Constructivism in Practice
The practice of constructivism in
education revolves around two major components.
It implies that students are going to actively generate their own
knowledge on particular concepts through experimentation and experience and
that they will test informed ideas to arrive at the proper conclusions (Pitler,
2007). There are a couple of strategies
highlighted in these week’s readings that use technology to support the realm
of constructivism. In Using Technology with Classroom Instruction
that Works, they highlighted using spreadsheet programs and data collection
tools (Pitler, 2007). Spreadsheet
programs can be used to allow students to make connections with information in
the proper circumstances. For example,
if students were working with large amounts of data they can use spreadsheets to
create data tables and graphs so that they can find connections in the
data. Probing hardware can also be used
to allow students to take valid data and find correlations between their
measurements. I have used this type of
software in the past with a system of probes under Logger Pro. Several activities that are in conjunction
with constructivist practices and use Logger Pro technology come from Enhanced PRISMS (Cooney, 2005). These activities cover a variety of physics
based real life scenarios that can be used as problem based activities for
students.
References:
Cooney,
T.M. Ed. D., Escalada, L.T. Ph. D., Unruh, R.D. Ed. D. (2005)
Enhanced PRISMS. Cincinnati,
OH: Centre Pointe Learning Inc.
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E. R., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K.
(2007). Using technology with
classroom instruction that works.
Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Jason,
ReplyDeleteYou mentioned that constructivism allows learners to generate their own knowledge, and that they will test their ideas to arrive at proper conclusions (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). By giving students the freedom to explore and discover for themselves, teachers are delving into the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy. When teachers provide students with the chances to reach these higher levels, students truly internalize the information and are able to then pass it on to others.
Spreadsheets are also a great way for students to organize large amounts of data in a user-friendly manner. Using spreadsheets allows students to compare predictions to actual results without spending valuable time doing calculations or designing spreadsheets (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). Spreadsheets provide a visual for students as well, giving them another avenue to learn information.
David
References
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
David,
ReplyDeleteThanks...I do enjoy the use of spreadsheets in my teaching. I'm actually very surprised that many students don't seem to even know that these programs exist. Fortunately, there are plenty of websites and tutorials that can help students learn to use them effectively and quickly.
Jason