ILI Blog - Week 6 - Planning

Questions
What are the essential considerations of the planning process? What are the differences between program, teaching, and student assessments? Describe an "aha" moment you had this week, if any.

Answers
The first thing to consider is the goal, the outcome of whatever is being planned, otherwise there's no guide, no path, no reason for the planning. Specifically in terms of lesson planning, you need to consider what the students should be able to do by the end of the lesson, what they will hopefully have learned and practiced, the reason for needing to teach a lesson in the first place. This can be informed by curriculum and standards (in K-12 at the school, district, state, federal, professional organizational levels, etc., and in collaboration with classroom/course teachers).

You have to consider who your students are, how you can be inclusive and equitable (what is their access to technology and information outside of the lesson context), what accommodations are necessary, and what their background knowledge is (subject knowledge, technical skills, etc.) and even what their goals are, their motivation, why they're attending your lesson.

You also have to consider how long the lesson will be, how much time you have to plan it, what your resources are, what you can give to or share with your learners in terms of physical and digital learning objects. Also how you can encourage collaboration and creation among your learners, and how you can give your learners a voice in and ownership of their learning. Finally, once you've conducted the lesson, you must consider how well the lesson went and how it might be adapted or improved.

ILI Blog - Week 5 - Online vs. Face-to-face Instruction

Questions
What are the characteristics of good teaching? What are some types of online instruction? What are some characteristics of effective online instruction? Compare the advantages and disadvantages of online and face-to-face instruction. Describe an "aha" moment you had this week, if any.


Answers

 

• Advantages of online instruction include
• having instruction synchronously or asynchronously
• flexibility over time and space
• reaching across distance that make face-to-face impossible
• through course management platforms/programs, creation of a record of discussions, other exchanges and work as it develops, documenting it all and potentially making it viewable/extendable for years to come
• accessing instruction from anywhere and whenever the learner needs to learn
• Advantages of face-to-face instruction include
• providing immediate feedback on ideas
• potential for more emotionally interactive and deep discussions and explorations of ideas not possible online
• creates a set learning space and time which can help instructors and learners be present
•  in-person learning is potentially more likely to lead to deeper learning 
• Disadvantages of online instruction include
• potential lack of immediate feedback, if not live video/chatting (though even then there can be lags)
• the potential for technical difficulties postponing/derailing the instruction
• a lack of immediacy in correcting incorrect conclusions or understandings, or answering questions
• the potential to feel disconnected with and un-serious about learning where you don't have to be somewhere with others at a certain time, in the case of asynchronous online instruction
• also feeling disconnected from instructor or fellow learners
• difficulty for learners who aren't as strong in writing as they are in discussing in person
• Disadvantages of face-to-face instruction include
• not generally having a record of every instruction situation or interaction (can be made available in blended approaches)
• some learners will have trouble joining discussions in person (anxiety about group/public speaking, incompleteness of thoughts or needing time to formulate and share ideas, greater ability in writing)
• learners having to be absent will miss out
• time and location incompatibilities

ILI Blog - Week 4 - Teaching and Learning Styles

Questions
What is your learning style? How do you think this will influence your teaching/facilitation? Is your teaching approach more akin to behaviorism, cognitivism, or constructivism? Describe an "aha" moment you had this week, if any.

Answers
I believe I have a very visual learning style, one that has contextual and sequential components. I remember information so much better when I've seen something, be it on a slide or whiteboard, or better yet written down in my notebook. Visual diagrams or examples, especially 3D and animated ones, help me conceptualize things so much better than just listening to someone lecture. The context and sequence part has to do with building schemata as I learn, taking the framework of the content and transferring it to my own notes and understanding.

My visual, structured preferred style of learning will guide how I design and present curriculum, as it is how I understand and organize my own learning. I will include visuals for reference and explanation/elaboration, and will try to be obvious and logical about how I'm structuring the information I'm trying to help students learn. I will have to be conscious of making sure to include verbal teaching as well - spoken descriptions, examples, metaphors, etc., from myself as well as my students - for those students who do better with that style. I will also need to give ample time for practice, exploration, collaboration, and creation outside of my organizing structure, and incorporate student discoveries in future lessons.

