This week's post is a reflection on our recent team-based activity to create Learning Theory materials for serving up in a "Marketplace" format.
What did we focus on?
What went well/could be improved next time?
Would I use the approach myself in a lesson?
Which other teams' theories appealed to me?
Our Focus
My team consisted of Jess, Ricky and myself. We focused on CONSTRUCTIVISM, suggested by the work of Piaget and championed by Dewey.
Our Team approach
My team used the collaborative functions provided by the edtech app: Wakelet. Each of us worked as individuals, initially, and populated the "workings" Wakelet with information we found individually useful, or ideas we thought would work. We then worked together to present these materials to each other and decided on a set of core deliverables with owners.
We made a second Wakelet to store the resulting materials. This was shared with the class and tutor during the remotely run (thanks to Covid!) Marketplace activity. We presented as a team.
Screenshots of the two Wakelets are below, and a link to the final "deliverables" Wakelet is here: https://wke.lt/w/s/8XdsbU (Links to an external site.)
We produced 5 items of materials to give access to learning in different ways.
Poster - the basics - Jess
Leaflet - the detail - Ricky
Cube net - make and keep with aspects and examples - Sue
Role play - give it a go - Jess
Debate topics in speech bubbles - Sue
Our Collaborative Wakelet
The screenshot, below, shows the body of research we produced, as a team!
Our "Deliverables" Wakelet
...and here are the final deliverables - click here to examine in detail.
Jess' Poster
Here is the poster put together by Jess - in the conference call she was pretty poorly but still managed to talk through key elements - well done her!
Ricky's Leaflet
The Leaflet produced by Ricky folds "concertina-wise" into a 6-page booklet, containing a lot of the detail we had produced together, such as Strengths and Weaknesses, QR codes to a video and a podcast about Constructivism and other gems of wisdom.
Click on the arrows to see all 3 shots of this masterpiece!
Making my "Constructivism Cube"
Here's a video of me making - and explaining as I go - the cube. The idea was that face-to-face, the students would construct a constructivism aid - as it were - thus using the physical element of the theory. The bonus was they got to take home this little "gift" and hopefully use it to spark their own constructivist ideas for teaching their students. They will all receive a printed copy next time we meet in Oxford and thus make this fine specimen their own!
Click on the play button and forgive the wild hair and very unforgiving camera angle!
What went well?
As a team we worked well together - there was mutual respect and all had a good level of input at every stage. We played to our strengths - so I did the printing using my plentiful print credits, Ricky used his Leaflet software to format the leaflet, Jess designed a role play as acting is her forte and I produced a cube net with my maths bent, and we all agreed on a consistent style and colour scheme to use throughout.
We came across a technical issue with sharing the Wakelet link - and it took a lot of time to sort out, but between us we got these. This was the icing on the cake for me; not giving up and seeing that your team mates were as committed to getting it right as you yourself.
I feel the quality and quantity of information we were able to present were good.
It would have been a lot better if we had been in person, as the speech bubbles represented an opportunity to provoke debate and would have been accompanied by blank flipchart sheets so the other students to write down their response to the questions.
Would I use the Approach Myself?
I very much enjoyed the experience as a student, and do use it with my own students. I already use Wakelet frequently in my Science lessons for collaboration, and have done physical marketplace activities in my IT with Business course, however the latter is done as individuals running their own business. I will try it out with teams next.
Which other Theories Appeal to Me
In a previous Blog post, I said I was looking forward to understanding more about Humanism, and I did! I was very interested in the alignment between the "ideal self" and the real self-image. I will have to think carefully about how this applies to a real-life teaching situation, but it is there in my mind now, so I am sure my creative juices will start to flow. I also liked the idea of Connectivism - and indeed I am a frequent "magpier" of online information even during conference calls. Cognitivism made sense to me and had a lot in common with Constructivism.
One of the approaches I liked much less was the behaviourist one. I did not feel it encouraged an independence of thought and felt it just manipulated students in a not ideal way.
But my verdict? I am still a firm fan of Constructivism and will continue to build it into my maths and other lessons. But perhaps I will also bring some of those other theories to play as well.
Shout out to Some of the other Heroes...
...though. Why are they all men?
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