aprticipant centered NTLC

Sacraments, Social Networks, Farm Teams

Sacramental and Social Networks and creating a farm team

I have these three ideas. I won’t try to explain them, just jot notes.

When you are in class with a laptop, you are in class technologized to your social network. A class then is a group of people all independently connected to their social network. In the old days a teacher could assume that for at least an hour students abandoned their social networks, left them literally at the door, and entered the social network of the class. No longer true. The class as a social network now competes with all the independent networks. The teacher must facilitate a way either to get all those networks to be part of and contribute to the class network, or to eliminate or at least minimize the independent social networks. I need to think though how to do that..

Perhaps sacramental will help. Thomas Merton suggests that even a landscape is sacramental, by which he means a site the experience of which leads to a satisfying connection to spiritual power. Actually he says that it leads to grace which is sharing in the life of God. I need to use the generalized statement.. I can use it to explain the attraction, even power, of landscapes, photographs, art, architecture. Each object becomes a sacramental site. But a further thought on sacraments. They define who is in, or to whom the connection is extended. Only members of Catholicism, for instance can receive Holy Orders or Extreme Unction. Baptism is what makes you a member. Other sacraments define a way of life—confession, communion, confirmation. I like the model, the generalized one, because it gives me an explanation of the power of the aesthetic and extends the aesthetic to all areas of life.

Now if we combine social networks, which in a way are sacramental, you join, you have communion, you proclaim yourself as a member of the group, you draw nearly constant strength from being a member and partaking in the sacraments. So how does the class achieve that status? The old rituals of registration are no longer effective, well efficacious is what I mean. They have the same quaint or oldtime presence that taking part in a bonfire ceremony on December 21 has, perhaps neat, but mostly something you do to get along with a group. Could a class achieve the status of replacing or at least joining all those independent social networks? If so, how?

Now on to the Farm Team. It has occurred to me that as a Director of a faculty development organization, I am a bottleneck. Here is the issue. I receive many ideas about possible development activities—grants, short tip or problem-solving sessions, long research sessions. The problem is that though the flow in is heavy and rich, the flow out is thin, narrow. The lake forms behind me, a stream trickles out from me. In other words, I don’t have anyone to easily send the message to with the expectation that I am not more or less begging them to take it, but offering them an opportunity that they want to be part of. I have a few people, my small team, that I can turn to, but they simply can’t absorb all the ideas; they can’t, in other words, act on the opportunities. There are too many opportunities. So I fill up the available reservoirs and have a lot left over with no place to go. If I may change the metaphor what I have is a situation where I have a major league site, but just now I haven’t filled out the roster. I can’t make any trades. All I can do is put people in the farm team and grow them into major leaguers (not that the people are not major leaguers personally, but that they are not on my team and often don’t have any idea of wha I have to offer). OK, I need to create a farm team. Or to put it another way, I need to build a new large reservoir so I can move the flow coming in out to a place just as large. How do I do that? How do I put people in the situation where they are on my team and ready for the opportunities I have to offer. I can’t trade for them; like major league teams I have to build the organization.

So, to brainstorm: I send out agents to recruit? I offer good deals to free agents? What do recruits need in order to join my social network? I am not sure. Perhaps I can offer 10 1k grants? But are grants the best? Could I offer 10 1K something else? Summer contracts? What would 10K buy in terms of personal satisfaction—speakers? The hallway groups? How many players do I need? Could I have, or aim for, a set number, a critical mass? Like 50 people on a special list?

Does Technology Cause Learning--(Quite Long, sorry)

Learning Through Technology

My question today is Do you learn through technology? I see this as a slightly different question than do you learn with technology? Let me explore both.

