Seeing our Way into Learning

Recent developments in physics and neurobiology help explain recursive interactions between peripheral images and higher cortical centres that process symbolic representation. Seeing with focused attention to colour, line, depth and form, for example, gains meaning and understanding through this recursive process. Art as representation of constant, essential features of the external extends functions of the 'visual brain' to centres that bring perception to meaning and understanding that are interdependent with aesthetic sensibilities. Collaborative work through art enables verbal explication and explanation about details, abstractions and process that lead to theory building dependent on propositional, procedural and dispositional knowledge. The swirl of verbal, visual and gestural interactions that proceed out of engagement with multiple modes of representation ensures development of abilities to focus, strategise, discern and explicate components and integrate possibilities through future scenarios. The future curriculum needs to integrate visual, verbal and other representational modes as schools move closer in goals and process to non-school learning communities and organisations. Proposed here are ways to create an infrastructure for just such an ecology of learning environments that will link tightly with the information base of the new economy and the communicational needs of a civil society.     

Teacher Educators,Student Teachers and Biographical Influences: implications for teacher education

The importance of acknowledging the influence of biography in understanding teachers’ work is well established in recent literature. Drawing upon data arising from a study of teacher educators and their students, we consider the influence of biography on the work of teacher educators and student teachers. We draw comparisons between the ways in which they make connections with their demographic characteristics, their personal and educational histories and their understanding of their work. We evaluate the data against two major positions in the literature on biography and draw some implications for teacher education.     

Unpacking students’ epistemic cognition in a physics problem-solving environment

It is a widely held view that students’ epistemic beliefs influence the way they think and learn in a given context, however, in the science learning context, the relationship between sophisticated epistemic beliefs and success in scientific practice is sometimes ambiguous. Taking this inconsistency as a point of departure, we examined the relationship between students’ scientific epistemic beliefs (SEB), their epistemic practices, and their epistemic cognition in a computer simulation in classical mechanics. Tenth grade students’ manipulations of the simulation, spoken comments, and behavior were screen and video-recorded and subsequently transcribed and coded. In addition, a stimulated recall interview was undertaken to access students’ thinking and reflections on their practice, in order to understand their practice and make inferences about their process of epistemic cognition. The paper reports on the detailed analysis of the data sets for three students of widely different SEB and performance levels. Comparing the SEB, problem solutions and epistemic practices of the three students has enabled us to examine the interplay between SEB, problem-solving strategies (PS), conceptual understanding (CU), and metacognitive reflection (MCR), to see how these operate together to facilitate problem solutions. From the analysis, we can better understand how different students’ epistemic cognition is adaptive to the context. The findings have implications for teaching science and further research into epistemic cognition.     

Quantifying the assessment loads of students and staff: the challenge of selecting appropriate metrics

Assessment is central to learning. It is also central to the cost of providing higher education. Choosing how much and what forms of assessment are questions not only of good teaching but of good policy. Measuring the amount of assessment set in each course provides a basis on which to determine equitable and appropriate workloads for students and staff across disciplines and institutions and to use institutional budgets and staff time to best effect. It is, however, more difficult than it might at first appear to select metrics appropriate to this task. This article considers the advantages and disadvantages of four options. It also suggests the potential value of ratios and proposes that further consideration be given to removing the distinction commonly found in student workload formulae between time spent on learning out of class and that spent on assessment.     

School evolution: scientist-practitioner educators creating optimal learning environments for all students

Similarities and differences between discursive practitioners and scientist-practitioners are discussed in reference to a variety of issues. The scientist-practitioner's approach to generating and evaluating new knowledge is illustrated with two partnerships: (a) between the University of Washington Multidisciplinary Learning Disability Center and a school district (at-risk first graders in the Los Angeles Unified School District) and (b) between the University of Washington Literacy Trek Project and a local school (at-risk second graders in Seattle public schools). Both partnerships involved mostly children who were English language learners. These partnerships also illustrated how Vygotsky's approach to fostering cognitive development through social interaction can be integrated with that of his pupil Luria, who assessed the neuropsychological processes of the individual mind/brain. The most effective instruction for school-age children, who exhibit biological and cultural diversity, takes into account individual and social-cultural variables.     

Fostering thinking through science in the early years of schooling

The purpose of this research was to investigate and describe concrete examples of Year 1 students engaged in good thinking and to generate assertions about the ways teachers can foster habits of good thinking through science. The research design was a multiple case study of 32 lessons, of which four are analysed in detail in this paper. The results suggest that young children engaged in good thinking are likely to explain and demonstrate their ideas and actions and to make suggestions for solving problems. Children engaged in good thinking also are likely to highlight discrepancies, adopt new ideas, and work collaboratively. The results indicate that teachers can foster habits of good thinking through science; first, by accepting difficulty as an integral part of the learning process, second, by encouraging children to explain and talk about their ideas and, finally, by creating an environment where thinking is a valued classroom process.