Introductions set the stage for learning.
Tracy Teal, Executive Director, The Carpentries
Day 1
Day 2
There is no universal theory of learning, but evidence-based research results support some learning principles, which are today accepted and applied.
by Yana Weinstein, Megan Smith & Oliver Caviglioli is licensed under a Create Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. It is based on work that can be found at
[http://www.learningscientists.org, teachinghow2s.com/cogsci](http://www.learningscientists.org, teachinghow2s.com/cogsci)
Students' prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
How students organise knowledge influences how they learn and apply what they know.
Students motivation determines, directs and sustains what they do learn.
To develop mastery, students must acquire component skills, practice integrating them, and know when to apply what they have learned.
Goal-directed practice coupled with targeted feedback enhances the quality of students' learning.
Students' current level of development interacts with the social, emotional, and intellectual climate of the course to impact learning.
To become self-directed learners, students must learn to monitor and adjust their approaches to learning.
Bloom's taxonomy can be helpful in aligning the training with the learners' level of thinking (complexity, experience, etc).
In practice, Bloom's level of cognitive complexity can be used to:
LOs (more accurately “desired LOs”) are statements of what you might (in principle) assess.
You may not end up assessing all of them, but they are statements of what a successful* student will know or be able to do at the end of instruction.
By the end of the lesson (session/course/instruction) the successful learner will be able to…
How many words do you remember?
How many consecutive letters can you remember? Write them down.
What about now?
Principle P1: Students' prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
Mental model - A collection of concepts and facts, along with the relationships between those concepts, that a person has about a topic or field.
Example: mental model of DNA
A novice, typically has not yet built a mental model of the field.
A competent practitioner has a mental model that works for many purposes, but will not be very accurate.
Experts’ mental models are much more densely connected. Therefore they can jump directly from a problem to its solution because there is a direct link between the two in their mind.
Simple factual errors: These are the easiest to correct.
Broken models: We can address these by having learners reason through examples to see contradictions.
Fundamental beliefs: These beliefs are deeply connected to the learner’s social identity and are the hardest to change.
Intrinsic cognitive load is the effort associated with a specific topic.
Germane cognitive load it is the (desirable) mental effort required to create linkages between new information and old.
Extraneous cognitive load is everything else that distracts or gets in the way. Extraneous cognitive load refers to the way information or tasks are presented to a learner.
Split-attention occurs when learners are required to split their attention between at least two sources of information that have been separated either spatially or temporally.
Think of the tasks you teach in your lessons/courses. Pick one.
What would be the extraneous load in performing this task. How can you avoid it?
Discuss with your partner(s).
https://www.clinton.edu/curriculumcommittee/listofmeasurableverbs.cxml
Choose a topic to demonstrate your training in three minutes.
Joseph D. Novak , 1972
Further reading http://cmap.ihmc.us/Publications/ResearchPapers/TheoryUnderlyingConceptMaps.pdf
Draw a concept map of your topic of interest, start with a question
In a group of 2 exchange concept maps. Do not explain the map.
You have 15 min to prepare the content of your mini-training The structure of your mini-training should be something like
Use your concept map and adapt as needed
Split into groups of 3
Nicholls G (2002). Developing teaching and learning in higher education. London, UK: Routledge. Pp 51-75
In your group…
Physical environment
Learning outcome: Be able to identify training materials that exist already, and develop a routine of sharing training materials.
Data and models are:
Training course materials: slides, exercises, datasets
Adopt collaborative platforms to support training activities
Articulate a goal of good teaching practice that you are ready to apply for your next training
Recall concrete examples of past trainings and list your thoughts (3 min)
In pairs (3 min)
What makes a good trainer? Write down some traits that you associate with a good trainer and describe them
Principle P1: Students' prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
Principle P2: How students organise knowledge influences how they learn and apply what they know.
Principle P3: Students motivation determines, directs and sustains what they do learn
Principle P4: To develop mastery, students must acquire component skills, practice integrating them, and know when to apply what they have learned
Principle P5: Goal-directed practice coupled with targeted feedback enhances the quality of sudents' learning
Principle P6: Students' current level of development interacts with the social, emotional, and intellectual climate of the course to impact learning
Principle P7: To become self-directed learners, students must learn to monitor and adjust their approaches to learning.
Principle 2: How students organise knowledge influences how they learn and apply what they know.
Think about a motivating experience in your life (as a student or as an instructor/teacher) and share it in the GDoc.
Think about a demotivating experience in your life (as a student or as an instructor/teacher) and share it to the GDoc.
Do not
Learners who actively engage with course materials will end up retaining it for much longer than they would have otherwise, and they will be better able to apply their knowledge broadly.
Waldrop, Nature 2015
Science Education Resource Center at Carleton College (SERC): https://serc.carleton.edu/sp/library/interactive/
Allow time for wrap up and feedback
On the GDoc
One or more new things that you have learned today and could be useful for your future teaching/training
Add a + sign next to the point you agree the most
In pairs ( 10 min)
One person will explain a topic for 90 seconds, while the other person write feedback about presentation and content.
Then you have a minute to go through the feedback.
Then switch and repeat.
As group (10 min )
We will go through the feedback together.
Our curiosity is provoked when we perceive a problem that we believe we can solve
Willingham, 2009
Ambrose, Susan A., et al. How Learning Works, John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2010
Collect data about students and use it to design instruction (P1,P3). Be aware and make people aware of diversity in the classroom.
Be explicit about learning goals, learning objectives and expectations (P3, P5, P6). Goals challenging but attainable.
Scaffold complex tasks (P2-P7). Teach and test at the right level, think about your audience.
Let learners formulate solutions before moving to work on new problems. Have them reflect on what they learned, and what they will do differently in the future (P2, P4, P7).
Establish a supportive class climate (P3, P6). Learn and use learners' names and encourage them to interact with you in and outside of the course. Collect anonymous learner feedback and investigate and respond to any complaints related to class climate.
Let’s take 15 min to read about the seven learning principles from the book How learning works
Develop an understanding of different types of feedback, when to give and receive feedback, and for which purpose.
Anonymous questionnaires allow us to have an idea of the level of knowledge of the whole group of learners.
Non-anonymous and personal questionnaires allow us to find out if the learner has a necessary pre-required knowledge, and in the negative case indicate an appropriate teaching choice to palliate this lack.
This is Instant Feedback.
Trainees feedback should be considered along other forms of quality evidence: