing their work), and authentic, focusing on problems that occur in the real world and that people care about.” In Kindergarten, I doubt that I could assign a comprehensive project that will engross my students for an entire term but I can give them little projects that are suitable building blocks. These little projects would need to build their social skills more than anything. Small group projects would strengthen their collaborative and communicative skills such as their ability to share materials, voice their thoughts, take on a role, stay on task, encourage each other, and peacefully settle disagreements. Those projects could certainly be authentic and student-driven in most cases. I could come up with a relatively simple guiding question that engages a particular group within something they are already playing at such as, How can we turn our house area into a veterinarian/pet store? How can we race our marbles/cars without damaging the walls or having dangerous rebounds? In Kindergarten, we’ll want to incorporate those pesky alphabet letters and numbers so I hope they decide to make signs, or do measurements. Otherwise, I’ll have to stick my nose into their fun to “provide proper scaffolding, assessment, and redirection as projects unfold” (Barron & Darling-Hammond, p. 8).

In the end, I hope I got the point of all the reading this week, but this is where my brain went.

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