Designing Your Learning

Think about a time when you consciously decided to learn something. How did you go about it?  Did you research, read, view, talk to others, and/or physically do something?  Most likely the methods of learning depended on both what you wanted to learn and your own proclivities for learning.  As you plan your degree, you will think about what you want to learn and how to go about it.  And thinking in this way can result in new learning in itself.

The way in which a situation for learning is established and then facilitated is called “pedagogy.”  According to Wikipedia,

Pedagogy (/ˈpɛdəɡɒdʒi/, /ˈpɛdəɡoʊdʒi/, or /ˈpɛdəɡɒɡi/) (most commonly understood as the approach to teaching) refers more broadly to the theory and practice of education, and how this influences the growth of learners. Pedagogy, taken as an academic discipline, is the study of how knowledge and skills are exchanged in an educational context, and it considers the interactions that take place during learning. Pedagogies vary greatly, as they reflect the different social, political, cultural contexts from which they emerge. Theories of pedagogy increasingly identify the student as an agent, and the teacher as a facilitator….Student-centered learning, also known as learner-centered education, broadly encompasses methods of teaching that shift the focus of instruction from the teacher to the student. In original usage, student-centered learning aims to develop learner autonomy and independence by putting responsibility for the learning path in the hands of students. Student-centered instruction focuses on skills and practices that enable lifelong learning and independent problem-solving.(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedagogy)

Continue reading about Lifelong Learning in Wikipedia, which offers an interesting brief overview of this concept and practice.

Note the paragraph on Metacognition, which is the act of thinking about your own thinking, or learning about your own learning.  Metacognition is an important learning skill, one that student-centered pedagogy supports, and one that in itself supports lifelong learning.

Cognition = Your thinking activities and processes. Metacognition = intentional thinking about how you think and learn. Examples of metacognition:

For an expanded description of metacognition, see Teaching for Effective Learning: Metacognition from Queen’s  University

Empire State College’s pedagogy, from its inception, centered on student-centered learning with the goal of fostering metacognition and lifelong learning, as you can see in the College’s Learning Goals, which include characteristics such as active learning and problem-solving. Students always had – and still have – the opportunity to work with a faculty mentor to develop a learning contract, or a student-directed syllabus for learning in a field or topic of importance to the student.  Learning contracts state the purpose of the learning, activities that foster the learning, timing of those activities, and criteria for evaluating whether and how well learning occurred.  You may already have participated in designing some aspect of your learning, or you may be considering doing so.  The activities on this page give you a chance to consciously approach something that you want to learn, and further develop competence in learning engagement.

initial learning activity

Identify something that you want to learn or learn more fully:

  • a concept that you’re struggling with in a current course
  • a work-related concept or process
  • an academic or work-related skill

Identify some obvious ways in which you might approach this learning, ways that you think of immediately.  Then think “out of the box” about other ways of approaching this learning.  List all of the different ways in which you might approach what you want to learn.

Then choose one or two approaches and actually use them to engage in the learning.

After you feel you have gained the knowledge or skill that you wanted to learn, at least in a rudimentary way, reflect on your learning.  Ask and answer the following questions:

  1. What did I actually learn?
  2. What challenged me in the learning process?
  3. If I were to approach this same learning again, what might I do differently to lessen the challenge(s)?
  4. How might I apply the concept or skill I learned to a different situation? (Identify a specific academic or non-academic situation.)

Submit:

  • learning goal & list of different possible approaches to achieve that learning goal
  • reflection on your learning after applying an approach, addressing the four questions

in-depth learning activity

You may want to pursue a cohesive line of inquiry in your degree, a focus on an issue or topic that can be approached from many different perspectives. For example, say you want to produce the first chapter of a graphic novel. You draw people well, but you could improve your architectural drafting. You’re a great storyteller, but you need to learn about dialects and dialog. You have a plot, but your characters need development, or you need to work on organizing flow in a storyboard. Your story takes place in an era or place you need to research. Or, suppose you want to research how women of color have used art to build community, and you want to use that research to support your own participation. What do you need to learn? Do you want to start with a historical foundation? How far back do you want to go? What areas or cultures do you want to explore? Do particular art forms concern you? For example, suppose you’re interested in coded art as a form of resistance; you can study coding, explore it in quilting and hip hop, and look for your own thesis in the connections you find.

