Learner Experience Design

Project Process + Reflections

I am taking Learner Experience Design, taught by Professor Stacie Rohrbach, as a graduate student in educational technology and applied learning science at Carnegie Mellon University.

Following is the course overview:

Designing experiences that engage people in educational activities that
enhance their learning through meaningful, memorable, and enjoyable
interactions with information is vital to the well-being and advancement of
our society. In striving to aid this effort, we will investigate the intersection
of design thinking, UI/UX design, cognitive studies, social sciences,
instructional design, and educational pedagogy as a way of developing
knowledge and skills in designing experiences for learners. Through
readings, projects, and class exercises, we will explore how people
perceive and process information, what motivates them to learn, and
what constitutes an experience. We will investigate topics that are often
difficult to grasp and collaboratively build a taxonomy that generalizes
and links learning challenges and design approaches. We will also study
traditional and emergent learning tools and methods as a means of
defining affordances and limitations of various learning approaches and
mediums. Our investigation will provide us the opportunity to apply our
discoveries in the design, testing, and assessment of learning experiences
that we create.

1.16.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Icebreaker and Kahoot

I liked listening and contributing to the analysis of the two games we played, the icebreaker and a Kahoot quiz, and am offering a personal take-away from the former, and a reflection on the latter.

Icebreaker game

I enjoyed playing the ice-breaker game because I didn’t know many of my classmates. One of the most memorable parts was a strategy I learned from a classmate. The strategy was to ask a question, and use that information to select one of the possible attributes. The strategy was original, useful and efficient to the game.

Classmate: “Where are you from?” (first question)

Me: “Ithaca, NY”

Classmate: “Oh! Do you prefer mountains over beaches?” (attribute on game board)

Me: “Yes, I do!” (successful use of strategy for the game!)

Additional ideas for Kahoot

I thought that the Kahoot game was a good assessment. In order to make it more instructional, perhaps Kahoot could add a feature wherein the person who creates the quiz can add a page after a question. On that page, the quiz creator could add information about the right answer. As it stands, I temporarily learned some facts, but I don’t have the prior knowledge to integrate those facts into a bigger picture of learning experience design, so I may forget them. If there was more information that did connect with my prior knowledge, perhaps I could start to build that picture.

1.18.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Visit to the Museum of Natural History

Today, our class visited the Museum of Natural History, because we are collaborating with them on a design project regarding their “We are Nature: Living in the Anthropocene” exhibit. During our visit, several staff members of the museum helped us construct understandings of 21st century naturalism, which is central to the purpose of the exhibit, through interactive activities. I would like to take this opportunity to reflect on these exercises.

In one activity, each of us drew a picture of us engaging with nature. I drew the picture of myself biking in the snow, because one way I feel connected with nature is through feeling wind, snow or sunshine.

In another exercise, we sorted cards (below) into a hierarchy in order to clarify the traits we think embody 21st century naturalists.

Explanation

Cards on the left:

• Two cards that are most anti-naturalist in my opinion
• The next four cards that are anti-naturalist in my opinion

Cards on the right:

• Two cards that most represent naturalists’ traits in my opinion
• The next four cards that represent naturalists’ traits in my opinion

Cards in the middle:

• Cards that are neither of the other two categories

Since the staff defined a 21st naturalist as someone who engages deeply with nature, I concluded anybody could be one, from children to older people. I strongly associate environmental conservation with appreciating nature, and humans as part of and a destroyer of other nature, hence the cards on the right. On the left side, I put “is a scientist” and everything else that seem particular to practicing scientists, because they seem like a small subset of naturalists.

I thought the design of the card game was interesting, from the activity itself to its larger context. The activity let us create hierarchies without overwhelming us with small details. By selecting either two or four cards for each level, we didn’t have to make as many decisions as compared to finding “the one most naturalist or anti-naturalist trait.” I think this probably let me do the activity in less time.

