| Updated on |
||||
ITEE |
What’s New: A few notes are supplied here on how learning takes place, as a guide to how to deal with learning opportunities such as lectures, tutorials and assignments. |
|||
In educational literature, it is broadly recognized that there are 3 models of learning and teaching in recently widespread use [Edu 2003]:
- Transmission model
- learner treated as a “blank page” on which instructor’s material is written
- learning treated as building on simpler components
- teaching by reinforcing “correct” behaviours, only demonstrating “correct” solutions, stamping out “errors”
- Constructivist model
- learner seen as developing new models based on existing ones, refining them by hypothesis testing
- learning seen as alternating periods of stability and instability, the latter occurring when a challenge to established ideas occurs
- teaching by facilitating exploration of a range of solutions: errors are seen as opportunities for learning, rather than as failures to correct
- Social construction model
- constructivist model adapted to allow some transmission from instructor
- learning by transforming existing experience to new situations
- teaching is by engaging in what the student already knows, and transforming existing knowledge through reinterpretation
The transmission model is most commonly understood to be what education is about: converting knowledge in possession of the instructor into bite-sized packages for students to swallow, until the exam, when it gets regurgitated – a kind of bulimia of the intellect. Unappealing though this image is, change to a more effective model of teaching and learning is difficult, because it violates too many certainties in the educational process.
The constructivist model is most difficult on the learner, because it requires periods of discomfort. Social construction smooths some of the disequilibria, but at the cost of requiring a lot more work from the instructor.
Both of the latter models assume that learning is more than simply pouring knowledge from one container to another, hopefully leaving some in at least one of the containers. Both assume that learning at the level of real comprehension requires building a new internal model of the world which is not just different in content, but in structure. To put it a different way, you don’t just learn new facts, you wire the connections between the new and existing facts differently. To do so requires activity on the part of the learner, and has to involve some discomfort, until the new model falls into place. The benefit is that you gain a deeper understanding than simply knowing what you were told, and this deeper understanding builds your capabilities for solving other problems in the future.
The big gain from a more sophisticated model of learning is that you break out of the cram-and-forget cycle, and things you learn stick. Like riding a bicycle, skills you think you have forgotten come back. There is some stress earlier in the learning cycle, where you are forced to confront errors in your mental model, but the stress later at assessment time is significantly lower.
How can you move to a more sophisticated model? Here are a few hints:
- mistakes are positive – it’s hard in a culture where mistakes are seen as failure, but offering mistakes for discussion (e.g. at tutorials) is a good way to address misconceptions; offering your solution even if you don’t think it’s a mistake is even better, because you could be exposing a deep misconception
- learn by doing – solve problems, relate things in your course to the real world, challenge your friends to solve a problem first, look for flaws in solutions (your own, your friends’, the lecturer’s)
- be active in lectures – quiz the lecturer, think of issues to raise later if you are shy
- look beyond the “right answer” – question whether a given solution is the only, or even best, answer to a question
Try some of these ideas. You may be surprised at how much you can reduce exam trauma just by having a deeper understanding of the issues. It will be years before the benefit of a changed learning style may show up as helping you solve a hard problem at work, but this is the ultimate measure of whether anything you do in a course is worthwhile.
An important issue to understand is the difference between deep and surface learning. In Figure 1 (based on Biggs [1999]), a more “academic” student is pictured as learning at higher cognitive levels than a “non-academic” student. The idea is that even less academically-inclined students are forced higher up the vertical axis by more active teaching styles. Note however that what a student does and what the teacher intends are two different things. It may well be that the teaching method is lecturing but the “academic” student doesn’t sit passively listening, but thinks up problems to solve, searches for related material and rewrites lecture notes to ensure they've been understood.
 Figure 1. Relationship between teaching method and level of learning. The more “academic” student will learn at a deeper level from less active forms of teaching. A less “academic” student needs pressures to be “active” (e.g., assignments) to learn at a deeper level [Biggs 1999]. |
What is the benefit of a more active learning style? Consider Figure 2, which illustrates again the difference between a more and less “academic” students. The more “academic” approach is to try to get a bit ahead of the lectures: to think more deeply about the subject by solving problems, and understanding what the course is about. Rather than simply sitting through lectures, the approach is to arrive at a lecture, ready to question the lecturer, or to fill gaps in previous understanding. This more active approach pays off in less stress at assessmement times. Observe what happens to the more passive learner. As times where knowledge must be applied arise, an attempt at converting facts into a more comprehensive mental model results in some of the facts coming unstuck (the downward movement in the line just before assignments, exam preparation, and the point in a future life where some aspect of the course turns out to be useful). The more active learner, on the other hand, has already developed a more consistent model of what’s going on, and hence doesn’t run into problems with finding their knowledge comes apart under pressure.
 Figure 2. Relationship between learning style and coping ability. The more “academic” student may not necessarily score much higher but will have less stress: deeper learning means better retention through deeper understanding |
Look at the later part of the graph, representing life in the real world. The more active learner’s internal model of the subject is stronger, and doesn’t fade as fast after the exam. When, suddenly, some aspect of the course turns out to be useful, the active learner can recover forgotten knowledge and build on it efficiently to solve a problem. The more passive learner goes through the same trauma again – and probably experiences this several times before finally working with the knowledge consistently over time has the effect that a more active learning strategy should achieve.
Lessons?
What can we learn from this? A more active learning model in the long run is less stressful even if it seems harder at first.
But the big challenge for lecturers is to facilitate active learning with limited resources – we can’t meet every student once a week to encourage progress, and we don’t have marking resources to do micro-assessment.
Improvement though is possible, and any ideas to encourage active learning are welcome.
References
[Biggs 1999] What the student does: Teaching for enhanced learning, Higher Education Research and Development, vol 18 no 1, 1999, pp 57–75.
[Edu 2003] Learning in University Contexts, EDUC6000 Module 2, University of Queensland, 2003.