Re: [xmca] The Grip of "Direct Instruction"

[mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>]

Larry-- I know the abacus expert literature. In that case there is strong
independent verification of the existence of an internalized image of an
abacus because of experts' performance. When attributing a deep disposition
of the sort "lack of attention span" to incoming college students in the
case I have been discussing, there is no independent evidence, and, as a few
have commented, pretty good reason to believe that it is mythical.
So, your caution about reification is certainly warranted.

I am unsure of the empirical basis of Jaan V's theorizing about affect and
semiotic mediation.

Yep, threads turn out to be related quite often. Something about less than 6
degrees of separation!

mike

On Sun, Aug 15, 2010 at 11:10 AM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:

> Mike
> The phrase "willingness to make deep disposition claims" leads me back to
> Valsiner's U-shaped model and level 4 de-differentiation of
> overgeneralized/abstracted dispositions.
>
> [I wasn't sure if this is a new thread or just multi-voicedness on a
> theme???]
>
> Your phrase also caused me to reflect on "skilled abacus masters" and their
> ability to create GESTALT cognitive representations which allow calculations
> that are as quick as a computer. Is this also another example of a  "deep
> disposition" that is sociocultural and appropriated??
>
> I'm wanting to be very careful not to reify this line of thinking and
> making a "structural" cognitive reality claim.  However, phenomena that can
> be labelled "deep disposition", may be explained as processes [and values as
> Valsiner explicates at level 4], which cognitively become "implicit" and not
> easily re-constructed and  reflected upon.
> Now I also want to emphasize that a huge caution must be emphasized not to
> explain these overgeneralized/abstract phenomena as "merely deep
> dispositions" and INTRApsychic.
> Is it possible to see that getting involved in active learning leads to
> deep dispositions and motivations for AGENCY-distributing activity-centered
> participation.  Once the person develops this deep disposition the
> person will struggle to adapt to alternative direct instruction models of
> learning.
> In the edited book "The Development of the Mediated Mind" a chapter by
> Lucariello explores this notion of deep dispositions [hermeneutics would say
> BIASES] that may be operating at Valsiner's de-differentiated 4th level of
> generalization and values.
>
> "Socialization experiences vary with respect to self-concept and language
> use. Socialization that emphasizes an interdependent self-concept and
> pragmatic-interpersonal language use is likely to foster social ToM
> development.  Socialization that accentuates an independent self-concept and
> referential-INTRApersonal language use is likely to facilitate INTRApersonal
> ToM development. Accordingly, children whose socialization was predominantly
> of one form or the other would manifset differtial strenghts, hence uneven
> ToM development across social and intrapersonal ToM kinds....
>
> The theme of this quote as deep dispositions and values at Valsiner's 4th
> level of de-differentiation is what I'm trying to highlight. [not
> Lucariello's sociocognitive framework]  Interpersonal activity based
> motivations and values has its roots in situational development that
> emphasizes pragmatic-intersubjective language, concepts, and identity
> dispositions that develop intersubjective "communal" self-concepts". When
> persons with "communal" self-concepts are placed in social institutions that
> value INTRApersonally REGULATED self-concepts the more "communally" oriented
> person looses motivation because the person's IMPLICIT values are not
> recognized or responded to and the person either "adapts" [learns to be
> intrapersonally motivated] or withdraws.
>
> I'm aware of how "internalized" the above descriptions are and there may be
> better frameworks to interpret the above phenomena, but it does bring in
> one perspective  for the perceived "tensions" of these various models of
> institutionalized learning.
>
> It also emphasizes how VALUES [human science] are central to cognitive
> accounts of learning.
>
> Larry
>
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, Aug 15, 2010 at 10:05 AM, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I'll send along the draft paper, Jerry.
>> My speculation concerning the "attention span" argument is the same as
>> yours
>> and Jay's: students who have gotten involved in active learning and been
>> successful doing it are badly turned off by transmission teaching in large
>> classrooms with little feedback. They display "short attention" spans
