If you could go back in time to a younger version of yourself what recommendations would you have? What would you do differently? Since time travel hasn’t yet been perfected the next best thing we have is the recommendations of people like ourselves who have gone through what we are currently going through and who can give us recommendations on what they would do differently.
In the following 3 Learner’s Stories podcast Applied Digital Learning (ADL) students reflect on their learning journey and discuss what they have learned and what they would do differently if there were able to start the ADL program now:
In EDLD 5317 ADL students Pedro Beltran, Colby Clifford, Allison Palmer, and Brianna Rodriguez created a 3 Part Podcast series called Thoughts on Learning where they discuss the following key topics with Dwayne Harapnuik:
Part 1 – ePortfolios as Assessment as Learning EP 36
Explores how educators can move beyond using ePortfolios for assessments for learning to assessments as learning.
Part 2 – Blended Learning and COVA EP 37
Explores how giving learners choice, ownership, and voice through authentic learning can have a positive impact on the blended learning environment.
Part 3 – Opportunities with ePortfolios Blended Learning and COVA EP 38
Summarizes the opportunities that learning environments that utilize ePortfolios, blended learning, and COVA can offer learners.
If you run a quick google search on the phrase “main learning theories” the results will reveal that there is inconsistency in what people agree are the main learning theories. You will also find that many sources will shift their perspectives on learning theories. For example back in 2016 when I first wrote this post, United Nations, Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) which should be considered an authority listed the following 7 learning theories:
While the changes are small, combining Social Learning Theory and Socio-Constructivism into what is now called Social Constructivism, lifting Situated learning to the level of a theory, removing 21st Century Learning or Skills and, moving Community of Practice into a separate category these changes reflect a shift from a contemporary or postmodern epistemological interpretation to a critical theory narrative.
Wikipedia points to Behaviourism, Cognitivism, and Constructivism as the main theories but also points to a wide assortment of related links. Learning-theories.com which was once a scholarly project but has now turned into an add riddled site suggests that there are the following 5 major paradigms which the different learning theories fall under:
Behaviorism
Cognitivism
Constructivism
Design-based
Humanism
21st Century skills
Depending on the theoretical preference of the author(s) and when the site you land on was originally written or last updated you will find many of the theories from the lists above.
Back in the late 90’s when I was researching learning theories for my doctoral thesis and in 2003 when I taught my first graduate course on learning theories most texts and literature pointed to the following as the main theories:
Behaviorism
Cognitivism
Humanism
Today the term Humanism is seldom used in the learning theory context and Constructivism has been pulled out of the Cognitive camp to stand on its own. Design is involved (or at least it should be) in most theories so I fail to see how this is a learning theory itself. Similarly, 21st Century learning is much more of a popular phrase of the day and since one could argue that all learning happening today is in the 21st Century, this really isn’t a learning theory.
Therefore, I suggest that the primary learning theories today are:
Behaviorism
Cognitivism
Constructivism
But which list is accurate? Perhaps a more important question is why is an understanding of learning theories important? The following four key points should serve as a good start for why understanding learning theories is so important:
1. Knowing what you really believe about learning is important because this foundational belief should drive the way you create significant learning environments and the way you engage learners.
2. Knowing that your beliefs about learning are supported by evidence and are shared with others should give you the confidence to move away from the role of sage on the stage to guide on the side as you give your learners more choice, ownership, voice, and authenticity (COVA) in their learning experiences.
3. Knowing the full breadth of the learning theory or theories where your beliefs about learning fall will help you to analyze, assess, and choose the appropriate technologies that can not only fit the needs of your learners but enhance the learning environment.
If we don’t choose to take a proactive approach to understand what we fully believe about learning and purposefully design the learning environment, we choose to follow tradition. As Christopher Knapper warns there are consequences to blindly doing what has always been done:
…there is an impressive body of evidence on how teaching methods and curriculum design affect deep, autonomous, and reflective learning. Yet most faculty are largely ignorant of this scholarship, and instructional practices and curriculum planning are dominated by tradition rather than research evidence. As a result, teaching remains largely didactic, assessment of student work is often trivial, and curricula are more likely to emphasize content coverage than acquisition of lifelong and life-wide learning skills. (2010, p. 229)
Understanding what we believe about learning has never been more important. We are living in the age where we no longer are asking if we should use technology to enhance learning but are asking how well are we using technology to enhance learning. Tony Bates has spent decades researching how to use technology to enhance learning and in his post Learning theories and online learning he points to the fundamental role the understanding of theories of behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructivism play in online learning and more importantly reminds us that our thinking must continually evolve as these theories evolve. Bates also reminds us that we need to be open to new theories as these new and old learning theories evolve we must move from theory to practice. We need to be flexible enough to adapt and grow in our thinking about learning to develop effective learning environments that meet our learner’s needs.