First, some assumptions. Right now I am assuming that the end product of the learning process remains the same. (perhaps this is it, the learning is a process not the product). In the end a good paper is a good paper, and the same with two other items, a good photograph and a good fitting pair of pants. End products are always created by technology. So there have been written documents for easily 2500 years. During that time superb documents, classics for the ages, have been composed using quill and parchment technology. The great Roman works, the Declaration of Independence, and the Gettysberg Address come to mind. The assumption I would make is that these documents are the definition of good. If a document is as good as they are, then that document is good, regardless of the technology used to create it.
The same is true of early photographs--say Steichen's. His images are good. Any image, created in any way, must be as good as that, and can't be any better than that. And the same is true of pants fitting. Regardless of how they are made, by hand stitching or machine, a good fit is a good fit.

The interesting thing about this is that new technologies replace old ones and no one goes back to the old ones. Word processors have for many people replaced pen and paper which in turn replaced quill and parchment. Even though a person could still produce a paper using either of the previous two, once you move to the new, you don't go back to the old, and you certainly don't go back two versions. You probably go can and do go back to pen and ink, but the number of people who would go back to quill and parchment is infinitesimally small.

So in terms of learning once you know a thing, you know it, regardless of how you got there. I know that Washington was the first president. I can't improve on my grasp of that fact and no one can really have a better grasp of that fact than I do. But of course someone can know a whole lot more about the implications of that fact. For instance I also know, from crossword puzzles, that Edo is the old name for Toyko. I know that as well as the residents of Toyko know it, but I have no sense whatever of the implications of that fact, a condition that I will return to later.

On to the second question. Do you learn with technology? Well, yes you do. To learn you go to a class room, use a pen and notebook to take notes, read from a book or magazine. Or you go to a lab and use various instruments to perform operations on various objects, and record the results of those operations using paper and ink, and pens. In other words it is fairly clear that you interact with a technological world in order to learn, and that learning, in one way, is interacting with the technological world.

Now, the interaction with the technological world can impede your ability to produce a quality document. You have to master the technology in order to make it work for you. Of course many technologies work hard to reduce this need to learn. Hooking up a TV to a cable system is now much easier than it was just five years ago. Then you had to manually cause the TV to 'memorize' each channel available on the system. Now the TV does that by itself, thus making it much easier (and thus desirable) to buy and use such a TV. The same is true say of overheads. If I know how to make an overhead, using a clear acetate sheet, and a typed page, I can conceive of the idea, open the software program, type, save, and print the document, go to the master maker, run the sheet and the acetate through the machine and take it to class and project it on the screen using the projector that is there in the class. I know before I start that I have mastered this process and that I can go from nothing to displayed-in-class in about five minutes. However, I could also do the exact same thing with a PowerPoint slide, in less time, if I open my laptop, open PowerPoint, type the slide, save it, and carry the laptop to class where I connect it to the cord, turn on the overhead and project it from my computer onto the wall. But the point here is that if I do not know the technology of laptops, PowerPoint, and the classroom LCD projection system, I will not use the technology, because it will take longer, I am not sure of the results (which I need to be sure of since I need it for a point in class), and I wish to avoid frustration.

In other words I cannot produce a quality document in PowerPoint until I master PowerPoint and the attendant display system. Thus my students will not use the electronic technology to learn, nor will I use it to teach, until I master the technology, though presumably the end product is as good and as effective whichever technology I use.

Let me go on. If I learn the technology, I can make a better end product, in some ways. So, for instance, I can eliminate reader discomfort by typing the essay, thus they do not have to decipher my bad handwriting. I can eliminate little errors in my photographs by touching them up with Photoshop. I can achieve better because I know how to use the technology. I am able to learn with technology because I can bring the photo onto the screen, change it, and make it better. I can do this process faster and easier on screen than I ever could by using a dark room. Notice the important part in the above description. It is the "change it and make it better"--the need to change it and the identification of the item to eliminate reside in my head, I think. I have amalgamated that into my value or judgment systems and I come to that conclusion and then I use the technology to fix it. There are variations on this process. So as I type, my program keeps underlining in green the two spaces I use after a period. It is signaling me that this item is wrong and should be corrected. If I eliminate one of the spaces, the green underline goes away and I have a better paper. And if I type "teh" the program will automatically rearrange the letters and place "the" on the page. In other words the technology makes my paper better even though I have not learned to type correctly. It finds and fixes the error.

