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Tyler Gates
Technology, curriculum, and learning theory
Technology, curriculum, and learning theory
Over the past few weeks I have had the opportunity to learn and reflect on quite a few things as classes hurtle forward at the speed of light (or at least electrons in a copper twisted pair that sometimes get lost on this rural route) at Ontario Tech online. Themes of this 5303G class have covered a lot of ground, some of which are a good refresher and some of which are new and exciting. Two areas of interest stood out to me which I would like blog on now: technology integration into 21st century curricular frameworks, and my one of my favourites, learning theory.
I took the learning theory course last May to August lead by Joe Stokes. I really enjoyed the course, and not just because it was my first in the program! I found that I was really interested in learning about learning, and that it was an incredibly very powerful tool to be able to apply as an educator. We are, after all, in the business of learning. I am 8 courses in to the program now and I still pay careful attention every time learning theory comes up because there's always something new to learn. It seems that M.Ed course creators are just as interested in learning theory as I am, which is great. Looking back though, I am surprised that this was not a key component of my B.Ed (not at OTU). As I recall, we did cover a few basics but not much time was spent on theory. Anyways, I digress.
A few new items to add to my repertoire: social learning theory, elaboration theory, and ARCS model of motivation. Social learning theory (SLT) is a derivative of behaviourism in the sense that rewards and punishments are more intrensic than extrensic. Good behaviour is learned and rewareded socially, while bad behaviour is not. Interesting concept, and intuitive. Especially young students who learn by observation. Elaboration theory I still don't understand. I've read a couple articles, but I still can't fully grasp how it works. Finally, and by contrast, ARCS motivation seems fairly straightforward: Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction. In fact, some of my research into self regulation, metacognition and self-efficacy leads to the importance of these characteristics of motivation and good learning. It is my belief that they likely must go together in some capacity.
image source: https://educationlibrary.org/model-of-motivation-arcs-instructional-design/
References
References
learning-theories.com. (2014a, July 23). ARCS Model of Motivational Design Theories (Keller)—Learning Theories. https://learning-theories.com/kellers-arcs-model-of-motivational-design.html
learning-theories.com. (2014b, July 24). Elaboration Theory (Reigeluth)—Learning Theories. https://learning-theories.com/elaboration-theory-reigeluth.html
Mae Sincero, S. (n.d.). What is Social Learning Theory? Retrieved June 4, 2023, from https://explorable.com/social-learning-theory
Games, gamification, and makerspaces. Oh My!
Games, gamification, and makerspaces. Oh My!
There has been quite a lot of chatter about gamification in my corner of the eduspehere lately. It seems particularly popular in OTU grad studies where has arisen in formal and informal contexts.
I first heard about gamification in my teaching practice when I was teaching Design in Vietnam a few years ago. It was during a conference where one presenter discussed how they gamified school introduction to new students. I thought this was very interesting since I had used extrinsic rewards (games and points) for younger kids in ESL during previous teaching gigs. The concept of gamification gave context to those activities and provided more recommendations. One of those was badges, which I thought was a cool idea so I tried it out. It had varied results but it was fun.
The first time I experienced gamification in a formal context was at OTU during my first course there in 2002 entitled Principles of Learning. I really enjoyed this class (as I mentioned in the previous blog post) and took a lot away from the course including an introduction to gamification. This is where I first heard about Yu-kai Chou's Gamification Octalysis Framework (Chou, n.d.) which I thought was really neat. I have since read several other papers and a book (source), and experienced presentations by enthusiastic grad students.
Every researcher (formal or informal) in the area seems to offer slightly different perspectives on the benefits and applications, but always a set of recommended classroom activities. This is confirmed in Hamari et al (2014) which shows that the gamification literature up to that point commonly mentioned activities including points, leaderboards, achievements/badges, levels, story themes, goals and feedback, rewards, progress, and challenges. Similarly, a book I read more perhaps more in the domain of makerspaces and design in particular suggests many of the same gamification elements including points, badges, levels, challenges, leaderboards etc (Abela, 2020).
Here are some that I think could benefit the program I am involved with, IBMYP Design:
Points. I'm thinking more towards the younger students with points. The youngest I have taught is grade 8, however in an upcoming position I will be teaching grade 6. This may be a suitable mechanism to inspire students as they make their way through the design program and design cycle for the first time, as well as develop technical skills in the makerspace.
Badges. As I mentioned above, I tried this previously in a Design class with limited success. The idea would be to focus on technical skills, but it could also be used to recognize other design skills such as CAD or even the design cycle itself. Badges could recognize specific metrics of achievement in technical skills with different levels such as novice, intermediate and advanced.
Leaderboards. A bit controversial, though appropriate in some instances I do not like the idea since it is entirely objective, while in my opinion one of the strengths of Design is that growth and success is subjective.
Challenges. Design has many challenges at its disposal, some just for fun and some bigger and longer. Challenges could be used intermittently as motivational tools or to contribute to the main design unit.
Story/Theme/Context. Also an interesting idea that I hadn't really thought of before. Brining in a theme of interest for novelty can bring intrest to a project. Though Design tries to do this by offering personalization and options for projects, more novel themes such as zombies or fantasy could be used as well.
References
References
Abela, J. (2020) The Gamified Classroom.
Chou, Y. (n.d.) The Octalysis Framework for Gamification & Behavioral Design. https://yukaichou.com/gamification-examples/octalysis-complete-gamification-framework/
Hamari, J., Koivisto, J., & Sarsa, H. (2014, January). Does gamification work?--a literature review of empirical studies on gamification. 2014 47th Hawaii international conference on system sciences, 3025-3034. IEEE. doi:10.1109/HICSS.2014.377.
About the author
About the author
Tyler Gates is a M.Ed student at Ontario Tech University and an MYP Design teacher.
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