The larger context of the activity is a research study coordinated between the UP CLOSE program at the University of Pittsburgh and the museum, which aims to figure out how different people (e.g. visitors and museum staff) think of naturalists. Exploring people’s varying definitions gives the museum the opportunity to develop more intentional programming and exhibitions. For instance, if some people believe they have to be a scientist in order to engage deeply with nature, and other people believe the opposite, I think the museum would provide a different experience than if everyone thinks one way. I think it’s a terrific idea for the museum to be in touch with people from the outside, and to partner with researchers, and feel fortunate to see that from this insider perspective.

1.21.18 | Reading Reflection

Chapter 2, Conceptual Blockbusting by James L. Adams

In Conceptual Blockbusting: A Guide to Better Ideas, Adams describes obstacles that can prevent someone or some people from solving a problem. Through exercises with small problems, like memorizing a string of words, I came to understand the ideas he put forth.

Adams helped me see that the tendency to form stereotypes are hard-wired into our brains. A well-supported theory from brain-research, that all of our brains house distinct ideas that are connected with each other, was made useful when Adams’ connected it to stereotypes. It provides a foundation. When one neuron fires, it causes connected neurons to fire. An example would be firing the idea of “scientist,” and that causing more ideas of “white,” “male,” to fire. Thus, Adams changed my personal definition of a stereotype.

Stereotype (of an individual or group of people): a connection between the neurons

Since stereotypes are dangerous, how does one weaken them? Having the foundation, I feel capable of generating ideas to solve this problem. To weaken the stereotype I have with a group (e.g. professors), get to know one of them, and pay special attention to what surprises you.

Another exercise that illuminated a concept that I kind of take for granted was the following, taken directly from the book (18–19).

Remember the following list. Read it and close the book. Then see if you can repeat it yourself: saw, when, panicked, Jim, ripped, haystack, the, relaxed, when, cloth, the, but, he

The first time I tried, I remembered about five words, a mere five seconds after reading them.

Then, Adams gave us two simple tricks: arrange the words into a sentence, and then keep in mind the phrase “parachute jumping.” Now, I remember almost all of them after a full day! Why could I remember them all with the trick, and only a few without it? It comes down to what Adams calls context, and what I know as prior knowledge.

In the words of Adams, “your brain does not like to transfer this (the original string) kind of information to long-term memory, because it seems random rather than important” (19).

I was a teacher before coming to CMU, and me and my teacher friends talked about “activating prior knowledge” all the time. However, this exercise made me appreciate the concept of prior knowledge even more, because this time I was the learner.

Additional take-aways:

• Ideas follow the problem-statement and its constraints — Reframing a problem from “how can we make a better ______” to the purpose that ______ is supposed to meet, can open the doors to a greater number of solutions.
• It is easier to avoid interpersonal problems than reflect — When such a problem arises, it is far easier to avoid thinking about the other person’s side than it is to try to imagine their side. Try writing about the problem from various perspectives.

1.23.18 | Post-class Reflection

Exercises based on Conceptual Blockbusting by James L. Adams

Today, we participated in four exercises to get to know four of the blocks Adams described in the chapter we read before class. Getting this kind of experience with a reading is tremendously helpful for building mental models of the reading material. We were up and out of our seats, working on authentic tasks with our classmates, so being minds-on and hands-on.

Activity 1: Stereotyping

The first activity involved Stacie calling out a noun, and the class drawing it, a total of four times.

It was interesting that very few of us drew roots for our tree or scallion (which was extra-concerning, considering that’s what they need to survive!), cords for appliances, an image on the TV, or an open refrigerator.

Take-aways:

• Question our interpretation of the “whole picture,” by asking: what am I missing; or what is invisible to the naked eye? Thinking of what is missing or invisible will take more time. In reference to Adams, what you think of immediately (the most well-connected neurons to an idea) is a stereotype, or oversimplification.
• It seems as though we think of appliances - like the TV, microwave or refrigerator - when they are off or closed. To counter this, think about what would distinguish them from something that looks similar.

Activity 2: Difficulty Isolating the Problem

For this activity, Stacie read a scenario in which a medical center was concerned that its patients weren’t taking their medication, and was asking us to communicate the positive benefits of taking it, and the adverse effects of not taking it.

