The Digital Learning Environment: What the Research Tells Us
In the article, The Digital Learning Environment: What the Research Tells Us, written by Kate Kemker written in 2005, she highlights some research about learning environments. I would like to highlight some of the findings and comment on them.
THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM
Technology is a tool to be employed by the students in all curriculum areas to aquire new knowledge and skills, analyze and synthesize that data, then construct a product that demonstrates their knowledge.
THE DIGITAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENT
Skills that need to be developed for the 21st century community and workplace include:
… information and communication skills; thinking and problem solving skills; and interpersonal and self-directional skills.
Students are engaged in authentic tasks that have a connection to the real world.
- Any project or presentation a student makes I try to connect to an authentic audience such as websites, letters to the editor, mass media, electronic media. The quality of the work I receive from my students is far greater when they know they have an audience (other than a teacher giving a grade).
… For meaningful learning to occur in the classroom, educators must employ five teaching strategies: active, constructive, collaborative, authentic, and intentional reflective learning. … The common thread in this type of [learning]environment entails educators providing students with the opportunity to be engaged in the learning process.
Learning With Technology
The more advanced uses of the computer support the constructivist view of learning in which the teacher is a facilitator of learning rather than the classroom’s only source of knowledge. …teachers become more open to multiple perspectives on problems and are willing to experiment in their teaching .
Authentic Instruction
Authentic instruction is based on the premise that students’ work in the classroom should prepare them for intellectual tasks that will be demanded of them as adults.
… three criteria that are consistent with authentic instruction:
(1) students construct meaning and produce knowledge – This involves organizing, interpreting, evaluation, or synthesizing prior knowledge to solve new problems.
(2) students use disciplined inquiry to construct meaning – This requires students to make use of deep knowledge and engage in substantive conversations.
(3) students aim their work toward production of discourse, products, and performances that have value or meaning beyond the success of school. – this might include integrating experiences in the community (outside of school) with activities in the classroom.
Standards for Authentic or Meaningful Instruction
1. Higher order thinking
2. Depth of knowledge
3. Conectedness to the world beyond the classroom
4. Substantive conversation
5. Social support for student acheivement
June 22nd, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Wonderful article. I been looking for one on a similar note. I guess you always have something up your sleeve.