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Andreas Kuswara's insight:
Although the title might be intended to provoke responses, IMHO the article put forward one important argument for a perspective; that is to look at the affordances of a mode of teaching/learning rather than the mode it self.The lecture is just another pedagogical approach; it's a method of teaching/learning. This mode has some inherent affordance, e.g. primarily one to many transmission to capture mass audience; it also has some context-dependent affordance, e.g. the interactivity of the feedback channel. No matter what you do, a lecture is essentially one to many transmission, which is the appropriate one to deliver standard content to mass to achieve consistency. If you wished to enquire students' mind and allowed them to reflect and project their opinions to others, lecture probably is a lousy (although not impossible) venue to do that.But within lecture mode, there you can control the degree of backchannel interaction; and usually technology plays the modifier effect to these context-dependent affordances.e.g.A Twitter used in a lecture hall allows students to engage in short & concise conversation, that force them to boil down their responses to short bursts. The rapid nature of live Twitter streams not inherently give your student sufficient time to reflect and ponder their response. The pace and nature of the response will to a great extent influenced by the technical affordance of the tool.e.g.A collaboration support tool such as NearPod, being used in a lecture hall allows a potentially very different interaction. There could be a more dynamic pull-push of information between individual audience, audiences as a collective and the lecturer/presenter. A survey can be deployed, and students give their response, then based on that, the presenter can adjust the content or pace or direction of the presentation.And there are more tools/technology available out there to modify the lecture mode. Technology has enabled us to add more these add-on affordance to the same delivery mode, i.e. lecture. This ability can also be true for many other pedagogical approaches. The same tool can modify several pedagogical approaches, another tool would be better suited to modify some other approaches.The role of technology as a modifier rather than a substitute for a pedagogy approach is a more appropriate lenses to look at educational technology, and a less confrontational approach in the ed-tech implementation.The article made a judgment that we should scrap the outdated lecture model, which is purely transmitted with students only taking notes. I probably agree we shouldn't torment our students with hours (or more) outdated model of lectures, but I probably won't call it outdated. There could be a time when students need to sit down and take notes, not doing anything else. If academics are more dynamics and add more arsenals in their pedagogy toolbox, incorporating technology whenever appropriate and for the duration when it's appropriate. Then confidently switch to other tool, just as we switch between spoon and chopstick during our meal, a different tool, different use, aiming at the same purpose.The author of this article summed things up perfectly when he said "There are multiple paths through which deep, meaningful learning can occur within the classroom. Rather than pitting one method against another or advocating a whole-scale substitution of instructional approaches, teachers and administrators should consider and leverage what works in a more integrated way".Image may be NSFW.
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Recently, Stephen Kosslyn, the founding Dean of Minerva Schools, offered a great explanation of
why active learning is superior to lectures. While I admire and appreciate radical innovations in educational models like Minerva, I’d like to share a point of view that presents the lecture and act
Andreas Kuswara's insight:
Although the title might be intended to provoke responses, IMHO the article put forward one important argument for a perspective; that is to look at the affordances of a mode of teaching/learning rather than the mode it self.The lecture is just another pedagogical approach; it's a method of teaching/learning. This mode has some inherent affordance, e.g. primarily one to many transmission to capture mass audience; it also has some context-dependent affordance, e.g. the interactivity of the feedback channel. No matter what you do, a lecture is essentially one to many transmission, which is the appropriate one to deliver standard content to mass to achieve consistency. If you wished to enquire students' mind and allowed them to reflect and project their opinions to others, lecture probably is a lousy (although not impossible) venue to do that.But within lecture mode, there you can control the degree of backchannel interaction; and usually technology plays the modifier effect to these context-dependent affordances.e.g.A Twitter used in a lecture hall allows students to engage in short & concise conversation, that force them to boil down their responses to short bursts. The rapid nature of live Twitter streams not inherently give your student sufficient time to reflect and ponder their response. The pace and nature of the response will to a great extent influenced by the technical affordance of the tool.e.g.A collaboration support tool such as NearPod, being used in a lecture hall allows a potentially very different interaction. There could be a more dynamic pull-push of information between individual audience, audiences as a collective and the lecturer/presenter. A survey can be deployed, and students give their response, then based on that, the presenter can adjust the content or pace or direction of the presentation.And there are more tools/technology available out there to modify the lecture mode. Technology has enabled us to add more these add-on affordance to the same delivery mode, i.e. lecture. This ability can also be true for many other pedagogical approaches. The same tool can modify several pedagogical approaches, another tool would be better suited to modify some other approaches.The role of technology as a modifier rather than a substitute for a pedagogy approach is a more appropriate lenses to look at educational technology, and a less confrontational approach in the ed-tech implementation.The article made a judgment that we should scrap the outdated lecture model, which is purely transmitted with students only taking notes. I probably agree we shouldn't torment our students with hours (or more) outdated model of lectures, but I probably won't call it outdated. There could be a time when students need to sit down and take notes, not doing anything else. If academics are more dynamics and add more arsenals in their pedagogy toolbox, incorporating technology whenever appropriate and for the duration when it's appropriate. Then confidently switch to other tool, just as we switch between spoon and chopstick during our meal, a different tool, different use, aiming at the same purpose.The author of this article summed things up perfectly when he said "There are multiple paths through which deep, meaningful learning can occur within the classroom. Rather than pitting one method against another or advocating a whole-scale substitution of instructional approaches, teachers and administrators should consider and leverage what works in a more integrated way".Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
