Department of Science Education

Approaches to learning (and teaching and supervising)

Aim of session:Understanding of how ones perception of learning can

influence how one sees supervision

Department of Science Education

What is learning?

Sted og datoDias 2

1. Individually: Reflect on what you mean by ‘learning’. When has someone learned something? (brainstorm 2-3 minutes)

2. Exchange your reflections in groups

3. Try to arrange your different conceptions of learning in a hierarchy with the most simple in the bottom and the most advanced at top.

Six conceptions of learning

Students say that learning is …

1. A quantitative increase of knowledge 2. Memorising 3. The acquisition of facts and procedures for later use 4. The abstraction of meaning 5. An interpretative process for understanding reality 6. Changing as a person

The outcomes of learning

The processes of learning

There are strong connections between a person’s conceptions of learning and the person’s choice of study strategies:

The conceptions of learning co-determine the learning outcome!

Students focus their attention on the overall meaning or message in a class session, text or situation. They attempt to relate ideas together and construct their own meaning, possibly in relation to their own experience.

Students focus their attention on the details and information in a class session or text. They are trying to memorise these individual details in the form they appear in the class or text or to list the features of the situation in order to pass the examinations.

Surface approach

Deep approach

Surface vs. Deep approach towards learning

Constructivist learning

Existing knowledge New informationNew phenomenon

interpret

modify

New knowledge

Department of Science Education

Constructivism versus Transfer

Constructivism: learning is determined by the individual’s development, and the individual must him- or herself construct the knowledge - it cannot be transferred

Activate the student – it is he or her that are going to do the work!• don’t always tell the ‘solution’, what’s ‘right’• give time and space for the students’ own knowledge

construction• relate to earlier knowledge and give examples and metaphors