Activity 4.3 (Learning Styles)

I don’t think that people only have one way of learning, but I do think we have preferences, or ways in which we learn most optimally. That doesn’t mean that people can’t learn in various ways. Daniel Willingham claims that it’s not how the information is presented, be it auditory or visual, but rather the meaning behind it. I don’t however agree with him when he talks about the prediction behind the learning styles theory, that a visual learner will always learn information that is presented in a visual way. I do think the theory is attempting to predict that if information is presented in ways that appeal to their preference, then they are more likely to remember it. However, I don’t think the theory is predicting that it will always have that outcome. He does make an interesting point about the acceptance, or individual belief, about learning styles which brings me to my next point.

One of my concerns about categorizing or grouping individuals based on a learning style is that it narrows one’s ability to branch out and learn in other ways. It’s not as if learning happens in only one form for one person. Individuals may have a tendency towards a particular way in which information or a task is presented (interest or familiarity), but it doesn’t mean that it’s the only way they can learn. I couldn’t help but remember a passage from James’ chapter on memory (pg. 61) where he says, “The ‘secret of a good memory’ is thus the secret of forming diverse and multiple associations with every fact we care to retain”. The word diverse is what stands out for me, meaning that information and experience comes from different places.  I realize we aren’t discussing memory specifically, but it is a piece of the learning process.  If I am under the impression, or have categorized myself, as being a kinesthetic learner then I’m more likely to shut out other ways in which information is presented, believing that I’m not able to learn it any other way than the one I’ve pigeon holed myself into.

When I was working towards my master’s in applied psychology (organizational) I had an instructor for a couple classes that was an advocate for Kolb’s learning styles. It was interesting to read in the literature review that it is a popular scheme, particularly in the United States (pg. 3). Reflecting back I realize that I embraced it wholeheartedly because my instructor was such a big supporter. We went through the assessment piece, and then discussed our results and how it applied not only to us but to employees. If I recall correctly I was an accommodator, and who knows maybe I still am if I were to retake the styles inventory. It’s just ironic how I haven’t thought about those learning styles for years (back in 2000) and here I am now reading about the topic only to find out that in 2004 a comprehensive review described 71 different schemes (pg. 2). It sure doesn’t boost my confidence level pertaining to this subject matter, and that’s not even discussing the lack of evidence related to many of them.

              By the end of the article you can’t help but think that it’s all gotten completely out of hand, similar to that of the self-help genre. That it’s been steered in irrelevant directions, and shows no promise to a valid and reliable end in sight. The researchers said it best with, “There is growing evidence that people hold beliefs about how they learn that are faulty in various ways, which frequently lead people to manage their own learning and teach others in non-optimal ways. This fact makes it clear that research—not intuition or standard practices—needs to be the foundation for upgrading teaching and learning” (pg. 13). It’s important to recognize that we have different approaches to learning, diverse experiences, and interest or appeal is generated in various ways. I think its good practice to present information with variety, it assists with repetition, and allows for “diverse and multiple associations” (James, 1899/2001, pg. 61).

Activity 4.2 (Short Term Memory)

I wrote some side notes on my original sheets while going through each test. Item #2 was really hard for me but it was AMAZING how it all changed with Item #3 because of the visual pairing. That one shocked me the most. I wasn’t surprised about the position in which I remembered the long list of numbers because of serial position effect. On Items #8 & #9 I honestly just guessed based on how often the images appeared more so than the colors associated with them. For Item #10 the majority that I recalled were connected to comics. Not surprised about Dr. King because I just discussed him in a blog post a couple hours prior. I was torn between #4 and #7 on the echoic recall. Now I know what my students experience when we review their tests and they say “Oh man, I almost chose that one!”. All I have to say for Item #12 is, seriously? I was lucky to write down any numbers at all. I was quite surprised that I forgot to write down USA because that was an obvious one that I knew. Interesting! The last item I couldn’t recall anything and felt cognitively exhausted. No wonder my students look like deer in headlights at the end of my class. 

Activity 4.1 (Resource on Perception)

          Several things from last week’s readings have been lingering in my mind; one in particular is the example of the gentleman’s IAT test results changing once after several times of receiving the same results all because of a recent exposure to an African American historical figure, Dr. King, perceived in a positive light. As I was viewing the PowerPoint lectures and readings for this week’s topic on information processing I was again struck by something that stood out to me, specifically how our brains select and draw attention to the various stimuli that we are exposed to in any given moment. What makes one stimulus more alluring or attractive than others? When what is being presented is ambiguous or incomplete, how does our brain organize the information so that it makes sense? And how does this effect learning?

