Learning Theories, Problem Based Learning and E-Learning; A Personal Review:

It’s interesting how the art of teaching has evolved over the last century with various theories of learning coming and going based on the next best theoretical idea usurping the last. The benefits of these theories are insightful as outlined by (Carlile and Jordan, 2005), they incorporate, justification, reflection, problem solving, affirmation and sharing. According to (Carlile and Jordan, 2005) these learning theories may be consciously or unconsciously something that we experienced through our own learning experiences and that we perhaps don’t really know what our own theories really are or even understand them. They go on to indicate that there isn’t any agreed definition of learning. I for one do have an understanding on how some of these theories underpin my understanding of how I teach or how I started to teach. I do agree with (Carlile and Jordan, 2005) that the way we understand our own learning does originate from our own learning experiences, however I don’t agree with their assumption that we don’t know what our own theories of learning are, although I agree that we may not know what they’re called.

For the past five decades teaching has gone through some amazing shifts, with the 5 orientations of learning in particular outlined by (Ashworth, Brennan, Egan, Hamilton, Sáenz, 2014). The most significant of these for me being Cognitivism, Social Learning and Constructivism starting in the 1960’s and moving right up to the 1990’s. My own understanding of learning and learning theories only came about recently when I started querying why certain students learned in a better way by doing. This only really started to surface when I came across Graham Gibb’s book, Learning by Doing (Gibbs, 1988). Graham Gibb’s got me thinking that we should be putting practice before theory and using experience to test the theory. This only further suggests that students have a wealth of their own experience and practice in life to draw on and therefore we as teachers need to be more open minded about our role in third level education, (Gibbs, 1988).

I personally believe that we are doing the exact opposite, Universities and lecturers are in fact not delivering content in a student centred, Constructivist approach even though they are advocating that they are indeed doing this. As (Lea, Stephenson and Troy, 2003) outlines …”Moreover, within the current higher education climate, it is imperative that institutions move from an ‘inside out’ approach, where those on the inside ‘know’ what is best, to an ‘outside in’ approach where customers’ expectations are researched and serviced.” They go on to indicate that student centred learning is not necessarily put into practice in third level institutes although they claim that they are, (Lea, Stephenson and Troy, 2003). I come across this all the time, as many of my student’s indicate that the way I teach is different to the way others have taught them and I believe that this teaching style is still Behaviourist in origin.

I do believe however that during the early part of the twentieth century that particular learning theories were very dominant such as Behaviourism with theorists such as Watson, Thorndike, Skinner, Gagne and Pavlov being the most notable, (Murphy, 2003).

Even though my education was in the second part of the last century and being mostly Behaviourist, I can understand why my own learning during my early years was uncreative with little or no independent learning. It contained repetition learning and the careful planning of learning events outlining learning objectives and learning outcomes, which I never understood, (Carlile and Jordan, 2005).

This is why most module descriptors are Behaviourist in their nature and are written so that the delivery of the content can be done in a Behaviourist manner. The nature of writing down goals to achieve and plan for learning outcomes is Behaviourist in origin and leads to passive thinking and doing. Unfortunately the teacher, lecturer or tutor here is instrumental to learning success, (Bloom, 1956). This is probably why I did so badly at school and ended up focusing on art, creativity and ended up going to art school.

Cognitivism on the other hand became popular in the 1960’s with theorists such as Miller, Piaget and Neisser opposing Behaviourism by focusing on how learners gain their knowledge and understanding almost like a computing processor with input and output modes of learning, (Carlile and Jordan, 2005). To a certain extent this is how I imagined learning was achieved through showing, demonstrating = input and then doing or regurgitating it back as = output.

(Carlile and Jordan, 2005) go on to indicate that this theory gave the learner small well organised material which is easy to learn and understand to start and then as the learning progresses they receive more complex and detailed content which may challenge the learner. It’s almost like feeding a computer simple data at first and then complex data to the end. This became very important for the third level sector with the development of less teacher centred methods and an emphasis on students choosing new forms of assessment within the curriculum such as continuious assessment, (Ashworth, Brennan, Egan, Hamilton, Sáenz, 2014). My understanding of my learning theory and teaching style, became focused on this approach early on in my teaching career.

However, on the other hand (Murphy, 2003) outlines in her “Situated Learning, Distributed Cognition” article that the dominant learning paradigm in the Twentieth century was Cognitivism with meta cognition, short and long term memory techniques and problem solving. She goes on to mention that this whole process under this theory remains in the mind of the learner which is totally cut off from the world around them. It’s interesting as I found that this is exactly what happened to me in my learning journey. She outlines this as an old style of Cognitive learning and that there is a new study of learning known as “situated” indicating time, place and social activity; known as ‘situated learning”, (Murphy, 2003). Murphy go on to indicate that this type of learning isn’t just about what’s goes on in the head of an individual but stems from the actions, activities, language and the environment around them, learning from a situation dicated by what surrounds us and this is what we learn from.

