Lana Thain Assignment 1 - Essay Due: 5th Oct, 2017

EDPROFST 313 Assignment Task 1:

Pedagogical Reflective Statement

Donovan and Bransford (2005) describe three key principles of learning

based on extensive research literature around the science of learning. The three key

principles have strong foundational research and implications for teaching and

learning (National Research Council (NRC), 2003); engaging preconceptions; the

importance of factual knowledge and conceptual frameworks in understanding; the

importance of metacognitive approaches in allowing learners to take control of their

learning (Donovan & Bransford, 2005). The following will reflect on one of my

personal teaching practices, evaluating its consistency with the principles of how

people learn, and identify areas for professional development in order to contribute

to a safe and high quality teaching environment in the future.

In a year 5-6 modern learning environment, a group of around thirty students

had identified one of their long term goals as being able to manage their own stall at

the school fair, selling items that they had made throughout the year. The money

they made would go towards new sports equipment for the school. The students

agreed that in order to reach their goal, there were gaps in their mathematical

knowledge that they needed to engage with before being able to independently

manage a stall. I facilitated an initial class discussion to identify the mathematical

knowledge that the students would need to draw on, recording their answers on the

board, prompting and questioning the students to unpick the context. The identified

mathematical knowledge would then be adapted to form learning outcomes to be

addressed through planned learning experiences. Where the students did not have

the information, my associate teacher (AT) described the knowledge and how it

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would be useful within the context. With the help of my AT, I created individual

tracking sheets for students to record areas of development and track their progress

towards learning outcomes. This would also help to determine groups for learning

experiences. From there, my AT and I designed learning experiences and follow up

activities to help students meet their long term goal. Motivated by this goal, the

students engaged in the learning experiences and tracking activity. Each student had

four to five areas of development and monitored their progress towards being able to

meet their learning outcomes. This was a practice that had been embedded in the

school before I arrived so they were already familiar with the metacognitive practice.

Principle of engaging prior knowledge:

Donovan and Bransfords (2005) principle of engaging prior knowledge

promotes learning for understanding by drawing on a learners preconceptions as the

foundation on which to build new understandings. The initial discussion that I

facilitated gave insight into the students preconceptions around the mathematical

knowledge required to manage a successful store. These insights gave a clear

indication of the foundation on which to build new understanding (Donovan &

Bransford, 2005). It would have been simple for the teacher to prescribe the

milestones or understandings that the students would need to meet in order to

succeed, but as Bransford, Brown and Cocking (1999) describe, had the

preconceptions not been explicitly engaged, the students may have learnt strategies

for the sake of a test, without fully understanding them or being able to retrieve them

to use in the context of the stall.

As well as indicating existing knowledge, the initial discussion exposed the

gaps of knowledge that presented themselves, indicating incomplete understandings

(Bransford et al., 1999) on which to form learning outcomes that related to the long

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term goal. My AT and I described the gaps of knowledge to the students, justifying

how they would aid them in achieving their goal. This discussion facilitated what

Darling-Hammond and Bransford (2005) describe as a bridge between prior

experiences and new knowledge. By bringing learners perspectives and incomplete

understandings to the foreground, we were able to make the mathematical context of

running a stall at the school fair explicit and accessible to students, ensuring that

their prior knowledge, or lack thereof, did not become a barrier in their learning.

Alexander and Murphy (2007) state that due to prior knowledge sometimes

becoming a barrier to new understanding, it is imperative that students beliefs about

content-related topics [are] engaged within the classroom environment in a way that

makes them explicit and, potentially, open to modification (p. 13). In hindsight, there

were some students who were interested in participating in the stall, but did not

make an effort to share their preconceptions around the mathematical or logistical

knowledge that was required to run a stall. This may have been for various reasons,

but creating a way for them to elicit their prior knowledge is an area for professional

development. By only facilitating a verbal discussion with the whole class, some of

the less confident students may have not been comfortable to share their

understanding or knowledge gaps with the whole class. I could have provided a

platform where they would have felt more comfortable, something written and

confidential, like a drop box.

Prior to the discussion, another source of prior knowledge that I should have

accessed earlier were standardised testing to show the level that students were

currently working at, and how to progress them in relation to the National Standards.

We referred to these when forming groups for learning experiences, but I could have

referred to standardised testing results to gauge performance, using this as a

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foundation on which to extend and build new understanding. Next year as a

beginning teacher, I will not have the support of my AT in the classroom so it will be

important for me to have an understanding of the achievement outcomes (Ministry of

Education, 2007) and National Standards that apply to my students. I could have

used this knowledge to guide the discussion in a way that pitches the knowledge at

the level that the students should be working towards.

Principle of connecting knowledge to a conceptual framework:

Donovan and Bransfords (2005) principle of connecting knowledge to a

conceptual framework discusses the idea that factual information, although accurate

and relevant, can be insufficient in regards to learning with understanding. In the

experience above, the mathematical strategies equate to factual knowledge, and

conceptual framework or the context for the learning was the ability to handle money

and independently manage a stall. The students knew that in order to meet their goal

and become confident enough to manage money, they needed to engage with

factual information and strategies in order to develop the skills required to meet the

context and fit the conceptual framework.

