Brainstorm in Progress: Learning theory

Showing posts with label Learning theory. Show all posts

Monday, April 28, 2014

Why Connectivism is a Learning Theory

Domains of major fields of physics (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

David Wiley recently made a comment on his blog, in response to a very succinct posting by Stephen Downes, that the learning theory Connectivism, though he is sympathetic to it, was incomplete. I am not sure what to make of that. I understand David's point that terms need to be carefully defined. A solid theory needs operationally defined key terms. But I am not sure that Connectivism is really incomplete. There are a lot of great theories out there that work well and are very useful but are not "complete" in every sense. Einstein thought that his theories of relativity would lead to a Universal Field theory and because his work does not account sufficiently for quantum mechanics, in that sense his theory is incomplete. But it is still quite useful and irreplaceable in many fields of study and in practical application.

When Einstein first published his theory it had to go through years of refinement and testing. That is the process. There are still things being worked out with Darwin's Theory of Evolution but the days of wondering if it is valid are long behind us. It has been proven, observed, and tested. There are still evolutionary mechanisms to be worked out and the history of evolution will take more field work.

Looking at the history of theories, I am beginning to think that the discipline a given theory arises from is often the one least capable of evaluating it. But that is where all of the experimental and observational evidence is going to come from. Most of the criticisms I have read of Connectivism boil down to the new theory is not like the old theories. A theory is meant to provide a conceptual framework for viewing and understanding phenomena. As an instructional designer, I have a purely practical approach. I am only interested in a theory's usefulness, but for me, a theory must

account for current theories (either through refutation or inclusion)? A theory shouldn't just account for a given phenomena, it should do so in some measurably better way (more complete, elegant, etc.).
sufficiently explain where we are now.
make predictions. Any theory that can't predict anything is basically a conjecture at best.
be subject to testing. Here I would emphasize that the theory should change what we do based on experiment and empirical data.

In my experience, Connectivism has met those four conditions. Those shouldn't be the only ones but as an instructional designer, the theory accounts for current issues in my work in ways that other theories do not.

One of the problems of learning theory is that it is usually an interpretation of learning based on a psychological school of thought, sociology, or philosophy. It would be difficult for learning theory not to come from those disciplines, but learning theory seems to get stuck because while the derivative disciplines may have moved on, the learning theory often does not because educators are not participating or doing research in the parent disciplines.

New theories come about when the current theories no longer account for new information or phenomena. This is what made Connectivism particularly important to my work. The theory was created by Stephen Downed and George Siemens (Connectivism: a learning theory for the digital age) at the same time that networks and social media were impacting education in some profound ways. Some of the phenomena that Connectivism accounts for are phenomena that many educators fight against: online classes, social media, MOOCs, student-driven learning, etc. Connectivism for these instructors will never be a valid theory because they will never be comfortable with some of the implications of the theory: it would represent a profound change in their world view that they are not ready to accept. Connectivism is a learning theory because it accounts for the changes we are seeing in our society and in education in ways that the older theories cannot. Even social constructivists have a hard time wrapping their minds around social networks.

With that said, I am no ideologue either. I have my own bones to pick with Connectivism. It is still unclear to me how learning "may reside in a non-human appliance." It should either be the case or not. My definition of learning requires someone to actually do the learning. I see non-human appliances storing information, processing information, even mimicking pattern-making (chess computers). I don't understand how learning resides there. That is my "why a duck?" moment with the theory. It also feels like a left over principle from another theory that is not necessary for Connectivism to be a strong theory on its own.

But Connectivism is not just an explanatory or descriptive theory. As an instructional designer, I can use it to help analyze the success and failure of a particular course. So how would I test it? There are a number of ways. First, we build a course design rubric based on the tenets of Connectivism, and compare the success and retention rates, and course satisfaction (for students and teachers). Second, we repeat the experiment, and share the finding so others can reproduce the results.

The jury is still out for Connectivism. This is as it should be! The jury should always be out for all theories if we are going to engage in the scientific method and reason together.

