the learning sciences: past, present, and future

The Learning Sciences: Past, Present, and Future

Janet L. KolodnerSchool of Interactive

ComputingGeorgia Inst. Of Tech.

8/7/03 U. of Mich. Learning Sciences: Present and Future

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What is a learning scientist, and what do learning

scientists do?• Harvest our best understandings of

learning to design software and environments and ways of educating that promote deep and lasting learning

• Study the environments we create to learn more about learning and promoting learning


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Related to but different from activities of lots of other

communities• AI & Education -- driven by

capabilities of AI technology• Cognitive Science -- focus on studies

of cognition• Science Education; Math Education;

etc. -- focus on teaching and learning in disciplines

• Instructional/Educational Technology -- focus on productivity


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What is/are the Learning Sciences?

• interdisciplinary pursuit of – understanding what “learning for use” looks like --

developmental trajectories, manifestations of different gradations of understanding and capability

– understanding ways of promoting deep and lasting learning – of skills, practices, content, and dispositions; in the classroom, on the job, informally, and as part of life-long learning endeavors; in person and at a distance

– understanding environments (small and large) in which people learn well and in which we want them to learn

– design of software, activity structures, curriculum materials, environments, teacher prof. dev., ... to promote such learning

• focus on learners and their needs


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Some of my favorites• Ann Brown’s Design Experiments paper• Jeremy Roschelle’s paper on Convergent

Conceptual Change (early 90s); Tim Koschmann’s revisit of that data (late 2000s)

• Danny Edelson’s analysis of the CoVis/Worldwatcher evolution

• A decade of publications about “transfer”• AERA session (2000?) on learning from design• Special issues of JLS on learning from problem

solving and on design studies• Gresalfi’s JLS paper on developing dispositions• Na’ilah Nasir’s talks and papers on identity

development• A session at 2010 ICLS on bridging learning across

formal and informal learning environments


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One science or many?Foundations and Methodologies

• Rooted in cognitive, socio-cognitive, and cultural approaches to learning -- learner as a social animal who is part of a community (and learns by active construction of mental models)

• Focuses on examining learning “in vivo” -- with all the messiness that involves and requiring methodologies that can nonetheless extract trends and descriptions

• Belief that technology can help promote learning, BUT it needs to be designed and integrated carefully taking the needs of the learners and whole social system and environment into account

• Belief that we have to work with practitioners as part of our research

• Design as an important research methodology


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Learning Scientists have developed shared goals and

beliefs• Learning is not just about content; it includes

“becoming” -- helping people to grow in capabilities and awareness and disposition (which includes learning content)

• We want people to have the understanding, capabilities, and disposition to participate as informed citizens in our democracy and to thrive and contribute to our knowledge society

• School is only one environment for learning• By understanding successful learning in

natural environments, we’ll be able to effect learning in designed ones


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Which has led to some shared beliefs about the “best” learning

environments• E.g., from communities of practice and

cognitive apprenticeship literatures– Knowledge societies where informed decision

making is valued and practices of inquiry and knowledge building are practiced

– Communities of practice where participants have the chance to be legitimate participants, first peripherally and gradually more completely

– Experts in these environments are committed to enculturating new members and helping them become more expert participants


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And some working models• Fostering communities of learners

– Brown and Campione

• Knowledge Building Communities– Scardamalia and Bereiter

• Learning by Design; Project-Based Inquiry Science– Kolodner, Starr, Krajcik, Edelson, Reiser, …

• Design-based kindergarden– Mioduser and Levy

• Each project began with foundations from theories of how people learn and continued to both– Use that understanding to promote learning better– Contribute back to that theoretical foundation

• As more was learned, each has evolved in some very sophisticated ways


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What kind of science?• A design science• An integration science• A cognitive science (and a social science)• A descriptive science• An experimental science• A creative science

• With the huge strengths and distinctions of carrying out basic research that addresses a real-world need and of imagining technology’s affordances

• … and methodologies that can contribute to both theory and practice at the same time


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Includes folks in …• Science education• Educational technology/ learning technology• Educational psychology; developmental psychology;

cognitive psychology• Cognitive science• Computer science -- HCI, AI, …• Information science• Anthropology• Targeted disciplines (science, math, history, …)• Plus …

