Asychronous learning found to be better for retention

How Does Distance Education Compare With Classroom Instruction? A Meta-Analysis of the Empirical Literature -- Bernard et al. 74 (3): 379 -- Review of Educational Research

Dividing achievement outcomes into synchronous and asynchronous forms of DE produced a somewhat different impression. In general, mean achievement effect sizes for synchronous applications favored classroom instruction, while effect sizes for asynchronous applications favored DE.

Delphi Method - Potential for Dissertation

An interesting way to conduct research without travel, plus to get ideas from participants as to what is important.

Delphi method is a systematic, interactive forecasting method which relies on a panel of independent experts. The carefully selected experts answer questionnaires in two or more rounds. After each round, a facilitator provides an anonymous summary of the experts’ forecasts from the previous round as well as the reasons they provided for their judgments. Thus, participants are encouraged to revise their earlier answers in light of the replies of other members of the group. It is believed that during this process the range of the answers will decrease and the group will converge towards the "correct" answer. Finally, the process is stopped after a pre-defined stop criterion (e.g. number of rounds, achievement of consensus, stability of results) and the mean or median scores of the final rounds determine the results.

Interesting idea from UTC professor for 3D periodic table

Chattanooga Times Free Press | Chattanooga: Professor puts spin on periodic table

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga professor Dr. Hinsdale Bernard has been working on a three-dimensional model of the periodic table of the elements since he was a chemistry teacher in Trinidad in the late 1970s. He recently received a patent for the model he has been developing. His "Periodic Table in Three-Dimensional Form" is meant to be a learning tool that would appeal to youngsters from elemetary school to college age.

Also interesting that you can't embed Chatt Times videos..

"Billy, share your research." "No, it's mine!"

New Effort Encourages Professors to Share the Research Materials on Their Hard Drives - Chronicle.com

Dan Cohen, director of the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University, wants scholars to stop keeping their research materials to themselves.

This article highlights attempts to get research faculty to share data online while they are conducting studies and after. This seems contrary to every aspect of academic research in which it seems that we all have to wait around and just be excited about what wonderful reports they will share. Additionally, the intellectual property issue is huge with every faculty member I've spoken with. However, in the day and age we live in, are we going to start to see LESS OWNERSHIP OF INFORMATION? Even though many academics hate it, I think Wikipedia and other shared knowledge efforts might be the start of something revolutionary and new, and research seems like the next logical step in sharing info online.

Posted by cmwillis at 4:28 PM | | TrackBack

Wikipedia debate..

Slashdot | Should Schools Block Sites Like Wikipedia?

I think it's hilarious that just becuase you didn't pay an arm and a leg for some piece of information, or it doesn't say Of Brittanica after it, people don't trust the information. Newsflash: We shouldn't trust anything without further investigation.

Slashdot | Should Schools Block Sites Like Wikipedia?

The reason given was that Wikipedia (being user created and edited) did not represent a credible or reliable source of information for schools.

Maybe they can ban students discussing things in the hallways as well. With these guidelines that is also not credible.

Academic Scholarly Journals: Look Out!

I finished my journal article a bit ahead of the buzzer this time and did some great work I think toward the end. The article was flailing for some time without the local connection which I finally made by meeting with Jill Levine at Normal Park Elementary. This gave my paper a very grounded, practical feel I think and her insight was valuble.

Thanks to Jim for pointing out potential for plagiarism, though I think a few of his notes on my paper pointed to my synthesis of other's ideas. I feel like if I've quoted and cited others work properly, then I go on to synthesize that into my own understanding of the topic in my own words with my new ideas--that would not be plagiarism. However, as Dean Hicks says, better safe than sorry since if I get into trouble I'll have to go see him. So I played it safe and shall continue to do so.

Also, when I get around to submitting this, I think I will remove some of the learning theory regurgitation, since I really just put that in there to adequately cover the assignment. As for an article for educators on curriculum design, I think readers will not need a refresher course in cognitivist and constructionist frameworks. I won't cut them out entirely, but I do plan to reduce those sections.

Click below to read The curriculum of museum magnet schools
and how it can be adapted to traditional classrooms.

Introduction

The information age has brought changes in all aspects of society--particularly public education. Many of the concepts our public educational system is built upon are remnants of the industrial age and gaps can be seen in what teachers and administrators are expected to achieve with students in these outdated systems (King, 1998). School systems have been attempting a wide variety of education reforms that employ various learning strategies. One of these strategies is the creation of magnet schools whose curriculums are focused on a particular theme or learning theory. An effective use of this practice has been the creation of museum magnet schools. In these schools the curriculum is tied in closely to local museums and the focus of learning is in the investigation and creation of exhibits. With this, curriculum school systems have been able to create a learning environment where students are able to participate in hands-on, object-based learning. This paper will demonstrate how the museum magnet school curriculum provides such a hands-on learning environment. Additionally, aspects of this curriculum will be discussed that can be adapted to be used in traditional school settings.

