Three New Approaches to Pedagogy: AJ Kelton on Disruptive Learning Design & Kirk McDermid on The Helix as a Model for Learning & Cigdem Talgar on The Uses of Emerging Technology in the Classroom

• *Christopher Donoghue will show how to increase the frequency and quality of instructor-student interaction in distance education using Qualtrics, in “Virtual Instructor-Student Interaction in an Asynchronous Learning Network”.
• *Michael Kolitsky will show how to enable different modes of learning, on-demand, with “Where Does 3D Printing Fit Into Your Pedagogical Thinking?”
• *John T Oliver will make a case for the pedagogical value of open, collaborative knowledge construction in “Making Student Wikipedians: Encouraging disruptive scholarly communication”
• *Sophie Idromenos will demonstrate game design using Scratch in a hands-on workshop called “The Scratch Disruption: Video Game Design with Scratch.

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Kirk McDermid on The Helix as a Model for Learning

Dear Neil:  As the new-ish Chair of the General Education Committee (charged with overseeing the General Education Program at Montclair State, a 41-credit blended content distribution and skill development ‘menu’ of courses) – we have a large and diverse program to manage.  And improve.  And ‘sell’ to students.  The problems we face are exacerbated because our Program is not a unified, small set of ‘core’ courses, but a wide variety from almost every discipline.  The Program is charged with exposing students to that wide range of disciplines, while also helping them develop a set of key competencies or Learning Goals such as critical thinking that crosses disciplinary lines. The helix is a fruitful image for me to use in order to make sense of this task.  No single course can accomplish the goals of our Gen Ed; no single discipline can, either – by definition in the case of the content requirements, but also in the case of the skills/Goals.  I took it as fundamental to the original vision of our Gen Ed that the learning and thinking competencies our students would acquire were to be understood as inherently interdisciplinary – critical thinking may have originated in philosophy and may even be exemplified in its “purest form” therein (a philosopher may argue), but surely we want critical thinkers across academia and outside it as well.  As you and I agreed, real intellectual skill is not confined within disciplinary boundaries; if it is, I would call it “technical proficiency” instead.  Students will only appreciate this if they can see such skills and abilities transcending disciplinary boundaries, and become self-aware of the interdisciplinarity of their learning.

The helix image “trajectory” shows a student’s growth as dependent upon repeated exposures to distinct but related content/disciplines, and skills/competencies, in different combinations.  As they gain such exposures, they will build upon their previous achievements to reach for more complex expressions or skill-sets – and we as their teachers & mentors would urge and demand that, as well.  We know from psychological studies of learning that single exposures to material rarely result in learning; students need repeated exposure, in a diversity of environments and situations, to learn.  The helix model represents this in the rotation of the trajectory, as students return to the ‘same’ material repeatedly.  Of course, it’s not the same: it’s different, as the students are somewhat changed from their previous exposure to that Goal or skill, as well as the other distinct but related ones.  They are also more aware of the diversity of disciplines in which those skills could be deployed.  Perhaps the helix’s radius should expand as it rises, to capture this growth in application; what starts as a skill ‘locked’ in a specific discipline becomes more flexibly employed across disciplines, as the student gains experience in seeing it deployed in new contexts.

The helix also represents the importance of apparently unrelated learning in different disciplines or skills: part of the ascension is due to the unpredictable connections the student constructs, or the inspirations they can draw from previous learning experiences.  As almost every student’s learning trajectory is unique at Montclair State — apart from the very beginning courses, students have flexibility to sequence their Gen Ed in various ways — we cannot tell what their previous learning experiences might do to shape their understanding of their present courses.  That’s a bad thing as it makes our jobs as teachers more difficult, not being able to take student preparation for granted, but also a good thing as it makes our jobs more interesting, and – if we are willing to work at it – better for all students who can see student models of achievement to strive after, in their own classrooms.

The helix is also very optimistic; the only thing we can control is the circulation around the perimeter.  The student’s progression upwards – the incline of the helix – is not under our control directly.  This points to the pessimistic possibility that students may not in fact “be helical” in their learning, but instead “circular” – i.e., cycling, but not progressing.  I would hope, though, that if this were the case, the repeated exposure to the same concepts, in diverse contexts, would trigger some substantial learning.  At the least, one would also expect that instructors and advisors would be able to detect with suitable assessments or feedback the ‘slope’ of any student’s helix, and design interventions or instructional aids to steepen that trajectory.

Ideally, we would have courses or learning experiences ‘calibrated’ for the student, such that they matched the students’ ascending trajectory, instead of being jarringly too far above or below the students’ present capabilities.  Don’t ask me how to manage that; we’re just beginning with this concept.

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Cigdem Talgar on The Uses of Emerging Technology in the Classroom

Dear Neil: Thank you for inviting me to share my informal thoughts with the CRC readership on the volatile, ever-changing field of emerging technology in the higher education classroom, where it offers an excellent ‘toolbox’ for demonstrating creativity.   For example, using ‘virtual worlds’ brings students in language classes to new and far-flung places where they can experience the cultures accompanying those languages.  In biology, students of anatomy utilize augmented reality to delve into the human body multiple times.  Students of psychology can network with students in various departments (i.e., physics) through social media to “invent” things that are possible via cross-disciplinary, peer-to-peer collaboration.

The availability of such technology is a testament to the creativity of the individuals who made it possible; however, it is a common misunderstanding that technology makes the professor creative.  Technology does, indeed, offer opportunities; but what these opportunities are — and how they are utilized — is a function of the creative nature of the professor and the needs that he or she possesses to bring the material to light.  The thought that infusing your classroom with technology will thereby lead your students to learn effectively is inherently flawed and, unfortunately,  all-too-common.

Rather, I believe, the creation — or disruption — of so-called “deep learning” environments depends upon factors such as student engagement, motivation, attention and cognitive load; these are not mutually exclusive but rather continuously interact.  The successful use of technology in the classroom is linked to the success with which it promotes these factors.

Emerging learning designs offer students opportunities to express their creativity.  Once again, they have to be given the opportunity or the problem or the limitation which requires them to go beyond their customary and comfortable use of the technology.   This thought of creating limits — or “blockages,” as my colleague, Iain Kerr, instructor of the Creative Thinking course at the University says — forces the students to think “sideways” about technology and other tools.  Students can use this sideways thinking to utilize technology that they usually use ‘one way’ to come up with creative solutions to problems posed by their instructors.

The June 7^th Emerging Learning Design Conference and the new Journal of Emerging Learning Design (ELDJ) offer a forum for discussion and debate of these issues from the perspective of instructors as well as students.

The ELDJ,  Montclair State University’s first open access, Web-based peer-reviewed journal,  provides a platform for higher education practitioners to explore emerging learning design theories, concepts, and issues, and their implications at national and international levels.  An outgrowth of the annual Emerging Learning Design Conference, which as you know makes its home at Montclair State University, the ELDJ invites scholarly communications in the field and will present best practices in design and implementation by offering articles that propose or review engaging and dynamic approaches to pedagogy and how it can be enhanced through technology.

The inaugural issue of ELDJ will be published on March 22nd, 2013.  It will feature invited articles from Joshua Danish, Jonathan Richter and Sarah Smith-Robbins, presenters of keynote addresses at the past two ELD conferences.  The second issue, due in early 2014, will feature an invited article by Christopher Hoadley, keynote speaker for ELD13, as well as selected proceedings from the ELD13 conference.