The following is an outline of notes/observations from this weeks’ readings for Technological Trends in Music Education.
Reading 1: Methodological Alignment in Design-Based Research – Christopher M. Hoadley
- Data isn’t biased, but the way it is collected can be (rigor). Science can be.
- hard to be “double-blind” where neither teacher nor student knows
- Design-based Research
- compliment to experimentation, but separate (although he admits in reality it may fall on a continuum)
- “problem of context” is fundamental. Hard to ensure ‘control’ and ‘universality’
- design-based research views outcomes as the culmination of the interaction between:
- designed interventions
- human psychology (nature)
- personal histories or experiences (nurture)
- local contexts.
- is all about variables, embraces them?
- different from Experimental Research because
- teachers are aware, subjective not objective
- nothing is expected to be universal, just “tentative generalization”
- less about the plan, more about following revelations/leads
- more open to results that fall outside of the initial hypothesis
- This is a problem for “Rigor” which has been well defined for Experimental Research, but not for the relatively new Design-Based Research.
- Hoadley: Design-based research is more rigorous in certain ways: can help connect the dots in complex realistic settings like the classroom.
Alignment
- align measurements, theories, and treatments –> because no measurement should stand in isolation.
- types of validity
- Consequential Validity – how to apply the results of the experiment in practice
- Systemic Validity – core: does research + inferences/results help us answer the question?
- studies must inform our theories, which must inform practice.
- Treatment Validity …?
- **because the classroom has so many variables, design-based is the way to go, it embraces the complexity and encourages us to analyze every detail.
- it becomes necessary to document everything
Researching Collaboration
- lots of variations in context. Settles over time.
MFK (Multimedia Forum Kiosk) => SpeakEasy – one of the first web-based discussion tools
- designed from a model of how collaboration would foster knowledge building (realizing that, poorly implemented, it could also hinder)
- challenges: 1. foster discussion 2. foster learning by discussion
- necessary features: inclusiveness and participation,etc…
- long process: 1. develop tools & activities that function, 2. ensure that they actually meet the challenges 3. demonstrate this empirically
- Usability does not always lead to adoption/use. Vs. “Context of Use”
- Context of Use i.e. does it relate to class?
- “kiosk groupies” – rarity makes it cool, but can erode discussion for other students ((social issues)) // groups can encourage or discourage others to join depending on social factors.
- –> once online (from MFK to SpeakEasy), new social space with new rules. Fortunately teacher “stake-out” as an intellectual space. Three years later, once www was popular, students approached it differently and the intellectual stakeout lost its impact. Example shows Design vs Context.
- Social context vs anonymity? interesting question.
- example of importance of iterative design: they created a feature (anonymity) that was important even to those who didn’t use it.
- but…less likely to read anon comments
- students look to others for cues about how to participate in this space. If anon, they’ll be anon, unless they don’t look to others for cues and have confidence.
- –> intervention: force students to formulate own thoughts before reading others.
- LESSONS: Design-Based Researchers’ view on anon changed
Key dif: interpretation is key, rather than trying to limit bias. Problem: tough to generalize. Upside: easy to apply.
Q: how does the MFK / SpeakEasy example demonstrate the power of “design-based research”?
Q: design-based research: so we should experiment on students?
Q: how does this relate to ___ concept of “iteration” ?
Christopher Hoadley’s slideshare:
- does media help learning? It depends. Not enough studies.
- Stanford VHS video: pause & rewind buttons are important piece of technology. Get together and engage / interact with a lecture. It’s not about the tech itself but how people use it. Why are we bringing a tool of any sort into the educational context?
- With tech, we have to evaluate: Learning more, learning more efficiently, or learning differently?
- What’s the same w/ tech?
- What’s different w/ tech? Experiences, habits, culture, roles, economics, teaching?
- example: email allows less hierarchical communication in business
- Skills that teachers learn in class are different than skills for online
- Hoadley’s Three Laws of Educational Technology
- It’s not the technology. It’s what you do with it.
- It’s not what the tech makes possible. It’s what the tech makes easy.
- examples, Brewster Kahle’s WAIS Wide Area Information Server
- Follow trends in learning, not in tech
- need to be able to learn, navigate knowledge, rather than memorize.
- know who vs know what.
- democratic media
- connected/global vs. isolated/local
- context / engagement (new) vs. content (i.e. MOOCs)
- summarize: we learn differently in an interconnected world where so much information is available
- Schools aren’t gatekeepers anymore, but a resource
- pick and choose rather than bundled education
- engagement (experience) > outcomes
- learning is fun > learning was forced
- schools are tailored / personalized > uniform
Q: What is Hoadley’s thoughts on MOOCs? Testing?
Karen Brennan & Mitchel Resnick – New Frameworks for studying and assessing the development of computational thinking
framework emerged fro studying interactive media designers. Context is Scratch
part 1: computation concepts (iteration, parallelism), practices (debugging, remixing), perspectives (world/self)
part 2: approach to assessing this development.
conc: suggestions for assessing the learning when young people program. Ultimately, a combo of 3 types of assessment.
Computational Thinking – thought process involved in formulating problems and developing solutions so that they make sense by a computer (information-processor)
- authors take “constructionist approach to learning” learning thru design, thru engagement.
