A Cognitive Perpective on How People Learn: Implications for Teaching

1. A Cognitive Perpective on How People Learn: Implications for Teaching Geoff Norman, Ph.D. McMaster University

2. The Cognitive Perspective expertise “The essence of intelligence is less a matter of reasoning and more a matter of knowing a lot about the world” H.A.Simon, 1989

3. Teaching MUTES • Memory and • Understanding • Transfer • Exercises • Skills

4. Some assertions about learning • Learning and remembering results from assimilation of new knowledge into existing knowledge, and meaning is critical to learning • Transfer (applying old knowledge to new situations) doesn’t happen easily • Structured, planned, practice with multiple examples is key to transfer • General skills don’t exist – it’s all imbedded in knowledge

5. Learning and Understanding • Learning is strongly influenced by the meaning . • If we can understand what we are learning in terms of pre-existing knowledge, better learning and retention results • Meaning is a consequence of the interaction between learner and ‘to be learned’

6. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time. And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot: Full of sound and fury Signifying nothing W. Shakespeare, Macbeth, V, v

7. Sound is walking, stage struts and a tale is heard. No more a poor candle, frets life. A brief idiot, fury and shadow, is in a dusty fool.

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9. Meaning is imposed by the learner and involves an interaction between existing knowledge and new information

10. The procedure is quite simple. First you arrange things into different groups. Of course, one pile may be sufficient. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities, this is the next step. It is better to do too few things at once than too many. At first it seems complicated, but soon it just becomes a fact of life. After it’s over, you arrange the materials in groups again, then put them in the right place.

11. Washing Clothes The procedure is quite simple. First you arrange things into different groups. Of course, one pile may be sufficient. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities, this is the next step. It is better to do too few things at once than too many. At first it seems complicated, but soon it just becomes a fact of life. After it’s over, you arrange the materials in groups again, then put them in the right place.

12. Evidence of the Role of Meaning • Chess • Nephrology

13. How do you get to be a chess master? Is it: - learning the rules? - learning to think of more moves and deeper strategy? (process) - learning to think better moves? (knowledge)

14. Recall of Chess Positions • 4 levels of chess player • mid-game positions • 5-7 sec exposure

16. Recall after 5 sec. Exposure(real positions)

17. Recall after 5 sec. exposure

18. It’s not just Visual Patterns • Lab data, nephrology problems • 5 research associates • 6 students • 5 experts

19. Recall of Nephrology Data

20. Basic science and meaning Why do students need basic science? • Some docs use it a lot? • Nephrologists, anesthesiologists, intensivists • Many docs use it a little? • With difficult problems • It may provide meaning and coherence for students…….

21. Basic Science and Meaning(Woods, Brooks, Norman, 2003) • 4 neurology / muscular diseases • 36 medical students • Basic Science or Symptom/Disease probability

22. Measurement • Diagnostic Test • 15 cases, 4-6 features • Administered at 0, 7 days

23. Score on Dx Test

24. Score on Dx Test

25. Score on Dx Test

26. Basic science is used to construct and reconstruct coherent relations between symptom and disease

27. Summary • Remembering for meaningful material is enhanced because there are more links or pathways to the memory trace

28. Implications for Teachers How can we, as teachers, help students impose meaning on what they’re learning?

29. Implications for Curriculum • What are we doing now? • “Traditional” • PBL • Does PBL enhance learning” • MACRO -- no or maybe • MICRO: • Active Learning • Imbedding problem • Everyday analogy

30. Effect of active, problem-oriented processing (Needham & Begg, 1991) • Intro psychology students, 5 classic problems • “Try to solve these difficult problems” ( 27% successful) vs. “Remember the problem and solution so you can solve some additional problems” (21% successful)

31. Effect of Active Problem-solving Needham & Begg, 1991

32. Imbedding Principle in Problem (Ross & Kilbane, 1997) Practice and Test problems with: • SEQUENTIAL • Principle explanation, then problem example • IMBEDDED • Principle imbedded in problem, explanation as part of problem “Reversal” = using original principle incorrectly

33. Reversal Errors

34. Analogy in Learning Science (Donnelly & McDaniel, 1993) • 48 students, 12 concepts • Literal description of concept vs. description + analogy in familiar domain • (e.g. pulsar star and lighthouse) • 24 MCQs; 4/concept, 12 basic +12 inference

36. An application in Medical Education Laplace Law: Anybody remember LaPlace Law? Anybody understand it?

37. Pressure and Tension on a Membrane r P T T = P * r Law of Laplace

38. The “weight and string” problem T a T = W / 2 sin(a) W

39. T = W / 2 sin(alpha) T T a W W

40. t T T t

41. Dual Explanations (Krebs, Dore, Norman, 2006) • Three “Laws” • Laplace , Right Heart Strain, Starling • Intervention • Mechanical + Biological Active Comparison vs. • Biological explanation only • Test 9 diagnostic cases • Sample -- undergrad psych students

42. Percent Correct

43. Implications for Teaching/ Curriculum • Arrange learning to integrate with prior knowledge • Active learning • Problem – based learning • Imbed principle in problem • Everyday analogy • Sequencing of concepts

44. Transfer using old knowledge to solve new problems

45. As teachers, we act as if all the knowledge we impart to students will be available to them to solve problems in the future

46. As teachers, we act as if all the knowledge we impart to students will be available to them to solve problems in the future Unfortunately….. it won’t

47. Views of Transfer General Transfer (1900-1915….) Subjects like Latin, algebra teach general “habits of mind” (disproved by Thorndike, 1913) Specific transfer (Behaviorism,1910--> Now) Learned concepts can only be transferred if new behavior = old behavior (disproved by Judd, 1908, Wertheimer, 1959, Pressley 1990) Intermediate / hybrid transfer Learned concepts can be applied (with difficulty) to new, dissimilar problem situations

48. A general wishes to capture a fortress located in the centre of a country. There are many roads radiating from the fortress. All have been mined so that, while small groups of men can pass over the roads safely, a large force will detonate the mines. A full-scale direct attack is therefore impossible. The general’s solution is to divide the army into small groups, send each down a different road, and have the groups converge simultaneously on the fortress.

49. You are a doctor faced with a patient who has a malignant tumour in his stomach. It is impossible to operate on the tumour. X-rays can be used to destroy the tumour. If sufficient rays reach the tumour all at once, the cancer cells will be killed, but surrounding tissue will be damaged as well. How can you arrange the procedure to destroy the tumour cells without severely damaging the surrounding tissue. Gick & Holyoak, 1980

50. Transfer and Context Specificity • The initial solution (multiple simultaneous paths) was learned in, and stored with the problem context (fortress and army). • To solve the new problem, must recognize that the old problem was analogous to the new, despite different contexts • To recognize analogy, we must recognize similarity in deep structure this rarely happens…..