Week 12 Jly

Learning is completing 12 weeks of readings, lesson plans, blog posts, and discussions on a multiple of different learning theories and being able to have an intelligable conversation with a colleague about them. I am so glad that I have had the opportunity to review these learning theories throughout this semester. They seem to mean so much more to me as a teacher now then they did in undergraduate study. WEIRD!!!
The best way that I can effectuate this new learning is to better understand my students and apply the various learning theories as they are needed in my classroom.
August???? School???? Bring it on!!!!!

Week 11 July 20

Vygotsky's theory makes me think that learning needs to be full of challenges, but also successes whether they be easy or difficult accomplishments.
As Teacher/Trainers we need to be aware of where their development is to allow for these accomplisments to take place. I think one of the best ways to better understand where our students are is by using frequent forms of formative assessment for our benefit as well as for the student.

Week 10 July 13

Learning? Well this week I think it is about discovery. Based upon Bruner's theory of spiraled curriculum, learners can learn any subject at any level of development as long as you can bring it to their level of understanding.
Teachers/trainers can better do this by picking and choosing things in their curriculum that really matter and that they will need to know as adults and be better contributors to society. One thing that I am going to is really think about what I teach each day and determine what in that lesson is important enough to really focus on and make sure they learn.

Week 9 July 6

Learning to me this week is to become aware of something by information or by observation. With the learning theory this week, learning is all about reality. It makes me think about how so many people think that as individuals we are either book smart or common sense smart, but that hardly you ever see people that are both.
As teachers/trainers we need to make sure to incorporated both so that are learners can take the information we help them acquire and use it in their lives.

Week 8 June 29

It doesn't matter if you are in church, school, a conference or just visiting over lunch, if you can link new information to a story or some set of interesting knowledge to the listener I think you will have success. Learning takes place when new knowledge has character to back it up. It is always more fun for the learner to have some sort of interest invested into the learning.
As trainers/teachers we need to keep this in mind when presenting new information. While we may find that what we say is extremely important, the learner doesn't see it that way unless you have reeled them in with some sort of clincher.

Week 7 June 22

Learning using Intrinsic motivation is important, but I think that sometimes as a teacher you need to be sneaky in order for it to be intrinsic for the learner to want to participate. Now that it is summer I have decided that it is time to potty train X, our 2 year old boy. I don't care what any book tells you about potty training, a kid is going to figure it out when he is intrinsically motivated. You can use all of the extrinsic motivation you want with some success, but ultimately they need to see the value in using the restroom before they will commit to the process. I have been lucky so far, because it is apparent that he is ready for the change. He wants to be big like his brothers and not go the bathroom in his pants. Sure he has had some accidents, but he is moving in the right direction with the right motivation.
As teachers, we need to take a more active roll in finding the intrinsic route. I think sometimes too often we rely on the extrinsic motivation techniques because they get instant results, but like Malone discussed, once it is gone they will not see a need to do it again.
I think we also forget that all students don't think our subject matter is as cool or interesting as we think it is. In order to grab their interest we need to teach to their level and understand their perceptions of the subject.

Week 6 June 15

As a mother of 6, I have children that fall in each of the 4 stages of development that Piaget distinguishes between. Xaviah, or just X is our 2 year old that has been as of late in the sensory-motor stage, but has rapidly moved into pre-operational representation. He is learning so rapidly and is reformatting all that he learned in the previous stage. Walker and Hayden are currently in the concrete operations stage of development. I watch them focus their learning on ordering and love simple math that is definitive. Nick and Gabe are twins and Kylie is just a year older. All three of them have recently moved into hypothetic deductive operations stage. With Nick and Gabe being 11 they are just figuring out some abstract math and continually ask me to come up with algebric equations to ask them. Kylie has been in this stage for a couple of years now and she uses a lot of deductive reasoning in her attempt to learn new information.
Looking at my kids and studying Piaget this week I define learning depends upon the four factors that Piaget says explain development which are Maturation, experience, social transmission, and equilibrium.
As teacher/trainers we can encourage and support learning by understanding the different developmental stages and consider the learners from this vantage point to better fit their needs and increase understanding and retention.