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Teaching and learning in a community of thinking –
challenges and dilemmas
Yoram Harpaz and Adam LefsteinAugust 2004
overview
Theory: pictures of teaching, learning, knowledge and educational aims (Yoram)
Practice: exemplification of the community of thinking framework (Adam)
The “atomic pictures” of traditional education
learning is listening
teaching is telling
knowledge is an object
to be educated is to know valuable content
FactsMathematical
PhysicalHistorical
DisciplinesMathematics
PhysicsHistory
SubjectsMathematics
ScienceHistory
World Scientific knowledge
Educational knowledge
The “Grand Picture” -- a mimetic chain
scientists
curriculumdesigners
teachers
Lesson plans
gluing
new knowledge
old knowledge
Student’s mind
Effective learning
Involvement + Understanding
Involvement: task involvement vs. ego involvement
Understanding: to locate (in context); to perform (thinking operations with knowledge)
• intrinsic motivation
• authentic problems
• undermining
• contents and process match student profiles and styles
• appropriate challenge
basic conditions for effective learning
basic conditions for effective learning
• dialogic environment
• informative ongoing feedback
• supportive climate
• constructive attribution: ability and will vs. other people or luck
• incremental learners vs. entity learners
alternative “atomic pictures”
learning is being involved and understanding
teaching is providing the conditions for effective learning
knowledge is a structure or a “story” that works
being educated is knowing how to relate to knowledge
questions and problems
Community of Thinking
An educational practice based on the alternative “atomic pictures”
Its primary components include
Fertile questionInquiry / researchConcluding performance
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Initiatio
n
Feedback
undermining
open
A Fertile Question is...
• Which is preferable, to be a house-
pet or a wild animal? (non-
disciplinary)
• Why do people marry? (sociology)
• Does competition make us better?
(interdisciplinary)
connected
rich
charged
practical
undermining
open
connected
rich
charged
practical
A Fertile Question is...
• Why did the peasants accept a
class system that exploited and
oppressed them? (history)
• Can betrayal be forgiven?
(literature)
• What should we wear? (chemistry)
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Initiatio
n
Feedback
A good research question is...
• Open – requires that the researcher take a position
• Rich – requires deep and extensive research
• Connected – to the communal fertile question and to the disciplinary domain
• Interesting – to students, and possibly also "objectively"
• Practical – can be coped with in the context of time, material and other constraints
?
fertile question: Does competition make us better?
?
? ?
?Can there be a game without competition?
Does testing improve achievement?
Does too much competition lead to cheating?
Has business destroyed competitive sports? What does
competition do to friendship?
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Initiatio
n
Feedback
School Subject
Research discipline
Pedagogic discipline
Central aim Inculcating existing
knowledge
Producing new
knowledge
Developing thinking and
understandingKnowledge
focus“Basic” and “accepted” knowledge
Areas of uncertainty
and controversy
“Big ideas”: disciplinary
insights and controversies
Inquiry: from School subjects to Pedagogical Discipline
School Subject
Research discipline
Pedagogic discipline
Sources of infor-mation
Secondary sources
(e.g. text-book)
Primary sources
privileged by discipline
“the world
is a text”
Preferred perfor-mance
Examination Research article
Personal under-
standing
Inquiry: from School subjects to Pedagogical Discipline (continued)
research question: Has business destroyed sports?
How would you recommend conducting inquiry?
examples of lines of inquiry:
• case study based on news reports
• interviews with athletes and/or fans
• analysis of a team’s financial report
• comparison of athletes’ biographies – “then” and “now”
• critical review of sports films
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Initiatio
n
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Feedback
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Understanding performances
• To explain knowledge in your own words
• To bring examples of knowledge
• To generalize from an item of knowledge
• To identify knowledge in different contexts
• To explain phenomena by the use of knowledge
• To give arguments to justify knowledge
• To predict on the basis of knowledge
More understanding performances
• To break knowledge into its components (analysis)
• To take a stance with regard to knowledge
• To criticize knowledge on the basis of knowledge
• To create knowledge on the basis of knowledge
• To create a simulation, model or metaphor
• To ask a question on the basis of knowledge
....
Policy position paper
Concluding performance
A comprehensive understanding performance which builds and exhibits understandings for an audience
Mock trial
Lecture
Documentary film Designing
a tool
Museum
Dramatic performance
Research paper
examples of communal concluding performances
Why do people marry?
What should we wear?
“Thinking about marriage?”
Instructions manual
Fashion show and information display
at shopping mall
more examples of communal performances
Why did the peasants accept a class system
that exploited and oppressed them?
Does competition make us better?
Mock trial with evidence and witnesses
Interactive museum
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Initi
ation
Feedback
Initiation
Developing the common knowledge basis necessary
for understanding the fertile question, for creating
questions and for conducting research, via...
• Clarifying central concepts and ideas
• “Creating” the fertile question
• Guiding “mini-inquiries”
• Connecting concepts to the questions that gave rise to them (archeology of knowledge)
• Creating a “questions bank”
• ...
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Research Question
Fertile Question
Communal concluding performance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Concludingperformance
Inquiry Inquiry Inquiry
Initiatio
n
Feedback
Feedback
Providing the learner with information and stimulus to
further and deepen his or her learning; providing the
teacher with information to improve his or her teaching
• Listen and converse
• Pose questions
• Probe student understanding
• Don’t solve students’ problems for them
• Orient to what can be realistically improved
• Provide examples, but aim for general issues
• Minimize judgment
• ...
questions and problems
