is used to inform analyses of two design practices stimulating experiential .... It is the reciprocality of the two aspects, the tensions and potential synthesis that.
Work in progress
EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING AND TEACHER PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES: A DEVELOPMENTAL APPROACH TO THE DESIGN OF TEACHING AND LEARNING Trond Eiliv Hauge and Andreas Lund Department of Teacher Education and School Research, University of Oslo
ABSTRACT: The paper provides an argument for reconceptualising experiential learning under rapidly changing conditions for professional learning. The notion of design for teaching and learning related to the Russian/Vygotskyan dialectical concept of obuchenie is used to inform analyses of two design practices stimulating experiential learning for teachers.
Introduction In this paper, we provide an argument for reconceptualising experiential learning as a basic approach to understanding and developing teaching as a truly professional endeavour. We argue that the complexities in education evoked by new technologies and media are rapidly changing the conditions for professional learning and the way experiences are constructed and perceived by professionals (Haythornthwaite & Andrews, 2011). This means that we need to redefine professional educational practices as part of a mix of multiple virtual and distributed, physical and co-located practices. Thus, we also need to reconsider experiences as advanced products of objects and activities interacting at different levels of learning. We argue that a cultural historical
1
Work in progress
approach to the design of educational practices (Lund & Hauge, 2011), and experiential learning in particular, is conducive to analysing and improving practices in the field. Our rationale for a design approach is found in the increasing complexity of learning environments. While e.g. talk and writing are still major constituents of learning and teaching, artefacts exercise increasing influence on how experiences are developed and embodied: How we make sense of and produce multimodal representations of our experiences, how we exploit and tweak models and simulations, and how we traverse the internet to make fragmented shards of information into meaning making entities are but some examples of how artefacts influence, afford and constrain educational efforts. When the complexity of learning environments and, thus, learning experiences increases it becomes difficult for professionals to design, plan or predict how learning activities will be enacted. Professionals’ creativity, subject content knowledge, and capacity to find ad hoc solutions to such, often sudden and unexpected, challenges are still important professional qualities, but this is not enough to turn complex teaching environments into productive learning environments. Designs cannot predict or prescribe how learners actually respond to the tasks or assignments they face, but they may offer support for professionals orchestrating tasks, activities, and resources into productive learning experiences (Dreier, 2003; Edwards & Mackenzie, 2005). Like Vygotsky (1978, 1986) we consider learning and teaching to be two mutually constitutive aspects of education as well as personal development. However, Vygotsky had the Russian word obuchenie at his disposal to capture this dual aspect, while English (as well as Norwegian and most other European languages) does not afford a similar term. This intertwined perspective directs our attention to the design of objects
2
Work in progress
of activity and practices that, in turn, constitute significant objects for experiential learning. In order to explore designs that are sensitive to obuchenie – learning and teaching – we draw on Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) (e.g. Engeström, 1987; Engeström, Miettinen & Punamäki, 1999). The relational nodes in an activity system connect human agency to a community with a collective motive, mediated by cultural tools or artefacts, and regulated by rules and conventions, and a division of labour. Thus, it links the individual to the collective, agency to available resources, and mind to communal and institutional contexts. Consequently, CHAT has proved to have explanatory power when theorizing and analysing learning, development, and transformation beyond the individual as a unit of analysis (Roth, 2004). However, there seem to be few empirical studies of using CHAT as a guide for educational designs (Luckin, 2010). This should not be understood as if we consider theories of learning to be operationalized as simple recipes for teaching. Rather, we believe that for educators CHAT is not only an analytical lens for examining (and explaining) phenomena, but can also be used as a framework for interventions that can effect change in learning and teaching. Consequently, the question we seek to answer in the following sections is how we can draw on theory in order to develop educational practices for technology rich settings. Hopefully, this discussion will enrich the understanding of experiential learning in the context of teacher professional learning.
Obuchenie and Design Obuchenie is a term that is vital for understanding Vygotskyan approaches to development but at the same time a term that has been widely misunderstood through
3
Work in progress
translation difficulties (Cole, 2009). In order to capture its essence the concept has often been translated into a dual activity term, for example as “teaching-and-learning”. It is firmly linked to the zone of proximal development as bi-directional knowledge production involving the teacher(s) as well as the learner(s). What the original term does not make explicit, but which is vital in sociocultural assumptions of learning as well as in our conceptualization of design, is the role of artefacts – how they can be conducive to obuchenie – teaching and learning as a unified and dialectic entity. This becomes evident in the following quote from Cole (2009: 292):
In general, the Russian word, obuchenie, refers to a double-sided process, one side of which does indeed refer to learning (a change in the psychological processes and knowledge of the child), but the other of which refers to the organization of the environment by the adult, who, it is assumed in the article under discussion, is a teacher in a formal school with power over the organization of the children's experience.