History of magnet schools
Museum schools have evolved in part from the recognition that in many cases schools must re-design themselves in order to adapt to society’s changing needs (King, 1998). Museum schools are often connected with or categorized as a magnet school. Magnet school programs have had a relatively short history in the United States, often occurring as a response to calls for voluntary desegregation in racially-divided school systems (Foster, 1976). One goal for the creation of magnet schools was to develop a curriculum and educational environment so desirable that parents from diverse background would want to enroll their children there regardless of racial stereotypes (Foster, 1976).
Magnet schools have been successful as measured by academic achievement tests and in comparison to their district’s averages. In a study on magnet schools performed in 1984 and repeated in 1989, it was found that of the sample population 80% or more had average reading and math scores that were higher than district averages (Blank, 1992). Other research has claimed that the educational quality in magnets schools does vary, but no more so than that in non-magnets (Foster, 1976). As will be shown, the academic achievement scores in certain schools adopting the museum magnet school curriculum have shown great improvements since that adoption and as compared to their school district’s averages.
Whether started to improve racial integration or to help with low-achievement on standardized tests, magnet schools “provide additional options to children whose current schools are in need of improvement, and… serve as laboratories of successful educational practice” (Creating Successful Magnet School Programs).

History of museum magnets
Magnets schools with a museum curriculum are the result of museums and school districts joining forces to create new and innovative educational institutions (King, 1998). A museum school can be defined as a partnership between at least one museum and at least one school in which curriculum is created that embeds state and federal mandates into experiential, hands-on learning (King, 1998). The benefits of such a partnership extend to the museum as well. A museum is able to more easily fulfill its educational role in the community with direct access to students in the school system. Through the partnership, they can increase community involvement in the museum, obtain greater resources for the collections, and build a more diverse audience as family members of the students also become more involved with the museum (King, 1998).
The history of museum magnet schools is relatively short. Kira King (1996), who has done a significant amount of research on the topic, believes the first school that fits the above definition opened around 1990. Out of several thousand magnet schools and magnet programs across the United States, there are still relatively few schools that fit the definition of a museum school. The implementation of the museum magnet school curriculum represents a complete re-design of a school and its entire curriculum, rather than applying superficial modifications to the existing structures (King, 1996). The result of this new school design is typically a collaboration of stakeholders and museum and school representatives that is uniquely capable of responding to the needs of the community.

