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Alienation and Learning
I want to talk about alienation as I believe it to be a topic of concern to most of us and it is an important influence on how we live our lives today. Karl Marx was one of the first to highlight how the structures of modern society inevitably lead to alienation. He describes how, in industrial settings, many workers are alienated from the products they produce. For example, an assembly line worker is far removed from the completed product. The alienation of the worker in his product means not only that his labor becomes an object, an external existence, but that it exists outside him, independently, as something alien…
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Learning about Thinking from James Joyce
In my view one of the best ways to study learning and thinking is to look to literature and in this arena one figure stands out for the manner in which he conveys the human thought process in print. I am of course referring to James Joyce. In this short review I present some aspects of Joyce’s work from the perspective of insights on how we think and learn. My argument is that great literature resonates with our thought processes. In reading Joyce we are provided with a working model of the inner structures and mechanisms through which we experience the world. I approach this analysis from the perspective of…
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Ssshhh!!! Exams in Progress!
This is a quiet but busy time in National College of Ireland semester one exams are now in progress. We are encouraged to keep as quiet as possible as each room on the campus is now used to its fullest extent to facilitate the process. There is always tension associated with exams. Students of all ages and all backgrounds find the prospect of being tested daunting. This is very understandable we live in a culture of measurement and accountability and education is an expensive process. So, especially for the self-motivated, we all want to see how much we know and how well we have progressed. As discussed previously, there is…
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Getting to Grips with Academic Writing
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What are New Year’s resolutions and why they seldom work
New Year’s Celebration fireworks at Carton House, Maynooth Happy New Year! It’s the start of 2011 and last night we celebrated as we said goodbye to 2010 and welcomed the turn over to a New Year. At New Year and perhaps birthdays or other recurring significant dates we often conduct a self-appraisal and make decisions about our future behaviour. This is typically framed as a New Year’s Resolution: I will go to the gym and loose weight;I will give up smoking;I will do a course;I will complete an unfinished project (I know someone who has resolved to complete her master’s dissertation). So what’s really happening–why do we make such self-resolutions? …
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Getting to Grips with Academic Writing
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Learning without Teachers
I met Sugata Mitra at On-Line Educa in Berlin two years ago and was very impressed by his research work and his thinking on how children learn. This most recent presentation at the TED conference opens up a timely debate on the role of instruction in education.It is easy to be sceptical about the findings from his research. One could argue that such insights are gleaned from very particular contexts and further investigation of the actual learning processes involved is necessary. However, I am not really surprised that these effects are in evidence and they are compatible with the work of other educationalists such as Dewey, Vygotsky and Bruner.Have a…
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Getting to Grips with Academic Writing
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We hold steadfast to our own theories of learning
I have always maintained that each of us has our own theory of learning and that we are prepared to defend it robustly. This tendency to hold steadfast to one’s existing understanding of learning is what I call the “in my day” (IMD) phenomenon. You will find IMD’s in many conversations concerning education and school. You just need to be on the lookout and you will be surprised at the number of times they pop up. Parents, politicians, economists and most especially business employers are IMD specialists. The simple premise of the IMD is that what worked for me and has made me successful must be right for everyone else.…
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Leaving Certificate Results
Today’s top story is the issuing of results to almost fifty eight thousand (58,000) Leaving Certificate students. This event is widely reported in national newspapers, radio and television news. Much of the coverage deals with the failure rates for different subjects. Of special interest is the success rates for Science, Engineering Technology and Mathematics- the so called STEM subjects. It is reported that some 4,300 students have failed Mathematics. The availability of a talented young workforce is often cited as part of the attraction of Ireland as a location for inward economic investment. Poor results do not help the international perception of our education system. Employers are increasingly looking for…
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TPACK: Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge
What makes a great teacher? This is a difficult but important question for education at all levels. One way to get to the answer is to think about individual teachers that you have encountered in your life. Somehow we all know great teachers when we meet them and of course, we certainly know poor teaching when we come across it. I am not one of those who believes that teaching is a natural gift and some people are born to be teachers and others not. Most great teachers that I know work constantly on their own development as educators. A capacity for great teaching can be gained through experience…
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Really Useful Websites on Learning and Teaching
As a follow-up to my previous blog on the Top Ten Insights on Learning I would like to provide a list of web sources and resources that may act as good places to start with insights on learning and teaching. I’ll try to give a brief description of each and why it makes the cut for me.Starting Points: Aggregation SitesTheory into Practice (TIP)Greg Kearsley has put together an excellent resource that deals with a wide variety of learning theories. This is an excellent starting point and it will give the beginner a good appreciation of the breath of theories and their practical applications. Emtech’s Learning TheoriesThis is another excellent starting…
