The last time I was in London, I was sitting in a corner pub in Islington, bored out of my mind, trying to pass the time by chatting with the bartender. He was from Germany, and had dropped his whole life to move to England. I asked him why he did it and he answered, "To see if I could." I made appreciative noises at this, and said the thing I always say when I meet people who have moved to a country where they don't know the language: "That's so amazing, I wish I had the guts to that." The bartender was completely unimpressed by this. He stared at me seriously, pausing in pouring a pint for the obnoxious drunks down the bar, and said, "You should. If you do not try, you will never know." He went back to pouring pints, largely ignoring me for the rest of the time I was there.
I remember sitting there, staring at my weak lager, and thinking, "I wouldn't bother talking to me either, if I don't have the guts to go for things I may fail at, then what's the point?" This is why moving to Thailand to teach English may be the right answer, but it's also the reason a Phd program may be the right answer. If I'm not willing to do things that it's entirely likely I'll fail at, but give them all I've got anyway, there just isn't much point. So in six months I will be in one of these places, either a Phd program or Thailand, and it's entirely possible that I'll fail terribly. But I'll have a hell of a time doing it.
Labels: being scared is good for you, phd, thailand, the future
I'm currently in the midst of a discussion on student blogging and how it can be used to promote higher order thinking skills. The basic premise, from my perspective, is that student blogging can be useful for a couple of reasons. Primarily, it encourages them to think about their work, or the course lectures, from a different perspective. Frequently, the main question front and center in most students' minds seems to be, "Will it be on the test?", when a more apropos question might be, "Do I fully understand this concept?". If they understand the concept, they don't need to worry about whether it's on the test, they are familiar with the material and should be able to think critically about how and why it matters.
But.
It's often difficult to be sure what percentage of students do fully understand a concept until they write a paper or turn in an exam. These are the traditional methods for assessment, and they do their jobs fairly successfully. The problem comes when students have failed to engage in higher order thinking skills along the way, and don't know that it's a problem until they come face to face with a test question they can't answer, or an essay they have no idea how to write. It can be difficult to ascertain, particularly in large classes, if everyone is engaged and following along with deeper learning ideas, or if only the 5 students who regularly answer questions are getting it while everyone else wonders what they're going to have for dinner. So, what's the easy fix?
As far as I've been able to establish (in my own mind at least) it depends on what the goal of student learning is. For some types of learning, rote memorization may be extremely useful, but it needs context in order seem worthwhile. I'm never going to bother learning all the bones in the human hand, for instance, unless I see some potential use for that knowledge, such as possessing a plan to go into sports injury medicine. Or hoping that will somehow be one of my categories on Jeopardy, when I go to win my fame and fortune. Without a reason for memorizing those bones, I'm just never going to see any purpose in putting in the time and energy. And if my only motivation is to pass a test, it's unlikely I'll see any purpose in attempting to store that information for longer than it takes to fill in the scantron. So it's important to give students a context for why their learning is important to them as individuals and to their lives outside the classroom. This is nothing new.
What is fairly new, however, are some of the technologies that can encourage students to think more deeply and rigorously about the material they are working with. This is where blogging can step in, and help establish interactive multimodal learning. Big buzzwords, simple idea. If students get information from multiple types of media it increases both basic learning skills, like that rote memorization we know can still be useful, and also higher order thinking skills, like their ability to evaluate, analyze, and synthesize. A study commissioned by Cisco, in 2008, found that interactive multimodal learning increased students' higher order thinking skills by 32 percentile points, which is a fairly significant jump[1]. They define interactive multimodal learning as including "simulations, modeling, and real world experiences; typically includes collaboration with peers, but could be an individual interacting with a resource." So, all of this sounds great, but how does blogging fit into interactive multimodal learning? How can it help students to engage in higher order thinking, and make long-lasting connections between factual data and broader ideas or concepts?
