This post is one of the THREE sentences to be completed. If you have found that at the time of your reading, this post has the LEAST number of comments, highlight the blank area below to read the 100 word instruction and complete it in EXACTLY 100 words.
As educators we have accumulated great insight and vast implicit knowledge of how and when learning is at its best. This game will help us to reach a common point of agreement about one or more aspects about all that insight and knowledge. The task invites you to adopt a role as an experienced learning designer. This may not be you now, so use your imagination. Complete the following sentence in EXACTLY 100 words. (You can end this sentence and add more to arrive at your 100 words).
Conditions for learning are optimised when . . . . .
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Conditions for learning are optimised when there are clear goals for learning and these are relevant and appropriate to the participants. They are also optimised when there are engaging and motivating activities that generate enthusiastic participation and build on the previous experiences and knowledge of participants. The teacher presence is encouraging and the social presence of the students create the feeling of belonging to a learning community. As well, the assessment is relevant both in process and skills-related form to what is being learnt. Every participant is treated in an adult manner which reinforces respect and the value of people.
Conditions for learning are optimised when:
1. the learning context is open, friendly, respectful and authentic
2. learning activities are engaging, challenging and foster collaboration and partnership among learners
3. content is relevant and builds on learners' prior knowledge and experiences
4. learning is designed with clear learning outcomes that match assessment, mode of educational delivery and learning activities. Evaluative processes are built in.
5. learners are motivated and aware of the learning process not just content.
6. facilitators model appropriate behaviour and consider (and monitor) the impact of their presence and learning design (including the affective dimension of learning).
Conditions of learning are optimised when the learner feels comfortable, supported and safe in the learning environment. Additionally, the learner must be motivated to participate with individual goals set, to strive towards.
The facilitator needs to be aware of the personal experience and background knowledge that each student brings to the class. With these in mind the facilitator also has a responsibility to provide an optimal learning environment by means of setting achievable goals and using continuous assessment both formal and anecdotal, which will measure the benefits of the learning experience and also drive the program in a forward direction.
the learning environment is aligned. The learning outcomes need to be established with the levels of experience/ knowledge of the learners in mind. The learning activities need to be aligned to maximise the opportunity of achieving these outcomes. The assessment needs to reflect both the learning outcomes and activities to demonstrate and assist student learning by incorporating feedback along the journey. The philosophy of the teacher also contributes during the cycle, as do the wider discipline and institutional contexts. I like John Bigg's image of a 'web of consistency' which traps the students in an environment optimised for learning.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the learning objectives and desired outcomes are understood, as are the assessment criteria, and learning activities are designed that align with those intentions taking into consideration student and wider community needs and desires. These intentions may be flexible or constraining but none the less, defined. In this context all technologies both manual and automated that are used in planning, defining, delivering and reviewing are secondary to the actual intended outcomes. This is to say we do not use technologies as a convenience but also align them with all the other aspects of successful learning.
Conditions for learning are optimised when participants are given frameworks conducive to learning:
• Safe environment that facilitates risk, enquiry and advocacy
• Agreed learning outcomes where participants can see relevance to their needs
• Facilitator who models behaviours aligned to learning
• Various activities and levels of, to accommodate different learning styles
• Sufficient time for reflection with a focus on future actions
• Creation of a mood-task match to encourage emotional connection to learning
• Opportunities for the learning to evaluated or demonstrated
A simple way to look at this is engaging every learner’s “heart, hand and mind”
Conditions for learning are optimized when learners have ambitious yet achievable target and strong motivations. The desire of learning can reverse unfavorable circumstances and take full advantage of favorable ones. Take myself for example, I wasted my time on everything but learning as an undergraduate student and felt rather empty when graduated. After struggling in work for years, I went back to school for further education. Although I was short of funds, doing part-time jobs and alone in a foreign country, my determination helped me get through all difficulties. Maybe this is why many adults can learn better than teenagers.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the environment is conducive for the learner’s physical and emotional state. This may require the facilitator to be open and have an appreciation of the individual frames through which people experience or view their surroundings. To enable the learner to be comfortable and at ease the learning environment and facilitator should attempt to encourage the learner to develop an understanding of their own needs through discovery of their learning style. Therefore the content, the learner and the facilitator all need to come together creating a harmonious environment where there is a freedom to express.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the learner, the facilitator and the environment are prepared for learning. The learner would need to have a passionate reason to learn, the timing of their learning coinciding with putting that learning immediately into action, and they are totally focussed on that learning. The facilitator would need to have a thorough knowledge of, and passion for, the subject, provide the learner with space to explore and be supportive, challenging and flexible. The environment would need to be conducive to learning with good light and ventilation, an amenable set up of resources and be spacious.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the students AND the teacher are continuously willing to learn, reflect and adapt. We can all trot out these theories by rote. But do we follow them? As former students we must have many examples of otherwise good teachers using lesson plans, assignments etc that were well out of date. There was no motivation for the learners; no apparent link between an assessment task and what we were expecting to use this knowledge for in the real world. Show me the magic wand of motivation and I will show you an optimised learning environment.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the following considerations are taken into account:
• The learner understands the aims, objectives and relevance of a particular learning task or topic
• The content is constructively aligned with the objectives and the assessment process
• The learner and teacher have a reciprocal relationship – learning together and from one another.