My team started by looking at the prompt and questioning the usefulness of scaring a patient into taking their medication, while simultaneously thinking about the form of the communication: app notifications, images, color. Interspersed, we talked about the reasons someone wouldn’t take their medication.

Halfway through the exercise, we received notice that our users were elderly people taking multiple medications. We made the assumption that the main problem was that they couldn’t easily keep track of when to take their different pills. This influenced the kinds of solutions we envisioned. Some were: make the bottle change color (red-yellow-green) as the time to take the medication drew closer; and have the doctor provide a service to the patient, by devising a personalized schedule.

After the activity, we debriefed as a class. Stacie showed us a way to visualize the quantity of possible problems/solutions. As you go down the triangle, there are fewer problems/solutions, due to making more assumptions. At the end, you arrive at one possible problem/solution. She suggested moving up and down the triangle throughout the design process, which I think will be difficult to do at times (sometimes I just want to get to an answer, and other times I just want to zoom out because of an uncertainty that my assumptions are correct), but ultimately more effective than only going up or down.

Take-aways:

• Move up and down the triangle of problems, by reframing the initial problem. Do you want to design a teapot, or a way to heat water?
• Seek constraints and validate/invalidate assumptions when high on the triangle of problems.
• Going too far down the triangle is equivalent to “working with blinders.” We might fail to identify the root problem, or frame an opportunity incorrectly. This has a huge effect on the possible solutions we come up with, which trickles down to actions and outcomes.

3. Tendency to Limit the Problem Space

For this group activity, we were given a word (knife) and asked to decide on three things it had to have. After we chose blade, handle and precision; we were charged with the task of design a knife without those three things! This was very surprising — I don’t think I had ever done this before.

We began by thinking of alternatives to blade, handle and precision, and then tried to imagine something that had one of each. This felt like applying brute force to the problem.

I thought the point of this exercise was straightforward, but one nuance is that the final products we imagined seem useful for different purposes than the original object, knife.

Take-aways:

• Externalizing ideas makes creating new combinations easier
• Breaking an object into its constituent parts is a good strategy, and then imagining alternatives is a good procedure for innovating.
• Changing an object may change its best use-scenario.

4. Inability to See Problems from Various Stakeholders

The final activity of the day was to develop a plan that would lead to a successful lecture series for a design school. Halfway into the exercise, we were given an additional stakeholder, local residents, to plan for, and asked to consider the challenges and opportunities of the series to them.

When considering audience, the first people we considered was students, and the next was school administration. Clearly, we took into account the people we have the most exposure to first. Being given the additional stakeholder led us to consider new ideas that might benefit ones we thought of before. For example, some design students and college professors might have children who they want to expose design to. Another is traffic — it was something we thought about for local residents that may apply to students. A final one is expertise — again, we thought about prior knowledge once we started considering local residents.

Take-aways:

• Think broadly about who stakeholders may be
• Think about the demographics of stakeholders, e.g., age, family; in addition to interests and goals
• Thinking outside of the necessary set of stakeholders may open up new ideas

1.25.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Conceptual Blockbusting and the Carnegie Museum of Natural History

Today we engaged in two blockbusting activities and then started applying these strategies to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History (CMNH).

1. Saturation

We were given the challenge of drawing the front and back of our student IDs. I was surprised at how little I knew about what was on it. From this activity, I learned that what I don’t use, I don’t notice.

Take-aways:

• What seems normal to people goes unnoticed: The next time I go to the museum, I should look out for what I didn’t notice the first time. For the project, some things that are part of our target audience’s everyday lives may actually be invisible to them. If noticing details is a behavior that is also a learning goal, the exercise we did in class is a good one.

2. Difficulty using all our senses

For this activity, we were given a target of designing communication promoting organic food. Our answer was a poster with pictures, text and icons; all visual things. The second part of the challenge was to incorporate a second sense. For us, it was smell. I took a stab at writing on the board, and found the experience challenging. There’s more to it than just note-taking.