          While I was hunting for something to share with others on how we register and perceive information the questions I presented above kept lingering in the back of my mind. I don’t know if anyone has experienced this before when searching the World Wide Web (key words being world and wide), but it is very easy to veer off into different avenues related to one’s search topic. Sometimes this can have a negative outcome where you find yourself 3 hours later in a completely different continent, figuratively speaking. However it can also have a positive outcome, which thankfully happened to me, where you stumble upon something that provides a connection, and helps to fill in some of the gaps, to the questions you’ve been pondering. That is what I found when I came across a concept known as “perceptual set”, which is the effect that frame of mind, which is coded in the brain, has on perception (Feist and Rosenburg, 2012, pg. 128).

In a classic study of perceptual set, researchers Bruner and Minturn in 1955 (McLeod, 2007) showed two groups of participants an image (image #1 below), one group was shown a series of numbers right before viewing this image and the other group saw a series of letters. The participants were then asked what they thought the figure in the middle was.  The group that saw the numbers beforehand said it was the number 13 and the group that saw the letters said it was the letter B. The researchers concluded that what people had seen prior to the test image created an expectation, or perceptual set, for how they perceived what came next.

          I think this information stood out to me because I had been thinking quite a bit about automaticity and implicit responses, specifically how the gentleman’s IAT score changed. This information supported this unique shift in his test results, which were a rarity from what I understand. I didn’t know that this concept even existed. The general psychology books I’ve used in class never discussed it, although it is a foundational topic similar to Weber’s law.

          If what we are exposed to in repetition significantly effects how we store, and later recall, information then that is something of value that I as an instructor need to be aware of. With all the distractions of not only our external surroundings but our internal ones as well, it's important to repeat and present material in a way that is connected to the intended learning outcome. In his chapter on attention James (1899/2001) talks about how a figure off in the distance is barely noticeable and hardly draws our attention. But when our companion (or teacher) defines or describes it in a way that ignites our own set of experiences (schema) to be connected to it, then we focus more upon it and draw connection to it (pg. 54). To me, this is the bridge connecting what we are exposed to, what we select and draw attention to, and then how we associate it with already existing information. From there we can then go into rehearsal for long term memory of storage and retrieval. 

Image #1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ3bA3NBRo4 (short clip showing perceptual set)

Reference:

Feist, G.J. & Rosenberg, E.L. (2012). Psychology: Perspectives and connections. New York: McGraw-Hill. 

McLeod, S. (2007). Perceptual Set. In Simply Psychology. Retrieved June 28, 2013, from http://www.simplypsychology.org/perceptual-set.html.

**I wasn’t able to get my hands on a copy of the original study by Bruner and Minturn (1955) because I don’t have access to the Taylor and Francis journals. If anyone does and can obtain it I would greatly appreciate a copy for my own library.

Activity 3.4 (Bart the Genius)

          I think a constructivist approach in school would look similar to that of the School of One. The learning environment is designed around the student’s actual level and presents various tools or methods to achieve his or her potential level. O’Donnell would most likely categorize the educational setting in the clip from The Simpsons as that of the endogenous constructivistic perspective. The goal of this approach to learning and development is to create an environment that allows a child to explore and manipulate the world around them, through this a cognitive imbalance will most likely occur (either through experimenting, questioning, or conflict of ideas). In one scene Bart was given a breakdown of how the classroom structure was setup, or lack thereof. The idea was to allow students the opportunity to participate in whatever they wanted to at the time, be it reading a book, taking a nap, or working on a project with classmates. Rather than the class structure being defined by the instructor it is the student who dictates that.Although I noticed in the clip that the majority of examples were teacher driven.

          I recently got the opportunity to tour a new learning environment at one of our sister institutions for the higher education system that I work for. It was set up as an open environment with no walls between the various work stations, rolling chairs, and moving white boards. The philosophy behind it was that teachers could conduct a class where open discussion and social interaction was common, but also that students could use these work stations as an open environment to study with others. I would say that it is a good example of what O’Donnell refers to as dialectic constructivism.