I am a function of so many environmental factors that all affect my learning style. I only learn when I am motivated to do so and most of my real learning is based on my own efforts and desires. A lot of what I learn is determined by the people I am around and the situations that I encounter. I learned a lot about conflict and disputes by being involved with many controversial matters. I learn a lot about health by the things I do and the people I work out with and associate with. So where I live, where I travel and kinds and age of people that I associate with really determine how much and how often I learn. I ask myself every day, if I have learned something today. I believe that you become what you think about and if you thing about learning you will become a life long learner.
I like this history of some of the founding fathers of constructivism. Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky are two eminent figures in the development of constructivist theories. They share the common belief that classrooms must be constructivist environments but I am sure they had no clue that the future would be online learning.
I have enjoyed reading Marcy Driscoll third edition of The Psychology of Learning for Instruction. She writes in a very easily reading style and has good examples. The content in this book is excellent and would make a good text for this course. I suggest that future classed use it since it is a good reference for future study too. I have thought about subscribing to Journal of Constructivist Psychology, it is published four times a year but I am sure that will not get the proper attention right now with all of the other readings and assignments.
I am hopeful that at some point in time I can engage in an online research project which will result in some good information to shape the motivation factor for online courses.
How well supported does your personal theory feel?
Here is a short video of me sharing at a very high level my personal learning theory.
Personal Learning Theory
I have been learning my entire life. Some of it has been institutional and much of it has been through life experiences. From an institutional perspective, I started out with an undergraduate degree in engineering (1975) followed by a graduate degree in conflict management (2011). My lifetime learning with real life experiences are related to technology and business development. I have been a serial entrepreneur and each of my business development engagements have been very much defined as active learning environments. You have to be constantly engaged with a variety of resources that include people, process and technology. The engagement is also very dynamic and changes rapidly, which requires you to learn from past experiences and to build more knowledge going forward. My theory of learning over time has actually transformed in a best practice. I continue to employ these best practices going forward from the REAL’s methodology (Rich Environments for Active Learning)
• promote study and investigation within authentic contexts;
• encourage the growth of student responsibility, initiative, decision making, and intentional learning;
• cultivate collaboration among students and teachers;
• utilize dynamic, interdisciplinary, generative learning activities that promote higher-order thinking
processes to help students develop rich and complex knowledge structures; and
• assess student progress in content and learning-to-learn within authentic contexts using realistic tasks and performances.
The challenge for me is to find ways to continue the active learning pedagogy within the new technology environment that is associated with online education.