This flexible and eclectic approach to understanding and adopting learning theories have driven my thinking about learning since the late 90’s when I developed Inquisitivism which is an approach for designing and delivering web-based instruction that shares many of the same principles of minimalism and other constructivist approaches. Being eclectic in my thinking about learning theories has enabled me to not limit my understanding of learning to one system but I have continually considered and selected the best elements from all systems.
Putting this in the 21st Century vernacular one could argue that I prefer the mashup theory of learning because creatively combining and mixing the best elements of learning theories is the best way to address the needs of 21st Century learners. Don’t assume that my mashup theory of learning is just a willy-nilly approach to being pragmatic. On the contrary, the quality of a mashup is totally dependent upon the quality of its components—remember I am continually selecting and mixing the best elements.
This finally takes me to my fourth key point why understanding learning theories is so important.
4. The better you know and understand specific learning theories the better able you will be to select the best elements from all the theories which will help you to mashup the most effective learning environment.
Regardless of where you land in your thinking about learning the fact that you are thinking about learning and how learning works means that your learners will benefit. When we strive to create significant learning environments we can all agree that it’s about the learning.
References
Knapper, C. (2010) ‘Changing Teaching Practice: Barriers and Strategies’ in Christensen Hughes, J. and Mighty, J. eds. Taking Stock: Research on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education Toronto ON: McGill-Queen’s University Press
Originally posted on March 11 and revised on November 10, 2021
If Genius Hour and 20% Time, Passion projects, and other similar project-based engagement activities are so helpful in promoting learning why don’t we spend more time on these activities and not limit them to an hour a week or 20% of our learner’s precious time? Why don’t we flip Genius hour and 20% time with the time we spend on test preparation. Perhaps if we move our learners away from the time-wasters of rereading and highlighting and get them engaged in the effective study skills of self-testing, distributed practice, elaborate interrogation, self-explanation, and interleaved practice we could flip the time we spend on test prep to 20% and spend 80 of our learner’s time engaged in Genius Hour type activities. The research is clear and the Scientific America article on study skills What Works, What Doesn’t – https://www.researchgate.net/publication/273626957_What_Works_What_Doesn’t confirms what study skill yields the best results and also points to a large body of research on this topic.
While flipping Genius Hour and improving our learner’s study skills may be a great first step it isn’t enough. Trying to apply a simple solution like flipping Genius Hour to the more complex problem of deeper learning within our current educational system will not work unless we address all the other key factors of this complex problem. We need to help change our educator’s and learner’s thinking about learning, their approach to learning, and we need to change the learning environment. I am not alone in calling into question the use of Genius Hour and 20% Time as a treatment without addressing all the other factors.
In a recent post The Research Behind PBL, Genius Hour, and Choice In The Classroom – https://www.ajjuliani.com/blog/research/ A.J. Juliani argues for the benefits of project-based activities that promote choice and give learner’s the opportunity to engage in learning activities that are important to them. Juliani is an advocate of these useful learning activities and in his post, he points to some research and larger body anecdotal or experiential support for these types of activities. He also deals with some of the objections to challenges to these activities and points to Ewan McIntosh’s 2013 post 20% Time and Schools: not the best of bedfellows – https://edu.blogs.com/edublogs/2013/08/20-time-and-schools-not-the-best-of-bedfellows.html where McIntosh points to the problem with our system of education that limits the effectiveness of these types activities in this statement:
The problem is, that students given this open stretch of time often don’t know what to do, or beyond their initial couple of passions they run out of steam. Their end-products are largely under par of their capacity. Sure, there are moments of genius, just as in Google, 3M or any other corporation that introduces 20% time. But, just like them, they are by a small proportion of students, with the vast majority of ideas failing to hit the mark.
McIntosh is pointing out that many, perhaps even most, of our learners are not prepared for this type of deeper learning. He suggests that that experimenting with these individual activities is a start it would be better to include more student autonomy in everything one does. This is not the first time we have heard an educator point to the sobering reality that too many of our students are not prepared to learn. In his book Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can’t Transform Education Justin Reich points out that pandemic inspired move to online learning hasn’t worked well because most students are not able to learn online because they are not self-directed and are not able to learn independently. Reich does a good job pointing out the complex problem but doesn’t offer a solution. Fortunately, in the post We Need More Autodidacts we offer a solution to this complex problem.
As you should have heard in the Learner’s Mindset Discussion video above we agree with McIntosh about student autonomy, but once again we go a fair bit further and address all the aspects of this complex problem. Incorporating more student autonomy is a good start and so is Genius Hour. But if these activities are used as treatments or stand-alone activities we argue that they won’t work because the problem that we need to address is much more complex and requires a much broader focus. Unless we adopt a Learners Mindset where you change your thinking and your learner’s thinking about learning, change the approach to learning, and create a significant learning environment in which you give your learner’s choice ownership, and voice through authentic learning opportunities you run the risk of running an interesting learning activity that will have minimal long term impact.