Now this find and fix appears to have a social dimension. How would I or the program know to find and fix? It is because I have had iterations--other times that I have done this--that have been compared to a standard created by others and explained in one way or another to me by others. So I might not see that a particular bright spot, or background item, hinders the effectiveness of a photo. But if other people who have mastery look at my work and use the standard that they have internalized as part of their becoming a master and if they apply that to my work, showing me what is wrong and explaining the principle to me, then I internalize it and use it in my work. The same can be said of well fitting pants. If I wear pants that are too long or short, I still cover my legs. But if someone else points out to me, as they do on Queer Eye on the Straight Guy, that my pants are ill-fitting and then show me how to judge well-fitting, I am able to internalize their principle and then in the future use the internalized principle and apply it to other pairs of pants. In other words the ability to make things better comes from not just my abilities with technology and with judgment, but also comes from my interaction with other people who have attained mastery in this system (paper, photo, pants).

This, of course, seems to be avoiding the question. I can make a better photograph using technology but do I learn through the technology? In other words even if I have a better understanding of technology, I am not, it seems, able to make a better paper than you. If you are a better writer than I, then your paper will be better even if I know word processing very well and you hand write it and have someone else type it.

Do I learn through technology, do I HAVE to learn through technology, in order to achieve the mastery that I need to show that I have learned? In other words can technology assemble in my head what I need in order to have a better product? Well for doctors there seems to be a situation where something like that happens. A good doctor analyzes a situation, and takes a course of action which allows a cure. However, in a complicated problem the doctor will take blood, urine, even fecal samples and have them analyzed by technological tests to identify ingredients, say potassium levels or the presence of certain kinds of bacteria. As a result of the piece of paper that he or she receives with the results on, he or she makes a decision on a course of action. The technology has performed all the analysis for the doctor. What the doctor has to be able to do is apply principles, gotten from other iterations and other interpretations from other doctors, in order to effect a cure. The analysis shows this level of potassium, thus prescribe this pill, that type of bacteria, thus this antibiotic.

Let’s go in a different direction. Let’s say that learning is the result of encountering something new (in various ways, problems and curiosity being two obvious ones), then working on relating it to prior knowledge, manipulating the relevant data, and reflecting on your process of dealing with the new item. This model is one put forth in How People Learn and seems robust. Can technology help with either of these three subprocesses? Well obviously it can. A person can perform any of the three using a technology, though, of course, no technology is required. For example if I wander off the trail and get lost but know that the mountain range was behind me as I entered the forest, and if I know that if I walk toward the mountains I will eventually hit the road, then when I walk toward them, find the road and my car, I will have solved my problem without any technology whatever.

Of course, if I had used a compass or a map I could have solved my problem with the aid of technology, an interaction that is absolutely essential if I get lost in a canoe in a fog on a lake with many islands. But what CAN technology do by itself to help me learn or to help me learn better? Granted the learning model I posited above, can technology help me relate, manipulate or reflect better? Well, first of all it could help me manipulate data faster and more thoroughly, showing history, range and patterns more quickly than I could produce by myself. In that way technology is a kind of ‘social learning community’, like a group of research assistants, it can find and present data faster than I could collect and arrange it. So it can help me that way. I can perhaps even be more assured that my data and my manipulations are correct, so the conclusions I draw are more useful. The example of the map and compass in the fog seem appropriate here.


But relating to prior knowledge or reflecting on process and implication, do not seem as amenable to technological intervention. I suppose I could technologize my prior knowledge and use technology to search likely areas that my memory suggests, helping me contact something essentially historical for me—a photo, an article, something I wrote. Again the technological ability appears to be speed, efficiency and range. I still have to interact with the technology to send it on its research journey. I have to tell it where to look. I could also use it to create a web of assistance with prior knowledge, asking others for their memories. There is nothing particularly technical about this act, except that I can ask lots of people and receive lots of answers relatively quickly.

So that brings me to reflection. It strikes me that this process is hard to technologize. I could use word processing to type out my reflections, or audio recording to speak them, but aside from making a record, which is good, the technology does not particularly help me, unless I argue as some do that the act of creating, especially in writing, is the act of discovery. But anyone who has ever been in a good conversation knows that the same level of discovery is possible simply by the interaction. I don’t know that technology can help you reflect better.

As I look at what I have written, I see speed, range, efficiency, social community both technical and personal, ease of contacting data. In the end then technology can help me learn better if I see it as other than learning that Washington was the first president. What the technology does do is allow me to create iterations faster, and if iterations are a basic cause of realigning brain synapses then that is a major help. If I can be surer of my data, as supplied by my technological community, then I can reflect with more confidence, and I should be able to probe my history with more confidence. The confidence level should affect my quality as a learner—because I would be closer to the expert capability of chunking my knowledge and drawing on the most relevant parts in order to solve future problems.

All by itself does technology change the need to invest myself in the process? No. but once I invest what does it allow me? My answer at this time would be that it allows me speed and confidence so that I can successfully encounter more problems. It then gives me two things, the solution to the current problem and the expertise to deal with the future. Other ways will—and obviously have—grant the same allowance. However, as no one will return to the quill pen, no one will return to laborious book searching by lone individuals, at least not for most of the problems. Can technology help you learn better? Well, yes, if you see that not just finding the answer is what you mean by learning.

Narrative of A Teaching Theory

A discussion of a teaching scenario—what happens after you hand the test back.
Dan Riordan
October 20, 2008

I am not sure that I can precisely define either a model or a theory with enough precision to differentiate the two. However I recently had an experience that has caused me to analyze actions in terms of theory (or model, I am not sure just yet). My analysis led me to phrase the kind of deeper learning question that SOTL can investigate.

Three math teachers sat in my office. We got to talking about tests and student complaints. All three had almost exactly the same story. It went like this: After the test is returned, a student emails the teacher, or asks (confronts?) the teacher about an answer that has been marked wrong. The student says that the grade is unfair because the teacher had never taught the problem that the student had been asked to solve. The teacher responds by pointing out at least three instances in which a problem of the type in question has been either assigned as homework or has been solved in class. The teacher feels that his/her actions are entirely fair, and what the student should know to expect.

I would like to examine this story. It seems to me to be very typical of student/teacher dynamic after a test. I would venture two interpretations—one that deals with morality and the other with theory.

In terms of morality the teacher assumes that he/she has acted in a just (or fair or moral or good) manner in presenting iterations of a problem that she/he expects the student to master because such mastery is essential to understanding essential concepts of the course. The student assumes that he/she has been treated unfairly (or in a bad, unjust, or evil manner) because the teacher has played a trick by not using the problems that had been previously treated in class. Or else the student feels unfairly treated by being marked down as a result of not remembering that the item was treated in class. Either way, the parties find the situation frustrating, so say the least.

In terms of theory, though, the teacher and the student have widely divergent, practically dysfunctional, theories of learning. The teacher assumes that learning occurs as a result of iterative treatment of specific problems that are of the same type. As a result of the iterative treatment the learner grasps the essential concepts and rules of action (in this case the parts of the formula and the appropriate places to apply the formula), and as a result can identify in a new problem, with new specifics, the elements that require using the formula to solve. The student, however, assumes that learning occurs as a result of being given in class a preview of the contents of a test. Having been given that preview, the proof of learning is the ability to identify the previewed problem and repeat the action that was initially performed to solve it. In this case a new problem, one never previewed, is irrelevant to proof of learning because it could not be learned because it had not been previewed.

It seems to me that all of us teachers can resonate to this scenario; we all have some version of this story. If we resonate and if we look at the story in moral terms (or as we often point out, in maturity terms), it is easy to get a good laugh. However, suppose we look at the scenario in learning terms. If my analysis is correct, what is operating here is an amazing disconnect in learning theories. If both groups continue to hold the theories they have, neither will convince the other that learning has occurred. At this point what occurs is one of those incredible “learning moment” opportunities. A teacher will no doubt be asked/confronted in frustrated moral terms, but the discussion could be turned to learning terms. If the discussion were successful the teacher would convince the student that he/she must abandon a currently held learning theory and replace it with a new, much more productive one.

Now, two more questions arise. How can the teacher do that? And Is the analysis I have presented of the student-held theory accurate? At this juncture, SOTL comes in. As a SOTL research director I can see two lines of inquiry here. First is there a way to determine what the student’s theory actually is? Second, what approach would facilitate the “conversion” to a new theory? At this point, I am not prepared to suggest a methodology for investigating these two questions, but it does seem to me that the results of such an investigation could be enormously helpful to all teachers, not just those in a particular discipline. It is possible that not only the student but also the teacher will have to alter her/his theory. It could be, for instance, that the iterative treatment is not as effective as the theory claims it will be, and, thus, something will have to be added to the pedagogical actions.

And a third question—am I correct in naming each of the actions a theory? By so doing I am assuming that a theory is an approach to a set of data that predicts a certain outcome by the use of the approach. Is that a good way to define theory? If we teachers are going to enter into this discussion, and this research, we need to have clear definitions of these concepts so we can guide our students to the growth and deeper understanding that our concepts, we hope, will produce.

And so, the end for now. Thanks to Jill, Nelu, Eileen, and Laura for a wonderful discussion.

Right Answers vs Discovery

I think that we should talk about "right answer" teaching and active learning. I recently was part of a discussion at a workshop that illustrated the difference in the two ways of thinking and the subsequent approaches. One of the participants in the workshop, when asked to demonstrate an active learning technique, asked us to get into groups of 4 and then answer this question, "Why don't the protons in an atom simply fly off into space?" The leader explained briefly that protons are positive charges and positive charges repel one another.

Our group talked for a bit, then decided that the answer was electrons, which are negatively charged and thus should combine with the protons and keep them in the atom. As the various groups in the room reported out, answers were "all over the place." It turns out that our answer is not the right answer—protons and electrons could combine but then the combined unit would fly off into space. What keeps the unit in place? Well, the answer is 'the strong force.' I didn't know that, I wasn't even sure that there was a strong force, and even now don't really know what it is. And, sessions being time bound, I never found out. We had to move on.

After the exercise the pedagogical question arose, "Why take all that time? Why not just tell us it is the strong force?" That question is one that all of us teachers should mull over.

To look at it one way, simply telling us saves a lot of time. It is more efficient. With the extra time gained a teacher could give the class a series of right answers, such as the definition of the strong force, and during the class the teacher could present a clear explanation of the theory of the atom. To find out how well students heard the theory, the teacher can ask the question about why protons don't fly off, receive answers, and identify which students know the answer and which don't.

To look at it a different way, asking groups to speculate on something that they know nothing, or little, about creates narratives of inquiry. These groups may not get to the right answer, though, as the example shows, the right answer can emerge in the discussion. But if the point is the right answer, why bother with the group? The answer is a bit unnerving. The right answer is not the goal of the group, the inquiry is. Given enough time, our group would have started to do some searching on the internet to find out the answer and would eventually have discovered strong force. The difference with the first vision is that we would have had to practice research. In the first version no one had to research.

The scenario leads me to ask, "Well, which way is better?" The answer relates to your definition of better. If better is replication, then the first is better, at least in the short run. If better is expertise, then the second is better, but probably not until there is a long run. At the end of the course the question would have to be, "Which scenario creates students who understand physics better?" The first way is very reassuring for many people. You don't know something. Someone tells you something. You know it and can prove it by telling another person what you know so they know it. In this manner the knowledge of the strong force can spread quickly and easily. The second way is often frustrating for people, especially if they are looking for the right answer.

