Talking Points

Engaging the Learner

“Research findings over the past 30 years unequivocally support the fact that student learning and retention are strongly correlated with student engagement. The more actively engaged students are with the subject matter being conveyed, with faculty and staff, and with other students, the more likely they are to persist and achieve at higher levels. Perhaps the most consistent thread that runs through much of the research is the simple fact that students must be mentally engaged in order to learn. The connection between engagement and student success has been emphasized in a number of major research studies and reports on the undergraduate experience in American higher education.” Engaged Learning: Pathways to Success
http://itc.utk.edu/newsletter/fall_04/engagedlearning.shtml

“It is curious that faculty members rely so heavily on methods of teaching and assessment that seem ill suited for the goal they claim to value above all others thinking critically. Why, for example, do so many college instructors continue to lecture long after most professional schools have drastically curtailed such methods in favor of more problem-based discussion? Merely accumulating information is of little value to students. Facts are soon forgotten, and the sheer volume of information has grown to the point that it is impossible to cover all the important material or even to agree on what is most essential.”

“Cognitive psychologists have an explanation for why colleges do not have greater success in improving reasoning ability of undergraduates. In their view, passive lecturing and drill can help students memorize rules and concepts and apply them to a limited range of problems similar to those covered in class, but they do little to equip undergraduates to apply their knowledge to new problems. Merely inviting students to ask questions or allowing them to carry a formless discussion among themselves is not much better. Instead, instructors need to create a process of active learning by posing problems, challenging student answers, and encouraging members of the class to apply the information and concepts in assigned reading to a variety of new situations.” - Derek Bok, former Harvard president in his new book "Our Underachieving Colleges: A Candid Look at How Much Students Learn and Why They Should Be Learning More"

Ken Bain in his book “What the Best College Teachers Do” states it very clearly, “The best instructors (1) think about their own thinking and (2) make students explicitly aware of that process, (3) constantly prod them to do the same.”

What kinds of thinking are they modeling? “They do NOT think in terms of teaching their discipline; they think about teaching students to understand, apply, analyze, synthesize, and evaluate evidence and conclusions.”

Why Modeling (making thinking visible), Coaching, and Scaffolding?

Our Conceptual Model is a model of the thinking skills; our pedagogy is modeling and scaffolding those cognitive skills.

“The interplay among (modeling) observation, scaffolding, and increasingly independent practice aids “learners” both in developing self-monitoring and correction skills and in integrating the skills and conceptual knowledge needed to advance toward expertise. Observation plays a surprisingly key role; Lave hypothesizes that it aids learners in developing a conceptual model of the target task prior to attempting to execute it. Giving students a conceptual model -- a picture of the whole -- is an important factor in “modeling” success in teaching complex skills without resorting to lengthy practice of isolated subskills, for three related reasons. First, it provides learners with an advanced organizer for their initial attempts to execute a complex skill, thus allowing them to concentrate more of their attention on execution than would otherwise be possible. Second, a conceptual model provides an interpretive structure for making sense of the feedback, hints, and corrections from the master during interactive coaching sessions. Third, it provides an internalized guide for the period when the apprentice is engaged in relatively independent practice.” http://www.21learn.org/arch/articles/brown_seely.html

“Coaching consists of observing students while they carry out a task and Modeling aimed at bringing their performance closer to expert performance.”

“Scaffolding refers to the supports the teacher provides to help the student carry out the task.”

“Articulation involves any method of getting students to articulate their knowledge, reasoning, or problem-solving processes.” http://www.newhorizons.org/strategies/thinking/perkins.htm