Basic concepts of the curriculum
Three distinct terms arise in the discussion of museum magnet schools: museum learning, the museum process, and a museum school (King, 1998). Museum learning occurs when these schools use the creation and examination of exhibits to enable “project-enhanced learning” (Takahisa & Chalusian, 1995). One such form is to encourage students to take on research apprenticeships. In this scenario, students work closely with museum curators to investigate and create exhibits. The museum staff is able to mentor students as they model the lifelong learning that occurs in their workplace.
The museum school curriculum is founded firmly on the concept that teachers do not hold the body of knowledge and distribute it to students in bits and chunks. In museum learning, students are empowered to choose what learning paths they wish to pursue and in turn are responsible for management of the information they acquire (King, 1998). The role of the teacher is thereby transformed into more of a facilitator than a content matter expert. Application from the museum learning experience is made in different subject areas in order to comply with state and federal mandates and to insure better performance on achievement tests.
An instructional strategy that works very well within this curriculum is object-based learning. The underlying assumption of this strategy is that there is “an interconnection between an object and the ideas that it communicates” (Object-based Learning). As students observe and research objects in a museum, they have unique learning experiences—each with their own thoughts, feelings, and emotions. This can be an effective starting point for incorporation of new knowledge by a teacher who facilitates learning rather than trying to dictate it.
Measurement of learning in the museum school environment is achieved by combining measurements of attention paid to museum exhibits and non-traditional measures of classroom learning. Frequently used measures in museums are “attracting power and holding power” (Donald, 1991, p. 371), essentially measures of an exhibit’s appeal to the museum visitor. These can be applied to the exhibits created by students in the museum school learning environment. Other scholastic measures can be applied to the student’s approach to and accomplishment of projects. These are the amount of time spent on task, measuring the knowledge gained, development of thinking and problem-solving skills, and “motivation or attitudes, and creativity” (Donald, 1991, p.371). A common problem of this type of learning is the subjective nature of works, thus rubrics for evaluation each project must be carefully followed when assigning a grade.
Many scholars in learning and formal education have recognized the need for students to be embedded in experiential learning environments. Museums offer learning experiences that realize many of the goals set forth by many of the education scholars of the last century. In 1938, Dewey’s (as cited in Neill, 2005) Experience in Education was a call for recognition of practical, hands-on learning experiences for students in formal education. He proposed that learning should have “continuity of experience” (Dillon, 2001)—every learning experience should build upon existing knowledge and should influence future experiences. This occurs when teachers prepare students for a museum visit, then the students explore the museum, and finally, reports and follow-up discussions take place. Another concept Dewey advocates is interaction—learning takes place by interacting with the physical world (as cited in Neill, 2005). Interaction is often more likely to occur in a museum than in a classroom.
Piaget’s cognitive development theory places emphasis on the cyclical interactions between the learner and the environment that occur in each of four major stages during a child’s development (Ormrod, 154), a principle which builds on Dewey’s principle of interaction. These stages are from birth to two, from two to six, from seven to eleven, and from twelve to fifteen years of age (Dillon, 2001). Vygotsky included a social dimension to this type of learning when he asserted that much of it is “culturally mediated” (Ormrod, 1999, p. 161). His argument proposed that advanced concepts appear first in social interactions and then are slowly absorbed by the individual.
George Hein espouses the constructivist learning theory which emphasizes active participation in learning, using both “their hands and their minds” (Dillon, 2001). A modification of this theory, situated constructionism is even more focused on the idea of “learning-by-making” which appeals to many different learning styles (Papert & Harel, 1991). Students should be given the freedom and challenge to produce work that reflects their own interests and personal growth. Therefore, conclusions reached by each learner should not be compared to external standards because “people make their own meaning out of experience” (Hein, 1994, p. 34).
Museums offer an environment that caters particularly well to experiential and constructivist models of learning. Terry Russell points out how adept museums are able to effectively engage visitors by connecting old and new ideas, by providing hands-on experiences, and creating forums for social interaction (Russell, 1994). Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi suggests that intrinsic motivation for learning can be sparked by supportive environments where learners are curious to find out more about each new topic (Csikszentmihalyi, as cited in Dillon, 2001). Exhibits in museums can provide this scenario and more museums are now including even more diverse ways of interacting with the content—a concept which supports Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences theory. Gardner (1993) points out that many schools are striving to recreate the learner-centered environments that exist in museums.
An over-arching framework used in the development of the curriculum of the museum magnet school, one that encompasses many of the concepts listed above, is called Understanding by Design—an idea developed by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe (Brown, 2004, p.13). The focus of their framework is to enhance student understanding, rather than focusing on rote recall or covering textbook material (Wiggins & McTighe, 1998). Their book, Understanding by Design, promotes facets of student understanding that should be at the forefront of any curriculum design. They present a backward design process calls for educators to ask essential questions, such as, “What should students know?” or What is worthy of understanding?” (Wiggins & McTighe, 1998, p. 8). By incorporating curriculum standards into the creation of learning modules, teachers can insure that classroom time is useful and meaningful for the students (Brown, 2004). Further, Understanding by Design recommends that students have a “photo album” of student performance rather than a “snapshot” as their learning is being assessed(Brown, 2004, p. 15). Clearly, this framework calls for a completely new approach to curriculum design and implementation.
During the exploration and creation of interactive, interdisciplinary exhibits, students in museum magnet schools are engaged in topics and information in a very different way than in a traditional classroom with a textbook. Experiential learning calls for active involvement and hands-on exploration (Sternberg and Zhang, 2000). This differs greatly from the traditional classroom model of teaching to the test. Museum experiences that are designed to stimulate a person’s intrinsic motivations to investigate, explore, and synthesize, can lead to the building of salient learning constructs to which further knowledge can be added. Intrinsic motivation in students has a multitude of advantages over extrinsic motivators, including: not needing to constantly compel student to perform tasks, the students are generally more engaged in the topics of study, and they learn new information in a more meaningful, connected fashion (Ormrod, 1999, p. 409). For these reasons, museum education is a particularly useful model of education that has been used by some as the basis of a new kind of curriculum for K-12 schools.
An added benefit of museum magnet schools is that they do not typically cost additional money or require new resources to enable. Because of the symbiotic relationship between the museum and the schools, resources can be shared for a mutually beneficial partnership. This partnership--where the school is incorporated into its surrounding environment, can be described as an integrated learning community (Glencoe Online, 2005). Their non-traditional approach to learning provides new ways to “bridge economic, generational, and institutional gaps” that may be present in the existing school system (Glencoe Online, 2005). Also, such partnerships can often be used as the basis for requests for grant funding, a resource almost all public schools require and often are in competition for.
An example of an integrated, learning community is the partnership between the two schools in Washington, D.C. and the Smithsonian Institution (King, 1999). Of course, a partnership with a museum holding one of the largest and most diverse collections in the world has a tremendous impact on each of the schools involved. In these schools students are encouraged to explore and research existing exhibitions, then work collaboratively to create exhibits. Museum education specialists are available to the students during each step of the process. Finally, the exhibits are put on display and the public is able to view their work, thus finalizing the real-world experience and fulfilling a “real sense of accomplishment” (Glencoe Online, 2005).
Many other school systems have applied the magnet museum school curriculum as successfully. One such school is the Normal Park Museum Magnet in Chattanooga, Tennessee which has partnered with no less than seven local museums (Headley, 2006). Students there engage in “hands-on, minds-on” learning with an emphasis on literacy (Normal Park Museum Magnet School). Once a predominantly black school with low achievement, Normal Park now serves students a very diverse population. Now only about 30% of the students in the school are minority and 70% are non-minority and the achievement gap between the two groups has been reduced by over 40 points (Levine, 2006). Gaps between students from varying economic backgrounds have been reduced significantly as well (Levine, 2006). Jill Levine, the principal at Normal Park, reports that test scores have improved in almost every area (J. Levine, personal interview, March 30, 2006).
In creating the curriculum for the school which re-opened as a museum magnet in 2002, Levine hand chose teachers from the county school system that were willing to think progressively about creating a new kind of educational experience for the students (Battles, 2004). State curriculums were unpacked (Brown, 2004), or taken apart and placed into a more concrete learning context as parts of 9-week modules that focus on specific topics (Battles, 2004). Fort instance, a 5th-grade student spends a 9 week block focused on the civil war. During this time that student will prepare for and then visit the Chattanooga Regional History Museum, report back on that experience, and then apply knowledge gained to the creation of an exhibit on the civil war. That exhibit will then be displayed in the school building and presented on one of four exhibit nights. On that night the student acts as a docent, explaining his or her work and demonstrating an understanding of its sociocultural context (Levine, personal interview, March, 30, 2006).
“Student work is put on a pedestal,” is the phrase Levine uses to describe the unique approach to teaching and learning taken at Normal Park (Levine, personal interview, March 30, 2006). Student projects are on display in every inch of the school building and even on the grounds. Every piece of work is unique and a student’s background cannot be determined by the exhibits they’ve created. This proves that the curriculum can work with students from any background (Creating Successful Magnet School Programs). Levine believes that homework can be an equity issue. When asked about parental involvement with the creation of the exhibits, she explained that the exhibits displayed in the schools are created entirely in the classroom. When parents volunteer they are encouraged to help their student’s entire class, not just their own child (Levine, personal interview, March 30, 2006). Parents at the Normal Park Museum Magnet must volunteer a minimum of 18 hours at the school each year (Normal Park Museum Magnet School). This provides teachers with much of the additional support needed to work in such a demanding teaching role, and it saves thousands of dollars each year for the school’s budget.
Administrators of museum magnets may be presented with more challenges than administrators of traditional schools. Continued funding must constantly be sought for the added costs related to development of the curriculum such as: busing costs for the trips to the museums, materials and supplies needed to create museum quality products, and funding for additional staff such as a museum coordinator (J. Stepanske, personal communication, March 28, 2004). Also additional time must be spent by teachers to create new and unique instructional units each year (Levine, personal interview, March 30, 2006). More teaching assistants are often needed, and this need cannot always be met by parent volunteers, however, even with all of these factors to overcome, administrators in these programs are very optimistic about the new programs they are creating (Battles, 2004).
Museum magnet schools represent one of the most effective education reforms of the last century. With its unique curriculum built upon Understanding by Design and its focus on hands-on, project-based, object-oriented learning, student achievement results at museum magnet school are very high. Normal Park’s school averages were once some of the lowest in Hamilton County, but now they bring up the average. When comparing the academic achievement of advanced students, those who typically score very highly on standardized tests, Normal Park’s students’ scores are consistently higher than advanced students throughout the county (Normal Park School Improvement Plan).