But the second way also involves people in a narrative, or scenario—depends on the point of view you want to have—of discovery. That discovery journey should lead people to independent work of investigation and should emotionally invest them not only in the answer, but the context of the answer. The first aspect of the discovery journey (investigation) will lead to the manner used by life-long learners, and, if handled well by the teacher, should lead them to the confidence that they can be, and are, people who know how to learn on their own. The second part of the journey (emotional investment) will allow them to remember the answer better but also to hook the answer into something else that situates the answer. So the answer is not just something one could say on Jeopardy or in Trivial Pursuit, but is something that one understands. The answer, then, is something that you can work with.

Should we abandon the search for the right answer? Well, no, of course not. But should we teach for the right answer? I would say, no. We need to teach for the understanding and the life-long learning. The process I have sketched out here will lead to that, as it is called, 'deeper learning.' The issue, one to take up anther time, is that in all probability teachers who use the discovery method will not introduce their students to as many right answers, thus they will not cover as much teaching this way as they could if they taught the other way.

Reflections on difficulties with the theory

The two-dimensional representation of curiosity may be too limited. As I read the theory, I find I would like to see represented two topics not currently in the image—interest and personal/social contexts. These contexts may act as brakes, may act as accelerators, and probably always influence the expression of curiosity.

I don't really know how to depict these two characteristics. The closest I can come is to a color theory illustration such as the following (mmas.unca.edu) that uses three axes to explain the range of any particular color (or hue) from white to black. In terms of curiosity, as the interest became higher the person would move toward white, from which all colors can emerge, and as interest lowers, the person would move toward black where no activity occurs. Highest interest then would be the flat surface at the top and lowest would be the point at the bottom. But this illustration does not yet show a way that the brakes and accelerators work.

Returning to the classroom, a teacher of any topic will be confronted by a range of circles, arcs, and rates of rotation. The issue is to determine what to do. One question, one to ask to get this discussion going, is What strategies can a teacher (or a learner for that matter) use to expand the size of the arc?

Right now I don't know. I don't know how to make "curiosity expand" (if expand is the correct word). I don’t know why I am willing to be curious. I don't remember ever thinking "oh, that is how curiosity works, so now I can do this in that situation." But I have it, and I can turn it on or off. I can get myself interested to explore just about any topic or object. At this time in my life that seems to me to be one of the most interesting, satisfying, compelling actions I can engage in.

The only intellectual strategy that I can think of that appears to cause curiosity, or at least gives the impression of producing the results of curiosity, is the old journalism heuristic—Ask Who? What? Where? When? Why?

In another direction I am very aware that education is impeded by the lack of curiosity which can show up in ways that can seriously affect a group in a class. Consider this scenario. Years ago a colleague and I, both young relatively inexperienced teachers, were teaching literature to freshmen. A standard approach in such a course is the Socratic method of asking a question of a person, then following up with related questions. On this day my colleague had asked a student "What do you think of character X?" The student, demonstrating the stuck curiosity circle beautifully, said, "I would never think of that." End of discussion.

The emotional situation here is important. The student more or less "stuffed" the teacher. There is no place to go with that answer. Thus the student is off the hook. But in addition the student makes social points. She demonstrated that she was in control. The teacher could not force the student's circle to rotate. Furthermore the student illustrates a social pressure—thinking about literature is not a good thing to do, for who knows what reasons. Of course it could be that the student also acted in self-defense, not knowing the answer or wishing to give it, not willing to reveal herself in the situation. In terms of the curiosity wheel, this student's wheel is braked and the arc is a straight line. In short the teacher is now in the difficult position of getting out of the emotional bind and of getting this student's and all the other students' curiosity circles freed up.

