Moving along well in the internship. Talking quite a bit with Grace about instructional design, the challenges professores have, limitations and strengths of the platforms, and possibilities for future collaboration. Talked about my Master’s project and getting more involved in an actual course planning process. Good stuff.
Talked about Learning Module Design, the Understand Phase (benchmark tests and initial cognitive analysis).
With my resume updated, new website look, new about me page, and updated LinkedIn profile, I went to the EdSurge job fair to see learn a little more about the job market and companies around here. Some interesting companies:
Went again to BEAM (ex-Career Development Center) today to consult with them about my resume and onilne profile. Great advice that resulted in a new version of my resume and website’s new look 🙂
Had a great presentation today on Machine Learning – the first of a series of 3 sessions -by Iris Howley. We went over the basic types of machine learning such as supervised and unsupervised learning as well as styles:
This week Izabel Fonseca, also a Lemann Fellow, presented her research to get some feedback. She presented one of her research topics: socio-economic factors associated with the transition from colleges to the labor market.
Was very interested in the concept of indexing higher education institutions in terms of how much better off a student might be after they graduate – how “much bang for the buck” would a student get from investing time and money in a certain institution.
Met with James and Camila about this class’ final project – which will be my Master’s project. Discussed what were the interventions I imagined we could do with the instructors and we all seemed to agree with what could be done.
While we were in the meeting, we were ‘visited’ by a photographer who wanted to take some pictures of the classroom we were in.
Later on I received an email from her 🙂
Hello,
Yesterday I wandered into a classroom and took a couple of pictures of you talking about course design. I work at Stanford in the VPGE office, and I also (on the side) write a blog about graduate education. I am working on a post related to a newly released study about the value of teaching development activities for grad students (lsfss.wceruw.org). My blog is here: http://gradlogic.org
I wanted to know whether it was ok to use one of these photos. Your face isn’t shown. I may also want to use them later, but only if it is ok with you.
Thanks,
Chris M. Golde
chris@golde.org
GRAD | LOGIC blog
Helping graduate students navigate the ups and downs of graduate school
http://gradlogic.org
Reading:
Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., & Norman, M. K. (2010). How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching. John Wiley & Sons.
Summary:
The first chapter illustrates how Prior Knowledge can affect learning both positively and negatively. When dealing with counterituitive concepts especially, common misconceptions that root from inacurate Prior Knowledge, are very hard to change and require time, cognitive energy, and an attentive teacher to scaffold the process. I appreciated all the methods offered to gauge, activate, recognize, and suplement Prior Knowledge as well as correct inacurate Prior Knowlege.
The second chapter goes into how students organize knowledge and how might a teacher build these schemas more effectively on them. It is important for the teacher to realize that students come into a new subject area with shallow understanding of how apparently unconnected peices of knowledge relate to each other. This richness of connections is one of the abilities that makes someone an expert. Therefore, the more the teacher is able to demonstrate how to build these connections and organize the information in an effective manner, the more students might learn.
“…it is not just what you know but how you organize what you know that influences learning and performance. ” (Ambrose et al., 2010)
Notes:
Chapter 1 – How Does Student’s Prior Knowledge Affect Their Learning?
Chapter 2: How Does the Way Students Organize Knowledge Affect Their Learning?
Reading:
Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., & Norman, M. K. (2010). How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching. John Wiley & Sons.
Summary:
The first chapter illustrates how Prior Knowledge can affect learning both positively and negatively. When dealing with counterituitive concepts especially, common misconceptions that root from inacurate Prior Knowledge, are very hard to change and require time, cognitive energy, and an attentive teacher to scaffold the process. I appreciated all the methods offered to gauge, activate, recognize, and suplement Prior Knowledge as well as correct inacurate Prior Knowlege.
The second chapter goes into how students organize knowledge and how might a teacher build these schemas more effectively on them. It is important for the teacher to realize that students come into a new subject area with shallow understanding of how apparently unconnected peices of knowledge relate to each other. This richness of connections is one of the abilities that makes someone an expert. Therefore, the more the teacher is able to demonstrate how to build these connections and organize the information in an effective manner, the more students might learn.
“…it is not just what you know but how you organize what you know that influences learning and performance. ” (Ambrose et al., 2010)
Notes:
Chapter 1 – How Does Student’s Prior Knowledge Affect Their Learning?
Chapter 2: How Does the Way Students Organize Knowledge Affect Their Learning?
Means, B., Bakia, M., & Murphy, R. (2014).Learning online: What research tells us about whether, when and how. Routledge.
Summary:
Means et al (2014) provide a comprehensive overview of the online learning space with helpful categorizations of the main variables and its attributes. One of the most interesting points, besides the finding that online instruction can be as, and sometimes more effective than face-to-face, was that the discussion must move from an overall debate of online or not, this platform or that, to a focus onto how each instructional design principle is effective, for each content type. As in classroom practice, each content area or skills set, requires different pedagogical moves and student interactions with the teacher, the content, and each other. In an online environment, the research and practice must attend to this granularity instead of approaching the use of technology in a generic manner or a technocentric approach. The challenge is that these technological affordances must be used purposefully by the instructors who, for the most part, have had little exposure to online learning environments, might never have been a student in one, and probably has never taken a course on how to create a course online. “People engaged in these activities are often disinclined lo spend time searching the learning sciences literature or selling out to experiment with alternative instructional design principles.” (Means, Bakia, & Murphy, 2014, p37)
Finally, in the conclusion, Means et al (2014) allude that MOOCs might move a direction of being used more and more across institutions. Does this mean that courses are going to, or should become more centralized? Should Stanford for example have the ‘standard’ Programming 101 course other institutions should use since it’s ‘the best’? The thought of centralizing knowledge is to say the least controversial, yet probably impossible. MOOCs themselves, along with the myriad of LMSes and course marketplaces, allow for anyone to publish their own knowledge – evidently with varying levels of quality and effectiveness. With this in mind I find it particularly interesting to research further into how to provide knowledge sharing tools that scaffold the instructor towards a better and more effective course.
Notes: