Learning to Learn
4:57pm Wednesday, 9th April 2003
Notes from the CfL event - "Learning to Learn"
9th April, New Connaught Rooms, London
Bill Lucas : Learning to Learn
Introduction
1. "Learning to learn" is not a quick fix. We don't need "learnacy" like we have literacy or numeracy strategies or "yet another initiative" of any kind.
2. Learning to learn is:
It is an approach to learning that is respectful of the learner.
3. In a recent large scale survey, 63% of students reported that they spent very high amounts of their time in school copying from the board and 37% said they spent very high amounts of time listening to a teacher talking.
4. At present in our education system, educators don't learn how the brain works.
Why is learning to learn so important?
Learning Styles
Learning styles are based on theories of whether potential is fixed (ability) or expandable (capability).
Examples of learning styles:
Many of the above are views of intelligence. They are all popular at the moment. Added to this list could be Sternberg's work on inkling and superintelligence, Handy on practical intelligence. The point is that each of the above is "entirely bogus" because they make unreal distinctions in the ways that people learn. The power of many popular styles is that they allow the general public to let go of IQ and other personality tests which are deeply engrained in our culture.
Lucas says:
"The key questions are: are you using the data you get via tests of learning style?" and "are you using them as alone or as one piece of information amongst many?"
The real benefit comes from students themselves learning how they learn.
It also means that teachers must know and be able to articulate what their own model of learning is.
Focusing on learning styles means looking at student aptitude and student attitude. However, we need to add a third factor - teacher attitude.
Lucas prefers Piaget's definition of intelligence: "Intelligence is wha t you do when you don't know what to do".
Strategies for learning
Hints and tips can be useful, e.g. Guy Claxton's 5Rs - readiness, resilience etc. The challenge is for people to use what they believe in "in every aspect of their discourse". Also, because we are in a complex, uncertain world, the ideas drawn upon need to be flexible and regularly up-dated.
For teachers, this means being in a "curious" mood.
Environment for learning
We want to create a cultural and physical environment that is: high challenge, low threat; fit for purpose, etc.
Assessment for learning
Assessment for Learning developed by Black and Wiliam has now produced evaluations on a large-scale that indicate increases in achievement from 6 months of using the programme. One activity in Assessment for Learning is the holding up of traffic lights:
Another activity in Assessment for Learning is putting your hand up when you don't know.
David Bell, Chief Inspector of Schools, has come out and said schools are over-tested. Public examinations, says Lucas, ought to be a celebration of achievement. Pupils should fail and enjoy it. Helping parents to see this is probably as important as helping students learn to learn and educating teachers.
David Hopkins - Why learning to learn is important
Introduction on the policy agenda
David expressed his commitment to spreading learning to learn across schools and throughout the DfES. Judy Sebba has/is instrumental in this. There is a need to put, for example, thinking skills and assessment for learning much more strongly into policy.
Useful definitions
He called learning to learn "deep learning strategies" where knowledge, instruction and learning are inextricably linked (cf Bruner) to create powerful learning experiences. In practice, it means teaching the teaching strategy to give a learning strategy to people.
The shift
Hopkins then talked about school improvement and the government agenda more widely. He seemed keen to take this opportunity to convey his commitment to and ideas for the education system. He talked about every new policy being underpinned by the core principles of learning and teaching, school improvement and system wide reform, and the need for practical ways to feed these in to the culture of schools. At the end, he stressed the need for moral purpose and social justice as underpinning policies, and the need to develop a language and discourse across the system.
Questions
Hopkins was asked who the idea of learning to learn can reach a wider number of schools - those who aren't yet "converted"? He answered:
1.develop a language around learning to learn, teaching and learning. Part of the problem is that the UK is not sophisticated in this.
2.underperformance is due to a lack of teaching and learning culture, and leadership is therefore trying to focus their work and support on this.
3.networking and collaboration helps the spread.
Heather du Quesnay
Heather gave a short, sharp and passionate presentation on the NCSL's commitment to ideas around learning to learn. She emphasised the need for a more radical, dramatic next phase in school improvement, where the system becomes able to adapt to students' needs and dissatisfaction with the out-of-date "factory" model of schooling is left behind.
Barriers to learning include competitive cultures, blunt accountability systems, isolation and time.
Re-structure for time for professional talk
A point I personally found most interesting was teachers "need to carve out time to talk" Some schools are moving to 4 - day teaching weeks, some 11 day fortnights. Each school needs to re-design itself so that this can happen.
School to school
Heather talked of a need to "ensure that learning transmits itself from school to school to make the whole system a richer, more dynamic and learning-focused place"
Learning is a social process - engage, connect, share. Need trust to do this.
Readiness - Readiness to learn is key. Readiness is a useful idea: it says things about your emotional state, your environment, whether your feeling curious.
Role of NCSL
The NCSL creates the "rules of engagement" through which people can be brought together for professional dialogue and improvement. Its programmes aim to build a knowledge base.
Question
Heather was asked what the NCSL is doing about student leadership. She answered that there is a lot going on around the country, that she's meeting with Louise Raymond from BSIP after Easter to discuss this further, that the NCSL's core mission is about adult professional development and so it has not focused on this very much and that well-led schools will have a place for student leadership.
Notes from the CfL event - "Learning to Learn"
9th April, New Connaught Rooms, London
Bill Lucas : Learning to Learn
Introduction
1. "Learning to learn" is not a quick fix. We don't need "learnacy" like we have literacy or numeracy strategies or "yet another initiative" of any kind.
2. Learning to learn is:
- a set of deep learning strategies
- a model of how we learn
- a language to describe what is really important
It is an approach to learning that is respectful of the learner.