• Organize what the group tells you: when working on a whiteboard, the person with the marker kind of set the tone with what he writes. Create sensible categories to brainstorm on. Write down ideas quickly, but also question them. If the content is disorganized, it is harder to build on what people say.
• Listen to what your group tells you: when you have the marker, you have to be listening actively, so you can write the ideas down. If something doesn’t make sense, that’s OK, but understanding is better. I need to be aware of my tendency to go too deep into an idea.
• Ask on-target questions: when you have the marker, the group’s collective progress depends in part on whatever is on the board. The person with the marker may be expected to have initiative, and facilitate the brainstorming. Other times, there are other people who can guide the brainstorming.
• What we’re doing is mostly intelligently exploring: this kind of sums up the last three points.

3. Blockbusting strategies applied to CMNH

Our group chose to apply our knowledge of blockbusting to the design challenge of getting people who have never been to the museum to connect with it. We started out by brainstorming stereotypes of natural history museums. Oddly, I found myself tending towards hypothesizing how other people see the museum, and less time with how I see them. Perhaps this is because I recently went to it.

• people don’t go because it’s prohibitively expensive
• in order to learn something from the museum, you have to physically go there
• there is pre-requisite knowledge that is necessary for a positive experience
• it takes a long time to go through the museum
• Natural history museums are generic
• they’re old, stuffy, non-interactive
• they’re mainly visual and a little tactile
• they rarely have digital or immersive stuff
• people who work there are old, kooky (not true!)
• audiences: families, tourists

After discussing stereotypes, we reframed the original problem by narrowing the scope. We eventually landed on an audience (single parents with more than one child) and a place (playground), which we plugged into the original challenge. We brainstormed widely given these constraints. Perhaps a whiteboard would have helped us come up with pieces that we could put together in different ways. Maybe if it were Tuesday… :)

Take-aways:

• Think metacognitively: Questioning our memories can lead to stereotypes. Carlie remembered an exhibit that felt immersive, and contrasted that with the stereotypical natural history museum.
• Whenever you speculate you’re hypothesizing, nothing else: this is especially true when trying to imagine from someone else’s perspective. Speculation probably gets less and less accurate as you go further away from your identity. Also, drilling into a stereotype is not necessarily great.
• Whiteboards are good for developing new ideas: I speculate it is easier to develop new ideas from disparate pieces (be creative) when someone is organizing the pieces in one central location. This could have something to do with people “being on the same page.”

1.30.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Dr. Bernice McCarthy 4MAT

Today in class, we took Dr. Bernice McCarthy’s student learning style survey and I found out that I was much more concrete as opposed to abstract in terms of how I perceive, and more active than reflective in terms of how I process information. My placement in the 4MAT graph is below; I’m way up in the upper left quadrant, at (8,-14). If you would like to find out more about 4MAT, you can watch this video.

Dr. Bernice McCarthy’s 4Mat

Funny enough, my reaction to my learning style was to try to think of concrete examples of thinking concretely.

My critique of learning style surveys is that people are prone to answering what they want to be, rather than what they really are.

We talked about the implications of being labeled with a learning style, which was more empowering to me than simply leaving it to sit. These were my main take-aways:

• 4Mat is a way to teach: Start in the upper-right quadrant and move in a clockwise fashion. Progressing through all four quadrants creates a cycle. After one cycle, the learner knows more, so the next time around s/he ideally has a more challenging task that builds off previous knowledge.
• Knowing about learning styles lets you self-monitor: In a project, people can go overboard on different parts of the task, and they usually know it. Therefore, the first important thing is to notice when you’re spending a lot of time on something and spinning your wheels. For me, it’s constantly looking for a bigger and better solution. The second important thing is to have strategies for moving past that point you just love to work on, but can’t seem to stop. One thing I do is try to work with another person, and collectively choosing a direction. Another one is to identify the main purpose I am striving towards, and evaluate all of my ideas based primarily on their alignment with that objective. I should note that these are all easier said than done, but they get the job done most of the time.
• There are issues with any survey: Instead of accepting my learning style as permanent, I argue that we might have answered the questions differently at a different time. Also, I think that some people, including myself, want to be a certain way, and that affects how we describe ourselves. It is hard to distinguish between who I am (which changes, of course), and who I want to be.

