Task One, Week Two. Sub-Reflection, De Bono's Hats

Well, well, well, we meet again.. 

This weeks task involved use of De Bono’s Thinking Hats to critically reflect on the concept of mobile phones in the classroom. The reflection was submitted via a wiki space created for the purpose of this task.  The use of the wiki space promoted peer collaboration and encouraged us students to move in and out of higher order thinking as we considered all viewpoints of the argument. It encouraged us to think deeply and reflect on our peer’s opinion and challenged old ideas, as we formed an opinion of our own. This process was clearly and effectively scaffolded with instructions and prompting questions. This aspect was so helpful, and upon reflection seem essential as with out the questions to prompt my thoughts I could have completely misinterpreted the whole idea of the task and gone above and beyond in the wrong direction (something that has happened once or twice before). The tasks promoted development of savvy IT skills as it required participants to change font color and encouraged they insert multimodal aspects such as picture and videos. On deeper reflection of the activity and the course content, it became apparent the ‘mobile wiki’ activity, was more than it seemed with various learning theories leaping out at me, namely connectivism and constructivism.  

Connectivism is a learning theory created by Siemens and Downes for the digital age (Duke, Harper & Johnson, 2013). They believe, knowledge is derived from personal reflections of diverse opinions and a collaboration of current ideas shared through email, wiki, blogs, social networks etc. (Duke, Harper & Johnson, 2013). They advocate our society is more complex than ever before due to internet technologies allowing expert groups to connect, and our education systems needs to acknowledge this to ensure our students are active members of society contributing to this learning and sharing cycle (Duke, Harper & Johnson, 2013). They believe that learning is stimulated and strengthened when students are able to make and maintain connections (Duke, Harper & Johnson, 2013). This learning theory clearly underpins the ‘mobile phone’ wiki activity.

The Constructivist learning theory also supports this activity nicely as the task encouraged the learner to build new knowledge and responses to questions from their previous experiences and understanding of use of mobile phones in the classroom (O’Donnell, et. al., 2012). The participants were also encouraged to read and reflect on their peer’s contributions, this supported and guided the learners (O’Donnell, et. al., 2012). The teacher facilitated learning in the form of a clear layout, instructions and helpful prompting questions, this encouraged effective integration of new knowledge and supported the collaborative process (O’Donnell, et. al., 2012).  This process encouraged students to engage higher-order thinking as they moved beyond simple recall and reflected critically by building on their own experiences (O’Donnell, et. al., 2012).

The purpose of this wiki activity was not only to expose learners to the concept of a wiki web page in an educational setting, however also to use De Bonos 6 Thinking Hats to deepen understanding and promote higher order thinking both individually and collaboratively by reflecting, critically, productively, and creatively. It was to encourage the participant to consider good pedagogy, and how it influences the process of teaching and learning. Learning outcomes were achieved through collaboration in a socially supportive environment and a carefully scaffolded experience which allowed learners to take control of their learning in a organised manner. Good pedagogy involves, problem based, real life and relevant learning, this task demonstrated this. The planning and scaffolding of the task provided value to the activity, promoting deepened knowledge.

On reflection, this activity was very beneficial. Both wiki space collaboration and the 6 thinking hats are beneficial. Using the program was great. The instructions were clear and the layout was simple to follow. I can definitely see it working in a classroom setting, however I understand the fundamental requirement for scaffolding and explicit instructions.

Blogger, OUWT xx

Reference:

Duke, B., Harper, G., & Johnson. (2013). Connectivism as a Digital Age Learning Theory. Retrieved from: https://www.hetl.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/HETLReview2013SpecialIssueArticle1.pdf

O’Donnell, A.M., Dobozy, E., Bartlett, B., Bryer, F., Reeve, J., & Smith, J.K. (2012). Educational Psychology (1^st Australian ed.). New York, USA: John Wiley & Sons Australia.