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Some Notes on Connectivism and Peer Review

A social network diagram (Wikipedia)

I have been looking at social constructivism and the social generation of knowledge over the last week. I am interested in this line of thought because I feel that for us to really get a handle on what connectivism is, we have to be able to talk about it in the context of previous theories that talk about how we communicate and learn. Connectivism has to account for social constructivism because that is one of the prevailing theories about learning in the universities. According to Stephen Downes, "connectivism is the thesis that knowledge is distributed across a network of connections, and therefore that learning consists of the ability to construct and traverse those networks." Connectivism, if you are not yet familiar with it, is a learning theory proposed by Stephen Downes and George Siemens. It is important to note that even though this is a new theory, it is not particularly dependent on any technology: connectivism was not invented by the internet. The internet was invented because we are very interested in communicating and being connected, and connectivism is a useful theory that can describe how this happens. When I say that connectvism is nothing new, I am not saying that in a derogatory way, I mean that it is the natural evolution of our understanding of how we learn. In various postings in this blog, I have pointed out how throughout history spontaneous learning networks have arisen between groups and individuals. I am interested in in the development of communication and knowledge networks from the earliest mail routes to the "Republic of Letters," from the telegraph to the early dial-up networks, from the Minitel to the modern internet. There is a lot of concern out there about whether or not connectivism is a learning theory or not. I find this issue ironic and kind of amusing. Well, it is about learning, so that is settled. How can it not be a theory? According to Merriam-Webster, a theory is "an idea or set of ideas meant to explain facts or events" and "an idea that is suggested or presented as possibly true that is not known or proven to be true" and finally, the third definition "the general principles or ideas that relate to a subject." So yes, it is a theory, the real question is whether or not it is a strong or weak theory, or does it account for the facts? Can we make predictions with this theory? Does it explain what happened before? The irony is that the same mechanisms that educators are going to use test whether or not it is a useful theory are the same mechanisms connectivism describes, for instance, peer review.

Brent Renalli has in interesting paper called "A Pre-history of Peer Review: Religious Blueprints from the Hartlib Cycle." In it, I ran into my old friend John Cominus (1592-1670), the author of one of the first illustrated textbooks for children. He was also an early proponent of universal education, visual learning, and going beyond rote memorization in schools. All of these ideas, like connectivism, are still considered "new" and controversial in many universities - any instructional designer can tell you stories about that! I didn't go looking for Cominus, but in my research into education, I keep running into him. In a typical paper on peer review, authors tend to credit the Royal Society with its invention, but it was already a well-established system in Europe and elsewhere to ensure religious orthodoxy as a mechanism of censure. "Peer review" is generally not a good way to get new ideas out.

Connectivism has gone through its modern "Republic of Letters" stage via the blogs. Downes and Siemens both have used the blogs to write books, essays, and propose ideas. Educators in turn have responded for and against on their respective blogs - and continue to do so. And now, Siemens has published in a more formal and traditional manner with peer reviewed journals such as MERLOT's Journal of Online Learning and Teaching. Other education researchers are publishing articles about connectivism such as Dorothy Kropf in the European Journal of Open, Distance, and Elearning. Thus far, the ideas around connectivism have had more exposure and peer review than Einstein's theory of relativity had in 1905 (the "Annus Mirabilis" papers) when only Max Plank and Wilhelm Wien had read them before publication in Annalen der Physik. I wonder if the theory of connectivism could have come out of the traditional institutions. I think these ideas had to have been born in the very media the theory analyzes. In many ways, the theory flies in the face of all the accepted theories in education (behavioralism, cognitivism, and the many shades of constructivism) and probably would not have gained traction. I have seen papers get rejected from journals because there are not enough researchers publishing about idea X in refereed journals. We have to expect that. Universities rarely innovate - that is left to the lonely patent clerks of the world. Universities are where ideas go to fossilize and become the established order. Connectivism needed the internet, blogs, and Twitter to take shape.

Friday, July 12, 2013

Mobytes Instructional Design App

Juniper Hall at Humboldt State University.
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One of our technologically ever-vigilant instructional designers here at Humboldt State (Kim Vincent-Layton) shared an interesting Android app with us the other day - Mobytes Instructional Design App. The app is a handy collection of articles and templates on instructional design. What is a "mobyte"? A mobyte is a "just-in-time chunk of learning designed for just-enough knowledge to learn or apply while performing a task. It can be used for learning from scratch, refreshing and updating knowledge while on the move." I like this app because it covers, at a basic level, the current understanding and definition of instructional design that any student of education would find in a instructional design class. I would like to share this app with administrators and teachers to help promote a deeper understanding of instructional design and its possibilities. The author, Madhuri Dubey, has distilled five topics into the app:

Instructional Design (ID) basics
Evolution and application
Learning theory and styles
Instructional theory
Getting started with ID

This reference would be useful for instructional design teams to all get on the same page as well as for instructors who would find it useful for a better understanding how teaching and learning work. It covers Gagne, ADDIE, Clark, Merrill, Bloom's and the usual suspects.

If you are not an Android phone person, much of the information here is available on Madhuri Dubey's blog.