Adapting the Curriculum
The concepts used in magnet schools can be adapted to and used in more traditional school settings to achieve similar results. The Queensland, Australia Museum Magnet schools program represents an effort to embed components of the museum school curriculum into a traditional classroom setting. Students and teachers in this program are similar to those in the magnet schools described above in that they “collect objects, study them to derive knowledge and present their findings through exhibitions and publications” (Museum Magnet Schools). However, these schools have not created an entirely new design in order to adopt the curriculum. Instead they have modified their existing curriculum to incorporate similar goals and have done so quite successfully.
The partnership at the heart of this program exists between four schools under the Queensland Department of Education and the Queensland Museum as well as the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. (Museum Magnet Schools). Students in this program create exhibits in their classrooms that are then displayed on the world wide web to be shared with other schools in the program and partner museum schools in the United States. Even though these schools do not fit the definition of a museum school as put forth by Kira King and others, these schools have been able to achieve many of the same results are possible with the museum school curriculum. Many of the adaptations have involved creative uses of technology, such as virtual field trips and presenting student work online (Museum Magnet Schools).
Jill Levine believes that components of the museum curriculum certainly be transferred to classrooms in non-museum schools. “It just takes a lot of extra work for teachers” (Levine, personal interview, March, 30, 2006). The preparation of the lessons and the museum visits, planning and arranging the projects, and finding materials and funds for purchase of materials can be exhausting, as many schoolteachers and administrators know. But the resulting learning and understanding of what is learned by the students is certainly worth the extra effort.
Teachers today in almost all subject areas are under pressure to adapt their instructional styles to incorporate situated, hands-on learning as is described by the constructivist and constructionist learning theories and to cater to multiple intelligences as described by Howard Gardner. Museums and schools are able to partner in ways that create new types of learning experiences for students of many different backgrounds and with many different learning styles. It should not be interpreted that traditional classrooms are inadequate when compared to the experiences provided by a museum but rather that, as stated by Sarah Dillon, “the learning experiences available in museums and schools can complement each other to the benefit of all learners” (2001). Partnerships between museums and schools are certain to be increasing in numbers and in complexity over coming years, and further research into the curriculum that is developing from those partnerships will be needed.
The current research, although limited, as a whole presents a very positive view of what the future holds for both museum magnet schools and even non-magnet schools. Traditional schools that are able to adapt their existing curriculum to include object-oriented learning experiences and the creation of exhibits in the classroom will likely be able to increase achievement scores and reach students with diverse learning styles. Further empirical research into achievement measures of these schools and cost/benefit analysis could benefit administrators and stakeholders as they proceed with future museum school partnerships.

