Team Education 2.0 – Research Post by Katie Petty
In this week’s lesson, we learned about invariant tasks and the various principles for learning them. We were asked to review an old project that we created either in Scratch or in Alice. We then review the invariant tasks we used and answered three questions.
In this summary of our research, I am going to present out what my group answered in regards to these questions and add to each question my own research to further discussion. I will then ask some additional questions to encourage us to consider new applications of what we learned.
Question 1: What principles for learning invariant tasks had accomplished in this Alice or Scratch project?
Team Response:
Each team member had a different view on this question. Nick tackled this question from the reading in our coursework. His Alice project “related to meaningful prior knowledge” and used “visual images” as he taught students how a camera worked (Reigeluth, 1999). Natalie focused on Piaget’s Stages of Development or Learning in her project. Her project broke concepts down into smaller blocks and then built them back up in a logical order. This method matches what Piaget shares in regards to invariant task learning (Ginn). Adelina takes it a step further by sharing research from Cohen that goes into Cognitive/Information Processing. Cohen shares that it is assumed that people learn to detect complex visual patterns, which rely on specifications such as putting items in order, sorting or listing. In relation to Alice, students are required to use step-by-step approach to populate the Alice world with objects and create methods that will manipulate these objects to perform a task. She used this concept in her development of an Alice project.
My Response:
In my Alice Project, I focused on the Constructivist Principle of Learning with a strong emphasis on recollection and recall. As Professor Jacqueline Brooks states in a published article on constructivism, “pattern recognition facilitates the mental self-regulatory strategies that result in conceptual change, with continual conceptual change resulting in increasingly complex thinking” (Brooks, 2003). In other words, creating a pattern of learning on recognizable items and them making associations and connections lead to a better understand of invariant tasks versus the traditional assumption of rote memorization. It is an active principle and worked well in my project and works well in my classroom.
Question 2: What principles for teaching invariant tasks had accomplished in this Alice or Scratch project? Explain the reasons with references.
Team Response:
Adelina and Nick focused on motivation in regards to this question. Adelina shares that as students create or develop their Alice project, there should be a need to acknowledge every successful step created. This encourages the student to put in more effort (building confidence) to accomplish the task and improve on their creative skills. She links this to research that she found by stating that the key factor to academic success of every teaching and learning activity is student motivation (Gonzalez & Mendez, 2011). Nick shares that his project contained informational as well as motivational feedback. For both Adelina and Nick, teaching invariant tasks were accomplished through motivation in their Alice Projects. Natalie focused in a slightly different direction. She shares that the principles of teaching invariant tasks that were accomplished with Alice or Scratch were repetition, practice, prompting and feedback. Natalie discovered in her research a wonderful article that expounded on feedback. The writer of that article, Kulhavy says “when a student gets a problem right, it should be confirmed that it is correct“ (Kulhavy, 1977). The use of motivation and feedback was the team’s main teaching principles for invariant tasks.
My Response:
I used the basic methods found in the Constructivist Theory for my development and overall teaching principles in my Alice and Scratch Project. In this theory, every thing is learner-centric. The design, the sequence, even the flow of your lesson is focused on the learner teaching themselves. In Sharon Collin’s analysis of the Constructivist theory she expounds upon this. She states that “educators who are committed to learner-centered education seek to challenge students within their abilities while providing encouragement and recognition of student success” (Collins, 2008). This capitalizes on what my team has shared in their responses. Basically, in order to teach an invariant we need to use motivation to create the desire to even go through the lesson. The with repetition, practice, prompting, and feedback we reinforce learning. Finally, with reward and recognition we solidify the overall learned tasks.
Question 3: If you are required to redesign this project with Alice or Scratch, how would you apply the Development Process to complete this task? (Analyze, Design, Develop/Produce, & Implement).
Team Response:
Nick and Natalie focused on analyzing the objectives and then in the design phase, they created an implementation idea that included introducing students to the main points of the lesson. After the introduction, they proceeded to use recall and recognition. Adelina broke it down by each stage with students analyzing and learning the objectives of the game, then building up the storyboard of their game, they proceed to create their own flowchart based on this storyboard, and then using a rubric that is provided the students reinforce what they just learned (the implementation phase). All three of my teammates did a great job of analyzing their projects and redesigning using the principles we learned in our reading.
My Response:
One of my favorite authors in regards to curriculum design is Ruth Clark. Dr. Clark has produced several volumes on the best way to design curriculum in a scientifically proven method. I found an article that was about athletic trainers using Dr. Clark’s methods in rigorous training of invariant tasks. The article states “processes that mediate the processes behind transformation of sensory data into retrievable knowledge” is the foundation of learning. These processes include “attention, rehearsal in working memory, retrieval from long-term memory, and metacognitive monitoring” (Clark & Harrelson, 2002). If I were to redesign my Alice Project keeping this in mind along the lines of the framework provided, I would do the following:
Analyze; Students would be given the chance to analyze the vocabulary they will be learning in the game environment. This will create a sense of familiarity with the subject before they dig into their game.
Design; In the design, I will take more in to account the repetitive process so that students will have many opportunities to review the material in a variety of places.
Develop/Produce; I would add to the project the ability for students to produce their own story from the vocabulary and grammar concepts introduced in the game.
Implement; Students will be given the opportunity at the end of the game to put everything into practice and thus reinforce their learning through recall.
Conclusion & Additional Questions:
This week has been a breath of fresh air. In today’s world of education, invariant tasks are consider simply rote memory and in our efforts to stimulate/entertain the students we teach we sometimes go overboard by not accounting for any invariant tasks at all in our curriculum. Spending the week understanding the exact place and time for invariant tasks has been extremely beneficial. So, with everything we have learned here is the final discussion question I have for my team:
In your experience in the world of education, what have you discovered in specific regards to invariant tasks? Do you find that your school system claims not to focus on “rote memory” but has students doing worksheets or does your school system have it down?
References:
Brooks, J. G. (2003). Thinking about learning. Hofstra Horizons, 13-17. Retrieved from http://www.thinkingfoundation.org/research/journal_articles/pdf/hofstra_j_brooks.pdf.
Clark, R., & Harrelson, G. L. (2002). Designing instruction that supports cognitive learning processes. Journal of Athletic Training, 37(4), 152-159. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC164417/.
Cohen, A. L. (2006). Contributions of Invariants, Heuristics, and Exemplars to the Visual Perception of Relative Mass. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, v32 n3 p574-598 Jun 2006. 25 pp.
Collins, S. R. (2008). Enhanced student learning through applied constructivist theory. (Master's thesis, College of North Atlantic, Province, Canada). Retrieved from http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cts=1330837330051&ved=0CEcQFjAE&url=http://kwantlen.ca/TD/TD.2.2/TD.2.2_Collins_Applied_Constructivist_Theory.pdf&ei=N_dST_Y4gumxAqvv8e8F&usg=AFQjCNEpHeAtJZUBvBWgra1UKqXm_pFg8w.
Gonzalez, E. J. & Mendez, J. A. (2011). Implementing Motivational Features in Reactive Blended Learning: Application to an Introductory Control Engineering Course
IEEE Transactions on Education, v54 n4 p619-627 Nov 2011. 9 pp.
Ginn, W. Jean piaget – intellectual development. Retrieved from http://www.sk.com.br/sk-piage.html.
Reigeluth, C. (1999, March 10). Principles for teaching invariant tasks. Retrieved from http://www.indiana.edu/~idtheory/methods/m2e.html.
