Learning Philosophy v. 2.0

When I revisit the philosophy of learning I presented here in January, I see perspectives that have not so much changed as they have deepened and broadened. Learning is growth. Teaching nurtures the learning landscape. Technology cultivates the growth mindset.

I find myself always revisiting one very palpable, pertinent theme: leader as learner, learner as leader. The most important lesson I teach is the enduring value of lifelong learning. A sense of wonder, a feeling of confidence, an air of respect for the learning process all serve the growing needs of the learner – and ALL OF US ARE LEARNERS. To me, embracing the learning process is not simply an extension of professional aspirations or academic objectives, it is a common thread woven intricately into the tapestry of one’s character, culture, and consciousness … a thread drawn tight upon the loom of human experience, binding us together on a sacred, infinite journey that is both uniquely personal and intimately collective.

I continue to see learning as growth, and teaching as the facilitation of that growth. My thinking has evolved, however, to include the realization that learners can and will endow their own initiatives through play, collaboration, connection, and community. While learning can occur through teacher facilitation, it also happens through personal expedition. When teachers provide appropriately scaffolded learning environments, students are free to explore content within safe confines; however, even outside of a formal context, learners can pursue deep learning through participatory culture, affinity groups, and digital milieus.

I believe learning is an organic process through which learners engage with the world around them and acquire knowledge in purpose-driven, accidental, and unconscious ways. Learning can take place in any environment and can be assessed through standards, by observation, or in reflection. … Ultimately, I see learning as the beautiful crux of human experience … a process that is simultaneously simple and profound, acute and persistent, common and extraordinary.

In this new ecology of learning, students and teachers work as partners to create and sustain opportunities for continued growth. Within a connected learning environment wherein the interactive web serves as the ultimate creative scaffolding, involvement, publication, innovation, and production present digital avenues for discovery. Learning in this environment unites teachers and students on a shared journey of infinite possibility and ongoing process. Evidence of learning can be subtle or overt, and can be observed in various manifestations that are not necessarily formal evaluations; a developing skill set, ongoing effort toward goal achievement, even an improved attitude or boosted level of confidence can serve as indicators of learning beyond traditional test scores. This evidence of learning is often aided through the use of technological tools that help promote interactive learning and media literacy.

Ultimately, in examining the role of technology in learning, I believe it serves the purpose of facilitation through function. Ongoing, provocative questioning and thoughtful listening create learning dialogues that not only foster a positive growth mindset, but also compel learners to delve deeper into inventive opportunity. The relevance a leader emphasizes of process as well as product should motivate the learners’ creative processes, providing guidance and empathy while challenging them to hone their craft.

Technology serves as a medium through which learning experiences can be delivered, enhanced, diversified, and optimized. Technology holds transformative power in that it provides modalities for learning that help engage students in new and different ways. With this power comes great responsibility: Technology should occur as universally within learning environments as it does in other real-life scenarios; its agency should afford opportunities for deeper learning over novelty functions.

Meeting learners … in their journeys and assisting them in getting to where they would like to be should be standard procedure for the facilitation of growth and cannot happen without an informed, adaptable guide. Openness to explore and refine skill sets and emphasizing the merit of open-minded development reinforces the learning scaffolding that technology provides. The best uses of technology occur ubiquitously, when learners are engaged fully without the interruption of having to think about it.

Moving forward in my instructional endeavors, I hope to inspire learners to empower themselves by providing opportunities that enable leadership and contribution over traditional rote responses. For example, I have found that my students are quite unconsciously contributing more authentic writing in the discussion threads of my LMS than they are in formal essays. It seems the social media feel of the online workshop forums I’ve been providing lend a sense of comfort to my students that enables them to contribute more freely and connect more deeply not only with the content but with each other. Similarly, I recently tested a self-paced module within the LMS that garnered great evaluative responses and yielded high levels of content comprehension. What this verifies to me is that my physical presence for learners is not nearly as important as my facilitative presence. Far from an ego insult to my instructional prowess, this data reinforces the efforts I have activated in creating a hybrid learning environment and advances my incentive to continue this effort.

As an educator devoted to both the pursuit and the facilitation of lifelong learning, making a lasting and constructive impact on learners by acting as a progressive contributor to their advancement is key. Through the practice of authentic teaching – which requires the leader to be a learner -all learners are empowered to question freely, think critically, examine fully, and integrate seamlessly with the world at large. Learning, therefore, is a catalyst of progress in the evolution of the self.

Learning is beautiful.

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April 20

Innovate the Future

Innovation is not a skill, it is a mindset. Innovation in teaching is the constant evolution to make things better for learning and we must maintain a ‘relentless restlessness.’ – Gerald Fussell

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Changing not only the way education looks but the way we look at education demands a radical paradigm shift … a new way of thinking about emergent technology that innovates learning spaces wherein the traditional lines of teaching and learning cohesively blur into a continuum of shared experience. Davidson and Goldberg refer to this space as a “mobilizing network,” a platform for learning that defies the confines of standardized education, “a definition of institution that emphasize[s] its flexibility, the permeability of its boundaries, its interactive productivity, and its potential as a catalyst for change rather than its mechanisms of cooperation, order, control, and regulation” (p. 14). While this idea may be slow to gain acceptance, its acceptance warrants serious consideration.

“Learning from one another’s expertise and experience is, after all, the theme…. Customized, collaborative digital learning cannot apply just to that which we educators deliver to our students. Indeed, we need to not only practice what we preach, but we must also learn to listen to what those more conversant with digital technologies have to tell us. In some cases, that means listening carefully to our students. This reversal of who is teaching whom, who is learning from whom, and the constantly shifting hierarchies of expertise and the ability to appreciate those shifts when they happen and to value them are central to digital learning.” – Davidson and Goldberg (p. 36)

The Future of Thinking identifies remix authorship and intellectual property as pertinent issues in the transition from institutional learning to mobilizing networks. This topic is of particular interest to me, as academic integrity enforcement comprises significant responsibility within my instructional context. As collaboration lines blur, so too do the lines of ownership. In my opinion, no simple solutions exist “…to try to understand the connections between and across the array of legal and social arrangements loosely grouped under such seemingly transparent terms as copyright, patent law, intellectual property, publishing, and authorship. As we see from the history of copyright law in the United States, transitional moments test the boundaries of accepted legal practice because new uses of media cannot be decided by past legal precedents” (p. 31). This is not to say that collaboration should not occur – as its myriad benefits to both collective and individual learning outweigh the slippery slope of proprietorship upon which the issue will continue to slide – but consideration to its integrity intricacies cannot be overlooked. Davidson and Goldberg loftily contend that “… defamiliarizing our ways of knowing is also inspirational. It means rethinking not only what knowledge we possess but how we possess it, from what sources, and what that body of knowledge actually means, what it is worth. It means moving beyond our comfortable world of peers and all the tokens of esteem, value, respect, and reward that that world holds” (p. 36). Although I do not disagree – in theory – these and other potential issues aside, should the institution truly be held to a new standard as a mobilizing network then radical upheaval of the traditional notion of ownership seems prerequisite to progress.

Innovation, however, seems paramount at this juncture. As educators we must acknowledge that learning is no longer simply disseminated from the podium behind which we sages stand and deliver. Emergent technologies continue to provide diverse and creative outlets for learners to engage. As the world of learning changes, so too must we change to facilitate growth, progress, and opportunity.