Teaching organizations how to learn. Part 2 – Conditions for learning

As discussed in a previous post, Driscoll (1994) outlines five conditions for learning (p.382-3). Very much like the multiple approaches and interpretations that exist in constructivism, a number of conditions must be met for the approach to be implemented. The conditions are:

1. Providing complex learning environments that incorporate authentic activity. Constructivists argue that learners should learn to solve the types of complex problem they will face in real life. Learning how to do this is difficult unless complex and authentic learning environments are available to the learners.
2. Providing for social negotiation as an integral part of learning. Bruner (1986) explains that learning is a cultural interchange between group members. Collaboration creates an opportunity for learners to share their understandings with others and to have others do the same with them. This provides multiple perspectives to each learner, and this negotiation process between peers should lead to enhanced understanding.
3. Support multiple perspectives and the use of multiple modes of representation. Because learning skills, behaviors and knowledge can be diverse and complex, constructivists believe that to achieve complete understanding the learner must examine the material from multiple perspectives. If they are not supported in this endeavor, the learner will achieve only a partial understanding of the material. Multiple modes of representation allow the learner to view the same content through different sensory modes.
4. Nurture reflexivity. Duffy and Cunningham (1996) characterize reflexivity as “the ability of students to be aware of their own role in the knowledge construction process.” (p.172). It could also be described as the learner taking ownership of their own thinking and learning processes. Driscoll (1994) assets that reflexivity and by extension critical thinking are central attributes in the constructivist methodology, as it enables learners to understand how and why cognition creates meaning. This enables learners to attain goals such as reasoning, understanding multiple perspectives, and expressing and defending their own beliefs.
5. The last condition Driscoll describes is to “emphasize student-centred instruction.” Bruner (1966) calls this “discovery learning”. By obtaining knowledge by themselves, learners select and transform information, construct knowledge, and make decisions in the context of a cognitive structure that provides meaning and organization to experiences and allows the individual to “go beyond the information given”. Students are actively engaged in determining what and how they will study or gain understanding.

These principles and conditions position the constructivist approach to learning as an appropriate orientation for learning sans frontiers; using technologies like the Internet, websites and virtual learning environments, applying collaborative learning, problem-based learning and goal-based mechanisms, making Open Source Software and Course- and Content Management Systems accessible to learners, and using e-learning applications like online conferencing and collaboration tools could be the foundation for these multiple constructivist conditions for learning. (Duffy & Cunningham 1996, Driscoll 1994, Schank 1994)

These characteristics provide an appropriate framework for knowledge workers to learn (and for the learning intervention), given that their ongoing development is based in the context of already-established cognitive schemata (from the learners’ perspective), the knowledge and skills are applied to solve real-world problems, and their expertise (behaviors) are typically used in collaboration with their peers to enhance the performance of organizations.

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References:

Bruner, J. S. (1986). Actual minds, possible worlds. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.

Driscoll, M. P. (1994). Psychology of learning for instruction. Boston, MA. Allyn & Bacon.

Duffy, T. M. & Cunningham, D. J. (1996) Constructivism: Implications for the design and delivery of instruction. IN: Jonassen D. H. (Ed) Handbook of Research for Educational Communications and Technology (pp.170- 198). New York: Simon & Shuster Macmillan.

Schank, R. (1994) Active Learning Through Multimedia, IEEE Multimedia, 1(1), pp.69-78.

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A Year in E-Learning: One Blog’s Progress

Welcome to my blog, The E-Learning Curve.

So began my first post to the E-Learning Curve Blog on this day in 2007. Upon reflection, I don’t think that I really had any idea about what I was letting myself in for, in terms of the discipline and commitment, not to mention the sheer effort required to create and maintain a high-quality blog about Electronic Learning & Development.

I don’t think that I had any real knowledge about how the blog would unfold either; I guess that for me, that was part of what attracted me to the idea of keeping a blog in the first place: I wanted to see what would emerge over time.

In that sense I was lucky: in it’s first year the E-Learning Curve Blog transitioned from a world with a stable economic climate, to the 2007 subprime mortgage financial crisis, through the tipping point of the Credit Crunch, and now, the Great DepRecession* of Aught Eight.

This has given me the opportunity to discuss e-learning in society-at-large, and in the workplace in particular. What better opportunity is there for learning professionals to introduce the benefits of education than now? From my own experience over the last year, I have seen attitudes to e-learning change - for the better – as individuals and organizations I have worked with have finally begun to let go of the idea that e-learning today is not about “Webified” instructor-led courseware, or worse, dull and boring Authorware-style page-turners, but is an effective means to deliver knowledge and information across many channels, and takes a range of technologies under its aegis.

The emergence of the Read / Write Web into the broader consciousness has demonstrated that learning online can be as immersive an experience as a face-to-face training experience.

What better time, then, for individuals and organizations to look at educational strategy and learning technologies than in a period of profound change – these are the times that test the mettle of ideas and concepts and where they prove their value; if the reality lives up to the perception, if the potential can be realized.

What have I learned?

In a response to a recent Learning Circuits Blog Big Question, I once described myself as a 'learnivore' - a bit of a naff term, but accurate. Writing and maintaining a blog is one of the best motivators I know to continue developing my professional knowledge - to discuss the kind of topics I like to cover requires a comprehensive and in-depth knowledge of the subject of e-learning and all that understanding e-learning entails.

As a constructivist, I would assert that the practise of blogging is a excellent example of Bruner's Learning Spiral: the act of writing a blog post transforms information and enables the construction of knowledge, based upon my extant cognitive structures or mental models. These cognitive structures - what Roger Schank calls “scripts” in his Dynamic Memory Model (1982) - provide meaning and organisation to experiences and allow the individual to go “beyond the information given” (Bruner, 1974).