This passage firmly links obuchenie to a teaching design in the sense that it refers to “the organization of the environment”. The relevance for technology rich learning environments is obvious. However, it also emphasizes the learning aspect in this dialectic concept. For example, Luckin (2010: 22) asserts that, “The important point here is that there is a sense of mutual cognitive growth within both the learner and their more able other or teacher”.
4
Work in progress
Translations have struggled with this: “In other words, unlike in English, obuchenie carries the meaning of both (…) By contrast, the meaning of “teaching/learning” is subtly, but clearly, different from either of the words used alone” (Tudge, 2009: 1). Consequently we struggle with awkward, hyphenized (teaching-andlearning) or slashed (teaching/learning – often perceived as the one OR the other) constructions in order to denote the original concept. One interesting attempt to find ways to capture dialogical concepts is the use of the Sheffer stroke, |, “whereby two mutually exclusive but reciprocal terms are combined together” (Roth & Lee, 2007: 197). In the following we adopt the Sheffer stroke when translating obuchenie into English learning|teaching. The implication is that neither learning nor teaching can be used as a point of departure for understanding the other. It is the reciprocality of the two aspects, the tensions and potential synthesis that we also seek to operationalize in our notion of design for complex learning environments. We distinguish between Design for teaching and Design for learning (Hauge, Lund & Vestøl, 2007), partly for analytical purposes and partly because this duality shows how the latter might be a transformation of the former – not least as a result of using powerful cultural tools. In our approach to design we acknowledge that the two design types for all practical purposes are mutually constitutive of the learning activity, we just do not have a singular concept for this. In order to make sociocultural aspects of design and experiential learning more visible we now turn to two empirical studies of professional learning; the first case is linked to the design process of teaching and learning at by mathematics teachers, and the
5
Work in progress
other one describes a design process of net-based learning resources to be used in a master program of school leadership education.
Two empirical studies We first give a brief outline of what happened in the two case studies before we seek to identify problematic issues regarding design and approaches to experiential learning.
Case 1: Designing mathematics teaching In the study by Hauge and Norenes (2009), a team of five mathematics teachers at Hillside secondary school is followed over a period of six months as they work jointly to improve their teaching and teamwork practice. In a stepwise strategy for deliberate and object-oriented practice transformation based on principles of Developmental Work Research (DWR) methodology, VideoPaper is used as a tool for mirroring and analysing the teachers’ practices. Research data encompass field observations and video-films of teaching based on a set of designed mathematics lessons focusing on students’ group work and problem solving in mathematics probability. The lessons and teaching practices were discussed in a series of teacher-researcher workshops by the use of VideoPaper web documents and illustrations. The researchers have analysed teachers’ use of resources in designing teaching and how they worked out the lessons in the classroom. In the mirror sessions or workshops the students’ learning activities were discussed assisted by an activity theoretical approach. The VideoPaper documents were used to expand the focus of analyses beyond the level of individual teachers, and onto a collective-oriented level of
6
Work in progress
teaching and learning for all the five teachers. The study demonstrates the crucial role of external artefacts and “neutral spaces” for discussion of personalized teacher experience, and the need for a transparent and confident context of reflection on classroom and teamwork practices. The joint object of teaching and learning regulated by the mathematical assignment, students’ group work and student supervision by the teachers evolved over time, as the teachers step-by-step moved forward in discussions and analyses of their own classroom practices and design work. Gradually, the object developed as a shared concern and awareness moving the teacher team further in rethinking models and methods of teaching. The collective object construction seemed to energize a “horizon” of possible new actions (Engeström, Engeström & Kerusuo, 2003). The study illustrates the complexities in bridging practices between individual teachers’ design of teaching and learning and the way they handle social interactions of learning in a classroom setting. We notice that teacher experiences were shared across individual practices; however, the teachers themselves needed to be pushed beyond ways of thinking about student learning, to expand observations of classroom interactions, and to reflect upon experiences when designing teaching and learning. This process of experiential reflection was enhanced by the informed DWR intervention strategy by focusing on practical tools for analysing social practices (cf. the object of activity, mediating tools, activity rules, communities, division of labour in CHAT).