Blogging can, under the right circumstances, encourage students to develop these skills in a couple of ways. If they are creating direct response blogs, they may be asked to use their blog posts to answer specific questions relating to course content, which can be designed with encouraging higher order thinking skills in mind. Some examples of this would be to ask students to use their blogs to discuss what elements of a particular process are necessary in order for it to prove successful, or how one concept or theory compares with another. These types of questions ask students to think about and analyze the underlying structure of an idea or concept.
Alternatively, they could be asked what questions still need to be raised about a particular theory, what they might predict or infer based on a specific set of evidence, what might happen if they combined multiple ideas or perspectives, or what solutions they might suggest for a particular problem. These types of questions ask students to synthesize information they already have access to, think more deeply about how processes interact with each other, and what ideas they might be able to add to an existing conversation.
Finally, they might be asked whether or not they agree with a particular theory, what the most important topic in a field is, what criteria they might use to assess a particular problem or idea, and how they would decide which idea could provide the best solution for a given problem. These types of questions are considered to be evaluative, and encourage students to make value decisions about issues, resolve controversies or differences of opinion, and to develop their own opinions, judgments, and decisions.
This type of direct response blog is useful because it allows the instructor to clearly guide students through the process of engaging in higher order thinking. Other options include course portfolio blogs reading analysis blogs, and podcasts or video blogs.
Another possibility, for courses where developing writing skills are seen as less central, is to give students the option to use their blog space to compile original podcasts or video blogs, which can cover the same types of information discussed in other blogs, but allow students to express that information in a less formal manner. Some students may find this preferable if they are uncomfortable with their own writing skills or find the process of writing to be too arduous. Video blogs and podcasts can make the whole process seem more like thinking out loud rather than work, which may encourage more student engagement.
For each of these blog types students can also be encouraged (or required) to comment on each other's work, creating a learning community that fosters genuine discussion of the ideas students work on throughout the semester. Hopefully, this provides students with a clearer sense of audience in the writing that they do, by opening up a forum where there is a possibility of genuine interaction, and where their work has the potential to be seen by a far wider audience than merely the instructor. This type of community can also foster another element of interactive multimodal learning, encouraging students to reflect not only on their own ideas, but on those of the students around them. This raises what is, perhaps, the most important effect of having a shared zone in which students give voice to their their ideas, that of the collaborative space. Not only does it provide a sense of genuine audience outside the professor, it also encourages them to engage in discussion about their ideas, creating a venue for working out thoughts and disagreements (polite, academic disagreements of course). Everyone learns more when the concepts are personally meaningful to them, and disagreement over preconceived ideas or beliefs can help make a topic far more meaningful; hopefully inspiring a new drive to further develop an idea, or move ideas from opinions to defensible positions that require a logically structured argument in order to prove their point.
Moderating is the other key element in student engagement. If students don't feel that the instructor is "checking up" on their blogs, they will quit posting. End of story. There has to be some level of feedback, even if it's minor, throughout the course of the semester. Often, this can mean leaving a comment saying something like, "This is an interesting idea, what would happen if x was suddenly taken out of the equation?". This doesn't need to be frequent, once every couple weeks is generally sufficient. If it seems like individual commenting might be too much of a time drain, however, another alternative is to simply mention in class that, "I've been reading over your blogs, and I'm seeing a lot of interesting ideas. Student X brought up a particularly interesting point, and I'd like to know what the rest of you think of this". This gives students a sense that their work is being acknowledged and read, but only takes a few minutes out of the overall classroom experience. The other element of moderating is making sure that students understand from the start that course blogs, and the comments they leave on each other's blogs, do not equal youtube comments. They have to present themselves as responsible, professional adults, and that there will be negative consequences if they fail to do this. Although this may seem obvious, it's sometimes easy for anyone to forget what community they are operating in, and a helpful reminder upfront can prevent a lot of grief, and help foster those polite, academic disagreements that lead to some of the best student thought.
So. What have I left out?