how (you can help) people learn (biology)

How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology)

1

What do you notice?

What do you wonder?

impaled by Yersinia on flickr CC-BY-NC-SA

How People Learn

HOW PEOPLE LEARN

Peter Newbury, Ph.D.

Center for Teaching Development,

University of California, San Diego

[email protected] @polarisdotca

ctd.ucsd.edu #ctducsd

slides and resources: tinyurl.com/HPLBiologyFa13

October 21, 2013

Survey

How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology) 3

Which of these do you associate with a typical

university lecture?

A) listening

B) absorbing

C) note-taking

D) learning

The traditional lecture is based on the

transmissionist learning model

How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology) 4 (Image by um.dentistry on flickr CC)

Let’s have a learning experience…

5 How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology)

Here is an important new number

system. Please learn it.


1 = 4 = 7 =

2 = 5 = 8 =

3 = 6 = 9 =

Test


What is this number?

New Number System


Here’s the structure of the “tic-tac-toe” code:

1 2 3

4 5 6

7 8 9

Test


What is this number?

Scientifically Outdated, a Known Failure

10 How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology)

We must abandon the tabula rasa

“blank slate” and “students as

empty vessels” models of teaching

and learning.

Constructivist Theory of Learning


New learning is built on and from existing knowledge.

You store things in long term memory through a set of connections that are made with previous existing memories.

(Images by Rebecca-Lee on flickr CC)

Creating memories (aka learning) involves having neurons fire and neurons link up in networks or patterns.


What are the patterns of

how people learn?

How do we use them?

How People Learn


National Research Council (2000).

How People Learn: Brain, Mind,

Experience, and School: Expanded

Edition. J.D. Bransford, A.L Brown

& R.R. Cocking (Eds.), Washington,

DC: The National Academies

Press.

Available for free as PDF

www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=9853

Key Finding 1


Students come to the classroom with preconceptions about how the world works. If their initial understanding is not engaged, they may fail to grasp the new concepts and information that are taught, or they may learn them for the purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions outside of the classroom.

(How People Learn, p 14.)

Key Finding 2

16

To develop competence in an area, students must:

a) have a deep foundation of factual knowledge,

b) understand facts and ideas in the context of a conceptual framework, and

c) organize knowledge in ways that facilitate retrieval and application.



Key Finding 3

17

A “metacognitive” approach to instruction can help students learn to take control of their own learning by defining learning goals and monitoring their progress in achieving them.



Aside: metacognition


Metacognition refers to one’s knowledge concerning one’s

own cognitive processes or anything related to them.

For example, I am engaging

in metacognition if I notice

that I am having more

trouble learning A than B.

([3], [4])

cognition meta

Key Finding 3

19




Please break into groups of 3-4...


Each set of cards has

Key Findings 1, 2, 3

3 Implications for Teaching

3 Designing Classroom Environments

TASK: Sort your cards into 3 groups of 3 cards by

matching the Implication for Teaching and Classroom

Environment to each Key Finding:

Designing

Classroom

Environment

21


Key Finding 1


Students come to the classroom with preconceptions about how the world works. If their initial understanding is not engaged, they may fail to grasp the new concepts and information that are taught, or they may learn them for the purposes of a test but revert to their preconceptions outside of the classroom.


Implications for Teaching 1


Teachers must draw out and work with the preexisting understandings that their students bring with them.


New Coding System


Please memorize this code:

1 = 4 = 7 =

2 = 5 = 8 =

3 = 6 = 9 =

1 2 3

4 5 6

7 8 9

unsupported, unfamiliar content built on pre-existing

knowledge

(tic-tac-toe board)

Classroom Environments 1


Schools and classrooms must be learner centered. (How People Learn, p 23.)

Learning requires interaction [2]




% of class time

NOT lecturing

Learning gain:

pre-test 0

100%

post-test

0.50



1 2

3 4

Key Finding 2

29

To develop competence in an area, students must:

a) have a deep foundation of factual knowledge,

b) understand facts and ideas in the context of a conceptual framework, and

c) organize knowledge in ways that facilitate retrieval and application.




30



Teachers must teach some subject matter in depth, providing many examples in which the same concept is at work and providing a firm foundation of factual knowledge.


To provide a knowledge-centered environment, attention must be given to what is taught (information, subject matter), why it is taught (understanding), and what competence or mastery looks like.