My view is that the e-learning blogosphere is inhabited by a population of knowledgeable, dedicated, and critical (in the positive sense) contributors, and if you want to be in that company, you have to know your stuff; of the blogs I read - see the nav panel to the right - the bar is set pretty high.

Top Ten

On a more practical note, here’s a list of the top ten topics according to the readers of The E-learning Curve Blog, courtesy of the fantastic blog analysis tools available on Statcounter – not just cool because they’re Irish.

1. Definition of E-learning
2. Economic downturn and the challenge to e-learning
3. The principles of constructivism
4. Non-formal learning in the workplace
5. Evaluating Non-formal Learning
6. Open Source E-Learning
7. E-learning & Knowledge Management
8. Using Kirkpatrick's Four-level model
9. Applying the e-learning curve in the corporate environment
10. E-Learning and the Economic Downturn: A Salutary Lesson

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* DepRecession: A portmanteau word to describe the current Recession and / or Depression. Also has the benefit of being an homonym for “Deep Recession”

FOGRA: Googling “elearning blog” about a week ago, this happened:

Certainly an unexpected (but rewarding) first anniversary present!

Thanks to all who’ve read, contributed to, and debated the topics covered over the last twelve months, and I hope you'll continue to engage with me in the times to come.

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References:

Bruner, J. S. (1974) Going Beyond the Information Given. New York: Norton.

Schank, R. (1982) Dynamic Memory: A Theory of Reminding and Learning in Computers and People. Cambridge University Press.

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More on defining e-learning, elearning, eLearning...

As I wrote yesterday, Don Morrison has defined e-learning as:

The continuous assimilation of knowledge and skills by adults stimulated by synchronous and asynchronous learning events – and sometimes Knowledge management outputs – which are authored, delivered engaged with, supported and administered using internet technologies.

(2004, p.4)

I briefly touched upon "continuous assimilation of knowledge and skills by adults"; andragogy.

Today, I'm going to talk a bit more about synchronous and asynchronous learning events. A proportion of the content I develop for the workplace includes non-formal informational and knowledge content delivered to learners (which I call "Information Sessions") via a number of synchronous and asynchronous channels. We will delve into the detail of this at another time, but for now it is useful to note the meanings of these categories. Colvin Clark and Mayer in e-learning and the Science of Instruction (2003) define synchronous delivery simply as that which occurs simultaneously, whereas asynchronous “occurs at different times” (p.201). I would suggest that implicit in the term ‘synchronous’ is the term ‘collaborative’ – that is, two or more learners, possibly in the presence of an instructor or domain expert, participating (remotely) in a learning event and exchanging information and knowledge.

In Designing World-class E-Learning Roger Schank (2002) calls this “e-learning by doing” (p.13) and cites the industry-wide use of computer-based air flight simulators in aviation as training tools to understand the potential of collaboration to develop learners in situated environments. Equivalently, implicit in the term ‘asynchronous’ is, I suggest, the notion of self-paced content. As Morrison points out though, “the flexibility of internet technology creates grey areas around the notion of synchronous and asynchronous” (p.7). He gives the example of a virtual class which “starts life” as a synchronous learning event, is recorded and can thenceforward be played back on-demand by learners. In a sense, Morrison argues, the presenter and participants taking part in the original event become co-authors of an asynchronous learning event. This, in fact, could serve as a rather broad working definition of the category of learning that the Information Sessions inhabit.

References:

Clark, R. C. & Mayer R. (2003) e-learning and the Science of Instruction: Proven Guidelines for Consumers and Designers of Multimedia Learning, San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer

Morrison, D. (2004) E-Learning Strategies: how to get implementation and delivery right first time, Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Schank, R. (2002) Designing World-Class e-Learning. London, McGraw-Hill

Constructivism Pt.1

In her comprehensive reference text Psychology of learning for instruction, Marcy Driscoll describes constructivism as having

…multiple roots in psychology and philosophy, among which are the cognitive and developmental perspectives of Piaget, the interactional and cultural emphases of Vygotsky and Bruner, the contextual nature of learning, the active learning of Dewey, the epistemological discussions of von Glasersfeld and the paradigm and scientific revolutions of Thomas Kuhn.

(1994, p.375)

Constructivism is an approach to learning based on the premise that cognition, or learning, is the result of mental construction: it is an active process in which learners construct new ideas, skills and behaviours based upon their prior and current knowledge, behaviour and skill assets. The learner transforms information, constructs knowledge, and makes decisions based upon extant cognitive structures or mental models. These cognitive structures - what Roger Schank calls “scripts” in his Dynamic Memory Model (1982) - provide meaning and organisation to experiences and allow the individual to go “beyond the information given” (Bruner, 1974). Even though there are numerous interpretations of constructivism, several central concepts inhabit all constructivist theories. Cunningham and Duffy (1996) identified two major similarities that are the foundation of all constructivist thought. They are that “learning is an active process of constructing rather than acquiring knowledge” and “instruction is a process of supporting that construction rather that communicating knowledge” (1996, p.172).

References:

Bruner, J. S. (1974) Going Beyond the Information Given. New York: Norton.

Cunningham, D. J. & Duffy, T. M. (1996) Constructivism: Implications for the design and delivery of instruction. IN: Jonassen. D. H. (Ed.), Handbook of Research for Educational Communications and Technology (pp. 170- 198). New York: Simon & Shuster Macmillan.

Driscoll, M. P. (1994). Psychology of learning for instruction. Boston, MA. Allyn & Bacon.

Schank, R. (1982) Dynamic Memory: A Theory of Reminding and Learning in Computers and People. Cambridge University Press.