3. In a recent large scale survey, 63% of students reported that they spent very high amounts of their time in school copying from the board and 37% said they spent very high amounts of time listening to a teacher talking.
4. At present in our education system, educators don't learn how the brain works.
Why is learning to learn so important?
- Results go up. Assessment for Learning has produced evidence.
- Preparation for life. Resourceful and resilient.
- Improves teacher retention = motivated, why teachers entered the profession.
- Fun
Learning Styles
Learning styles are based on theories of whether potential is fixed (ability) or expandable (capability).
Examples of learning styles:
- VAK = visual, audio, kinaesthetic = three modes, not styles, of learning.
- Personality tests, e.g IQ and Myers Briggs.
- Behaviour models of learning, e.g. activist, reflector, theorist, pragmatist.
- Multiple intelligences by Gardner, emotional Intelligence by Goleman
Many of the above are views of intelligence. They are all popular at the moment. Added to this list could be Sternberg's work on inkling and superintelligence, Handy on practical intelligence. The point is that each of the above is "entirely bogus" because they make unreal distinctions in the ways that people learn. The power of many popular styles is that they allow the general public to let go of IQ and other personality tests which are deeply engrained in our culture.
Lucas says:
"The key questions are: are you using the data you get via tests of learning style?" and "are you using them as alone or as one piece of information amongst many?"
The real benefit comes from students themselves learning how they learn.
It also means that teachers must know and be able to articulate what their own model of learning is.
Focusing on learning styles means looking at student aptitude and student attitude. However, we need to add a third factor - teacher attitude.
Lucas prefers Piaget's definition of intelligence: "Intelligence is wha t you do when you don't know what to do".
Strategies for learning
Hints and tips can be useful, e.g. Guy Claxton's 5Rs - readiness, resilience etc. The challenge is for people to use what they believe in "in every aspect of their discourse". Also, because we are in a complex, uncertain world, the ideas drawn upon need to be flexible and regularly up-dated.
For teachers, this means being in a "curious" mood.
Environment for learning
We want to create a cultural and physical environment that is: high challenge, low threat; fit for purpose, etc.
Assessment for learning
Assessment for Learning developed by Black and Wiliam has now produced evaluations on a large-scale that indicate increases in achievement from 6 months of using the programme. One activity in Assessment for Learning is the holding up of traffic lights:
- Red- I haven't got a clue what the teachers/facilitator is talking about,
- Amber - I have a vague clue and if I can sit with someone who is green I'll quickly learn it for myself,
- Green - I've got it.
Another activity in Assessment for Learning is putting your hand up when you don't know.
David Bell, Chief Inspector of Schools, has come out and said schools are over-tested. Public examinations, says Lucas, ought to be a celebration of achievement. Pupils should fail and enjoy it. Helping parents to see this is probably as important as helping students learn to learn and educating teachers.
David Hopkins - Why learning to learn is important
Introduction on the policy agenda
David expressed his commitment to spreading learning to learn across schools and throughout the DfES. Judy Sebba has/is instrumental in this. There is a need to put, for example, thinking skills and assessment for learning much more strongly into policy.
Useful definitions
He called learning to learn "deep learning strategies" where knowledge, instruction and learning are inextricably linked (cf Bruner) to create powerful learning experiences. In practice, it means teaching the teaching strategy to give a learning strategy to people.
The shift
- There needs to be a shift from informed prescription to informed professionalism. Prescription from the centre will not do alone.
- What is needed is powerful learners who can take their place in the knowledge society.
- The government was committed to building programmes and now it needs to be concerned with building capacity.
Hopkins then talked about school improvement and the government agenda more widely. He seemed keen to take this opportunity to convey his commitment to and ideas for the education system. He talked about every new policy being underpinned by the core principles of learning and teaching, school improvement and system wide reform, and the need for practical ways to feed these in to the culture of schools. At the end, he stressed the need for moral purpose and social justice as underpinning policies, and the need to develop a language and discourse across the system.
Questions
Hopkins was asked who the idea of learning to learn can reach a wider number of schools - those who aren't yet "converted"? He answered:
1.develop a language around learning to learn, teaching and learning. Part of the problem is that the UK is not sophisticated in this.
2.underperformance is due to a lack of teaching and learning culture, and leadership is therefore trying to focus their work and support on this.
3.networking and collaboration helps the spread.
Heather du Quesnay
Heather gave a short, sharp and passionate presentation on the NCSL's commitment to ideas around learning to learn. She emphasised the need for a more radical, dramatic next phase in school improvement, where the system becomes able to adapt to students' needs and dissatisfaction with the out-of-date "factory" model of schooling is left behind.
Barriers to learning include competitive cultures, blunt accountability systems, isolation and time.
Re-structure for time for professional talk
A point I personally found most interesting was teachers "need to carve out time to talk" Some schools are moving to 4 - day teaching weeks, some 11 day fortnights. Each school needs to re-design itself so that this can happen.
School to school
Heather talked of a need to "ensure that learning transmits itself from school to school to make the whole system a richer, more dynamic and learning-focused place"
Learning is a social process - engage, connect, share. Need trust to do this.
Readiness - Readiness to learn is key. Readiness is a useful idea: it says things about your emotional state, your environment, whether your feeling curious.
Role of NCSL
The NCSL creates the "rules of engagement" through which people can be brought together for professional dialogue and improvement. Its programmes aim to build a knowledge base.
Question
Heather was asked what the NCSL is doing about student leadership. She answered that there is a lot going on around the country, that she's meeting with Louise Raymond from BSIP after Easter to discuss this further, that the NCSL's core mission is about adult professional development and so it has not focused on this very much and that well-led schools will have a place for student leadership.
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