Case 2: Designing online learning resources. In the study by Hauge and Dolonen (2012), an activity-driven design method for online resources was created to support a technology-enhanced program of school leadership
7
Work in progress
education. The study was part of a follow–up research of the Digital Leadership Project (DLP) at the University of Oslo in 2006-2008. DLP was designed to serve a growing use of networked learning in the master program for school leaders. The online learning resources were tested on two course levels in the program comprising 50 students each. The program is 1) oriented towards experiential learning for the participants, which means that the students have to describe and analyse practices and experiences from their own workplace, 2) research–based, which means that the students have to read and analyse current research literature and theories applied to school leadership and education practices, and 3) focused on leadership for change and development in the school context. In particular, the study of Hauge and Dolonen (2012) focuses on the design method created to develop a set of learning resources to be used in distributed and advanced settings of work place learning. The leading design team comprised two teachers involved in the program, two researchers of technology and pedagogy, and two external professionals supporting the management of the project. Process data are collected documenting phases of problem solving, minutes from meetings, sketches and design documents produced by the design team, and participatory observation notes produced by the researchers in the design process. The design method was experimental and grounded on CHAT principles. The study contributes to the understanding of strategies for change by the use of new technologies when trying to bridge the gap between different approaches to experiential learning in an existing course design. A set of tensions occurred as models for experiential learning were discussed and tested. At the one side, previous learning resources for the course program were visited to untangle the underlying instructional
8
Work in progress
models. These models were part of an implicit study design, e.g. a goal-oriented curriculum design, a didactic-relational model of teaching (an influential Norwegian design model by Bjørndal and Lieberg, 1987) and an open inquiry oriented approach to learning. On the other side, most of the net-based learning resources formerly created in the DLP program had to be used in a physical and teacher led instructional setting. The idea of the new learning resources was to break away from these traditions and combine students’ workplace experiences and course mediated resources by the use of a net-based application of the LAMS technology (Learning Administrative System, Dalziel, 2007) facilitating flexible use of resources and task management for the students. The study shows how the LAMS environment became a driving force of the design of students’ learning activities. The technology facilitated a transparent structure for authoring and visualizing aims, content and learning activities for the students. In this process the activity system model anchored in CHAT enabled a design for scripting student activities and objects of experiential learning. Activity theory was learned to operate as a powerful lens for understanding the implicit needs and strategies of the DLP project. The system approach showed to be a strong tool for sorting significant activities in the design of task–specific communications and productions by the learners, and how they were related to resources, communities and regulation of labour. Compared to the implicit pedagogical model in the education program, the activity-driven design method gave an added value to the scripting and implementation of the digital learning resources. Hauge and Dolonen (2012) point to the necessity of going further in explicating how learning activities in a particular teaching situation are linked to task structures, resources, work regulations, communities and outcomes. The study reveals a change in
9
Work in progress
design work from a content oriented and instructional approach to a focus on context, object-driven activities and collaboration among learners. It contributes to the understanding of how the interplay between cultural artefacts, such as pedagogical ideas, design methods and technological solutions leads to contradictions in a design activity and creates opportunities for the transformation of the design as a whole, which seems to be a necessary condition for stimulating advanced forms of experiential learning.
Implications and conclusions From the studies above we see how complex education tasks and a series of available resources make heavy demands on designs for learning and teaching. Collaborative participation among professionals and new cultural tools, so typical for the networked society (Castells, 1996), are studied in transformed educational activities. In the cases we have examined, we see how such activity involves understanding education design as a complex phenomenon balancing between various perspectives by the participants, but strongly linked to institutional traditions and individual practices. Digital tools may break the way to new professional practices; however, it means to follow carefully tensions between social and technological designs that appear at different levels in the process and make bridges between these practices. Also, we have drawn attention to analysis of the relations between individual and collective contributions as well as the need for instruction in the shape of informed intervention and participation. Transformed activity creates tensions between subjects and mediational means (Wertsch, 1998) but also places existing rules and conventions of teaching and learning under pressure. This is why we propose designs that materialize at
10
Work in progress
the juxtaposition of teaching and learning, that is, take obuchenie as a point of departure, and which require professionals to design with a persistent focus on learners’ trajectories and experiences. In our case studies, we see that the delicate teaching|learning balance to be reached is part of a discursive practice among the professionals where implicit models or approaches to teaching are questioned and evaluated. In this context, the DWR strategy and CHAT principles translated to the users plaid a significant role as means for examining traditions and unspoken experiences. We have argued that the notion of design is highly relevant when the complexity of learning environments and learning trajectories increases. Empirically, we have demonstrated how lessons learned from case studies point to the need for conceptualizing design as a dialectic teaching|learning activity. Theoretically, we find that sociocultural activity and theoretical perspectives provide us with a framework for not just understanding designs but for producing and enacting them for experiential learning. Also, such perspectives may be drivers for developing didactical approaches responsive to complex and technology-rich learning environments and trajectories of learning, and where the object of learning is not just given but also constructed in collaborative actions.
