Personalisation of Learning

Campbell(2007), exploring the taxonomy of personalisation of public health care,  discusses 5 levels of personalisation

1. providing more customer friendly services
2. giving people more say in how they use the services
3. giving users more say in how money is spent on the services
4. allowing users to become co-designers and co-producers of the services, and
5. allowing self organisation of services by individuals, with support provided by professionals.

If we translate the above into an education context, we will

1. provide learners with more student centred opportunities
2. give learners more choice in what they learn, how and when and where they learn it
3. give learners more say on how resources are used
4. allow learners design and produce their own content
5. allow learners to self organise their own learning with the support of professionals.

Is it feasible to allow the learner to choose and construct their own learning environment , and personalise it for themselves? The third component is already in place - Web 2.0 tools are available for all learners to choose and use to support their own self organised learning. It's the first two that are the problem if we are ever to get to the point where learning becomes deeply personal for all.
Reference:
Campbell, R. J. et al (2007) Personalised Learning: Ambiguities in Theory and Practice. British Journal of Educational Studies, 55 (2), 135-154.

Personal Learning

The term “personalized learning” has often been misunderstood. What does that mean for schools and students? Personalized learning is difficult to define because by its very nature, it looks different for every learner.  It may be best to start with what it isn’t.  Personalized learning does not mean that each child should have a unique program.   The big idea of personalized learning put simply is  that students take a much more active role in their learning, that they become far more engaged in their learning and that learning is a shared endeavor between students, families, schools, and communities.

It, therefore, is really about the things that make learning meaningful and powerful for students.  There are no programs or prescribed steps to achieving personalized learning, rather, personalized learning happens when students are fully engaged in their learning, when they have ownership in their learning, when they can talk with confidence about their learning, when they see the relevance of their learning and when they know where they are going with their learning.  The challenge for schools, however, is to develop the practices and create the networks that will increase these kinds of learning experiences for all kids.

I would like to invite readers to share examples of when you or your child felt particularly engaged and fully connected to new learning and what were the circumstances and what was your involvement as a parent? For my friend’s primary aged child, they cited the relationship with the classroom teacher to be the most significant influence on her level of connectedness and engagement with school and her learning.   It is the same for my children, it was the same for me when I was in school and I would suspect the same holds true for most children.

Again, I invite your comments or other examples of personalized learning experiences.

Reference

1. Campbell, R. J. et al (2007) Personalised Learning: Ambiguities in Theory and Practice. British Journal of Educational Studies, 55 (2), 135-154.
2. Personal Learning Plans: http://www.highlandschools-virtualib.org.uk/ltt/whole_learner/plp.htm

Assessments & Grades

Assessment is a hot topic in schools today and for good reason.  When it is done well, there can be high impact on learning and when it is not done well, learning can be negatively impacted.  When I was in school back in the late 70′s and 80′s, I had a fairly limited understanding of what testing in school was all about.   Basically, you memorized stuff, wrote a test and it counted on your report card.   In schools, our understanding of, and use of assessment has changed dramatically over the years but as far as grading goes, our practices haven’t changed all that much.  As parents, we seem to still have a need to see the A, B or C on the report card as a reflection of how well a child has learned.  This, in my view is largely due to the fact that the practice is deeply rooted in tradition but may not necessarily be the best way to report on learning, in fact, it may even interfere with learning.
I have a great deal of concern about the different categories of assessment, and the differences between assessment and grading practices.  In my view assessment has to do with the kind of information we collect about learning, how we collect it, how we use it and how students are involved in the process.  Grading is about how we translate the assessment information for the purposes of report cards.  I would love to hear what you think.

Biggs’ three levels of teaching

Most often our teaching is too general, too sweeping. The vast majority of what passes for teaching has a number of really significant flaws. It’s based more on what the teacher is familiar with  than on any idea of what might be effective. Of course, we can always find some good practice amongst academic staff, but sadly it is a small percentage. The vast majority of learning and teaching is demonstrably less than effective.

The following is an attempt to draw on Biggs’ (2001) three levels of teaching to formulate three levels of improving teaching and, as a result, improve learning.

Biggs' Three Levels of Teaching

1.     What the student is. 
This is the horrible “blame the student” approach to teaching. I’ll keep doing what I do. If the students can’t learn then it is because they are bad students. It’s not my fault. Nothing I can do.

2.     What the teacher does.
This is the horrible “look at me and all the neato, innovative teaching that I’m doing”. I’m doing lots of good and difficult things in my teaching. Are the students learning?

3.     What the student does. 
Obviously this is the good level. The focus is on teaching and leads to learning.

Biggs (2001) uses a quote from Tyler (1949) to illustrate that this is not a new idea that learning takes place through the active behavior of the student: it is what he does that he learns, not what the teacher does. Flowing from these levels is the type of teaching that can occur at level 3. It is based on the simple steps of:

• Clearly specifying detailed learning objectives for students.
• Arrange teaching and learning activities that encourage/require students to carry out tasks that provide the student with exposure, practice and feedback on the learning objectives.
• Design a grading/marking system that requires the student to demonstrate how well they achieve the stated learning objectives.

Performing these 3 simple steps well results in the situation that Biggs (2001) describes: In such a teaching, where all components support each other, students are “trapped” into engaging in the appropriate learning activities, or as Cowan (1998) puts it, teaching is “the purposeful creation of situations from which motivated learners should not be able to escape without learning or developing” (p. 112). A lack of alignment somewhere in the system allows students to escape with inadequate learning.

Souns simple, doesn’t it? So why don’t more teachers use it?

References

1. Biggs, J. (2001). “The Reflective Institution: Assuring and Enhancing the Quality of Teaching and Learning.” Higher Education 41(3): 221-238.
2. Kreber, C. and H. Castleden (2009). “Reflection on teaching and epistemological structure: reflective and critically reflective processes in ‘pure/soft’ and ‘pure/hard’ fields.” Higher Education 57(4): 509-531.