Development of Mastery [3]


conscious

unconscious

incompetent competent

Level of Expertise

Beha

vior




Level of Expertise



conscious

unconscious

adikko.deviantart.com

Beha

vior



conscious

unconscious


Level of Expertise

Beha

vior



conscious

unconscious


1

Level of Expertise

Beha

vior



conscious

unconscious


1

2

Level of Expertise

Beha

vior



conscious

unconscious


1

2 3

Level of Expertise

Beha

vior



conscious

unconscious


1

2 3

4

Level of Expertise

Beha

vior

Why Your Students Don’t Understand You


Expert brains differ from novice brains because novices:

lack rich, networked connections so they cannot make

inferences

cannot reliably retrieve information

have preconceptions that distract and confuse

lack automization, resulting in cognitive overload

Key Finding 3

41






The teaching of metacognitive skills should be integrated into the curriculum in a variety of subject areas.


Formative assessments — ongoing assessments designed to make students’ thinking visible to both teachers and students — are essential.

Instructors need to provide opportunities for

students to practice being metacognitive: an

internal dialogue about their own thinking




student-centered instruction traditional lecture


peer instruction with clickers

interactive demonstrations

What do you notice?

What do you wonder?

surveys of opinions

reading quizzes

worksheets

discussions

videos student-centered instruction

Clicker Question

45

The molecules making up the dry mass of wood that

forms during the growth of a tree largely come from

A) sunlight.

B) the air.

C) the seed.

D) the soil.

Question credit: Bill Wood


Typical Episode of Peer Instruction (PI)


1. Instructor poses a conceptually-challenging

multiple-choice question.

2. Students think about question on their own and vote

using clickers, colored ABCD cards, smartphones,…

3. The instructor asks students to turn to their neighbors

and “convince them you’re right.”

4. After that “peer instruction”, the students vote again

and the instructor leads a class-wide discussion

concluding with why the right answer(s) is right and

the wrong answers are wrong.

In effective peer instruction


students teach each other while

they may still hold or remember

their novice preconceptions

students discuss the concepts in their

own (novice) language

the instructor finds out what the students know (and

don’t know) and reacts, building on their initial

understanding and preconceptions.

students learn

and practice

how to think,

communicate

like experts


Veritasium (Derek Muller) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KZb2_vcNTg

As you watch the

video, notice how

Derek talks to the

people he

interviews.




What do you notice?

What do you wonder?

surveys of opinions

reading quizzes

worksheets

discussions



50

Chemistry Day 4 by pennstatenews on flickr CC-BY-NC

Clicker question


A ball is rolling around

the inside of a circular

track. The ball

leaves the track

at point P.

Which path

does the ball

follow?

P

A

B C

E

D

(adapted from Mazur)




What do you notice?

What do you wonder?

surveys of opinions

reading quizzes

worksheets

discussions



53

What do you notice?

What do you wonder?

impaled by Yersinia on flickr CC-BY-NC-SA

Active Learning in Discussion Sections

54

peer instruction with clickers, colored ABCD cards, ABCDE pdf on smartphones,…

1-Minute papers: What is most confusing right now?

Problem Solving in Groups

Provide scaffold/structure

Ask what steps would you take to solve problem (versus actually solving them)

Critique or “fix” sample work/problem

overhead slides, document cameras, board?

If there’s a skill expert biologists have (drawing, identifying structures in diagram, etc.) give students a worksheet which gives them practice doing it.


How People Learn

55

Learning is not about what the

instructor does. It’s about what

students do for themselves.


How People Learn

56




Students will not learn (just) by

listening to the instructor explain.


How People Learn

57




Students will not learn (just) by

listening to the instructor explain.

BE LESS HELPFUL How (You Can Help) People Learn (Biology)

If in doubt, ask yourself…

58

Who is doing the work,

you or the students?


References


1. National Research Council (2000). How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition. J.D. Bransford, A.L Brown & R.R. Cocking (Eds.),Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

2. Prather, E.E, Rudolph, A.L., Brissenden, G., & Schlingman, W.M. (2009). A national study assessing the teaching and learning of introductory astronomy. Part I. The effect of interactive instruction. Am. J. Phys. 77, 4, 320-330.

3. Sprague, J., & Stuart, D. (2000). The speaker’s handbook. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt College Publishers.

4. Flavell, J. H. (1976). Metacognitive aspects of problem solving. In L. B. Resnick (Ed.), The nature of intelligence (pp.231-236). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

5. Brame, C. (2013). Thinking about metacognition. [blog] January, 2013, Available at: http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/2013/01/thinking-about-metacognition/ [Accessed: 14 Jan 2013].

6. Mazur, E. (2009). Farewell, Lecture? Science, 323, 5910, 50-51.

HOW PEOPLE LEARN

Peter Newbury, Ph.D.

Center for Teaching Development,

University of California, San Diego

[email protected] @polarisdotca

ctd.ucsd.edu #ctducsd

October 21, 2013

slides and resources: tinyurl.com/HPLBiologyFa13

how (you can help) people learn (biology)

Education

san diego

national academies

defining learning

learning requires

clickers interactive

colored abcd

people learn

understand