1. "Start with assessment" is the approach taken by Wiggins and McTighe in their excellent "Understanding by Design."
2. "Desirable difficulty" aligns with Vygotsky's "Zone of Proximal Development." If learning is too easy, there's no real learning (easy means the learner already knows the content) and it gets boring. If learning is too hard, the learner gets overwhelmed, stops paying attention, and then gets behind such that catching up is essentially impossible.
3. On the topic of attention, I'm by no means an academic expert, but I've spent a fair bit of time and effort thinking about and learning about attention. I've outlined some techniques for helping to manage one's own attention here:
A couple of notes from a career 'Learning Designer'. Take them at face value, I have been working in higher ed for over 3 decades and have very rose tinted glasses on.
Point 1. I think this starting point is not the best starting point: Start with the assessment. You should always start from the broad goal of the learning, then define learning outcomes.
Secondly, The expert blind spot comment assume the expert has not applied good design principles. If they themselves employ good design (such as backwards design) then there is no issue in having the expert at the helm. An expert is a facilitator of learning and they know where you should be headed and what the goals and outcomes you should reach are. Learning from peers at times, and in particular with no one at the helm, is learning from those that don't understand the nuances of the discipline, subject etc.
I agree on the middle point. I call it the 'Path of least resistance' and use it quite a lot to help motivate teachers to develop good courses.
Thank you so much Andrew! I'd love to chat more if you have any time at all over the summer.
On your first, point: completely agree. I think the framing start with assessment can perhaps be improved. In my initial draft I expanded more on the point here which is exactly what you state defining the learning outcomes and then measuring them. I say "start" with assessment as that is what I primarily see missing from most if not all the edutainment platforms I see/ pitches I get.
On the second point, I think there needs to be a clearer definition of expert (which was also in the longer draft): I define expert as an expert practioners i.e. think of all the initial excitment about platforms like MasterClass. Just becasue a top performer in a category is trying to impart her lessons doesn't mean they will be successful. They need the exact kind of expert faciliation and backward design you talk about. However, even with that learning from near-peers with the right scaffolding can be as if not more effective.
Several things:
1. "Start with assessment" is the approach taken by Wiggins and McTighe in their excellent "Understanding by Design."
2. "Desirable difficulty" aligns with Vygotsky's "Zone of Proximal Development." If learning is too easy, there's no real learning (easy means the learner already knows the content) and it gets boring. If learning is too hard, the learner gets overwhelmed, stops paying attention, and then gets behind such that catching up is essentially impossible.
3. On the topic of attention, I'm by no means an academic expert, but I've spent a fair bit of time and effort thinking about and learning about attention. I've outlined some techniques for helping to manage one's own attention here:
https://dieffenblog.wordpress.com/2021/02/03/may-i-have-my-attention-please/
Wise words!
Thank you sir!
A couple of notes from a career 'Learning Designer'. Take them at face value, I have been working in higher ed for over 3 decades and have very rose tinted glasses on.
Point 1. I think this starting point is not the best starting point: Start with the assessment. You should always start from the broad goal of the learning, then define learning outcomes.
Secondly, The expert blind spot comment assume the expert has not applied good design principles. If they themselves employ good design (such as backwards design) then there is no issue in having the expert at the helm. An expert is a facilitator of learning and they know where you should be headed and what the goals and outcomes you should reach are. Learning from peers at times, and in particular with no one at the helm, is learning from those that don't understand the nuances of the discipline, subject etc.
I agree on the middle point. I call it the 'Path of least resistance' and use it quite a lot to help motivate teachers to develop good courses.
Thank you so much Andrew! I'd love to chat more if you have any time at all over the summer.
On your first, point: completely agree. I think the framing start with assessment can perhaps be improved. In my initial draft I expanded more on the point here which is exactly what you state defining the learning outcomes and then measuring them. I say "start" with assessment as that is what I primarily see missing from most if not all the edutainment platforms I see/ pitches I get.
On the second point, I think there needs to be a clearer definition of expert (which was also in the longer draft): I define expert as an expert practioners i.e. think of all the initial excitment about platforms like MasterClass. Just becasue a top performer in a category is trying to impart her lessons doesn't mean they will be successful. They need the exact kind of expert faciliation and backward design you talk about. However, even with that learning from near-peers with the right scaffolding can be as if not more effective.
Thanks again for the very thoughtful post!
Great blog!
Thank you Sofia! Glad you liked it :) Please do share any thoughts/feedback and share with your firends :)
Excellent article 👏🏼
Thank you Zaied! Glad you liked it :) Please do share any thoughts/feedback and share with your firends :)