References

Battles, L. (2004). A Magnet for Learning. Dimensions. 17-18.

Blank, R. K. and Archbald, D. (1992). Magnet schools and issues of education quality. The Clearing House.

Davis, J. and Gardner H. (1993). Open Windows, Open Doors. Museum News Jan/Feb. 34-37, 57-59.

Dillon, S. (2001). Learning Theories and Museum Education Practice: Food for Thought. MERT Journal 2:1.

Donald, J. (1991). The Measurement of Learning in the Museum. Canadian Journal of Education. 175:2. 179-192.

Education Queensland, (n.d.). Museum magnet schools. Retrieved Mar. 12, 2006, from Museum Magnet Schools Web site: http://mms.eq.edu.au/.

Foster, G. (1973). “Desegregating schools: A review of techniques.” Harvard Educational Review v 43 n 1.

Gardner, H. (1993). Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice. New York: Basic Books.

George Mason University Instructional Technology Program, (n.d.). Object-based learning. Retrieved Mar. 14, 2006, from http://chd.gmu.edu/immersion/knowledgebase/strategies/constructivism/objectbased.htm.

Glencoe Online, (2005). Integrated learning communities: communities building better schools. Retrieved Mar. 1, 2006, from Education Up Close Web site: http://www.glencoe.com/sec/teachingtoday/educationupclose.phtml/34.

Hamilton County Department of Education, (n.d.). Normal park museum magnet. Retrieved Mar. 11, 2006, from Education on the Move Web site: http://www.hcde.org/magnet/npmm.htm.

Headley, A. (2006). Normal Park Museum Magnet School. CityScope. 60-64.

Hein, G. (1994). Learning in the Museum. New York: Routledge.

King, K. (1996). Alternative educational systems: A multi-case study in museum schools. Retrieved Feb. 21, 2006, from Dissertations in instructional systems technology. Web site: http://www.indiana.edu/~educr795/prop2.html.

King, K. (1998). Museum Schools: Institutional Partnerships and Museum Learning. AERA Annual Meeting. San Diego.

King, K. (1999). Transforming education: Case studies in systems thinking. Retrieved Mar. 30, 2006, from http://education.indiana.edu/~frick/aera99/transform.pdf.

Neill, J. (2005). Experiential learning. Retrieved Feb. 21, 2006, from 500 Word Summary of Dewey’s “Experience & Education” Web site: http://www.wilderdom.com/experiential/SummaryJohnDeweyExperienceEducation.html.

Ormrod, J. E. (2004). Human learning. 4th Edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall.

Papert, S. (1991). Situating constructionism. In I. Harel & S. Papert (Eds.) Constructionism. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation.

Russell, T. (1994) The Enquiring Visitor: Usable Learning Theory For Museum Contexts. Journal of Education in Museums. 15. 19-21.