I started teaching in third level in the early 1990’s and at that time I taught Visual Communication, Graphics. The teaching involved literally using current design studio practices at the time to deliver a range of studio based classes. The work undertaken by the students was problem-based whereby students were all given a project brief outlining a problem to be solved. Students were expected to take control of the project and manage the learning process through group work and self-directed learning. I became the project leader rather than the manager and gave feedback as required throught the project lifecycle, (Duffy, Burke, Chance, Bowe, Howard, 2013).

At the time lecturing in third level wasn’t what it is now, as the visual aids used to show students the topic and content was very basic. As a graphic designer I used to think very hard about how I could show my students visual examples in a better way. At this time the only way to visually teach was by using an overhead projector and some props. My concern at the time outlined to what extent did my learners retain what they learned and this depended on the approach I took to their learning and this is why I concentrated on visual demonstrations using diagrams and getting the learners to work in groups, (Approaches to Teaching & Learning, 2007).

The interesting thing about the way I taught was very much based on the Social Constructivists approach, whereby my leaner’s learned through social interaction, to construct meaning by interacting with the experience and therefore gaining knowledge in a socially cohesive way, (Ashworth, Brennan, Egan, Hamilton, Sáenz, 2014). Even thought my learners didn’t work in teams or groups on their projects they worked on solving their problems as a group outside the allocated class time. As outlined by (Duffy, Burke, Chance, Bowe, Howard, 2013) students require time to adjust and develop their ways of learning with open ended problems and how you do this depends on the ways that they as students engage with you the leader and the content.

This just happened like this, however a certain amount of scaffolding was necessary to support the learner’s to get to the required higher levels and this was gradually withdrawn over a period of time. Learners as the class progressed became more independent in their ability to do the work themselves without my help; I used Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) encouraging, supporting students to allowing them to move on to higher learning and become more independent, (Vygotsky, 1978). The work was problem based as learners were asked to solve a problem; such as design a logo or create a brochure for a certain business. The learning opportunities here were real, embedded in realistic situations and the knowledge gained was involved in the activity, the doing, the approach the learner’s took to solve the problem, (Murphy, 2003). The knowledge learned was gained from situated learning where the learning places the learner in the community of the real world where they have to deal with cultural and social interactions, (Carlile and Jordan, 2005).

Although my class and teaching was student centred and problem based learning (PBL) became the main way my students learned, other teachers/lecturers never talked or discussed the teaching methods or theories that they used nor did they discuss their ideas of their own teaching styles or theories. I was using a PBL Constructivist and Social Constructivist approach by default even though I didn’t know that this learning theory existed or had a name. I naturally used this learning theory as it made total sense to me, however I am not sure if this would have happened if I had been teaching accountancy. I am however very critical of why third level institutions in Ireland don’t actually teach using a Social and Constructivist approach although they advocate that they do, (Lea, Stephenson and Troy, 2003). I feel that most lecturers, because of the technology, i.e. PowerPoint and online Prezi that they resort to a Behaviourist – Cognitivist model and I am confused and baffled with why this is so even though there was a shift in the 1980’s and 1990’s to a Cognitivist-Constructivist approach, (Murphy, 2003).

I am a great believer in learning by doing or by example; this lends itself very well to what I teach graphic design, digital media design and digital marketing. I have been very interested in the Instructional design concept and educational technology ever since I start teaching in the university sector, (Lebow, 1993). To teach effectively back in 1990 I created a whole range of visual aids, such as photographic slides, white cardboard sheets with marker drawings outlining the topic and content graphically. At the time I was undertaking research into the area of effectively teaching using new technology that was just emerging at the time, (Gibbs, G. 1981).

As a designer multimedia and new media was an area that I naturally progressed into and it seemed the most natural next step to take in order to try and find an effective way to teach using visual aids via new media and technology. New media or digital media as it is now called is an area of great interest for me, web based technologies and their development which has gradually improved over the last number of years has made the possibility of learning using the internet possible. The Internet itself evolves and in doing so it forces new and improved developments in mobile devices and becomes faster and more intelligent. Therefore as this technology evolves the devices we use on the Internet evolve as well, (Fling, 2009).