>> which
>> at least one of their professors interprets is a deep disposition brought
>> about by the hidden failures of activity-centered, motivating, and
>> agency-distributing activity-based instruction (with the caveat from David
>> K
>> not to lump all non-direct-instruction into a virtuous clump).
>>
>> It was primarily the willingness to make such deep disposition claims with
>> the idea that it was now up to the college to teach attention span, that
>> were the focus on my amazement in the discussion I reported.
>> mike
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 10:30 PM, Jerry Balzano <gjbalzano@ucsd.edu>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > Hey Mike Coole,
>> >
>> > I for one would very much like to see a draft of your APA paper, if you
>> > please.
>> >
>> > I'm trying to figure out how your Canadian interlocutor comes to the
>> > inference that the collaborative learning per se, as it were, is acting
>> as
>> > "intellectual Borax", stripping students of their attention spans.  How
>> > could such a thing work, in principle, I wonder?  Seems more likely to
>> me,
>> > in any case, that having had first-hand experience with successful
>> learning
>> > using collaboration and other more activity-based methods gives students
>> a
>> > healthy skepticism about the value of "direct instruction for its own
>> sake",
>> > especially when the latter is manifested in the form of a
>> > not-very-skillfully-executed lecture.  What, precisely, does my
>> inability to
>> > pay attention to a badly designed lecture say about my attention span?
>>  Did
>> > this woman, one wonders, really have her "scientific thinking cap" on
>> when
>> > coming to these conclusions?
>> >
>> > As for good ol' calculus, it just so happens that I have a personal
>> story
>> > -- a slightly sad one -- to tell.  I was as happy as a clam, learning
>> > calculus quite successfully as an "autodidact" during my senior year of
>> high
>> > school, and I entered college very much excited to take a "Real Calculus
>> > Course" taught by a Real Calculus Professor so I could really go racing
>> > forward in this wonderful subject.  As it turned out, Direct Instruction
>> in
>> > Calculus, in my freshman year in college, all but killed my love of
>> > mathematics; I barely survived the course, escaping with a C+, which
>> stands
>> > to this day as my lowest grade ever in a math course or any other course
>> > (OK, I also got a C+ in an Anthro course, but that's it).  My love for
>> > mathematics survived, thankfully ... but it really didn't come all the
>> way
>> > back until I taught myself group theory approximately eight years after
>> my
>> > Freshman Calculus Direct Instruction Disaster.
>> >
>> > There does seem to be some very strongly entrenched pedagogical folklore
>> to
>> > the effect that Some Subjects Require Direct Instruction, or at least,
>> Some
>> > Subjects Necessitate More Direct Instruction Than Others, but it's never
>> > been clear to me what the provenance of this folklore is, or what the
>> logic
>> > of it is based on.  I certainly don't buy any of it; and in the case of
>> > calculus, a strongly favored example used to illustrate the folklore by
>> its
>> > advocates (I think of Al Manaster from UCSD lecturing me about this, no
>> pun
>> > intended), I have direct personal evidence strongly to the contrary.
>> >
>> > Jerry
>> >
>> > On Aug 14, 2010, at 4:01 PM, mike cole wrote:
>> >
>> > Thanks, David.
>> > If anyone is interested I can send draft of paper for APA. It is similar
>> to
>> > my AERA address (but less interesting-- damned print!).
>> >
>> > Sure, crappy instruction can come from "we pretend to teach they pretend
>> to
>> > learn" regimes. The examples I gave all have pretty good evidence in
>> their
>> > favor and in many cases detailed differentiation of what gets cut out as
>> a
>> > coherent program enters the sausage grinder.
>> >
>> > While I am certainly willing to believe that people get into
>> Universities
>> > having acquired levels of learning that are very low ( I deal with
>> transfer
>> > students from California colleges, and direct admitees into UCSD who
>> cannot
>> > handle, for example, a book as complicated as *1984*, I do not believe
>> that
>> > it is a plausible account of the average Canadian university's entering
>> > classes.
>> >
>> > Apropos, however, of your point. Recent news reports concerning
>> > unemployment
>> > indicate that there are a couple of hundred pretty well paid jobs going
>> > begging in the US right now because there is a dearth of people who can
>> > handle the work tasks. Not a new story -- one which puts many industries
>> in
>> > the business of paying new employees to learn a lot before they start
