Looking Forward: How Students Learn

1. Looking Forward: How Students Learn MCC 2020: Sharing the Vision Jane Fried, Professor, Central Connecticut State University

2. Evolution of Higher Education • Phase One- Church based • Focus on moral values, meaning systems and character • Content- All classical knowledge • Methods -talking, listening, writing Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

3. Evolution….. • Phase Two- Science based • Focus - empirical knowledge, impersonal learning • Content - developing new information , building on what is known • Methods-laboratory, demonstration Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

4. Evolution… • Phase three- Learning based (Brain neurology) • Focus-knowledge/meaning synthesis • Content - creating/reflecting on knowledge • Methods- multidimensional, multiple intelligences Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

5. Evolution of Student Affairs • Phase One - In loco parentis, responsible for character development of minors • Phase Two - fiduciary and legalistic, contractual, responsible for behavior management of “adult” students • Phase Three - Integrative, transformative education, cognitive development, assessment of learning outcomes Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

6. LEARNING: Transformative or Informative? There are many ways to learn and the brain uses several modes to accomplish learning.

7. Informative Learning • Serial learning involves acquiring data and organizing it into logical patterns. • Tacit learning involves skill development and pattern recognition. • Danah Zohar, Rewiring the Corporate Brain, Berrett Kohler. 1997 Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

8. Transformative Learning • This learning involves awareness of the learning process, synthesizing new information, changing our ideas about the meaning of the information in relation to the larger world and to ourselves. • It also involves changing perspectives and habits of behavior. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

9. Transformative Learning… • Is very disorienting • Provokes reflection on both the world and the self simultaneously • Opens possibilities for new behavior, beliefs, relationships and roles • Ultimately requires a shift in cognitive/ emotional development • Raises more questions than it answers Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

10. Transformative learning forces you to become aware of your perspective. • The world isn’t just “out there” anymore. • You realize that your perspective shapes your world. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

11. You also realize that others have a right to their perspectives because their life experiences have been different from yours. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

12. The primary key to learning is developing the ability to make good decisions in the real world, based on the knowledge that people have and the sense they have made of the experience.Caine, Caine, McClintic & Klimek, 2005, p.6 Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

13. Brain Based Learning Principles • All learning is physiological. • The brain/mind is social. • The search for meaning is innate. • The search for meaning occurs through patterning. • Emotions are critical to patterning. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

14. Learning involves both focused attention and peripheral perception. • Learning involves conscious and unconscious processes. • There are two approaches to memory:archiving facts and skills and making sense of experience. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

15. Learning is developmental • Complex learning is enhanced by challenge and inhibited by the threat associated with helplessness. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

16. We Learn Everywhere and All the Time • Students learn from instruction, from experience and from observation • Learning is most powerfully embedded in awareness when it can be expressed or explained and when it fits into a person’s ideas about how the world works. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

17. Sustaining Transformative Learning • We learn best when we are relaxed and alert; • We learn best when we feel safe, among people we know and trust; • We learn best with multiple modalities - seeing, hearing, doing; • We learn best when our worldview is challenged and we feel emotionally supported. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

18. Transformative learning takes time- to think, to feel, to imagine consequences, to apply to concrete situations and real life problems; • When students are engaged with the learning process, they integrate what they learn with what they believe and what they care about in their own lives. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

19. Designing Learning Experiences that are Sustainable • Relaxed alertness • Orchestrated immersion in complex experience • Reflection/expression • Integration of new insights into the individual’s life narrative and social network • Caine,Caine, McClintic & Klimek, 2005, p.237 Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

20. Supporting Learning Everywhere • Ask students about their favorite courses? • Ask them why they care or what matters to them? • Ask them if they can think of a situation in which new information might be useful to them. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

21. Supporting Learning… • Talk about current events and connect them to academic content; • Talk about life issues ( health, relationships, career choices) and connect to academic content; • Ask them to describe their decision-making about something important to them. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

22. Transformative learning is sustainable learning; • Students become aware of their own learning processes; • They practice applying what they know to what they think and do; • They learn to adopt different perspectives on real life problems. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

23. Feeling competent and understanding situations make us feel good; • We keep doing what makes us feel good; • After a while, we can see that our students are becoming the people we want them to become… Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

24. People who can work together Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

25. Who can develop good relationships and healthy families Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

26. Who can express themselves and appreciate artistic expression Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University

27. And keep the welfare of the planet (and all of us) in mind. Jane Fried, PhD. Central Connecticut State University