– Experts with target populations– Experts at targetted learning environments

• …• And includes a lot of folks educated as Learning Scientists


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Past: The first decade (1990s)

– Careful descriptions of learning (Chi, Schauble, Ng)

– Computational models of learning (Hammond, Ram, Pazzani, Burstein, Van Lehn, Roschelle)

– Creating methodology (special issue: Schoenfeld -- dealing with messy data; design experiment -- Ann Brown)

– Software proposals, descriptions, evaluations (Schank, Fergusson, Reiser)

– Classroom studies (Roseberry, Fernandez, Scardamalia, Williams)


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Present: The past decade (2000s)

• Dealing with complexity– Methodology -- design experiments and design studies mature– Understanding complex systems (as a disciplinary focus)– Diversity– A focus on systems (in classrooms, in teacher education, in

promoting reform)• What does it/can it/should it look like?

– Aiming for transferable learning– Software-realized scaffolding -- principles for design– Bring back a new kind of modeling?– New technologies

• Methodology: – Lab experiments and cognitive models mostly dropped

out– classroom studies, careful descriptions, software design,

integration, and eval are still in– curriculum design was added


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Future: the 2010s

• Personal platforms for learning– Integrating technologies– Interactive etextbooks – Construction/expression workbenches– Their integration

• Promoting sustained engagement through attention to popular culture– Citizen science– Do it yourself– Serious games


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The Future (continued)• Bridging learning in formal and informal

learning environments– More project and problem-based learning, more knowledge

building, more communities-of-practice-like culture in classrooms

– Possible because of new ways of doing teacher professional development

– Taking advantage of opportunities in the community and beyond

• Linking assessment and learning– To promote needs-based promotion of mastery– Large-scale collection and analysis of learning data

(Educational data mining to link assessment and learning

• Transforming Education: Making real change


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From Research to Transformation

• Implementation research: research into issues of implementation and sustainability (may also learn about learning and promoting learning from the efforts)• Vigorous program of taking some selected software

national -- working out sustainability issues and integration into the curriculum issues

• Efforts need to be organized so implementation researchers and more traditional learning scientists work together and learn from each other.

• Organizations that know how to do these things or can make them happen need to be brought into the effort and possibly created


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From Research to Transformation (continued)

• New players; new collaborations: e.g., – Research on educating public policy makers– Research on educating the public about

learning and education– Apply what we know about learning to teachers

(just like kids, they need to be passionate to want to learn, they need to concretely experience and reflect on targeted skills, practices, and content, …)

– Making time for real teacher professional development

– Large-scale implementation projects


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Implications for educating the next generation of learning scientists

• About people -- as learners, collaborators, thinkers, speakers, players, users of tools, members of communities, …

• About learning environments -- classrooms, workplaces, museums, parks, on-line communities, ….

• About technology• About methodologies for assessment -- that get at

depth of learning and at degree of capabilities; quantitative and qualitative

• About methodologies for data collection -- that take complexities of learning and learning environments into account

• About design and integration -- of technology, curriculum, learning environments, communities

• About some content area(s)• Some need to also know about policy and economics


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Special Issues• Methodology -- messy data (1992; 1994-5; 2001;

2004)

• Computer Support for Collaborative Learning (1993)

• Goal-Based Scenarios (1994)

• Collaborative learning -- including gesture (1996)

• Conceptual change (1997)

• Authoring tools (1998)

• Learning through problem solving (1998)

• Learning through designing (2000)

• The role of designed artifacts in math learning (2002)

• Scaffolding (2004)


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2003:Areas of Focus/ Areas of Need

• Technology design and integration• Curriculum design; activity structure design• Collaborative learning and CSCL• How people learn (and don’t) -- at different ages,

in different kinds of situations -- trends, individual differences, what it looks like, what effects it

• Methodologies for assessment, data collection, and analysis

• Methodologies for design• Teacher professional development; school

reform (teachers as learners; schools as learning communities)

• Understanding complex systems (e.g., evolving from what we have)

the learning sciences: past, present, and future

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