I feel like I default to behaviorist and direct instruction, though it was encouraging to read that there's a valid use for it, as long as it involves active learning. I have had a lot of experience as a learner with these instruction types, especially over the last ~dozen years of undergraduate and graduate school. I think my goal in teaching is using more constructivist approaches, especially with older students, but I will probably start with more behaviorist approaches with the youngest students, building towards cognitivist and constructivist approaches overall as the school year goes on, and with older grade levels.

ILI Blog - Week 3 - Educational Philosophy

Questions
What is your general philosophy of teaching and learning? How have your previous educational experiences affected your philosophy? What is critical thinking? What is reflective practice? Why are these important? Describe an "aha" moment you had this week, if any.

Answers
"Question everything" is probably the basis of my teaching and learning philosophy, informing both reflective practice ("How is this going? Is this effective? What's going wrong or working really well? What have I mistakenly assumed?") and critical thinking (for myself and my students).

Critical thinking is not just passively accepting whatever you're told, whatever you hear or see or read or experience, but is actively considering context, construction, chronology, etc. - understanding the why and how of information and stories being transmitted across various media. Reflective practice is being aware of what you are doing, critically examining it, being flexible and open to change and criticism, recording your thoughts about your practice and reflecting on them, all towards the goal of improving teaching and learning.

I believe that both teaching and learning are most effective when they are engaging, relevant, hands-on, transformative, subversive, meaningful, and social. My teaching needs to connect with learners, personally and academically, as they learn how to not just take what's fed to them at face value, without critical examination - not to reject everything, but make sure they pay attention to who is saying what, how it's being said and why, what the context and purpose is, and the veracity and bias - then process, create, and share their own information and stories. As a teacher, I need to treat my learners with respect, praise effort, encourage exploration, scaffold responsibility, and build community.

I have had teachers that have challenged my thinking and beliefs, have fired up my passion for subjects, and have shown investment in my success. Listening to the educators around me, as well as experts from a variety of informative fields (psychology, etc.), I have become aware of the complex, interpersonal, and deep societal importance and impact of education on individuals, society, and our future. All of these experiences have made me committed to helping everyone learn, grow, and do good and well, in school and in life.

ILI Blog - Week 2 - Technology and Information Literacy

Question(s)
How is technology changing our view of information literacy? What challenges does this bring to library services? Describe an "aha" moment you had this week, if any.

Answer(s)
What did information literacy look like before technology (writing tools, printing presses, the internets), before it was formalized as a concept? What sociocultural practices shaped how people sought, consumed, and shared information? Is there an oral literacy different from reading/writing/etc. literacy, or is it just a difference of mode of transmission?

Technology deepens, expands, and makes more complex my view of information literacy. Information is able to spread further faster and more fragmented, and be available in a slew of new formats from various new access points, created and shared widely by more people with fewer barriers to publishing and dissemination. We are no longer limited to engaging mostly with physical copies of books and other texts that make their way into our neighborhood, or local news reports on events of the world, or even our own sociocultural/familial paradigms. We are able to access overwhelming amounts of information from experts to total ignorant novices from all over the world, and need to remain reflective and critical of what we seek, find, manipulate, and share.

In other ways, technology merely changes some of the details of delivery but not the overall ideas and needs of information literacy. We still need to pay attention to who is saying what and why, and why they're not saying other things, and how they came by their information and opinions, and who they're associated with, and so on. There are always people with agendas, for good or ill, behind information, from data sets to philosophical rumination, and we need to understand that context.

Especially on the internet, we have to be vigilant, as anyone can say they are anybody and tout anything as truth. And with the speed at which information travels and proliferates and cascades and multiplies, we need to be aware that the first thought that pops into mind isn't necessarily the most refined, or the one that needs to be shared, without further reflection and examination.

Library services have to rise to the challenges that technology brings (speed, convenience, unchecked and uncritical proliferation), in order to fulfill library missions and also to retain relevancy, against so many other sources of query answering as well as misinformation and opinion about libraries' value to society.