- CT defined:
- Computational Thinking Concepts
- sequences – like a recipe to make something
- loops – more succinct
- parallelism – sequences of instruction happening at the same time.
- events – one thing causes another to happen
- conditionals – if this then that
- operators – mathematical, logical (and/or/not), and string (i.e. concatenation and getLength), random,
- data – variables and lists. Keeping score in a game.
- Computational Thinking Practices – the process of learning, moving beyond what to how
- be Incremental and iterative – adapt, get feedback, try new ideas
- Test and Debug – what is the problem? how do you deal?
- Reuse and Remix – build off others to create things much more complex than solo. What is reasonable to borrow? How do you credit? How to assess?
- Abstract and Modularize – easier to understand / communicate ideas
- Computational Thinking Perspectives
- Expressing – media is to make, not consume.
- Connecting – interact with others
- Questioning – interrogate the world, consider how it is programmed. You can even reprogram Scratch itself.
- Computational Thinking Concepts
Assessing learning thru design –
- Project Portfolio Analysis – analyze portfolios for what type of blocks they’re using and how much.
- – not all avail to analyze
- – No process!
- Artifact-based interviews – select two projects and tell us about them (project creation)
- background (how have you evolved?)
- project creation (framing / process) *most important for assessing computational thinking concepts and practices.
- online community
- looking forward
- Interviews can reveal conceptual gaps that computer analysis can’t capture
- + nuanced, product–>process
- – timeconsuming, limitation of memory / boasting “I never get stuck!” . Constraints of project
- Design scenarios (tests)
- process in action rather than from recollection
- nature of the questions might appeal to some users more intrinsically than others.
- might feel like a test even tho they are designed to feel like “helping a peer”
Six Suggestions for Assessing Computational Thinking via Programming
- Support further learning – make it useful / connect to the learners.
- Incorporate Artifacts (project examples) for rich assessment to see progress one time
- Illuminate the Process – it’s important to think about our thinking if we are going to become a self-regulating learner
- Checkpoints throughout learning experience
- Value multiple ways of knowing – not just definition, but analyze and critique each other, debug, etc
- Include multiple viewpoints – don’t just rely on interviewer / interviewee but incorporate self, peer, parent, teacher and researcher assessments as much as possible.
Thoughts: Concepts and Practices, useful to outline and thinking about how Scratch is designed to foster. For example, the practice of Reuse and Remix – the ability to build off of the work of others – is reinforced by design. Perhaps a bias of the designers, but I like it. I’m interested in the way Scratchers address some of the unanswered questions.
–Perspectives: COOL that Scratch gives new insight into the world.
Central issue: How do we assess learning?
Q: reusing and remixing –> What are some of the ways that Scratch is designed to encourage Computational Thinking Practices?
Q: questions about scratch
Q: What might Hoadley say about the fact that Design Scenarios (tests for using scratch) were presented in the classroom?
Q: Brennan & Resnick emphasize the importance of developing “self-regulating learners.” How does this concept relate to ideas from last week’s readings?
Andrew R. Brown – Software Development as Music Education Research
SoDaR approach
3 stages
- identify learning opportunity / define the activity
- a situation in which new tech is likely to encourage interaction leading to learning
- document the situation, describe activity and educational potential (objectives?)
- initial specs w/ explicit theories, expectations and hypotheses.
- research & reflect
- design and produce
- mockup
- reflective questions w/ focus on research objectives
- implement usage and refine in an educational setting (repeat this!)
- reflection-in-action
- collect supporting data
- reflective questions
Different from Trad Software because exposed to real-world situations at each stage of the dev process. More like XP (eXtreme Programming).
Action Research – repeated observations in a deliberately altered situation. Established educational strategy. Stage 3 of SoDaR.
Case Study – gather data from multiple perspectives.
Activity Theory – study technologically-mediated experiences. Psychological, about the everyday. Real-world situations. Contextualized. But unlike Activity, SoDaR uses experiences to test hypothesis that may illicit new discoveries.
SoDaR – a research tool that enables new ideas about interaction, understanding (learning?), behavior to be tested thru activities using designed software that facilitate specific interactions.
Implementation Issues in Educational Settings:
- skills and teams: work with a software developer!
- when does software add value? When it opens up opportunities not previously possible to create a unique learning experience.
- Designing Interaction: can iterate based on how it’s used. Unlike trad software engineering whose goal is to deliver complete functionality at release time. “improv”
- Usage Context – SoDaR relies on strong link between software and a learning activity (i.e. experience / curricula)
jam2jam – developed by Steve Dillon
Q: Why do you think Scratch has taken off, but Jam2Jam is not as popular? Is it just a matter of timing?
Q: How does Brown’s description of the “usage context” for Jam2Jam development compare with Hoadley’s account of how different contexts factored into MFK/SpeakEasy?
Q: Brown / Dillon looked at existing research design approaches for Jam2Jam, did Scratch? Brennan’s article mostly cited her own experiments. In what ways might this be indicative of their approaches to design?
Q: Scratch is open ended, while SoDaR/Jam2Jam is focused on specific interactions
Q: How does Steve Dillon’s __ ( ) come into play throughout the three stages (define activity, software design/production, implement and refine) of the SoDaR approach defined here by fellow jam2jam founder Andrew R Brown?
Q: students as beta-testers