For a class activity, we designed an intervention to help freshman college students take care of themselves through food.

• Why?: To start, we try to convince students to consider eating better. We do this indirectly, using another desire we think is related, and may cause bad eating habits. We thought of stress, especially during the second half of a semester; and a desire to save money.
• What?: We thought that we would teach students how their energy is related to what kind of food they eat, from a high-level as well as from a medium-depth biology lesson. We would also give them recipes and food samples, and prices of produce at the supermarket.
• How?: Our solution was to advertise for a stress-management group that centers on beating anxiety with healthy eating and community support. We would give flyers out in the library, since this is where a lot of stressed students go for long hours of studying.
• What if?: In order to encourage students to apply what they learned to new situations, we would want them to spend more time shopping at grocery stores and making recipes. What better way to do that than with friends! To this end, we would offer rides to a supermarket once a weekend, and cooking parties. Eventually, we hope that group members would start their own.

2.1.18 | Post-class Reflection

We formed teams today! I’ll be working alongside TC and Xenia. TC is studying large-scale design and Xenia is in the Integrated Innovation Institution, which makes the three of us different in terms of our background, perspectives and skills.

Our first activity was called “Defining Problems and Mapping Learner Relations.” After talking about objectives, problems and stakeholders, we chose to focus on three stakeholders in particular: first-time participants, 7th/8th graders and camp counselors. I think that’s a good combination, because the counselors and campers will interact directly with each other, so if they have some similar goals, we can design for them first. Those are the low-hanging fruit.

2.6.18 | Reading Reflection

For today, we read chapter three of Julie Dirksen’s great Design for How People Learn. In it, Julie brings to life research-based theories on the mind, particularly the existence of an unconscious, pleasure-driven mind (the elephant) and a conscious, goal-driven mind (the rider). This was one of my main take-aways:

• Sustaining self-control depletes resources: I was reminded of young students in schools who act out. If we give them a task they aren’t interested by, and ask them to sit in their seat “properly,” we are asking them to sustain self-control twice. Given research that supports the notion of finite resources for self-control, it seems advantageous to both classroom management and learning to use strategies for engaging the unconscious, pleasure-driven mind.

Dirksen also talks about stories as a way to draw the elephant’s attention, i.e. motivate the unconscious mind to pay attention to something. To be continued…

2.6.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Today Stacie had us start class by re-orienting ourselves to the project, by taking 10 minutes to write on Medium. I found this very helpful, and — I’m not trying to be funny here — age-appropriate. I thought about whether this exact “anti-activity” would work well with 5th graders, and decided it might. Kindergarteners — not so much. College/graduate students — yes.

After this, we got into our groups and evaluated the problems we thought stood in the way of a successful camp experience at CMNH based on why they were problems at all, and their consequences.

• Inter-group dynamics: We thought about the problems that could arise if campers do not find connections with each other. On the concrete side, campers who feel disconnected may not want to participate, and their overall experience would be negative. As we learned from Adams, the learners might not want to draw upon the knowledge they gained in camp because of those bad feelings that are tied to it.
• Extending learning: Our prompt is to extend learning prior to and after camp. I think the purposes of pre-camp experiences could include: getting students prepared for camp, or getting students excited for camp. For post-camp, the aims could be: making a goal that leads to a habit, teaching what they know (empowerment), or constructing deeper connections by transferring knowledge to another context.

In the second part of class, we started defining the root causes of problems in terms of several channels: knowledge, skills, motivation, environment and communication.

Something I found difficult with this was defining:

• the current state of what: With Stacie’s help, we decided to go with the current state of our three main stakeholders (1st time participants, 7th/8th graders, camp counselors) in the context of the camp. Later, we will define their current states in terms of the pre/post activity and exhibit. Until we know more about the learners, I don’t see how their three states would be different from each other…
• what to put in the current state: In our current framework, we have problems to do with each one of the channels.
• What to put in the communication channel: Is this how CMNH communicates with families, the public, and stakeholders about their camp? If so, we are switching from the current state of learners to the current state of CMNH.

