Education Bookcast
124. The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences
Podcast summary created with Snipd AI
Quick takeaways
- Deep learning requires integration of knowledge, pattern recognition, and relating to previous experience.
- Instructionism fails to prepare students for modern society, emphasizing memorization over practical skills.
- Authentic learning environments can hinder learning without foundational knowledge and explicit instruction.
- Learners require explicit instruction, scaffolding, and structured learning experiences before engaging in complex practices of experts.
Deep dives
Importance of Deep Conceptual Understanding
Deep learning requires learners to relate new ideas and concepts to previous knowledge and experience, integrate knowledge into interrelated conceptual systems, and look for patterns and underlying principles.
Critique of Instructionism and Authentic Practices
Instructionism, which emphasizes memorization of facts and procedures, is criticized for failing to educate students for the technologically complex and economically competitive modern society. The idea of authentic practices in learning is challenged, as it overlooks the need for explicit instruction and guidance from experts in order to develop expertise.
Challenges in Applying Authentic Learning
The belief that engagement in activities similar to professionals is essential for learning is refuted, as it ignores the complexity and time constraints inherent in developing expertise. Authentic learning environments that prioritize inquiry-based methods can hinder learning when foundational knowledge is lacking.
Importance of Prior Knowledge and Reflection
Building on a learner's prior knowledge is crucial for effective learning, as it provides a foundation for understanding new concepts. Reflection is beneficial, but excessive focus on discussion and reflection alone can hinder learning, as it neglects the importance of direct instruction and explicit learning goals.
The Flaws in Instructionist Approaches to Education
Instructionist curricula are based on behaviorist assumptions and focus on transmitting facts and procedures to students. This approach often neglects the complex practices and processes involved in scientific knowledge and authentic learning. It fails to promote deep understanding, generalizable knowledge, and motivation in learners. Furthermore, the emphasis on memorization without reflection or understanding can lead to ineffective learning outcomes.
The Importance of Scaffolding and Externalization
Scaffolding, which provides prompts and hints, and gradual support, is crucial for effective learning. Learners gradually move from receiving explicit instruction to actively constructing their own knowledge. Externalizing and articulating developing knowledge helps learners gain a deeper understanding and retain information more effectively.
Critique of Constructivist Learning
The idea that learners construct their own knowledge without explicit instruction is flawed. While constructivism emphasizes active participation, research shows that explicit teaching and guidance are necessary for effective learning. Simply facilitating students without direct instruction often leads to ineffective results.
The Misconception of Experts and Learners
Experts in a field have developed their expertise through years of building specific knowledge and skills. It is unrealistic to expect novices to immediately engage in complex practices of experts. Learners must first pass through a novice stage, receiving explicit instruction, scaffolding, and structured learning experiences.
I picked up The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences hoping for a longer term project of enrichment from a volume published by one of the most prestigious universities in the world. However, it only took reading the introduction by editor R. Keith Sawyer to see that this book is suffused with ideological stances commonly supported and even dogmatically preached in educational circles, whose major tenets have been shown wanting time and again by empirical evidence from cognitive science - not to mention the practical experience of teachers.
The whole thing is made all the more facepalm-worthy for the extent to which the author emphasises that his ideas apparently are based on "cognitive science" ideas of "deep learning". In practice he has paid attention to some important facets of the cognitive science of learning (mainly the value of the novice vs. expert axis of comparison), but draws from this ludicrous conclusions which are not, in fact, supported by the science at all.
Ultimately, I decided that this book is a good opportunity to discuss widely circulated claims which are invalid or misleading. Among these are the denigrating of "instructionism" (read: common sense teaching) by use of a combination of straw men and false dichotomies; the suggestion that learning should be "authentic" (i.e. inefficient); motte-and-bailey arguments concerning the (un)importance of factual knowledge; and the fallacy of gaining expertise by direct mimicking of experts' day-to-day activities (even though that isn't the way those experts themselves became experts).
Enjoy the episode.
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