>> > working.
>> >
>> > I'll read your paper with interest.
>> > mike
>> >
>> > On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 3:44 PM, David H Kirshner <dkirsh@lsu.edu>
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > Mike,
>> >
>> > Thanks for sharing that anecdote.
>> >
>> > Unfortunately there is a mirror image in reform teaching to the
>> >
>> > dysfunctional portrait you presented of direct instruction of procedures
>> >
>> > disconnected from meaning-making: engagement in activity with no vision
>> >
>> > on the teacher's part of what or how learning is to be supported. I
>> >
>> > think there is good evidence that the Math Wars in the US initiated not
>> >
>> > from ideological resistance (that came later), but from true horror
>> >
>> > stories of kids in dysfunctional reform classrooms, some of them getting
>> >
>> > to college unprepared as learners (getting into college is not always a
>> >
>> > sign of a successful K-12 learning experience). As a community, I don't
>> >
>> > think we've done a good job of articulating what it is that makes
>> >
>> > activity-based learning environments effective.
>> >
>> > This was the topic of my AERA paper in May, "The Incoherence of
>> >
>> > Contemporary Pedagogical Reform," which I attach in case anyone is
>> >
>> > interested. (The meat of the paper starts about half way through at the
>> >
>> > section titled "Theoretical Analysis.")
>> >
>> > David
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> >
>> > From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
>> >
>> > On Behalf Of mike cole
>> >
>> > Sent: Saturday, August 14, 2010 2:39 PM
>> >
>> > To: eXtended Mind, Culture,Activity
>> >
>> > Subject: [xmca] The Grip of "Direct Instruction"
>> >
>> >
>> > Yesterday I presented a longish paper at the American Psych Association
>> >
>> > meetings here in San Diego.
>> >
>> > A lot of it was about what here I would refer to as "activity-based"
>> >
>> > curriculum projects -- their virtues, problems, and apparent inability
>> >
>> > to
>> >
>> > gain traction against recitation scrips and direct instruction. A major
>> >
>> > general finding was that when implemented as designers intend, such
>> >
>> > program
>> >
>> > work, but they tend quickly to be undermined by teachers who strongly
>> >
>> > believe that direct instruction on elements not under control of a
>> >
>> > meaningful whole is THE only way to be effective.
>> >
>> >
>> > A person from Canada posed a question after prefacing her remarks by
>> >
>> > saying
>> >
>> > she agreed with all I said, and thank you, etc. She began by saying that
>> >
>> > in
>> >
>> > Canada such approaches had gained a lot of
>> >
>> > traction in k-12 education, but they were causing a problem at the
>> >
>> > university level. She phrased the problem roughly as follows: "We get a
>> >
>> > lot
>> >
>> > of students who are great at collaborative learning, but it appears to
>> >
>> > strip
>> >
>> > them of their attention spans. And, doesn't a subject like calculus
>> >
>> > REQUIRE
>> >
>> > direct instruction?"
>> >
>> >
>> > These comments/questions knocked me over. I have long disliked the
>> >
>> > discourse
>> >
>> > of short attention span in school kids, which appears to masquerade far
>> >
>> > too
>> >
>> > often as a proxy for "the kids will not sit still and control themselves
>> >
>> > doing stuff they do not understand and do not understand why they should
>> >
>> > try
>> >
>> > to understand."
>> >
>> > But I never expected that the the charge of "reduced attention spans"
>> >
>> > would
>> >
>> > be attributed to college students (who have succeeded in getting in to
>> >
>> > college, after all) with the causal factor inducing this "deficit" being
>> >
>> > that their former (successful) modes of learning engendered by
>> >
>> > activity-centered instruction). Moreover, I was surprised that anyone
>> >
>> > believes that calculus can be taught by "direct instruction" with no
>> >
>> > effort
>> >
>> > made to subordinate procedural knowledge to knowledge of the potential
>> >
>> > motives for learning.
>> >
>> >
>> > I think I was experiencing exactly the challenges confronting the many
>> >
>> > really interesting and successful innovators in education (we might
>> >
>> > start
>> >
>> > here with Dewey, but I have in mind modern scholars) who want to make
>> >
>> > education a meaningful process to students but who find that their
>> >
>> > efforts
>> >
>> > are rapidly deconstructed once they leave the home ground.
>> >
>> >
>> > Anyone else have observations of this kind?
>> >
>> > mike
>> >
>> >
>> > Two things struck me
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
>> >
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