The development of educational technology over the last 20 years has now allowed us to consider e-learning and e-teaching as an option for learning online, moving away from the traditional face to face classroom facility. I am very interested in this new approach and how this can provide a constructivist collaborative interactive approach to learning, (Donnelly & O’Farrell, 2006). Donnelly & O’Farrell go on to indicate teachers and lecturers outline that they have to reinvent the way that they teach because new technology allows for different formats to be delivered, all at the same time online to any amount of learners. The one thing that I understand is that once you learn and experiment with the new technology and apply what you have learned within the classroom to address educational needs it opens up your classroom to do other things. These can be debates, discussions, view videos online, making presentations which can be all student centered, (O’Neill and McMahon, 2005).

The only problem that underpins this e-learning and e-teaching new paradigm is interaction and engagement, how do you get your students to engage online? As this is teaching using technology the environment is very suited to social constructivist learning where by learners can interact and engage online socially through discussion boards as students need to consider their own understanding of what they are learning, through interaction with others in a social construct online, (Donnelly & O’Farrell, 2006). This new approach does however have a number of issues, which I have experienced myself, and Donnelly & O’Farrell have outlined this. In order to teach effectively online, a tutor must first experience what it is like to be an online learner, before being able to properly deliver an effective online course. In terms of understanding teaching using technology teachers will have to think about how they can use this new teaching approach to transform their own practice. I have done a number of full online courses as well as a number of blended online courses and I have been able to incorporate my learning and understanding from my experiences and to think reflectively about using technology to teach. Using a learner centered social constructivist approach to online e-learning with a (COP) a ‘Community or Practice’ or an online community is perhaps the only way to encourage interaction and engagement, (McCabe & O’Connor, 2014).

References

Alan McCabe & Una O’Connor (2014) Student-centred learning: the role and responsibility of the lecturer, Teaching in Higher Education, 19:4, 350-359, DOI: 10.1080/13562517.2013.860111

Approaches to Teaching & Learning. (2007). 1st ed. [ebook] Dublin: INTO, pp.16-18. Available at: https://www.into.ie/ROI/Publications/ApproachesTeachingandLearning.pdf [Accessed 15 Dec. 2016].

Ashworth. F., Brennan. G., Egan. K., Hamilton. R., Sáenz.O., (2014) Learning Theories and Higher Education. Dublin: DIT, pp.1-16.

Bloom, B. (1956). Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. 1st ed. New York: Longmans, Green.

Carlile, O., & Jordan, A. (2005). IT WORKS IN PRACTICE BUT WILL IT WORK IN THEORY? THE THEORETICAL UNDERPINNINGS OF PEDAGOGY (1st ed.). Dublin: AISHE. Retrieved from http://www.aishe.org/readings/2005-1/carlile-jordan-IT_WORKS_IN_PRACTICE_BUT_WILL_IT_WORK_IN_THEORY.pdf [Accessed 8 Dec. 2016].

Donnelly, R. and O’Farrell, C. (2006). Constructivist E-Learning for Continuous Professional Development of Academic Staff. In: J. O’Donoghue, ed., Technology Supported Learning and Teaching : A Staff Perspective, 1st ed. [online] Dublin: Hershey, PA : Information Science Publishing., pp.146-159. Available at: http://arrow.dit.ie/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=ltcbk [Accessed 16 Dec. 2016].

Duffy, G., Burke, T., Chance, S., Bowe, B., Howard, R., (2013). “Student Experiences of a Project-Based Learning Module” presented at the Proceedings of the 41st SEFI Annual Conference, Leuven, Belgium.

Fling, B. (2009). Mobile design and development. Sebastopol, Calif.: O’Reilly Media.

Gibbs G. (1988) Learning by Doing: A guide to teaching and learning methods. Further Education Unit. Oxford Polytechnic: Oxford.

Gibbs, G. (1981). Teaching Students to Learn: A Student-Centered Approach. Milton Keynes: The Open University.

Lea, S., Stephenson, D. and Troy, J. (2003). Higher Education Students’ Attitudes to Student-centred Learning: Beyond ‘educational bulimia’?. Studies in Higher Education, 28(3), pp.321-334.

Lebow, D. (1993). Constructivist values for instructional systems design: Five principles toward a new mindset. Educational Technology Research and Development, 41 (3), 4-16.

Murphy, A. (2003). Situated learning, distributed cognition: do academics really need to know?. Learning, Teaching & Technology Centre DIT, [online] 3(1). Available at: http://arrow.dit.ie/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=ltcart [Accessed 14 Dec. 2016].

O’Neill, G. and McMahon, T. (2005). Student-centred learning: What does it mean for students and lecturers?. [online] Aishe.org. Available at: http://www.aishe.org/readings/2005-1/oneill-mcmahon-Tues_19th_Oct_SCL.html [Accessed 10 Dec. 2016].

Vygotsky, L.S. (1978) Mind in Society. The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.