Whatever interests “cap” your education or fulfill your educational dream, this is the place to transform them into independent studies and/or courses.

This learning activity assignment has five parts in which you will:

  1. write a brief description of what you might want to accomplish in a capstone project.
  2. create a list or a breakdown of your capstone project into its component parts; what are the pieces that make up the whole of what you want to study?
  3. describe your preliminary purpose and learning activities.
  4. draft a learning contract.
  5. reflect on your learning.

Parts 1 & 2

  1. Write a brief explanation describing what you want to accomplish in a capstone project.
  2. Think about what it will take to accomplish your goals. Identify the skills you want to improve, the research that could inform your project, the kinds of tasks that could add up to a successful project. How can you move towards a capstone project inquiry in the amount of work typically accomplished in three upper-level courses? Think of these courses collectively as a capstone project. If you have more than three, you can include them, but keep in mind that you will need room for them in your degree plan.  Break your capstone project into several consecutive or simultaneous courses of study. List or write about the “pieces” of your project that make sense for you to pursue.

Part 3

For one piece or course of your capstone project, identify:

  • the purpose (what you want to learn and how it fits into a capstone project)
  • learning activities that you’d like to pursue and that make sense, given the purpose of this study and how it fits into your capstone project.  Note that you will need to do some research to identify appropriate learning activities.

See the Part 3 examples below.

Part 4

Working with your mentor, create a full learning contract for the one study or course you chose from the three or more you identified as part of your capstone project line of inquiry.  Add to the learning activities to create a 4-credit course.  Brainstorm criteria for evaluation: how will you assess your learning? Make sure to include all parts of the learning contract: Purpose, Learning Activities, Timing, Criteria for Evaluation.

See the Part 4 examples below.

Part 5

Assess your learning as a result of this activity.  What insights did you gain about designing and evaluating learning? …about the amount of learning needed for 4 credits?  …about yourself as an active participant in designing learning?

Submit: all 5 parts

 

In-depth learning activity examples for Part 3

Sample #1

PURPOSE:  This study has four purposes:

  1. to explore slavery and post-slavery examples of how African-American women have empowered themselves and their communities through the development and implementation of their creative artistic skills and abilities
  2. to explore the heritage of this history among African American women who use their art in community context today
  3. to identify and perform a feminist analysis of constraints and pressures which have obstructed and obstruct this work (along vectors of analysis such as race, class, and gender)
  4. to examine specific contemporary triumphs of personal and community empowerment as effective inspirational strategies

LEARNING ACTIVITIES:  Research of slavery and post-slavery examples of African-American women’s art, interviews with contemporary African-American women community artists, writing a comprehensive paper interweaving the results of this research. Activities will also include associated work individualized according to the discoveries made in research and interviews, and any questions and plans that result.

Sample #2

PURPOSE:  This study has three purposes:

  1. to learn some of the fundamental concepts and methods of fieldwork
  2. to engage in the practice of reflexivity
  3. to prepare for a proposed fieldtrip to Taiwan and China during which I will collect oral histories and primary documents related to my further studies

LEARNING ACTIVITIES:  Activities in this study will include reading parts or all of several texts that discuss concepts and methods:

  • Wolf, Margery, A Thrice Told Tale: Feminism, Postmodernism, and Ethnographical Responsibility, Stanford U. Press, 1992, discusses and demonstrates the relationships between fieldwork notes and scholarly production in a project in Taiwan.
  • Narayan, Uma, Dislocating Cultures: Identities, Traditions, and Third World Feminism, Routledge, 1997, explores the complexity of “insider” and “outsider” identities.
  • “Norms are the Cultural Tape on Pause: Cultural Schemata, Grids of Intelligibility, and Reflexivity,” Menoukha Case, Course Document, 2005.
  • appropriate films, literature, or artwork

There will be two ongoing projects.  One is a start-up Fieldwork Inquiry in which I will apply reading of the “Norms” text to the other two, and maintain a Reflexive Journal that looks at my experience in the context of the fieldwork I want to do and contributes to the ongoing revision of my inquiry throughout the course. The second, at the end of the course, is a summary of key shifts experienced in this process. The summary may be in different forms and different media, including visual arts.

