Theory and practice
Richard's work does surface some important pieces of learning
theory that fly in the face of those who see teaching as a craft, not to be
polluted by science, research or learning theories. He teaches biology which, at A-level, has some pretty complex
language, structures and processes, primarily in molecular biology. Rather than
stand and talk at his sitting students, hoping that this stuff will stick, he 'elaborates' the concepts so that they really do stick, in the practical sense of
retention and recall. In short, he uses some pretty basic psychology and learning theory to blend his courses.
Blended learning
What does
he do? Well it’s neither new nor radical. It’s a ‘blend’ of experiments,
videos, models, role play, games, poems, songs and dance to make his lessons more memorable for students. He refuses to just lecture, although he
does include some straight talks in his teaching. Cleverly, for some complex
processes he recognizes that role-playing those processes will result in higher
retention and recall. For
example, in his songs and dances, they wear coloured bibs to represent chromosomes
and DNA neucleotides. In his DNA Boogie, the structure is made explicit by becoming part of the molecule and in the Meiosis Square Dances, students
act out how chromosomes are shared between cells as tissue grow. The students
become the chemical structures, then move and interact with each other to
represent what happens in that biological process. He claims that, “years down
the line they can still recite the songs, even after 15 years”.
Elaboration
What is actually going on here? In terms of learning theory
his method could be summed up as the use of blended learning that includes lots
of ‘elaboration’ to improve retention and recall. He is optimising his blend,
matching elaboration techniques with the learning outcomes. For simple naming the learners stand and chant the structure using their bodies and arms as cues. For
processes, they line up and move around. For chemical interactions, they start
to interact with each other in groups. This is not blended teaching, it’s
blended learning. There's a difference.
What helps here is a simple understanding of Declarative
(semantic & episodic) and Nondeclarative (skills, priming, conditioning)
memory. Put simply, the difference between knowing that and knowing how. Once
you understand these different forms of memory you can blend more successfully,
even using one form of memory to help another. Elaboration, along with spaced practice is little understood
in education but it can be incredibly useful for novice learners, who, despite
what we think of the curriculum, do have to retain and recall large amounts of
knowledge across a wide range of subjects.
Body as a cue factory
In singing songs and using your own body as a “basic memory
trigger’ Richard Spencer is using the theory of ‘cues’ to improve memory. This
theory was expanded by Tulving and others to show that recall is aided by
‘cues’ which are a bit like the handles on suitcases, in that they can be used
to haul out larger amounts of content. Cues can be things that you already
know, such as your own body, episodic memories such as the route you take to
school or the layout of your own house. In particular, the body can be used for a huge amount of any biology
curriculum. The advantage of using your own body is that this is the one thing
you can take with you into any exam. It’s a travelling cue factory.
Learn by doing
Then there's a well researched area, that is largely ignored in teaching
practice, learning by doing, The simple idea that ‘doing’ results in deep
processing, by using other channels and forms of memory, is well known. Yet we
insist on getting students to sit down for hours on end while we ply them with
information that appeals to only one form of memory – semantic. What Richard is
doing here is linking semantic information ‘words, concepts and processes’ to
songs and dances that act as cues for recalling that semantic knowledge.
Practice
An additional
benefit of Richard's blended, elaborative, cued approach, is that the learners
can go off and practice these songs and dances themselves, even if it is just recall and rehearsal in their heads. They offer ample opportunity for rehearsal and practice, leading
to reinforcement into long-term memory and better recall.
Conclusion
Richard is not charismatic, he’s enthusiastic. In fact he’s
so ordinary, if you watch the videos, it all seems a little gauche. As he says “It’s not about
creating a celebrity teacher but good teaching…. getting people to talk about
teaching globally”. But the key issue here is that it’s not about him, it’s
about what the learners DO. That’s why I think these prizes are misplaced. This
is not about great teachers, it’s about better learning. This is not about
blended teaching, it’s about blended learning by DOING, with a hefty dose of
elaboration – well known and researched topics. The problem is the lack of good theory informing practice and relying on excuses, such as 'teaching is a craft or practice'. This simpely begs the question - what practices? Wouldn’t it be better, not to send Richard
careering round schools, teaching other teachers his dances, but to capture
this stuff and share it through online CPD? To this end I’ve tried to collate a
few links that may be useful.
DNA Boogie dance
Meiosis Square Dance
For a step by step explanation of the dance:
DNA/RNA
No comments:
Post a Comment