11
Work in progress
References Bjørndal, B., & Lieberg, S. (1978). Nye veier i didaktikken (New didactical approaches). Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget. Castells, M. (1996). The rise of the network society. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell Publishers. Cole, M. (2009). The Perils of Translation: A First Step in Reconsidering Vygotsky's Theory of Development in Relation to Formal Education. [Editorial]. Mind, Culture and Activity, 16(4), 291– 295. Dalziel, J. (2007). Building communities of designers. In Beetham, H., & Sharpe, R. (Eds.), Rethinking pedagogy for a digital age. Designing and delivering e–learning (pp. 193–206). London, UK: Routledge. Dreier, O. (2003). Learning in Personal Trajectories of Participation. In N. Stephenson, H. L. Radtke, R. J. Jorna & H. J. Stam (Eds.), Theoretical Psychology. Critical Contributions. (pp. 20-29). Concord, CA.: Captus University Publications. Edwards, A., & Mackenzie, L. (2005). Steps Towards Participation: the social support of learning trajectories. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 24(4), 287– 302. Engeström, Y. (1987). Learning by Expanding: An Activity – Theoretical Approach to Developmental Research. Helsinki: Orienta-konsultit. Engeström, Y., Miettinen, R., & Punamäki, R. (Eds.). (1999). Perspectives on Activity Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Engeström, Y., Engeström, R., & Kerosuo, H. (2003). The discursive construction of collaborative care. Applied Linguistics, 24(3), 286–315.
12
Work in progress
Engeström, Y. (1999). Activity theory and indi- vidual and social transformation. In Engeström, Y., Miettinen, R., & Punamäki, R. L. (Eds.), Perspectives on activity theory (pp. 19–39). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Engeström, Y. (2007). Putting Vygotsky to work. The change laboratory as an application of double stimulation. In Daniels, H., Cole, M., & Wertsch, J. V. (Eds.), Cambridge companion to Vygotsky (pp. 363–383). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Hauge, T. E., Lund, A., & Vestøl, J. M. (2007). Undervisning i endring: IKT, aktivitet, design [Teaching in transformation: ICT, activity, design]. Oslo: Abstrakt forlag. Hauge, T.E. & Dolonen, J.A. (2012). Towards an Activity-Driven Design Method for Online Learning Resources. In A. D. Olofsson & J. O. Lindberg (eds.), Informed design of educational technologies in higher education: Enhanced learning and teaching. Hershey: IGI Global, 101-117. Hauge, T.E. & Norenes, S.O. (2009). VideoPaper as a Bridging Tool in Teacher Professional Development. Journal of Technology, Pedagogy and Education, Haythornthwaite, C. & Andrews, R. (2011). E-learning. Theory and practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications. Luckin, R. (2010). Re-designing Learning Contexts. Technology-rich, learner-centred ecologies. London and New York: Routledge. Lund, A. & Hauge, T.E. (2011), Designs for teaching and learning in technology-rich learning environments. Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy, no 4. Roth, W.-M. (2004). Activity Theory and Education: An Introduction. Mind, Culture and Activity, 11(1), 1–8.
13
Work in progress
Roth, W.-M., & Lee, Y.-J. (2007). "Vygotsky's Neglected legacy": Cultural-Historical Activity Theory. Review of Educational Research, 77(2), 186–232.
Tudge, J. (2009). Re: [xmca] Does "Obuchenie" Have Two Sides? Retrieved Nov 11, 2010, from http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/private/xmca: http://lchc.ucsd.edu/mca/Mail/xmcamail. 2009_11.dir/msg00217.html Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in Society: the development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Vygotsky, L. S. (1986). Thought and Language (A. Kozulin, Trans.). Cambridge, Ma: MIT Press. Wertsch, J. V. (1998). Mind As Action. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
14
