Week 8 – EDUC 342: Child Development & New Technologies

Week 8

sandhini — Thu, 25 Feb 2016 08:17:46 +0000

The Zimmerman piece was extremely interesting because it showed gave good guidelines for how ‘learning’ and ‘fun’ can be seamlessly integrated. It was interesting to note how science can informally be integrated in other activities a child engages in.

I found the concept of place-based education to be very relevant. Something that I have heard many students in school complain about is how they feel their education isn’t relevant to ‘real’ life and that after school they’re going to forget everything that they have learnt anyway.

Using the principles of place-based education, people will not only grasp material more easily since it will be easier for them integrate it with prior knowledge but they will believe that what they’re learning is important which will hopefully act as a motivator.

On a different note, it was sad to see how unconscious, instilled stereotypes impact the informal scientific learning of girls. While the findings of the paper were extremely unfortunate, they were also reassuring in that they offered a plausible explanation for the gender-gap in scientific learning. I wonder if this phenomenon is noticed when families engage in activities in domains typically considered to be feminine. Do parents explain more to girls then?

Experiential Education

hgamble — Thu, 25 Feb 2016 07:30:39 +0000

I found Zimmerman’s study of place based learning to be particularly interesting because it rests on a similar educational philosophy as that of Programs like Outward Bounds of SPOT. The motivating philosophy behind outdoor educational experiences is that, with the guidance of an expert, people may push themselves to adapt to often inclement or less than ideal situations, challenge themselves to accomplish tasks that are both physically and mentally demanding, integrate themselves into an environment by not just learning but experiencing the flora, fauna, topography and weather patterns of that area, and reflect on the above experiences with the ultimate goal being personal growth. I am a strong advocate for these types of educational experiences because they emphasize the application and contextualization of knowledge, something that is often difficult to communicate in a classroom setting.

Week 8: Informal Science Learning

ccolgan — Thu, 25 Feb 2016 06:55:32 +0000

This week’s readings looked at how scientific habits can be formed, fostered, and adapted. Crowley et al.’s look at parents’ explanations to their children featured specific, though “inconclusive,” evidence of its findings that parents explain scientific phenomena more to boys than to girls. Parents have go beyond simply bring their children to the museum, they must overcome gender stereotypes in order for their daughters to have the same relationship to science as their sons. Is this something that museum facilitators could be trained to encourage in the museum? If children of all genders receive the same explanations, they can develop scientific reasoning, a skill they just might need to play WoW.

While video games were considered “torpid” by researchers of the past, Steinkuehler and Duncan find that WoW can actually be a place of learning, specifically in informal science literacy. By giving these players a platform for collective knowledge gathering, they learn from each other about how to play the game. The knowledge does not come from above, but can be the result of one player’s shared experience which is then debated and built upon by other players. This kind of community collaboration could definitely be used for “bridging third places” — Steinkuehler’s name for the space between school and home that allows for student learning.

Zimmerman and Land discuss the design guidelines that can be used in these “third places,” specifically in place-based learning at the Arboretum. These researchers find some really compelling applications of place-based informal learning. However, I still struggle with this approach: how much is the app a distraction from the nature at hand? Is it important that the kids learn outside? In different life stages, would they learn as much in an informal discussion with mom and dad or as a player in a video game with an active scientifically minded-community?