RE: active learning/teaching at the 7000 level

From: Phillip Capper (phillip.capper@webresearch.co.nz)
Date: Mon Jul 16 2001 - 17:38:37 PDT


Phillip White's suggestions are fine, but they presuppose that the students
are or can be motivated to be enthusiastic, collaborative learners. In my
days of evaluating teaching in schools I saw many examples of teachers who
created nothing but chaos by doing exactly what Phillip suggests.

What I am suggesting is that the teacher must first be able to create a
collective object of collaborative learning. The practices and processes
that Phillip suggests then form part of a portfolio of tools that create an
environment which nurtures the collective object. This prerequisite requires
that the teacher is able to create a zoped focused on the subject matter for
the course into which the students wish to flow. Or, to put it bluntly, the
teacher herself must be able to demonstrate her own passion for the subject,
and also relate it meaningfully to the personal objects and aspirations of
the students. Without that, no creative classroom practices will work.

This was brought home to me by a conversation I had with my son yesterday.
He is doing a masters degree in a university where the language and culture
is not his own. Although he is the only person in the class for whom the
language of instruction is not his native language, he has topped the class
in his first year exams. Mindful of Barb's posting, which I read last week,
I asked him (playfully) how could that be. He answered entirely seriously.
He is the youngest in the class by a number of years. It turns out that this
course is primarily taken by mature age public servants in its own country.
My son's answer to my question was 'I want to know about these things. Most
of the others in the class are doing it to open up promotion options.' I
then asked him about the quality of the teaching. He replied 'They're very
good with me and a few others. But for the rest the teachers and students
reinforce each other's apathetic rituals."

Phillip Capper
WEB Research
PO Box 2855
(Level 9, 142 Featherston Street)
Wellington
New Zealand

Ph: (64) 4 499 8140
Fx: (64) 4 499 8395

-----Original Message-----
From: Phillip White [mailto:Phillip_White@ceo.cudenver.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, 17 July 2001 11:10
To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: active learning/teaching at the 7000 level

xmca@weber.ucsd.edu writes:

        Barb wrote several days ago - but not quite a week ago - and i've been
wanting to respond but .... time .......
anway, Barb, i think that your questions themselves points to you doing
action research / teacher research on your own practice.
>
>
>My questions really have to do with how one creates an environment as a
>teacher
>which fosters or engenders enthusiastic collaborative learning. I think I
>read
>here some time ago about work that Eugene and Barbara Rogoff did
>videotaping the
>classroom and some of the subtle and not so subtle inhibitors of a
>collaborative
>environment. (Apologies if I misunderstood)

        so my suggestion would be for you to enter your classrooms asking
yourself "What can i do to create an environment that fosters and
engenders ethusiastic collaborative learning?"

        with that in mind, the way you would arrange your classroom furniture,
classroom activities, your role within the classroom, etc., would be
something you would always consciously keep in mind as a way of supporting
and engendering collaboration. for example, i arrange my classrooms to
that the students can see each other at all times, a
square/rectangle/circle, of course reflecting the physical constraints of
the classroom. also, i never sit in the same place - when means that in
time the students stop going to the same places to sit. however, in point
i'd like to say that the activities arise naturally/artificially from the
subject matter, as well as the various forms of collaboration. i also
make it explicit that this is a goal of mine as a teacher and that i'm
going to be doing in-class on-going data collection to find patterns of
relationships that support collaboration.
>
>I am working with MBAs, many of whom are brilliant international students
>and
>would like to create authentic assignments, authentic assessments, and
>very
>active learning *environments*. I have unbelieveable technology which
>supports
>my classrooms. Now I am looking for info on how to make these supports
>part of
>the way I construct my classroom activities, and part of the way that
>students
>learn, something beyond powerPt..
>
        i think that your point about how the technology support the classrooms
bears some investigation - in fact, how does the technology support
collaboration? but then, it wouldn't be in the technology itself but the
activities in which the technology is a tool.

anyway - good luck!

phillip
>
>
>Barb
>

* * * * * * * *
* *

The English noun "identity" comes, ultimately, from the
Latin adverb "identidem", which means "repeatedly."
The Latin has exactly the same rhythm as the English,
buh-BUM-buh-BUM - a simple iamb, repeated; and
"identidem" is, in fact, nothing more than a
reduplication of the word "idem", "the same":
"idem(et)idem". "Same(and) same". The same,
repeated. It is a word that does exactly what
it means.

                          from "The Elusive Embrace" by Daniel
Mendelsohn.

phillip white
doctoral student http://ceo.cudenver.edu/~hacms_lab/index.htm
scrambling a dissertation
denver, colorado
phillip_white@ceo.cudenver.edu



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