We are surrounded by opportunities that guide learning all the time. We have smartphones, iPads, and computers that are full of instant information. We learn from people that are next to us, or from the ones we communicate regularly with using the new apps and social media that make the world a little smaller. But, how can we integrate all of this and the theories of learning to have an effective space of learning?
Teachers are constantly racing to meet deadlines, make personal connections with students, be in compliance with the curriculum, support the kids in all the possible ways to make sure they have better chances to pass the standardized tests, and additionally they need to find time for their personal life. With the time constraints we live in, we almost never take the time to study the best practices for teaching and learning. I am convinced that big changes are needed to have better education models, and they have to come from the big education agencies that create the curriculum, but for now, we can take little steps to move to what we believe is the best for our kids.
I believe in letting the students wonder, use their imaginations, and experiment to get to new solutions. We need to give the students the basis to be able to use that knowledge in a flexible way to create bigger things. One of my favorite books is Mindset The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck because it believes in growing. It brings the idea that intelligence is not something fixed and that you can enlarge it by trying new things and learning from mistakes. Another aspect that is significant in my learning philosophy is to have close and regular informal and formal assessments for each student. They are essential to be informed and to be able to decide together how and when to turn the paths. Furthermore, I think is important that students learn to learn from each other and to combine the knowledge from everyone to get better results.
I am very bad at memorizing facts and that is why history and geography were so hard for me. I never understood why you had to put a lot of information in your brain to answer some questions if you had the resources to find it, just to forget everything “you had learned” a few days later. Maybe that is why I became a Computer Science Engineer: I loved to apply my knowledge to create solutions, and that was fascinating because I was learning a lot during the process. Now that I am older, I am very passionate about reading, knowing what is happening in the world using Twitter, cooking different recipes every day using Instagram, and keeping in touch with family and friends through Facebook. All of this includes learning, but now I am using different resources around the world to get what I wish for and need. Since I began learning what I really want, I discovered that I was able to retain more information. Maybe it is because it really interests me and I acquire it in a fun way.
For my blended learning environment, my goal is to use the best practices in teaching and learning to give my students the best that I can. I read some articles about learning theories and found that there are four popular models: behaviourism, cognitivism, constructivism, and social/situational. These are some of the main points for each theory:
After reading the first articles, I noticed how teachers are trained to use different aspects of these theories: We are instructed to give feedback, connect with prior knowledge, plan instruction for the different learning styles, give the students opportunities to have experiences, and let them work with their peers, to give some examples. In reality, aren’t we only using the best of each model? We are always hearing that we need to differentiate our instruction according to the needs of every student. I don’t believe that one of these theories gives me everything I need for a specific kid. My learning philosophy believes that I need to study each kid and make an educated decision to apply what that kid needs from each model. There are some points that I think are applicable to every kid, though: learning by doing, giving positive reinforcers, using prior knowledge, and learning from others.
Then, I read about the theory of Connectivism and boom, this theory includes many of the aspects I believe our students need nowadays. This theory uses technology to move learning to the digital age we live in now, and these are some of the main points:
This theory has in mind how learning is something that is flexible. We need to teach our students to move according to the knowledge we have today and to understand that it might be different tomorrow. They need to be able to work with tons of information and take what is important and what is not to make connections. We need to teach them how to make safe connections with other people and maintain them to increase their learning. Furthermore, our students need to be able to discover patterns and create innovations. In summary, we need to prepare our kids for jobs that have not even been invented yet, so our teaching has to be moldable according to how every kid is reacting to the new ways of teaching and learning.
In conclusion, for my innovation plan, even though I will be using some bullets of the main learning theories, I believe that Connectivism is the theory that is most accurate for the reality we live in. I need to learn and mentor our team to be able to work in this way because it requires a shift in how we are used to teaching. We need to coach our kids in a way where we equip them with tools to learn how to learn and to abstract the important information that the world brings every day to use it for making new and big things.
Annotated Bibliography:
Bates, T. (2014). Learning theories and online learning. Online Learning and Distance Education Resources. https://www.tonybates.ca/2014/07/29/learning-theories-and-online-learning/
An excellent resource that explains the fundamentals of each learning theory and how and why they are applied according to each situation. It helps you to understand the theories of learning, allowing you to make an educated decision of what to use according to the needs of your learners.
David, L. (2019). Summaries of learning theories and models. Learning Theories. https://www.learning-theories.com/.
This article gives you a great idea of various learning theories. It helped me add some other valuable information to the ideas I already had of the theories.
Dweck, C. S. (2006) Mindset: The new psychology of success. New York : Ballantine Books.
This is one of my favorite books. It shows how important it is to change your mindset to something where you believe that your intelligence and abilities can be developed, instead of being something fixed and static where you can’t do anything about it.
Thomas, D., & Brown J. S. (2011). A new culture of learning: Cultivating the imagination for a world of constant change. Lexington, KY: CreateSpace
This book showed me how the new culture of learning is more guided toward playing, questioning, and the cultivation of the imagination where technology is a very important part. Where you have the possibilities of dynamically creating or moving to different collectives according to your passions.
Siemens, J. (2005). Connectivism: A learning theory for the digital age. http://www.itdl.org/journal/jan_05/article01.htm
This is a very interesting article that connects the learning theories with technology and the concept of the “half-life of knowledge”. Since my innovation plan is a blended environment, this theory of connectivism makes a lot of sense for a rapidly changing world.
Smith, M. K. (2018). ‘Learning theory’, the encyclopedia of informal education. http://infed.org/mobi/learning-theory-models-product-and-process.
This article contains links to five orientations of learning theories (behaviourism, cognitivism, humanism, social cognitive theory, and constructivism) and an excellent table where you can find the main points of each orientation. It helped me have a clear overview of each theory.