Elements in a university course, designing courses backwards and approaches to
learning
TOT PhD supervisor course
Elmina Feb 5, 2013
Jens Dolin
Various framing factors
7. Your strengths and weaknesses as a teacher/instructor
1. Duration of the course (ideal, tactical, resource etc. considerations)
2. Placing in academic calendar
3. The target group (experienced supervisors, not-experienced, PhD-students, specific disciplines, …)
4. Mandatory course for all supervisors? For PhD students?
5. Criteria for approval
6. Participants’ implied conditions (supervisors’ approaches, students’ attitudes)
8. Which course material (books, articles, power points, …)
9. Which course formats will you use?
10. Which form for evaluation (written-oral, anonymous-no anonymous)?
Different course formats
• Cases
Exemplary cases chosen by the course leader and/or concrete examples from participants. Could be written, video, oral.
• Exercises
Learning by doing
• Homework
To the first part or to do between two parts of a course
• Lectures
By the course leaders or by invited speakers (experts) or participants
• Groupwork and plenary sessions
Find a good balance between small group work and common discussions
• The most important format is variation !!!!!!
Designing courses backwards
STEP 1 What is most important to learn? What do you burn for?
STEP 2 Select three to five major learning outcomes. Think in broad categories (attitudes, foundational knowledge, …)
STEP 3 Work backwards. What competencies and skills demonstrates the achievement of the goals? What content is required to obtain these competences? Which formats supports the different aspects?
COMPETENCES
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Definitions of Competence
Competencies reflect expectations of workplace performance
(Rolls, 1997) … competence is a […] roughly specialized system of abilities, proficiencies, or skills that are necessary or sufficient to reach a specific goal. This can be applied to individual dispositions or to the distribution of such dispositions within a social group or an institution … (Weinert, 2001)
Competence is an expression for the ability to manage and to act in a social and cultural diversity. … A bit simplified you can say that competence is something you have, because you are able to meet the challenges in a given situation.(Jørgensen, 1999)
There is no basis for a theoretically grounded definition or classification from the seemingly endless inventory of the ways the term competence is used. … There (is) … no single common conceptual framework. (Weinert, 2001)
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The concept of competence
• refers to the necessary prerequisites available to an individual or a group of individuals for successfully meeting complex demands
• should be used when the necessary prerequisites for successfully meeting a demand are comprised of cognitive and (in many cases) motivational, ethical, volitional, and/or social components
• implies that a sufficient degree of complexity is required to meet demands and tasks
• implies that much must be learned, but cannot be directly taught.
Competence is
- a preparedness for action
- based on knowledge
- displayed in a concrete situation
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Why this shift towards competencies?
• Generel social trends: Increased complexity and contingency → difficult to formulate precise demands → increased emphasis on generel, social, and personal competencies
• Requirements from the business world – the insufficiency of the school or university as an independent actor
• Insight from learning theory: The lack of transfer of traditionel school/university/institutional knowledge (the situatedness of learning)
• Pragmatic reasons: You need a floating denominator to catch something new
Central connections
How do you learn to complete a PhD study?
What is (the purpose of) a PhD study?
How do we learn?
Organizing the supervision
Regulations
Traditions
Conceptions of the professionConceptions of research
What is it to learn?Learning Theories
Conceptions of learning
Attitudes toward the PhD-stSupervision model
Feedback format
The Practice Triangle
Actions
Justifications
Value basis
Supervision form, texts, forms of talk, …
Experiential (based on experience)Theoretical (litterature, courses, …)
Ethical (attitudes towards students etc.)Conceptions of learning and teaching (Understanding of knowledge, …)
Own reflections on learning
1. Individually: Reflect on what you mean by ‘learning’. When has someone learned something?
2. Exchange your reflections with those around you
Different conceptions of learning
All learners say that learning is …
1. an increased quantity of knowledge 2. to be able to remember and reproduce3. to acquire facts and procedures for later use 4. to understand5. to interpret and give meaning to reality 6. to change your interpretation and hence change as a person
RECEIVING
ACTING, DOING
There are strong connections between a person’s conceptions of learning and the person’s (ofte unconscious) choice of study strategies:
The conceptions of learning co-determine the learning outcome!
When have you learned science?
• when you know (?) the concepts• when you master the theory• when you can solve the equations• when you can work out the solution of a problem• when you can pass the test• when you can speak the science jargon• when you can pose the right questions• when you are able to do practical work in the lab or in the field• when you can cope with everyday situations involving science• …
Pipe-line approach to science education
Citizenship approach to science education
44 % of the 1.& 2. year students at the Technical University of Denmark passed their tests (written exercises) without understanding the underlying concepts (Jakobsen&Rump 1999)
Very small correlation between the achievements in the core items from TIMSS1995 and in the achievements in the performance assessment problems (Weng&Hoff 1999, p. 231)
Students focus their attention on the overall meaning or message in a class session, text or situation. They attempt to relate ideas together and construct their own meaning, possibly in relation to their own experience.
Students focus their attention on the details and information in a class session or text. They are trying to memorise these individual details in the form they appear in the class or text or to list the features of the situation in order to pass the examinations.
Surface approach
Deep approach
Surface vs Deep approach towards learning
Three approaches to teaching
Content/discipline
Teacher Student
Approach to teaching
Teacher centrered/ content oriented position
Student centrered/ learning oriented position
Teacher/student interplay position
Constructivistic learning theories Practice learning theories
Psycho dynamic learning theories
Constructivist learning
Existing knowledgeNew information
New phenomenon
interpret
modify
New knowledge
Constructivism versus Transfer
Constructivism: learning is determined by the individual’s development, and the individual must him- or herself construct the knowledge - it cannot be transferred
Activate the student – it is he or her that are going to do the work!•don’t always tell the ‘solution’, what’s ‘right’•give time and space for the students’ own knowledge construction•relate to earlier knowledge and give examples and metaphors
Elements in a learning process
Experiences (examples,
hands on, …)
Reflection
Theory
Acting consciously
Dialogue
(Kolb)
Teacher role in ‘traditional’ vs. constructivist teaching – an oversimplified dichotomy
Student role in ‘traditional’ vs. constructivist teaching – an oversimplified dichotomy