• The learning process is supported with appropriate scaffolds
• Learners are encouraged to link concepts so that simple ideas progress to increasingly complex ones
• The learning environment is safe and supportive
• The learner is provided with timely and constructive feedback
for adults when:
-the student is ready to learn – eg;the need to apply the learning can provide a powerful reason for learning receptivity
-learning can be applied / practice and feedback provided
-reflection is present – people learn from reflecting on experience, more than from the experience itself
-new information can be connected to existing schema
-learning can be absorbed in manageable ‘chunks’, avoiding cognitive overload
-motor, cognitive and affective domains are engaged appropriate to what is being learned
-learners are given the freedom to construct their own meaning from the learning experience
Conditions for learning are optimised when the activity is relevant (recognisable, emotionally engaging, and usable to the learner), when the learners are required to reflect on the activity’s meaning and usability for them in different contexts, and when the learners trust each other enough to take the risk of making mistakes and learn from them. The latter is supported when the educational setting is sufficiently clear (through explicit framing of time, space, and expectations) for the learners’ needs and the facilitator’s purpose, and when the facilitator knows and accepts herself generally, trust the learners, and is transparent in her actions.
Conditions for learning are optimised when various factors co-exist:
The facilitator is friendly, approachable, has a good knowledge base, and humbly knows where and how to find information that is outside their knowledge base.
The facilitator is respectful of learners' needs and acknowledge the learners' prior knowledge
The content is clearly defined to learner and facilitator
The content has interest and relevance to learner.
The context encourages the learner to participate in learning
The learner's motivation is essential, if it does not exist learning is not optimised, regardless of how interesting the topic is and engaging the facilitator is.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the nature of the learner is taken into account, including but not limited to their prior knowledge and environment. This includes structuring a learning program that incorporates all the different types of learning styles. Fostering a creative environment free of negativity is essential as is ensuring that learners have sufficient knowledge prior to learning so that knowledge structures can be created. In relation ensuring that the relevance of what the learners are learning is clear. The learning environment also needs to safe and appropriate as well as varied to ensure that learners remain stimulated.
Conditions for learning are optimized when the learning objectives are developed in conjunction with the participants and the facilitator. The facilitator needs to engage participates to ‘take the journey to learn’ and guide participates to achieve learning objectives and not simply deliver content.
Participants must have a willingness to learn, a need to know and the content must be relevant. The facilitator must be organised, know the content, recognise learners past experiences, encourage dialect and apply various learning styles. Referring back to the learning objectives throughout the learning experience can ensure learning objectives are achieved, promoting optimal learning to occur.
Conditions of learning are optimised when the learning environment is student-centred, knowledge-centred, assessment-centred and community-centred. The content, teaching method, and assessments should be aligned. Teachers take on the role as facilitators to provide clear objectives, communicate high expectations and to provide scaffolds through the process. Students should be engaged in a collaborative task or problem where they are individually responsible and accountable. The task should be authentic, preferably situated in everyday context, where its relevance is obvious or communicated to the student. The assessment criteria is explicit, and formative feedbacks are provided to students to allow improvement in the process.
Conditions for learning are optimised when the learner is open to the material being offered for instruction and is at a point in his/her own experience that enables the acquisition of this new material to happen; if a teacher is to facilitate the process, he/she must have some understanding of the material to be learnt and be able to present it in a way that is conducive to effective learning. Any resources that are introduced into the learning process should be relevant to the task at hand and should facilitate learning and not distract from the material to be learnt.
Conditions for learning are optimised when using diverse and innovative ways of learning expression. Using structured designs to generate active learning, we find that there is a whole new world out there! It teaches us to understand other contextual relationships, develop new skills and abilities, explore alternates to traditional teaching methods, and extend our capabilities to other creative fields.With structured designs the 'knowing' and 'doing' go hand in hand.
Simulations and Games are great! They teach us strategy, problem-solving that develops our leadership skills. Games can reveal those amongst us who appear passive, but who often emerge quite competitive!
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