Learning and Communities of Practice (CoPs)

By David Hung
Learning Sciences and Technologies

Changing Paradignms
From

• "I think, therefore I am" (idividualistic in cognition to determine the capability of the person) to
• Social orientation (cognition distributed in social context, tools that are applicable in real life not necessary in an exam, not in the interaction in the mind or tool)

Changes are necessary

• less stability and more emergence
• changes in environment is happening at a much greater rate

Managing Emergence

• Deliberate Strategy
• Emergent Strategy

Differences in Strategies

• Presence of planned intention
• destination and env are quite predictable
• a plan exists
• plan is usu centrally formulated
• plan is implemented

Fresh Mindset

• human org are very adaptive
• leadership amd mgt philosophy must be more adaptive?
• flattened hierarchies and less linear authorities
• interdependencies

Change in Metaphor

• Machine (Central orchestrator that mg)
• Biological (Self organising and interdepending, it evolve and adapt)

How to foster a dynamic learning environment

• mindset that is highly adaptive & evolving
• connectivity
• responsive and updated milieuly iterconnected web
• distributed info and leadership

Behaviourism...

• B.F. Skinner

Objectivist Framework

• What's the story so far? Objectivist Worldview
• connectivity

Imagination is more important that knowledge (Albert Einstein)
Reality is just a very persistent imagination (Albert Einstein)

The Brain's CEO
Although all knowledge is (socially) constructed -- the knower is an intimate part of the known (Polanyi, 1964)

Evertime you remember sth, it reconstructs (revisualising) the memory when you first construct it (depending on how you do it - i.e. good/poor memory - it is NOT a retrieval but reconstructing amongst all other 'noise'. Use what you learn continuously)

Biological Brain

• Jungle Metaphor - ecology
• Self-organising
• brain-damage patients
• brain imaging techniques
• gap between neuroscience and education-pedagogy

Bright air, Brillant fire by Edelman (1989, 1992)

• Our brain come out of biology, not technology
• the immune system operates through 'selforganisation'

What you reap is what you sow

• Principle 1: Neurons that fire together wire together

Be careful what you see

• Principle 2: Use it or potentially lose it

Use the constructed neurons or lose it

From Maual to Automatic

• Principle 3: Rich constructions (pattern recognitions) lead to rich re-constructions (momory)

Why & How We remember

- the formation and recall of each memory are influenced by mood, surroundings at the time memory is formed or retrived

- that is why the same event can be remembered differently by different people.

Balancing the neuronal with the social-cultural or social-hisorical

Cultural Historical Theory
the child's hgher function of thought first appear in the collective life of children in the form of argument and only later lead to the development of reasoning in the child's own behaviour.
(Vygotsky, 1987, vol 3, p. 141)
automatic appropriation of behaviour

3 active processes
The educative process - student is active, teacher is active, environment active

Structural Coupling Between Mind-and-Environment as a whole "system"
Process interaction between the two

Social Constructivism - Situated Cognition
Contextualist worldview

• focus is interaction between man and environment
• relational view of meanings - interpretation
• participants' constructs
• knowg is an experienced realaion of thinngs (Dewey, 1910/1981)

Korzybski (1941)
The map is not the territory
representations Experience
descriptions Phenomena
narratives 1st person perspectives
accounts tacit
3rd person perspectives
explicit

Communities of Practice
Practice
- Scientific, Math, Engineering, Law, Accounting, etc
- A community of people who practice a certain profession

• code of conduct
• ethics
• history and culture

- identity

• way of seeing
• core values and beliefs

engaging the pupils in a simulation in strategies of project work prepares them (skills - presentation, teamwork...) in work, NOT the implementation of just the curriculum; Learning is most effective in a community - struggle through the process before reaching equilibrium)

Definition of CoPs

• people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowg and expertise in this area by interacting on an on-going basis (Wenger etal. 2002)

Sherman Oaks Community

Social Spaces

• copying from wall to web
• learning to use technology from and with others...learning and helping while waiting
• supporting the periphery...distributed CoP

IT Sharing

Sharing of resources
http://www.quia.com/web (used by West Grove Primary)

Interactive Resources from Edumall website

Games for Learning

Some traditional games
http://www.playkidsgames.com
http://www.theproblemsite.com/games.asp

What is the difference between a game and a toy?
Games are bounded by rules,goals and objectives, receive feedback

Stimulus-Response-Reinforcement (Reward / Punishment)

Why digital learning?

