Teaching - Art or Science?

I think I am going to have to cheat and say that on some level I believe teaching to be both an art and a science.  We have certainly seen how the study of different learning theories and the ways in which individuals learn and understand can definitely be grasped on a scientific level.  But once that process is understood, the real art of the practice of teaching takes over.  Understanding the tools at hand, the instructor must now develop the course work on top of the over-arching principles.  The science provides the foundation, but the art is the source of the rest of the structure.

Collaboration

We are social animals, and - especially when young - we learn by watching others.  Collaboration then is an opportunity to learn from others.  We can see how someone else approaches the same task and maybe discover a more efficient method, or we become satisfied that our way is the best way.  In the true spirit of collaboration, perhaps we meld the two approaches to create the most efficient process.  In this way, collaboration is like an act of building, taking disparate ideas from different individuals and bringing them together to create one thing.

But how does this help us to understand?  Having the opportunity to see things from someone else's perspective provides us with a more balanced understanding of a problem and its potential solution. Being exposed to others’ points of view expands our own understanding of a problem to where we can begin to see more than one side to an argument rather than just our own.  It forces us to explain ourselves, our position, our reasoning, thereby cementing what we know and understand in the telling.  If we are wrong, then we have our collaborators to correct us.

Online vs. F2F Learning Environments

I have been in the online learning environment for the better part of six years.  I can say that, for me anyway, online learning is more work.  Not only must I manage the coursework, but I must spend a considerable amount of time navigating each instructor's setup in the LMS to get a sense and feel for the way each course is structured.  In face to face courses, again from my experience, this is often done by the end of the first class meeting with syllabus in hand.  It just seems to me that working in the online learning environment is more labor intensive; I have to work a little harder to stay on top of assignments and readings.  In short, online learning requires a greater degree of discipline in order to be a successful student.

Beyond what was stated above, the obvious differences are also the strengths of online learning.  The F2F classroom exists in a definite temporal and spacial environment.  Students attend at an appointed time and place each week.  In the online environment, there is the option of offering instruction both synchronously (as in the F2F format) or asynchronously.  The latter provides students with the ability to manage coursework on their own time; there is not a preappointed time and place to meet; the structure is looser, being determined more by the student than by the instructor or institution.

In the online environment, discussion boards are the hub of the classroom.  These take the place of the (hoped-for) lively discussions of the F2F classroom.  The latter is often spontaneous, flowing with the immediate energy of debate and discussion.  I think this is harder to replicate with online discussion boards.  Granted, online students have more time to generate thoughtful responses, but the spontaneity of the F2F classroom is often lost. 

Assessment

Without assessments, how can we accurately gauge students’ learning?  Proper assessments provide instructors with a means for determining the amount of learning/understanding that has taken place in a given course.  However, not any old assessment will do.  Oftentimes, assessments fall into the realm of multiple-choice or short answer/fill in the blank questions.  How can these show any evidence of understanding or transfer?  The use of assessments has to be carefully tailored to evince the desired outcomes of a course or unit. 

At the university where I work, we are attempting to implement the program-wide use of standardized rubrics so that we might be able to determine the level of student learning that takes place over the course of the entire curriculum.  Moreover, the use of these rubrics will create more consistency in grading as well as providing students with more concrete information as to what they are being graded on.  Additionally, the rubrics can serve as a starting point for discussions between instructor and student about individual assignments and course goals in general. 

Teaching about Information

Information is an abstraction and thus meaning has to be teased and formed from it.  The meaning underlying information “cannot be taught; it must be fashioned by the learner” (Wiggins & McTighe, p. 103).  Bruce gives us the seven faces of informed learning which “reveal different ways in which information is experienced” (p. 39).  More than that, they show us that each of us may experience information in different ways.  The seven faces then provide a common ground where teacher and student can instruct and learn, respectively, most efficiently.  Where we have standards that describe what an information literate individual might look like, Bruce’s seven faces of informed learning provides a means for reaching those standards.  This is important because as we have learned through our work with learning theories, individuals come to learn and understand in different ways; we each have our strengths and weaknesses when it comes to approaching and mastering information.  Therefore, through the seven faces, one can begin to recognize how a student might engage or respond to information presented.

Information Literacy

According to a 1999 National Research Council report, there is some misunderstanding as to the difference that exists between information literacy and information technology.  While there is, indeed, some overlap of the two, the former’s “focus [is] on content, communication, analysis, information searching, and evaluation; whereas information technology ‘fluency’ focuses on a deep understanding of technology and graduated, increasingly skilled use of it” (from Association of College & Research Libraries – Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education). Information literacy competency also augments the goal of higher education in promoting lifelong learners and increases students’ opportunities for self-directed learning.

ACLR outlines some standards for the information literate students that seem to be deficient in considering the needs of the students for that information.  The standards seem to treat all information seekers the same and seem to overlook the fact that information seeking can also be a personal, organic process.  The standards make information seeking sound cold and clinical, applying to information literacy a one size fits all set of descriptors.  A student may be information literate without ever having the opportunity to demonstrate proficiency of some of the outlined standards.   Yet, the need to assess information literacy drives the creation of these standards.  Education is about assessing learning, so there must be a method to quantify that learning.  Information literacy falls beneath that umbrella to join other areas of learning such as reading and writing.  Unfortunately, this seems like an area difficult to accurately assess as the true test of information literacy is the fulfillment of an information need.

Knowledge and Understanding

What does it mean to learn?  Include thoughts and definitions regarding knowing and understanding? (Final conversation due Feb 20th)

We learn to know, and in knowing, hopefully come to understand.  But what does that sequence really suggest?  What do these concepts of learning, knowing, and understanding really mean?  Perhaps knowing is having possession of the facts, but understanding is the grasp of the meaning behind those facts (Wiggins & McTighe, 2006, p. 38).  Simply stated, I know that 2+2 equals four, but I understand that if I add one more I get 5.  Or I know that being approximately 93 million miles from the sun it takes light approximately 8 minutes to reach earth.  From that I can extrapolate, given I know the distances from the sun of other planets, the length of time needed for light to travel to them from our central star. 

The authors propose “An understanding is a mental construct, an abstraction made by the human mind to make sense of many distinct pieces of knowledge” (p. 37).  Any creature with a brain can learn and know.  Pavlov showed us that a dog can come to associate particular stimuli with the introduction of food.  Mice learn that a stimulus can presage the introduction of a pain stimulus and will act accordingly even though that second stimulus never comes.  But these actions, in and of themselves, do not constitute an understanding.  These animals have learned and know what to expect, but in possessing such knowledge, are they able to apply what they know to other situations?  This, I believe, is the foundation of understanding – being able to take a piece of knowledge and use it to solve a different but related problem.  Perhaps, understanding then is a recognition of patterns in things; having one piece of knowledge we can then see how that knowledge relates and can be used in other instances.