Takahisa, S. & Chalusian, R. (1995). New initiatives for museum-school partnerships. American association of museums’s 90th annual meeting. Washington, DC: American association of museums.

US Department of Education, (n.d.). Creating successful magnet school programs. Retrieved Feb. 22, 2006, from Innovations in Education Web site: http://www.ed.gov/admins/comm/choice/magnet/report_pg8.

Sternberg, R. J. and Zhang, L. F. (2000). Perspectives on cognitive, learning, and thinking styles. NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2000. html.

Multiple Intelligences Test

That's my score on the test found on this site. Kind of a cheesy little test for a scholarly page..

The greatest paper--I never wrote.

Spent half a day Thursday with this mensa trying to gather research for the article I wanted to write, How do slackers learn? but finally realized that the topic just doesn't fit the assignment or my more immediate needs that well. Based on the lack of scholarly writing on the topic I think there is a need for such a paper, so when I get done with this paper I at least want to post an essay on that with my thoughts on the topic and what little I found.

I believe a great percentage of HS and college students I deal with fall into this category and I have certain leanings myself. It's not a bad label in my opinion (like my previous post about Freaks) but it's basically a question of motivation. Ron Livingston's character in Office Space is my example of a slacker. He is not lazy or incompetent, but in his own words, a slacker basically needs the right kind of motivation:

Peter Gibbons: You see Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.

Bob Porter: Don't... don't care?

Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime, so where's the motivation? And here's another thing, I have eight different bosses right now.

Bob Porter: Eight?

Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled, that, and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.

Reminds me so much of when I have a student ask, What's the lowest grade I can make on the exam and still pass the class. So, more to come on slackers and how they learn, or as I am calling it--Slacker Learning Theory, very soon.

See also: Slackers on imdb.

2006 Educator's Conference

I attended the 2006 Educator's Conference today at Covenant College on Lookout Mountain. Someone said to me, maybe they built this up here so they could feel closer to God (actually they converted a hotel I believe..). I told him that based on some of the students I've met from there it seems that they feel that way. But otherwise the campus is very impressive and feels like a ski resort.

Dr. Howard Gardner was the big speaker and I was fairly impressed with his presentation since several had warned me he was dry. He didn't jazz it up at all, but his ideas on learning are pretty on target so I was very interested. He pimped (promoted) his book Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Changing Our Own and Other People's Minds, which sounds very business leadership oriented, but does not read as such. A big idea he promoted is summarized by the Harvard Business Review as:

Howard Gardner contends that the ability to synthesize information will be the most valued trait for leaders.

This comes from a forthcoming book about the "5 Minds of the Future" that he is still working on.

Other big ideas I keyed in on were related to his review of multiple intelligences. I've heard of this concept and feel that I vaguely understand it, but haven't read his books yet so was glad to get from the horse's mouth.

The intelligences he describes are:

Linguistic intelligence ("word smart"):
Logical-mathematical intelligence ("number/reasoning smart")
Spatial intelligence ("picture smart")
Bodily-Kinesthetic intelligence ("body smart")
Musical intelligence ("music smart")
Interpersonal intelligence ("people smart")
Intrapersonal intelligence ("self smart")
Naturalist intelligence ("nature smart") (thompsonarmstrong.com)

Another good handout can be found here.

The key points I heard were that these intelligences are essentially like computers in our head that are better at sifting through certain types of information than the others. We all have these intelligences, but most people are more proficient with a couple of these than they are in others.

In Changing Minds Gardner talks about 3 common sense dimensions that explain the phenomenon of changing one's mind. These are the entity (how you attempt to change a mind), the arena (the context of the group or individual you are trying to influence is in), and the levers or tools that actually work to change someone's mind. These are: resources and rewards, reason or logic, research, resonance, representational redescription, real workd events, and resistances (convenient how they all start with R..)

Gardner then went into a long diatribe about Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan...

Finally he discussed his current topic of research which is about the nature of good work. Good is defined by he and his colleagues (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and William Damon) as 1) of expert quality, 2) is ethically responsible, and 3) feels right or is enjoyable and engaging to the worker. For this to take place in an organization there should be what he calls "Alignment," which is when all of the stakeholders have common goals. I was thinking about UTC, as a university and within departments, and I would question whether there is that much alignment and therefore not much good work being produced.

Finally, either during asides or in answering questions, I picked up on what I believe to be his solution for education today, in K-12 and higher ed, which seems to be mentors. For someone to really have an impact, there seems to be no combination of curriculum and technology, no new learning theory, no better way to teach than by examples of mentors exhibiting good work. To foster good work in our students, we need to be all about good work ourselves. I think this attitude is probably more prominent in K-12, but many college professors do not seem to feel this need.

