The 2013 AERA meeting was a huge (13000 plus
attendees), complicated (2400+ sessions), long (five full days in San Francisco
for 2013) education research conference, with some unusual sessions. Yet, if
you dig a little, you can find real gems, including research from David Feldon,
Briana Timmerman, and colleagues, showing a simple intervention change based on
cognitive task analysis can lift both learning and retention in an early
science course in college.
An
interesting article in EdWeek last month about new methods for teacher
preparation caught my eye. It described
an approach focused on giving teachers a specific repertoire of competencies
through structured training and practice before they’re let loose on
classrooms. What’s reassuring (and maybe
puzzling this didn’t happen earlier) is how close this new approach to training
teachers is to what research says works best for learning.
In the next few weeks there will be two different sessions
(full disclosure: I’m a panelist on both) talking about how education can
benefit from more learning science, one at the ASU GSV meeting in Scottsdale
Arizona, and the other at the huge education research conference, AERA. The audiences are the right ones to also give
insight into why that hasn’t happened yet.
Big
data is big news. Some might think
the arrival of very large education-related data sets spells the end of our
education troubles – that by analyzing this data, all necessary new information
to accelerate learning will be revealed.
My friend Richard Clark from USC pointed me to a very
interesting, but troubling, study recently published in
Europe. It looks at teachers' misconceptions about learning statements
that have been steeped in either neuroscience language or in
“brain-based” language. Even teachers who are enthusiastic about
neuroscience, and view themselves as reading popular science versions
of neuroscience findings, turn out to believe a variety of
“neuromyths” about learning – false statements about what works
for learning, clothed in the language of scientific findings.
If we are to make progress with
learning at all levels, we have to figure out how to help teachers –
and most especially those who design instructional environments and
materials – avoid falling prey to palatable but unproven assertions
about how learning works.