In-depth learning activity examples for part 4

Here’s one sample of how a student’s purpose and learning activities was turned into a learning contract, through work with an instructor.

 

Student’s Purpose & Learning Activities

PURPOSE: I want to investigate what’s meant by “the sacred” in different cultures.  This investigation supports one piece of my line of inquiry/capstone project, which deals with understanding multiple, and particularly non-Western, cultures.

LEARNING ACTIVITIES: I want to fully read works by Rothenberg, parts of which I’ve come across in many different courses.  I expect to research and read additional articles and texts as I learn more in this area and develop additional interests.

 

Learning Contract that Resulted from Student-Instructor Discussion (Note that this syllabus document is written in the third person.)

 

PURPOSE: In this 4-credit upper-level individualized study, Mr. Jones will gain in-depth knowledge of how the sacred is culturally constructed, how and when the body becomes sacred (a sacred vehicle), and the role texts play in this process. The cultures to be studied will almost exclusively be indigenous/non-Western.

 

LEARNING ACTIVITIES: In this study, the student will read various materials related to the sacred, and will investigate the cultural phenomena that lead to the construction of texts and physical acts that are said to be sacred. Similarities, divergences, and themes of indigenous notions the sacred will be considered, and finally brought to bear on a reflexive consideration of the student’s own notions of the sacred. The student will maintain a reflective journal. This circular examination will begin with response to some indigenous beliefs that may be alien to or counter Western monotheistic religious beliefs, and these responses will be taken into account to examine how his pre-conceived and accepted notions affect his perception of indigenous material.

Readings will be from the following books, as well as other documents and articles supplied by the instructor or researched by the student:

  • Jerome Rothenberg, ed.: Technicians of the Sacred: A Range of Poetries from Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Oceania, 2nd ed.
  • Jerome and Diane Rothenberg, Symposium of the Whole: A Range of Discourse Toward an Ethnopoetics

The student will develop a series of (double-spaced) papers and projects totalling between twenty-five and forty pages or their equivalent. All work will be the student’s own and will demonstrate advanced college level writing including critical thinking, analysis, and synthesis, and will include appropriate citations and bibliography in an accepted academic style.

 

METHODS AND CRITERIA FOR EVALUATION: The student will be evaluated on the quality of his preparation for discussions with the instructor including questions as well as thoughtful reflection and observation and on the quality of his papers and/or projects. Papers must conform to expectations of standard college style, and Mr. Jones is free to choose a style such as APA, MLA, or Chicago.

All written work in final form should address the following:

  • Clear focus and fully developed ideas
  • Inclusion of appropriate and accurate material
  • Relevance of the materials used
  • Depth of discussion
  • Perspectives on the issue(s) involved
  • Sense of the material presented, i.e., logic
  • Critical thinking when writing and using sources
  • Solid organizational structure
  • Appropriate style
  • Good mechanics including spelling and grammar
  • Necessary documentation in an appropriate format (APA, MLA, Chicago)

 

Syllabus

1. REFLECTIVE READING JOURNAL – Due 4/11

2. PAPER EXPLORING DIVERSE TEXTS – Due 5/2 – Based on your reading selections for the first Reflexive Journal.

3. REFLEXIVE READING JOURNAL – Due 5/23 – More reading and reflexive journaling.

4. FINAL PROJECT – Due 6/20 – After completing and getting responses to 2 sets of journals as well as the 1st paper.

5. FINAL CONVERSATIONS – Complete by 6/30 – This leaves time for final reflections on your learning, and how this learning might change former work in hindsight (rather than actual revisions, this informal mode works very well.

Related college Learning Goals

Active Learning: Assess and build upon previous learning and experiences to pursue new learning, independently and in collaboration with others.

Critical Thinking and Problem Solving: Evaluate, analyze, synthesize and critique key concepts and experiences, and apply diverse perspectives to find creative solutions to problems concerning human behavior, society and the natural world.

 

For more information, see the College Learning Goals Policy.