Some blog followers might be interested in a recent discussion-list post “The Effective But Forgotten Benezet Method of K-8 Education - Response to Camp” [Hake (2012b)], which might better have been titled “WHAT'S THE MEANING OF 'DIRECT INSTRUCTION'?” The abstract reads:
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ABSTRACT: In my post “The Effective But Forgotten Benezet Method of K-8 Education” [Hake (2012a)] at http://bit.ly/SbTiWD, I listed as one of the reasons that the Benezet Method http://bit.ly/926tiM is virtually forgotten is “the opposition of those who favor ‘direct instruction’ (i.e., ‘drill and practice’) in the early grades.”
PhysLrnR’s Paul Camp responded: “THAT'S NOT WHAT DIRECT INSTRUCTION REFERS TO AND YOU KNOW IT.”
Camp evidently thinks “direct instruction” has some commonly accepted meaning. But had Camp bothered to scan my complete 21 kB post at http://bit.ly/SbTiWD, he might have noticed my emphasis on the ambiguity of that term and my guess as to its operational meaning to those who oppose the Benezet Method. Therein I wrote:
“The ambiguous phrase ‘direct instruction’ is used [here] in the ‘Mathematically Correct’ http://bit.ly/beOVtu sense discussed in ‘Language Ambiguities in Education Research’ (Hake, 2008) at http://bit.ly/bHTebD: “ ‘DRILL AND PRACTICE,’ ‘non-hands-on,’ ‘teach ’em the facts’ (Metzenberg, 1998) at http://bit.ly/9rGbSj (scroll down to just above “AAAS Benchmarks for Science Literacy”), and ‘non-discovery-learning,’ where ‘discovery learning’ means setting students adrift either in aimless play or ostensibly to discover on their own, say, Archimedes’ principle or Newton’s Second Law.”
In “Language Ambiguities in Education Research” I indicate my guesses as to what the following groups have meant by “direct instruction”: (a) Mathematically Correct, (b) physics education researchers, (c) Klahr & Nigam (2004) in “The equivalence of learning paths in early science instruction: effects of direct instruction and discovery learning” http://bit.ly/9jzh39 (the CMU server was down on 03 Sept 2012 but will probably recover), and (d) Association Of Direct Instruction http://www.adihome.org/.
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To access the complete 16 kB post please click on http://bit.ly/PWS8aj.
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
Links to Articles: http://bit.ly/a6M5y0
Links to SDI Labs: http://bit.ly/9nGd3M
Academia: http://bit.ly/a8ixxm
Blog: http://bit.ly/9yGsXh
Twitter http://bit.ly/juvd52
GooglePlus: http://bit.ly/KwZ6mE
"When we say force is the cause of motion we talk metaphysics, and this definition, if we were content with it, would be absolutely sterile. For a definition to be of any use, it must teach us to measure force; moreover, that suffices; it is not at all necessary that it teach us what force is in itself, nor whether it is the cause or the effect of motion."
- Henri Poincare
REFERENCES [URL’s shortened by http://bit.ly/ and accessed on 03 Sept 2012.]
Hake, R.R. 2012a. “The Effective But Forgotten Benezet Method of K-8 Education,” online on the OPEN AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/SbTiWD. Post of 02 Sep 2012 15:28:15-0700 to AERA-L and Net-Gold. The abstract and link to the complete post are being transmitted to several discussion lists and are also on my blog “Hake’sEdStuff” at http://bit.ly/ORLO6e with a provision for comments.
Hake, R.R. 2012b. “The Effective But Forgotten Benezet Method of K-8 Education – Response to Camp,” online on the OPEN AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/PWS8aj. Post of 3 Sep 2012 13:20:41-0700 to AERA-L and Net-Gold. The abstract and link to the complete post are being transmitted to several discussion lists.
Showing posts with label operational definition. Show all posts
Showing posts with label operational definition. Show all posts
Monday, September 3, 2012
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Re: A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?
Some blog followers might be interested in a discussion-list post “Re: A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?” [Hake (2011)].