Back then to the teaching/learning question. What do you do to free up the wheel and enlarge the arc?

Curiosity Theory--Circles, Arcs, and Interests

Curiosity -- Circles, Arcs, and Interests

This is my first entry for building a model of curiosity for teaching and learning. I have not populated it yet with examples, but I am amazed at how helpful it is in my teaching and learning situations.

Let me tell one story that will perhaps help with my concept. I recently with my wife toured The Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, Maine. This museum occupies the site of three former shipbuilding companies along the Kenebec river. Just upstream from this site is the Bath Iron Works, which builds ships for the US Navy. Since the mid-18th century people have been building ships in this space, rolling them out to the river, and sending them off to sea. The tour had a guide, very knowledgeable, who led about 20 of us around the grounds and explained what happened in the various buildings, and what happened in the yard as the ship took shape over a number of months.

In the group was a woman who asked a LOT of questions. The guide would talk for a bit, telling us about attaching the sides of the ship, creating pitch for sealing, identifying different types of sailing vessels. Whatever it was this woman had a question, often two or three, all of which the guide answered clearly, but briefly. After the tour I thought about the scenario for a long time.

Let's look at the woman. I can say that she was curious. She asked a lot of questions. Her questions indicated that she had some familiarity with the process. She asked those questions in among a large group of strangers. The questions she asked covered a range to topics, often from different angles, such as cause, effect, or an awareness of the system that created the ships. She was curious and fearless. She got a lot of information and I am sure she found the tour very satisfying.

Now let's look at me. My initial reaction was surprise, surprise that someone would ask so many questions in so public a space, especially this type of space, which, according to my way of thinking, has "rules" about not saying too much, and taking up special issues in private after the tour is over. Then my reaction turned to annoyance. Would you please just pipe down? Let the guide get on with it. Quit hogging the question time. I don't care about the answer to a question about the formation of square nails. In other words, not only did I resist her questioning, I resisted her right to ask the questions.

But, finally, thanks to this theory, which I had started to formulate in the car during one of the long drives on our road trip around Maine and the Maritime provinces, I finally realized that she was a model of curiosity, and I, shame on me, needed to get my practice in line with my new-found theory. As I said she was fearless. She asked a lot of questions, she increased her knowledge of the site and the history, she had fun doing it, and she did it in a group. This scenario then showed my the two sides of curiosity—one, it is a way to expand your knowedge and, two, it has a negative social side that has to be ignored if you wish to exercise your curiosity. For me, I realized that I let my curiosity (well, how DO they make square nails?) be impeded by self-imposed social constraints. She had an "arc of curiosity" that swung freely, and I was willing to let my arc by braked by other factors.

With that story in mind, I hope that the following comments and illustration provide an entrance into a topic that I find has thoroughly engrossed, well, my curiosity.

Each person has a curiosity circle. For any given object (which includes anything physical or conceptual) they implement a curiosity arc. If they are very interested in the object, the arc is large, 90, 180, even more degrees. If they are not at all interested in the object, the arc is a line or at best very small, perhaps 2-3 degrees. If they are "typical," the arc is probably about 20 degrees. The circle rotates, freely or impeded, and the arc is thereby moved from curiosity point (or focus) around the circle. Here is my first depiction of this concept.





In addition to the size of the arc, however, is the list of topics of "foci of curiosity" to which the arc can rotate. The list can be numerous or sparse, narrowly focused or very broad, and it probably changes based on the object of focus. More than likely the topics for most people are broad ones, such as cause, effect, implications, history, morality, finances, systems, and associations.

Moreover the arc is clearly associated with and affected by emotions relating to the object. For an object of high interest the arc is large, including a number of focuses, and the circle rotates freely from one focus to another. A person compiles a lot of information about the object. But for an object with low interest the arc is small, and the circle is stuck, won't rotate at all. The interest level depends on many factors, both personal and social. Objects that are approved by personal history or social context allow a larger arc and freer rotation; objects that are not approved or even scorned receive no arc and rotation is slow or non-existent. Often in such a situation efforts to increase the arc or the rotation cause resistance, sometimes acute.