C-VISions: Vacuum chamber (teaching of science)
C-VISions: MAgent-MUser

Emerging Technologies
Nesta FutureLab
Mixed Reality:XaviX
Augmented Reality
Monjakids: http://www.monjakids.com/CDK/

Contact:
Stephen Black
stephen@compudia.com

Daneel Pang
daneel@pracbiz.com
9627 6884

Microsoft Singapore/IDA/NIE
backpack.net (IDA-Lifestyle and Education Department)
Problems encountered
- convince the teachers
- convince the parents
- demographics of students

Contact:
Chris_TNG@IDA.GOV.SG

Summary of Emerging Technology (by Chia TF)

Question: How does 'common' thinking help or hinder us in our work? Moulding the Future? All come out with similar thinking? :@

Review: Working by Specific Theme / Event, Event embedded by smaller tasks

Getting Ready for Life Sciences

• Life Sciences and Singapore
• Moulding and Shaping Ourselves
• My Own Experience with life Science: how to get into it
• How Schools can Participate and Enjoy

Life Science is the way to go for S'pore

Moulding and Shaping Ourselves
Striving for excellence

• Initially...learn to imitate and mimic
• Be selective in finding role model(s)...dream: with experience
• Read wisely. Try reading more original papers and articles: Not so much on review of articles because it is the interpretation of another person - influence
• Nurturing and grooming confidence
• Should not focus on getting respect from your peers: draw as much as you can from the group
• Instead focus on older clever people. However, not too old...can't look up to senility
• No point behaving like the mass, you will never succeed in a normal way: but not behave as a lunatic :)
• Reject authority...positively. Being against everything is a sure way to get nowhere: must be able to see the good, cream off, add your own...do not take wholesale.
• Try to hang out with really bright people: we are all bright in different aspect, sense and see the strengths to use them and learn

Sharing 3 case studies on Life Sc journey by Prof Chia TF

• The story of the glowing orchids:

Firefly luciferase as a nonevasive marker for orchid transformation.

Orchid is the most clever plant - produce 1000 seeds and use fungus to feed them, can mimic a female bee and attract male bees to pollinate. Really ah? 9 years of experimentation - first few years force feeding and the orchid did not bloom. Sixth year -re-experimented and left nature take its course and the first full bloom orchid.

• Gene therapy against cancer using gene gun:

What are the major causes of death?

• Heart Diseases (35%);
• Cancer (35%),
• Others (30%)

Cancer Eradication of Tumour Growth via Biolistic Tranformation with allogenic MHC genes.

• Genetic engineering of resverartrol for cancer

Prevention of Cancer and Cardio-Vascular Diseases

What is resveratrol?

• It is a potent compound against cancer and heart diseases
• found naturally in grapes, peanuts and 70 other plants
• A phytoalexin, it has a strong anti-oxidant activities and is a phytoestrogen
• Anti-ageing properties

How schools can participate in Life Sciences

• getting the involvement of ALL
• structure it within curriculum: not as enrichment and not overload
• making it fun, enjoyable and rewarding
• go for discovery and product creation: the product cement all the theory

How do we get to know Life Sciences?

• from books, mags, internet, trs, friends
• you also learn fr experience (hands on), interesting projects, satisfaction, real life, and multidisciplinary projects
• ability driven education: know your ability and level of drive

Some ADE projects for schools

• Orchid Hybridisation Programme (OHP)
• Rainbow Corn Course (RCC)
• Lets Breed FISH
• Health Info Tracking System(HITS)
• Fr biology into aerodynamic toys
• Our DNA tree

Succeeding in Science. Some rules of thumbs

"to succeed in science, it's not enough to be smart - lots of people are very bright and get nowhere in life"

How Jim Watson thinks...

Learn from the winners

• avoid dumb people
• turn to people brighter than yourself
• play not to win but to win at something really difficult
• go somewhere beyond your ability and come out on the top

Take risks

• to make a big success, be prepared to get into deep trouble
• good brain but no vision gets you nowhere
• ignore the assessment of those in power, your scientific hero,...if not careful, you will develop deep anxieties

Have a Fallback

• be sure that there is someone that will save you when you are in deep shit
• if you cannot a whole someone, divide it up

Have fun and stay connected

• never do anything that bores you
• you need to have people you can go to for intellectual help
• expose your ideas to informed criticism

Interesting....

1. Race vs Enthnic Grouping? No such thing as a race :-@

2. Have you used bread to clean your toilet bowl, apparently some brand of bread can keep it clean from mould for up to 7 days. Urgh...What am I intaking? Wonder if people can be preserved after death with so many years of this food?

Changing Roles of Leaders by A/P D. Ng

1. Personal Perspective
The No. '2' (Hierarchical Chain)
"The hardest instrument to play in a symphony orchestra is the 2nd instrument" (Leonard Bernstein)

Q: How does this relate to organisational structure and the way leaders lead?
Profiling Teachers
Current Teachers vs Teachers 5-10 years ago

• Qualifications
• Duties
• Competencies
• Mobility

Q: How does it imapct the way organisation work and the way leaders will have to lead?

Evolvement of Organisations (Changed Roles)

Machine Model: Bureaucracy model where workers are not expected to contribute/think but to follow instructions and do their part of the work repetitively.

Biological Model: Direction is still set by 1 person and organisation is growing in parts and expanding in diversity

Social Model: schools need to move in this direction because of the profile of the teachers coming in.

What's for Homework?

1. What is my role as HOD/IT?
2. Affordances of IT hardware
3. Classification of HOD/IT roles