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Spending Class Time on Projects?
As advocates both for the integrated use of technology and for engaging students with authentic learning tasks, we feel some responsibility to connect our recommendations to empirical evidence. One criticism of such recommendations has been that quality research is not presently available to justify the time and expense the changes in classroom practice will require. The question of what qualifies as quality research has generated a great deal of debate and there are many side issues such as whether the variables we have traditionally used to evaluate instructional quality (e.g., standardized tests) are even appropriate as ways to assess the desired consequences of the proposed changes in learning experiences.
Throughout "Integrating Technology ..." we offer summaries of what we have gleaned from the research we feel relate to the learning experiences we propose. Some of the research we cite is not a direct test of a proposed use of technology. Some studies may evaluate features of proposed practices in more controlled setting and offer insight into the value of such features. Others might evaluate a learning experience that did not involve technology. These studies are mentioned because technology could be used to provide similar learning experiences.
One area we mention from time to time, but which could have been developed more completely as part of the general perspective provided in Chaper 2 concerns the importance of multiple, independent learner aptitudes. The multiple intelligence theories of Howard Gardner or Robert Sternberg would represent one way to gain perspective on this topic. Rather than assuming there is a single type of aptitude that might be used to represent learning capability, these theories propose that learner capabilities are best represented by multiple categories of somewhat independent abilities. We take a somewhat related perspective when we suggest that complex, cooperative learning projects provide opportunities for different learners to contribute in areas of personal strength.
Some of the research based on theories of multiple intelligences may offer a fairly direct test of the learning experiences we propose throughout the later chapters of this book. Consider several studies based on Sternberg’s Triarchic Model of Intelligence. Sternberg proposed that it was possible to differentiate three independent aptitudes - analytical thinking, creative thinking, and practical thinking. One of the more common interpretations of multiple intelligences has been that learners typically are taught in a single way with the greatest emphasis being placed on factual learning and analytical thinking. Individuals with greater aptitudes in the areas of creative thinking or practical thinking are short changed by this type of system. In one Sternberg study (Sternberg, Ferrari, Clinkenbeard & Grigorenko, 1996), gifted high school students were taught Introductory Psychology (college level) using activities that were either consistent or inconsistent with their measured area of giftedness (analytical, creative, practical). Learning experiences included traditional lectures and reading (to cover general background knowledge issues) and then activities requiring analytical, creative, or practical thinking. If nothing else, Sternberg’s examples of each type of learning activity are helpful to those attemtping to understand what classroom tasks emphasizing higher order thinking look like. The outcomes of this experimental study indicated that matched students did better than nonmatched students.
What are the implications of this study? Perhaps, in situations in which flexibility is possible, learners should be allowed to commit to different types of learning tasks. Perhaps, educators should simply recognize that individual learners benefit from different types of learning activities and commit to making a greater variety of activities available.
A second study conducted with K-12 students (Sternberg, Torff & Grigorenko, 1998) also offers what might be interpeted as support for the integration of authentic tasks in content area instruction (Note: This would be our way of interpreting Sternberg’s extension of traditional instruction to include activities requiring analytical, creative, or practical thinking). In this study, 3rd and 8th graders received traditional learning experiences or traditional learning experiences augmented with tasks requiring the use of the three aptitudes Sternberg defines. These were careful experimental studies involving an extended period of instruction (30 hours over 10 weeks for the 3rd grade group) using existing curriculum units. Learning was assessed using fact oriented multiple choice items and other essay and performance items to evaluate analytical, creative, and practical capabilities. In general, those learners experiencing tasks involving the triarchic skills later performed better on the tasks requiring triarchic skills. In addition, the learners experiencing the tasks emphasizing analytical, creative, and applied skills also demonstrated greater factual knowledge.
Again, this study appears to demonstrate that learners benefit from tasks that require more than knowledge acquisition. The results may also provide a counter argument to those educators who feel that they must sacrifice the opportunity to engage students in authentic tasks because student performance on important tests of knowledge will suffer. In this study, knowledge acquisition was enhanced by the substitution of the tasks requiring analysis, creativity and practical application.
We assume the details of how teachers integrated the triarchic tasks and traditional instruction are very important. We encourage a careful reading of the Sternberg, et al., (1998) paper and careful reflection on how class time can be used most efficiently.
It is the similarity of the tasks used in encouraging triarchic thinking to the types of projects we propose throughout our books that we find encouraging. The Sternberg research appears to support the value of such tasks. Here is one example of this similarity. The third-grade unit involved understanding community public services (e.g., police, fire fighters). Two tasks related to this unit are described below (simplified from Sternberg, et al. (1998)):
Invent a government agency. Decide what services it will provide, give it a name, explain why it is important and why the government should pay for this service. Develop an advertisement for the agency. (creative)
What can be done to reduce litering in the community. What consequences should there be for littering? Develop a strategy to reduce littering on the school grounds. (practical)
Can you imagine how tactics such as image capture or multimedia authoring might be employed to support what these students did without technology?
Sternberg, R., Ferrari, M., Clinkenbeard, P. & Grigorenko, E. (1996). Gifted Child Quarterly, 40(3), 129-137.
Sternberg, R., Torff, B., & Grigorenko, E. (1998). Teaching triarchically improves school achievement. Journal of Educational Psychology, 90
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