2.12.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Articulate why the preferrable states are preferrable (add because…)

Bridging

Pace layering: fast-paced layering shocks and gets our attention; slow-paced learning is retained, so they have all the power

We might find Bloom’s levels as we start thinking about how to teach quickly/slowly, and bridging the gaps bw current and preferred states.

Activate — when have you done this, or have you ever heard of that

Sufficient — not just asking ‘what is something,’ but asking when and how to apply it

appropriate — how do you begin to apply / why is it important

accurate — how do you address misconceptions: cognitive dissonance, repeated exposure, not too overt

2.13.18 | Pre-Class Reflection

Group Process Thus Far

Our group has a consensus towards developing one or more games that would extend learning to before or after a camp. I think we have good direction in the general areas that our game could touch, from our clients, the Museum of Natural History.

We could put campers in contact with each other through an app, before or after the camp, and give them a game to play. One inspirational game is Matchin’, produced by Luis von Ahn and playable at www.gwap.com. In it, pairs of players operating remotely are given the same picture, and try to guess whether the other player thinks it is attractive.

One mechanic of the game is seeing something with another person, which should build some bonds before or after camp. Another mechanic, the guessing, may build empathy.

• Challenge one’s own psychological barriers to action — both players see text describing a problem the other has posted, e.g. Wants to eat fresh food, but it’s hard to get. The players think of three possible solutions or follow-up questions. Then they see the other player’s proposed solution to their own problem.

• Be inspired to take stewardship of the natural world — players see a picture e.g. pesticides being thrown over plants, and answer the question Would your partner care about this enough to do something about it?

• Break down the line separating humans from nature — players see a term, e.g. pets, and answer the question Would you partner think that this is natural or man-made? ← this one is too objective, I think, there seems to be a right/wrong . An alternative could be a competitive game wherein players race to identify the natural thing in an urban picture.

2.13.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Part 1: Musical Chairs and Resistance to Change

We started class today by playing a game of musical chairs. This is how it went down. Stacie made the announcement, and then let us figure out the rest. Immediately, my analytical brain was on alert. What were we supposed to learn from setting up the game? What role in setting it up was I most suited for? These sorts of questions ran through my head for a few seconds, and then I calmed down. I want to get better at just acting with my gut. I slow things down to be more intentional, and to survey the situation. I like to think that I was just reacting to what the group “needed.” If there was a lot of silence, I would have tried to get us going. I am very metacognitive these days, and sometimes I miss out on a different kind of active learning situation as a result of being very analytical. For example, I look for ways to learn something about social behavior from every situation. I think that I should relax with that.

I found Laura’s comment on resistance to something new very interesting. At the beginning of Musical Chairs, when we were setting up, Laura asked, “Why do we even need chairs? We can just sit on the floor.” She had a reason — we were having a hard time figuring out how to arrange 16 chairs — and she wanted us to get out of that rut. What happened? — there was a slight pause, and then we went back to organizing chairs.

• Being resistant to the status quo is something one hears about all the time, but is hardest to see in oneself.

In this situation, what could have led us to run with Laura’s ideas?

• If a few other people had jumped on board, that might have done it. I dare say we are a pretty daring group, so if a few other people supported, we might have done it just to be different.
• If Laura had given us an action plan, that might have helped too. Without anyone else being gung-ho from the start, I think we needed more than cognitive dissonance to change our mind.
• On the same note as the last idea, if people had ever played Musical Chairs without chairs, we wouldn’t have been so set in our ways. As it was, I’ve only played musical chairs one way.
• Honestly, if we were kids it might have been different. What I’m really getting at is that the idea of sitting down and getting up so many times isn’t too appealing.
• If we had had fewer people, maybe Laura’s idea would have “stuck out” more.
• If there were fun bean bags that we could sit on, maybe it would have worked.

Even though it totally wasn’t the point of the Musical Chairs activity, this resistance-to-change notion was been fun to think about. Thanks Laura!

Part 2: Comparing Musical Chairs and Knockout

What makes musical chairs not very replayable? I was thinking about comparing it to a game I call knockout (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCt8xZgslik)

In knock-out, people shoot a basketball and try to make it in before the person behind them does. In musical chairs, people walk in a circle and try to sit down before the person behind/in front of them does. But knock-out is much more replayable. Why?