The abstract reads:
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ABSTRACT: Joshua Fisher (2011) in his Math-Teach post “A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?” wrote (paraphrasing): “How does one enable middle school kids to know the formula for the area of a sphere as required by the standards? . . . .So just give it to ‘em, right? Yet, my supervisor tried to avoid this consequence. My question is . . . . ‘What is the incentive to promote Not Telling over Telling?’ ”
For physics education, Fisher’s last question might be better posed as “What is the incentive to promote ‘Interactive Engagement’ (IE) over ‘Direct Instruction’ (DI).” The answer is that over 40-years worth of physics education research has demonstrated that IE is far more effective in promoting students' conceptual understanding of physics than DI.
I suspect that a similar statement might be made for math education, but except for the work of Jerry Epstein (2007) at http://bit.ly/bqKSWJ, there's been little, if any, pre- to post-course testing of math concepts. Thus math educators have little information on the relative effectiveness of IE and DI courses in promoting conceptual understanding.
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To access the complete 19 kB post please click on http://bit.ly/iHzGwm.
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
Honorary Member, Curmudgeon Lodge of Deventer, The Netherlands
President, PEdants for Definitive Academic References which Recognize the
Invention of the Internet (PEDARRII)
rrhake@earthlink.net
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi
http://HakesEdStuff.blogspot.com
http://iub.academia.edu/RichardHake
“…I point to the following unwelcome truth: much as we might dislike the implications, research is showing that didactic exposition of abstract ideas and lines of reasoning (however engaging and lucid we might try to make them) to passive listeners yields pathetically thin results in learning and understanding - except in the very small percentage of students who are specially gifted in the field.”
Arnold Arons in Teaching Introductory Physics (p. vii, 1997)
REFERENCES [URL’s shortened by http://bit.ly/ and accessed on 26 June 2011.]
Arons, A.B. 1997. Teaching Introductory Physics. Wiley. Amazon.com information at http://amzn.to/bBPfop. Note the searchable “Look Inside” feature.
Hake, R.R. 2011. “Re: A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?” AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/iHzGwm. Post of 26 Jun 2011 15:07:50-0700 to Math-Teach, AERA-L, and NetGold. The abstract and link to the complete 19 kB post are being transmitted to various discussion lists.
The abstract reads:
***************************************
ABSTRACT: Joshua Fisher (2011) in his Math-Teach post “A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?” wrote (paraphrasing): “How does one enable middle school kids to know the formula for the area of a sphere as required by the standards? . . . .So just give it to ‘em, right? Yet, my supervisor tried to avoid this consequence. My question is . . . . ‘What is the incentive to promote Not Telling over Telling?’ ”
For physics education, Fisher’s last question might be better posed as “What is the incentive to promote ‘Interactive Engagement’ (IE) over ‘Direct Instruction’ (DI).” The answer is that over 40-years worth of physics education research has demonstrated that IE is far more effective in promoting students' conceptual understanding of physics than DI.
I suspect that a similar statement might be made for math education, but except for the work of Jerry Epstein (2007) at http://bit.ly/bqKSWJ, there's been little, if any, pre- to post-course testing of math concepts. Thus math educators have little information on the relative effectiveness of IE and DI courses in promoting conceptual understanding.
***************************************
To access the complete 19 kB post please click on http://bit.ly/iHzGwm.
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
Honorary Member, Curmudgeon Lodge of Deventer, The Netherlands
President, PEdants for Definitive Academic References which Recognize the
Invention of the Internet (PEDARRII)
rrhake@earthlink.net
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake
http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi
http://HakesEdStuff.blogspot.com
http://iub.academia.edu/RichardHake
“…I point to the following unwelcome truth: much as we might dislike the implications, research is showing that didactic exposition of abstract ideas and lines of reasoning (however engaging and lucid we might try to make them) to passive listeners yields pathetically thin results in learning and understanding - except in the very small percentage of students who are specially gifted in the field.”
Arnold Arons in Teaching Introductory Physics (p. vii, 1997)
REFERENCES [URL’s shortened by http://bit.ly/ and accessed on 26 June 2011.]
Arons, A.B. 1997. Teaching Introductory Physics. Wiley. Amazon.com information at http://amzn.to/bBPfop. Note the searchable “Look Inside” feature.
Hake, R.R. 2011. “Re: A Question: Where Does Current Reform Come From?” AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/iHzGwm. Post of 26 Jun 2011 15:07:50-0700 to Math-Teach, AERA-L, and NetGold. The abstract and link to the complete 19 kB post are being transmitted to various discussion lists.
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