After this week’s readings I feel as though I have a better understanding of the preceding theories that theoretical frameworks have developed in response to. I enjoyed the Blumenfeld et al. article, Chapter 4: Teaching for Understanding, because it gave a thorough synopsis of many of the concepts we have discussed in class over the last few weeks. Blumenfeld et al. discussed the branches of constructivism, and although they are very different I was able to pick up on how they can relate. On page 830-831 a quotation from Bruer demonstrated a bridge between the cognitive and sociocultural theories that I had trouble connecting in the past. It states, “The significance of sociocultural context, communities and discourse for cognition and learning…emerged in part because researchers have attempted to apply cognitive science to authentic classroom tasks rather than just artificial laboratory tasks..focused on individual problem solvers… when researchers brought ideas about domain specific trajectories, active learning, and metacognition to the classroom they realized that other factors influenced learning as well…” (Bruer 1995). Although I am still trying to find my own grounding of what I deem to by my definition of how learning takes place, I do know that I believe that it is a mix of the cognitive and sociocultural activities that allow for the process to occur. The programs that were designed as examples of the constructivist theories were interesting applications to what the theoretical framework provided. In particular, the Project-Based Science caught my eye. It seems like a tactic that provides reason and drive to doing an activity. I could see projects and problems that are found in the real world, to be something that could motivate the students to become a part of a scientific community, rather than just passively learning through an independent approach. The goal of Blumenfeld et al. was to find ways to make the theories into practical techniques in the classroom, but the most important thing is to gain the support of current and future teachers. As in all professions, teachers need to be developing themselves and changing how they teach their class in order to find the way that learning occurs best.
diSessa’s A History of Conceptual Change Research pointed out that the term “concept” is something that is so loosely defined by theorists, even though it is crucial to what entails a misconception. As quoted on page 269, Toulmin stated, “The term concept is one that everybody uses and nobody explains – still less defines.” In general I feel like I find myself struggling to understand what the theorists are implying based off of the terminology that they use to convey their theory of learning. I did like that this reading also touched base with other readings that we have read earlier in the semester. I found it interesting that Posner et al.‘s theory was not meant to be something for instruction. I guess when I first read that article I assumed it was something that should be automatically translated into the classroom, while it was quite different- it was something that simply supported a theoretical framework.
Lastly, Greeno’s Learning in Activity also provided a lot of background on the development of theories. I was confused in particular on page 82 of the reading, under the subtitle- “Including Interaction in Cognitive Analysis.” Was Greeno implying that due to the way experimentation takes place it is impossible to find the activity and tools of an individual through experimentation, and rather this is why the activity system needs to be looked at? I don’t know why, but I have trouble understanding Greeno’s point here. If he is saying that people can’t be studied because the social context changes, what good would any experiment have then in his point of view?
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Do you get the feeling like me that we are just chasing our own tails? Every time I think I have a pretty solid understanding, I think of a counterexample!
I did really appreciate reading Hewson, though, because it characterized how your epistemology can affect the way you should view yourself as a teacher. If you are a conceptual change theorist, you should view your primary goal as facilitating the process of conceptual change for your students.
Mary, reading these articles assisted me in organizing my thoughts regarding the different theories discussed throughout the course. The one point you made that I find that I relate to quite well was the comment you made regarding Posner’s theory not being meant for instruction. With my lack of knowledge about educational research at the start of this course, I found that I was unable to look at any of these theories without any biases. I couldn’t believe that people would talk about learning without directly stating the classroom implications of their theories. I have come to see that my view of these theories originally was completely invalid, and I need to reconsider each theory for what it states instead of my own personal opinions of how it could be applied. Although Blumenfeld did discuss some applications of the situated theory, I see that none of these applications encompass all aspects of the theory. This, too, made me realize that I need to take the theories for what they are – theories, as opposed to trying to make them fit a classroom environment perfectly.