- maybe it’s because there’s more skill in knock-out

- maybe it’s because kids already like shooting hoops

- maybe they think it’s a way to get better at basketball

What makes a game replayable is a question my team and I will consider as we think about using games in the client project this semester.

2.15.18 | Post-Class Reflection

Play

Today, Stacie explained “the magic circle” — which is a framework for separating games, play and culture. Games, without their players, are a closed system. In them, there are rules, e.g the code in a videogame or the rules/materials of chess. When a person interacts with a game, s/he can playfully engage with it. In some games, like chess, the players stick closely to the rules. In other cases, which seem more interesting to me at the moment, players go “in and out” of that closed system. I would like to explore this notion by trying to think of some examples from my life…

• Speaking Spanish — I only speak basic Spanish, but when I speak it, I feel like I’m playing. The rules are the Spanish words and grammar. When I formulate a sentence, I have to use the words I know, but there are other words that I don’t know — and I have to improvise. The improvisation feels like play, and saying a sentence feels like a game because there’s a goal.
• Having conversations — Two modes I have while partaking in a conversation are “serious” and “joking.” Culturally, individuals and groups have different ways of talking. Some people like getting to know others; some are more comfortable one on one. Trying to figure out what will make someone start talking and feel comfortable is a kind of play for me.
• Running — it can be very straightforward. Basic running is “the rules” in the Magic Circle. When I’m running in the woods though, and doing more zigzagging and jumping over things, it seems almost like play. It doesn’t feel just like running anymore — it’s as if there’s an obstacle course. These additional elements make the activity more challenging and lead to greater enjoyment.

2.20.18 | Recap

Meeting with TC and Xenia

The first, most important decision we made over the weekend was to change our team name from the apathetic sounding “Fairly Decent” to “Captain Planet.” With that in place, we sent a message to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, asking to meet with them and discuss their camp activities.

TC and I met up another time

2.20.18 | Recap

Memory

How do we get learners from unconscious incompetence → unconscious competence → conscious competence → conscious incompentence

What are the facets of “helping nature flourish in urban settings”?

• observe nature in urban settings — sketch, collect, organize (sort), take pictures of, collaborate, growing a plant
• understand what flourishing means — diversity, individual, an, active, growth spurt, food, family, pets, likes, views, build a team, teamwork, clubs, girlscouts/boyscouts, videogames, community service
• understand the needs of particular kinds of nature — huge range, themselves — sports, pets, baby
• understand their natural habitat(?)
• hands-on experience helping things grow
• understand where to get resources for helping things grow — youtube, google, hardware, home depot field trip,
• dissonance: urban farms

Sequence — above; observe a cycle

mental models (something that you use to store the knowledge): ecosystems, sort stuff into categories, relating human growth to other growth

Are there natural affinities? How do we leverage their prior knowledge? What kinds of mental models do we want the learners to build?

• experience could be individual to start
• homework is to find the perfect plant(s)… or to write a story

why?

• weird stories (someone trying to survive)
• find out where X, Y, Z comes from
• grow the tallest, most nutritious plants

what?

• different components — sunlight, water, air
• where does ______ come from?
• find plants

how?

• challenges
• choose resources
• introduce a disastrous event (e.g. the sun goes out)

what if?

• give students a context
• mentor another group

3.1.18 | Reading Reflection

Understanding

In preparation for class, Stacie had us read a chapter in Understanding by Design, by Wiggins and McTighe. This book has come up quite a few times, not only at CMU, but ever since I started my career in education. To be honest, I never really understood it before. This time, however, the authors and I clicked a little better.

The chapter we read was on different ways people “understand”: through explaining, interpreting, applying, seeing different perspectives, empathizing and by examining self-knowledge.

