neil SMITH

 

Hi everyone 

I am very much looking forward to working with Sylvia on our Inquiry Learning seminar. We will begin our first conference tomorrow and anticipate a wide open, compelling exporation of the nature of Inquiry and its various manifestations in formal and informal learning environments.  

For tomorrow's first conference, it may be helpful for participants to take time to review the introduction of the Inquiry video (link provided in Sylvia's welcome posting of this morning) as well as the first video vignette in the series. This may give us a common foundation from which to begin the seminar.

Also of interest is the very rich conversation initiated last spring by SCOPE participants. This you will find in the links below; most of them dated in March 2011. 

See you Tuesday!   Regards, Neil 

Greetings

Attached to this note is a two page brief on the Interview Matrix strategy.

I mentioned that this is the process that has rendered the most success in a) engaging students in the central inquiry of the course and b) heightened their sense of responsibility to contribute and engage - right from the beginning of the course. It sends a message right off the bat that they are the most important part of the class.

I like it because it optimizes EVERYONE'S involvement in a safe process - and I have been able to use it with groups of 125 plus as well as classes of 25. Hope you find it interesting!

Neil Smith

What instructional processes can actively increase the levels of confidence and active engagement with the younger students?

Mary had suggested that grad students always have a greater sense of readiness to "engage actively".. and challenged us to think of sharing ideas of how we increase the capacity of undergrad students to connect with the learning with confidence.

What instructional systems can we put in place to ensure that the "active learning" in our classes moves beyond FUN - "edutainment" as Glen coined it - to substantive learning?

We talked in the session about deep learning and transformative learning in terms of enabling a learner to experience and move to new mindsets, paradigms, or perhaps world views..


If we believe as teachers that transformative learning is a realistic goal - AND that is a good thing to aspire to... what things can we do to realize this goal?


We also discussed the importance dissonance in learning..building some degree of uncomfortability as learners engage with challenging and possibly difficult learning experiences. It begs the question - what role and responsibilities do you think teachers should have in the creating dissonance to promote deep learning?

Thoughts?