So that's basically everything I know about Howard Gardner and MI. I hope it helps you..

Article

So, here it is. A very good educational toy product that does not work with Windows Media Center 2004, but pretty well with just about any other DVD player.

InteracTV by Fisher-Price: Children’s television you can feel good about.

The Fisher-Price InteracTV DVD-based Learning System is a very simple concept, with very lofty goals. It is essentially nothing more than an oversized universal remote control for your DVD player and a collection of specialized interactive DVDs similar to Scene It? But what it accomplishes is so much more. The product actually has the potential to take one of our worst vices as a parent—allowing our children to watch television, and make it a virtue.

The innovative product uses existing technology, DVD players found in most homes, and programs that your child is already familiar with. These include: Dora the Explorer, SpongeBob, Scooby-Doo, and many more. As the program progresses, the characters ask your child a series of questions. This level of interactivity has been going on in children’s television for years, but now there is a distinct difference. Your child can answer back.

The packaging of the product indicates that the system allows children “to interact with their favorite characters and shows in a fun and educational way.” The curriculum includes about 100 learning questions that are included during each show. This supports the claim that this toy is focused on the child’s cognitive development skills. The box lists a variety of learning objectives that can be achieved as the child uses the toy. Perhaps even more important than these is the way this product can change the experience of television viewing for your child for years to come.

Jackson loves television.
My two and half year old son loves watching TV. He would watch TV all day long, every day! Early on in his television viewing we were amazed at how quickly he learned the names of characters on TV. He often knew names for programs that he had not even seen. Despite our best efforts to ban certain programs we didn’t like, Jackson was learning about them from storybooks, advertisements on other children’s T-shirts and sneakers, and talk amongst children at his daycare.

What is the harm in watching television? I did it. So did my wife. And we both seem relatively normal. We both even went to college and have respectable jobs. Television didn’t ruin our lives. Yet you hear so much negativity about children’s television viewing these days. News programs and magazine articles suggest all types of negative outcomes for children from watching too much TV. You might think allowing your child to watch television was on a par with encouraging your child to smoke cigarettes or drop out of school. But what does the research really say?

Children’s TV Viewing: How much is too much?
In my graduate program I am doing my research on children’s television. In a review of literature on children’s television I found that children’s viewing habits were shown to have effects on subsequent learning patterns. A great deal of research points out that even too much viewing of educational programs such as Sesame Street can have negative effects . This is usually said to be caused by displacing other important learning activities such as reading and social interaction. Another concern that has been heavily researched in recent years is the relationship of children’s television viewing and childhood obesity. Because of these concerns, the American Academy of Pediatrics has called for reduced levels of television viewing in children ages 2 and up, and urges parents of children under 2 to not allow any viewing at all (http://www.aap.org/family/smarttv.htm).

I was concerned about the possible negative effects that watching too much television could have on my child. The literature I reviewed led me to the summary that any amount over two hours each day may be too much television. With that general rule of thumb in mind, my wife and I have decided to do “No TV” nights, in which we plan activities that would otherwise have been replaced by sitting in front of the television. Of course these don’t completely counteract “Movie Nights” where we purposely all watch television together, but at the end of the week we believe our average viewing time is lowered to about 2 hours per day or less.

What kind of viewing is taking place?
Other research into children’s television has shown that it is equally important that we pay attention to how our children are watching television. Does your child slump back on the couch and barely blink or do she jump and down when something funny happens? Does he clam up when Dora the Explorer or Steve from Blue’s Clues asks a question, or is he calling out the answers? Does your child seem to be interacting and engaged, or catatonic? These behaviors may indicate whether a child is an active or a passive viewer of television.

This is where Fisher-Price’s InteracTV system shines—in creating a more interactive learning experience out of an activity otherwise referred to as being a couch potato. The system encourages a more interaction with the content of the programs and compels the child to think critically, rather than just viewing the content hypnotically. This new way of viewing television can develop into patterns of engaged viewing that last a lifetime.

Engaged viewing is when your child is plugged in and engaged while watching a program. When a child is actively engaged in watching a TV program, he uses the same cognitive skills as are used when reading a book. In cognitive learning theory, knowledge is thought to be created when a child is actively involved. Jean Piaget, renowned psychologist, emphasized that children aged 2 to 7 need new concrete experiences upon which to build learning cognitive structures—the building blocks of knowledge (http://www.funderstanding.com/piaget.cfm).

The Fisher-Price InteracTV system causes a child to be more engaged while viewing. They do this by periodically pausing the action during which the characters ask questions. Your child must then press the appropriate button on the InteracTV controller before the program will continue. If wrong buttons are pressed the question is either repeated or advice is given on getting it right. This series of questions is repeated each time the game is played, but they are randomized and the answers are never in the same order on the screen. In this way, the experience is never the same for the child.