The NRC (2003) describe research that compares the performance of

novices and experts in a field. In relation to learning and transfer, the NRC (2003)

notes that novices view new information as separate and are therefore able to

memorise and retrieve less information whilst experts connect new information to the

conceptual framework within the subject matter or context, therefore organising it for

retrieval as it is connected to the bigger picture of the context (NRC, 2003). That is,

experts connect knowledge around concepts to contextualise them, relying less on

the ability to memorise information (Bransford, et al., 1999). In order to progress our

students through the novice stage towards expertise, we drew on the conceptual

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framework of managing money to teach students content knowledge such as adding

and subtracting with decimals, building on the prior understandings and connecting

factual information and strategies to the bigger picture.

As described in Donovan and Bransford (2005), novices view new

information as separate set of ideas. During the initial discussion, it was interesting

to note that the students referred to adding and subtracting, but needing prompting

to realise that balanced equations, percentages and place value were mathematical

concepts that related to their context for learning. This could indicate that the

students had not been made aware that the strategies they had been taught were

not just pieces of information taught in school (Alexander & Murphy, 2007), but had

application in various real-life contexts. This emphasised to me the importance of

making the links to conceptual frameworks explicit in learning, referencing the

contexts in which new information can enable them to operate.

Reflecting on my practice, an area for professional development would be to

have less reliance on declarative assessment in formative assessment. The activities

I created often relied on students recalling strategies in contexts similar to learning

experiences they had previously engaged with. Although declarative assessment is

useful, in this context procedural and conditional assessments may have been more

useful in preparing the students for the future. With such a motivational context and

conceptual framework, there was opportunity for me to create simulations as

formative assessment, giving students the opportunity to practice retrieving and

applying their knowledge to the situation of managing money at the school fair.

Principle of engaging a metacognitive approach to learning:

The unit described above strongly draws on Donovan and Bransfords (2005)

principle of a metacognitive approach to learning; the unit was designed to inherently

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help students to develop the ability to self-monitor their progress towards intrinsically

motivating learning goals. Being metacognitive is not an inherent skill, rather it is

something that must be explicitly taught and practiced in order to become automatic

(Martinez, 2006). Metacognitive skills include self-monitoring, self-assessment and

reflection with the objective of allowing the learner to take control of their learning

process (Bransford et al., 1999). The school where I was placed valued the

metacognitive approach, giving me the ideal model of a successful metacognitive

learning environment.

Martinez (2006) highlights the importance of allowing students the

opportunity to practice metacognitive skills. The initial discussion that I facilitated

allowed learners the opportunity to verbalise and become more aware of their

current understandings and their areas of development. From the learning outcomes

that we listed, each student identified the ones that they had not yet mastered, listing

them on tracking sheets that I had created. These tracking sheets were

metacognitive tools for the learners, a visual supports for the students to monitor

their progress towards realising learning outcomes. At the end of each learning

experience, I allowed space for students to indicate their confidence in the

mathematical concept by showing their level of understanding on a thumbs scale.

They would record their level of understanding on the tracking sheet and then put

their name down to attend the next lesson on that particular topic. This transferred

the responsibility of learning from the teacher to the learner, allowing them to

appraise their own level of understanding (Martinez, 2006).

In order to allow for students to understand themselves as information

processors (Donovan & Bransford, 2005), my AT created a resource to develop

metacognitive processes during the learning and as an evaluation tool, one that she

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referred to frequently throughout the day. The cards involved questions such as what

did you find difficult, how did you overcome difficulties, what was most helpful in your

learning and what did you enjoy the most. At the end of learning experiences or a

series of lessons, I questioned the students using cards to prompt them to self-

evaluate. This opportunity allowed students to verbalise their cognitive processes

and develop the capacity for metacognitive practices (Martinez, 2006).

I have used the tracking technique in subsequent placements, giving

students space to define learning goals and then evaluate them, but allowing little

emphasis or opportunity for the students to engage in the monitoring process of self-

regulation. This is where students engage in metacognitive practices during the

learning, finding ways to overcome potential barriers and tracking their progress

towards learning goals (Bransford, et al., 1999; Martinez, 2006). In my future practice

I will create space monitoring processes to take place, using the valuable model

described in the experience above, and the cards that my AT created to prompt them

to evaluate themselves as learners.

As described above, Donovan and Bransford (2005) highlight three key

principles of learning based on decades of research literature around the science of

learning. Having strong implications for teaching and learning, this essay has

discussed the key principles of learning with understanding, evaluating ways in

which one of my personal teaching practices was consistent with these principles

and identifying areas for professional development towards creating a safe and high

quality teaching environment in the future.

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Reference list:

Alexander, P. A. & Murphy, P. K. (2007). Ethical Educator: Integrating Ethics within

the Context of Teaching & Teacher Research. In S. E. Israel, C. A. Lassonde

(Eds.), The ethical educator: Integrating ethics within the context of teaching

and teacher research (pp. 11-17). New York: Peter Lang.

Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L. & Cocking, R. R. (1999). How people learn: brain,

mind, experience, and school. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Darling-Hammond, L., & Bransford, J. (Eds.). (2005). Preparing teachers for a

changing world : what teachers should learn and be able to do. Retrieved

from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com

Donovan, S. & Bransford, J. (2005). How Students Learn: History in the Classroom.

Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

National Research Council (2000). How People Learn: Brain, mind, experience, and

school. Washington, DC: National Academies Pres

Martinez, M. E. (2006). What is metacognition? Phi Delta Kappan, 87(9), 696-699.

doi:10.1177/003172170608700916

Ministry of Education (2007). The New Zealand curriculum. Wellington, New

Zealand: Learning Media Limited