One area of considerable interest, to me at least, is what happens to the arc when the circle is placed over a new object? To my way of thinking, as a curious person, the arc should be large, include many topics, and rotate freely, but my experience shows me that that is seldom the case. Part of that stems from the fact that I don't have time or energy to engage my curiosity circle for every object I encounter. But what should happen if a person is called to focus on an object that is often ignored, say, an automobile transmission, or a species of vegetable, or a philosophical concept?

If you have followed this abstract discussion you can leap, I hope (if I have been clear enough), to applying this model to teaching and learning. It is helpful to think in terms of the resistance that this model indicates, but it is also helpful to think in terms of expertise. In terms of interest, the circle "sticks," won't rotate, if there is a personal or social brake impeding it. In terms of skill, the focal points to place around the circle aren't numerous enough for beginners to investigate the correct aspects.

Experts have lots of expertise (duh). When they encounter an object or situation within the realm of their expertise, they have, you might say, a ready-made template to investigate it. They have learned how to formalize curiosity so that it serves them well. So to speak the circle sits over the object and spins from one focus to another until they find what they need. Because they have committed themselves personally their interest level is high and the circle spins freely. Even if they don't like the object, or the situation in which they study the object, they exercise their curiosity, the circle rotates.

A teacher's problem, and a learner's, is to free up the circle, populate the circumference with enough relevant points, and expand the size of the arc for this, and perhaps any, topic.

Laptop Discipline--Controlling Laptops in the Classroom

Laptop Discipline

I suggest three quite different strategies to use in controlling the way laptops are used on your classes. You can find other discussions of using the laptop as a learning facilitator and that is the way to think of laptops, but the discipline issue is constantly there, so here are some tips.

1. The small child. Think of the laptop as a small child. In a formal situation the child will fidget, fuss, and fool (the 3Fs) around—think of kids at churches, speeches, restaurants. This is the kid who will bother their neighbor and try to get them to fool around too. Then think of the same child engaged in an art project cutting out shapes, gluing them together, creating a final product, perhaps a card for a loved one.

The laptop is like a small child. It will fuss, fidget, and fool around unless you engage it. When I teach if I have my students use their laptops for a focused strategy, all the surfing and 3Fs stop. If I just let my students sit there with their laptops unfocused, pretty soon they and the laptops will be 3F. The key, then, is—focus the use of laptops on course activities. This focus may cause some shift in what you do in class, but it will minimize the 3Fs considerably.

2. The back row crowd. One instructor, Ilse Hartung of Speech Communication, Foreign Languages, Theater and Music, solves her laptop discipline issues by sending those that insist both on coming to class and surfing, etc, to the last two rows of the class. The goal is to move the distraction of the constant screen motion out of view of the people who want to pay attention to the instructor. She says that after a while a number of people leave the back rows and move up front.

This is a brilliant strategy. At first, I know, it sounds horrible, like you are simply "caving in" to laptop misbehavior and acknowledging that you can't do much about it. But actually that is not the way to look at it.
First, you have made a statement of support for the many students who do want to focus on the class.
Second, once you "give permission" to fool around and, at the same time, set up a place for it, you take away the traditional "sneaky not pay attention" scenario. In one way the fun goes out of it.
Third, people who are in the last rows can be down a way, or off, your let-me-give-you-special-help list.
Fourth, as one teacher's experience shows, the act of being sent to the back to fool around often causes students to rethink their presence in class, and the way they want to hang out with their "laptop buddy."

3. Turn off a few programs. Another thing you can do is ask students to turn off their IM program while they are in class. You could also ask them to close their Facebook/My Space tab. If they eliminate just those two sources, a lot of the 3 Fs will end.

Test

This entry is a test to determine how my rss works.