• Explain: saying how something works, and providing evidence if possible. How to do it: when looking at student work, look for whether they can support their conclusions.
• Interpret: showing that you know the deeper meaning(s) of disparate pieces of evidence. telling or understanding the deeper meaning of a story. For example: a grandfather tells stories about the depression to illustrate the importance of saving for a rainy day. How to do it: After giving students ambiguous, noisy data, see whether they get the main ideas.
• Apply: using information in a new context. How to do it: Give students real-world problems and see whether they can apply their theoretical knowledge.
• Perspective: seeing the various points of view in a situation, without taking a side. For example: seeing how oil companies and environmental activists have vested interests in a dispute.
• Empathy: putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. Different from perspective because empathy means putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, while seeing perspectives is more distant. How to do it: have students role play.
• Self-knowledge: Being aware of what you know and don’t know. Finding your blind spots.

I think most of the learning objectives that I have written as a teacher were of the explain, interpret or perspective variety. I have definitely written LOs with apply, but I don’t think I usually make it a goal for students to empathize or realize what they do and do not know. Why is that?

I think that empathy doesn’t come up a lot in math or science — they are more objective. Social studies and English Language Arts lend themselves better. One often empathizes with characters. It is easier for me to empathize with struggling characters because I associate that with trying to understand someone, making helpful suggestions and being supportive. To me, that’s when empathy is needed.

Over the course of my teaching career, I tried to teach my students to empathize with characters in books. In hindsight, I think they were rather able and willing to do that. It was probably easier when the characters were going through something relatable, and the author tried to elicit an emotional response through words and pictures.

I also tried to teach empathy in a slightly superficial way whenever there was a student in class whom the other students didn’t really understand. For example, if there was a boy who got really angry over small things, I’d bring that up with the rest of the class and ask them to be understanding.

Self-knowledge, being aware of the limits of your knowledge, was something I taught through conflict resolution. In conflict resolution, I would try to help a student see the limits of his own knowledge. “Can you be sure that’s what the other student meant when he said ‘no’?”

3.1.18 | Post-class Reflection

Knowledge

Today, Stacie reviewed the 6 facets of understanding with us, then engaged us with an activity. She assigned each of the four groups one of the facets, and asked us to come up with a dozen examples from our own lives. For our group, the task was to think of times we applied something we learned.

One of the examples from our list was applying the principle of metal expansion under heat to open hard-stuck jars with metal lids. Another example that is not on the list is using the meniscus when measuring water while cooking. These examples are applications that we use very frequently. From them, we abstracted that applications we remember are often practical.

Stacie noticed that most of our examples were from math and the sciences. This made sense, because math and science just seem like they were created in order to be applied. In fact, science might be the opposite, but in school, we use science in order to understand — and that is application.

What would application look like in another discipline? I tend to apply psychology to my everyday life. For example, after reading about the idea that people have limited cognitive resources, and that maintaining attention on something disinteresting, I take more breaks and feel justified doing it.

3.1.18 | Reading Reflection

Component Skills

We read a short section of How Learning Works by Ambrose et al before class today. It was about ‘component skills,’ which are all the smaller skills needed to perform a larger task. The METALS students are well familiar with this idea. We do theoretical cognitive task analyses (CTAs) for tasks, which is a set of methods for hypothesizing the component skills, and empirical CTAs for ascertaining the skills that people actually use while solving those tasks.

Theoretical CTA for solving a geometry problem

Empirical CTA of novices working on geometry problems. Green boxes indicate differences from the theoretical CTA.

Ambrose et al propose that whether to isolate component skills for practice, versus practicing them in the context of the whole task, depends on the task, the goals and the level of expertise the learner possesses.

A while ago, I used to run track and field. We had practices of course. During practice, we would do some warm-ups, and then a work-out — which involved running and drills — followed by a warm-down. The drills, with their emphasis on form, was practicing component skills in isolation. For example, when we did high-knees, we practiced having a straight back and driving our arms to the height at which our fingertips were eye-level. These skills are important for running fast, and driving the arms is useful for when your legs are shot. The work-out, on the other hand, let us integrate our skills within the whole activity.

Going with Ambrose et al, I would say that this kind of practice was useful for semi-novices like ourselves. The drills were teaching us something. For a professional athlete, those drills might be more useful for making certain parts of the body strong. Also, they were able to be isolated from the entire task.