What do children learn while watching television?
When children watch television they learn quite a bit more than just what is presented on the screen. They learn patterns of viewing behaviors that will last for many years to come. If the pattern that is learned is that of a “couch potato,” it is very likely that the child will not be interested in challenges and critical thinking opportunities that appear in other media as well.

In a study of the effects of children’s viewing of learning-based programs such as Blue’s Clues it was found that viewing such a program can affect how a child watches other shows (Crawley et al., 2002). For instance, if children begin watching television that is entertainment-based, they will more likely watch other shows passively. This is true even of educational shows which present material in a straightforward manner, but do not ask the child to participate in meaningful ways. If the child is not encouraged to interact with the material by their parents, they will likely zone out, and not construct new knowledge with the presented material.

On the other hand, if children watch shows that are learning-based first, they will be more likely to be engaged, interactive viewers of many different types of programs—and of other types of media as well (van den Broek, 2001). This is particularly encouraging for Fisher-Price and other toy manufacturers, as well as television production companies, because they would like to use children’s television to help build reading and literacy skills, rather than taking away from them. Rather than allowing television to displace activities such as reading and play that promote learning (Wan, 2000), TV can actually be a source for all of the above.

InteracTV has the potential to take this to a whole new level, largely due to its most important selling point—it’s fun! The product is a game, and it is a game that kids will want to play. Yes, children can learn by playing with it. They can learn math, vocabulary, and observation skills as the packaging suggests. But most importantly they are learning to be active, engaged viewers. This is a learning behavior that will be important for them in years to come as they encounter other forms of media. Will they be mesmerized by the screens of videogames and dulled to sleep by textbooks? Or will they interact with television programs and dig deep into books to find the answers their brains are wired toward figuring out? I believe that InteracTV has the capability to expand a child’s capacity for critical thinking, for developing a curious mind, and for making the most of their entertainment-time—teaching them that learning can be and is fun.

Final Analysis
There are just a few drawbacks to this product that a parent must consider. It does heavily encourage TV viewing. If your child is already having difficulty tearing him or herself away from the tube, you may want to consider buying a few more books and investing in a pair of earplugs as you guide them through TV withdrawals. But, if you can incorporate InteracTV into a healthy TV diet of no more than 2 hours per day, this product definitely has the potential to fulfill a variety of learning outcomes.

A quick check of user reviews online will tell you that several people have had trouble with the setup of the DVD remote controller. My tests worked fine with all of the suggested methods of teaching the remote to work with my DVD player. I never could get it to work with my Windows Media Center PC however, even though it uses an infrared remote control and has all of the same buttons as my DVD player’s remote.

The price and flexibility of this product’s being able to work with the majority of DVD players on the market make it a very effective and relatively low-cost educational toy. It is both age appropriate and safe, though it should never be used as a sitter for your child, which is generally the problem with children’s television viewing. If you are in the market for something that will cause your child to tune in to the learning possibilities offered by educational television, rather than vegging out while watching any form of TV, I highly recommend this product.

References

Crawley, A., Daniel R. Anderson, Angela Santomero, Alice Wilder, Marsha
Williams, Marie K. Evans, Jennings Bryant. (2002). Do children learn to watch television? The impact of extensive experience with Blue’s Clues on pre-school children’s television viewing behavior. Journal of Communication. June 2002. 264-280.

Piaget. Retrieved Feb. 01, 2006, from Funderstanding Web site: http://www.funderstanding.com/piaget.cfm.

Smart Guide to Kid's TV. American Academy of Pediatrics. Retrieved Nov. 20, 2005, from http://www.aap.org/family/smarttv.htm.

van den Broek, P. (2001). The role of television viewing in the development of reading comprehension. Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved November 17, 2005, from www.ciera.org/library/archive/2001-01/04Oct99-58-MSarchive.html.

Wan, G. (2000). “Barney and Friends”: An evaluation of the literacy learning environment created by the TV series for children. (ERIC Document Reproduction No. ED 438 900).

Podcasting assignments?

I am curious about how podcasting is being used as an instructional tool. Perhaps I can do a paper on it. I know many universities are using the technology to push delivery of lectures and materials, but I am more curious about where it is being used as a portfolio of student presentations and so forth. I have seen several locally from Baylor High School and I know that there were talks between the COMM dept and the Hunter museum about creating a series of podcasts, but I am not sure how well they are being integrated into the curriculum.

At my suggestion (and others) a couple of students I know have started a weekly 30 minute podcast in which they review movies and dialog about filmmaking. It is featured on the PulseBlog and on the Chattanooga Film Blog. Check it out below.