<excerpt>>----- Original Message -----
>From: Linda Polin <<lpolin who-is-at pepperdine.edu>
>To: <<xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu>
>Sent: Thursday, May 27, 1999 12:45 AM
>Subject: Problem Based Learning
>
nate writes:
>There will always be teachers who will roll out the carpet for every
new
>invention, but there will be others who will negate it as just the
most
>recent invention that will fade away. Some teachers as in your
example by
>the reference of "we" will incorporate such approaches into their
theory.
>I would suspect that such teachers theories would be more relational
than
>appossitional as in teacher centered vs student centered.
>
> If we see mutual transformation (activity,
>artifacts, teacher, students) as I see Activity Theory more or less
>embracing, PBL focuses on the transformation role of students, but
does not
>focus on the relational nature of activity, teachers, artifacts etc.
In
>this sense, the students only transform but are not transformed.
They
>transform or utilize artifacts (internet, books etc) but those
artifacts do
>not transform them. The teacher's role is contructed in reaction to
their
>role in a teacher centered classroom rather rethinking the role of
the
>teacher itself. Teacher as facilitater, what does it mean? My sense
is
>its defined more by what they don't do rather than what they do.
Hmmm...at first I was going to agree with you but I thought about it,
the more I find the intention of PBL in K-12 (the IMSA model) to be
about moving from away from a curriculum-centered approach to
teaching. You know: cover and expose. As such, when teachers implement
it I'd bet that it *is* transformational for them. They do a lot of
"rethinking the role of the teacher." You can't run a PBL unit as a
teacher-centered or curric.-centered unit. Stuff happens. Based on some
similar experiences with graduate students who are themselves K-12
teachers, I'd have to say that good PBL turns out to be a negotiated
experience between teacher(s) and students, and often with outsiders
relevant to the student-defined tasks. I'm not sure the experience is
as profound for the students; I imagine that would depend on what they
encounter in non-PBL classroom life. I sense that the framework of
schooling is way too overpowering for kids to break free, at least by
the middle elementary years. That's why some of us half joke about the
need to dismantle schooling or to let childhood learning eek out to a
new venue.
</excerpt>
You're right, Linda, a teachers, can't do PBL without undergoing a
form of transformation not only in the way that they relate to
students, but also in the way that they relate to learning and
knowledge. This is a difficult transition and, unfortunately, not
every teacher is able to make it.
I will concede Nate's point to the degree that I think tutor training
in PBL tends to be more focused on the "don't bees" (don't lecture,
don't direct, don't assess), than providing a helpful set of "do bees".
This is part of a bigger problem involving how one goes about
preparing folks to make a radical shift in their working practices when
they have never done learning in this way themselves and have no role
models to fall back upon. I don't think PBL should be viewed as simply
a critique or a reaction to the standard model of classroom practice.
I'm also not sure how you can compare PBL to Activity Theory or
constructivism. PBL is just an alternative framework for organizing
learning activities, it does not aspire to being any kind of grander
theory than that. People take this theory and appropriate it in many
different ways---sometimes the results are breathtaking and sometimes
they aren't. My colleague, Paul Feltovich, once said, "PBL is nothing
new, it's just the way that good students have always learned".
I'm afraid I just shot a perfectly beautiful afternoon taking on all
comers and I've worn myself out. I think I will take off my
sole-defender-of-the-faith helmet now and let this strand simmer down.
I suspect that the other members of this list have probably had their
fill of PBL by now, anyway. ---Tim