Healy and Kynigos refer a lot to the work of Papert who started working with the idea of microworlds in 1972. This original idea has evolved into as the article states, "redescribed as computational environments embedding a coherent set of scientific concepts and relations designed so that with an appropriate set of tasks and pedagogy, students can engage in exploration and construction activity rich in the generation of meaning." My take away is that you create an environment that can change and grow as the student learns which I love as a concept. The authors place this belief in two main constructivist theories, body syntonic and ego syntonic. These two involve the student relating behaviours of the microworld object to their own and then in turn passing judgement with relation to their real world experiences. Healy and Kynigos link these base theories to Vygotsky's view of internalisation that later links the fact that individuals can adapt the environment to them personally to Vygotsky's zone of proximal development. I always wonder how you can optimise students' success if you are purely relying on their self-motivation? I feel it takes great practice. Healy and Kynigos refer to the blurring of socially constructed lines which makes the teacher the knower and the student the learner. This i feel helps in the answering of my above question.
Even with the thorough theoretical grounding I was still unclear of what this looked like in a classroom. One example given which surprised me was the use of storytelling. "Current research is identifying regularities in the stories,
which emerge across learners working on the same activ-
ities, suggesting that storytelling for meaning making is not
random: it seems that we might be able to predict the
storylines associated with different microworld tasks and
hence highlight possible connections to the particular
mathematical relations, which these stories emphasise
(Sinclair et al., in press)." Then an example was presented with a more technological basing about a calculator that uses sounds and colours as well as just numbers. The authors pose this as an idea for adaptations for students who are blind or deaf. The proven could be individualised to fit each students' desires, creating their own microworld.
Although I really loved what I learned in the article, I still feel like I am not fully clear on the framework of the microworld as an entity. A quote stated in the article i found very appropriate for my feelings was, "One of the challenges faced by the microworld community, then, is to find methods and avenues for
communicating these ideas to a wider audience in a form that makes sense to all." I believe there are some excellent applications and I look forward to further clarifying my understanding.
Philippa,
ReplyDeleteI took a class last term where Sandrine Han, a professor in EDCP, came to discuss her research, which seems quite similar to this idea of a "microworld". She used the the "virtual world" Second Life for teachers to create learning environments for students; you might take a look at some of her research. In fact, I'm pretty sure she offers a class about these virtual worlds.
Are these microworlds being created by the students or the teacher? I imagine that this changes dependent on how the teacher and/or researcher wants to use the technology. Your mention of student success and self-motivation strikes a very personal level with me. I've always been very self-motivated. When I was homeschooled in middle school, I was responsible for organizing my day and making sure that I did everything that my mom said needed to be done. Honestly, my main motivation for finishing my math work was that if I didn't finish it, I couldn't go to ballet! At the time, that was really all that mattered to me.
There is an interesting connection with your article and mine in regards to color. You mention color being used in a calculator setting, where as mine used color to represent angles. What is really interesting here is the use of something that is usually not associated with mathematics, and using it to build bridges between concepts.
As a final note, I'm interested in the personalization that these microworlds can take on. Each learner is unique and what helps one student's understanding might not help another's. I suppose this comes back to your question about self-motivation. If a student feels as though the microworld is their own unique creation, would they be more self-motivated to purse its development. On the other hand, it could be a downfall for these microworlds to be extremely personal. I think it is valuable for students to talk to other students, as conversations between may lead to a more full bodied understanding of a concept. Are the students sharing their microworlds with each other? Again, I suppose this is dependent on the context.
Thanks for the great blog posting Philippa and the great response Vanessa. I apologize for not having my own blog posting this week.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to the micro world and constructivism, a useful reference could be Seymour Papert's book called "Mindstorms", as well as this inspiring interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOf4EMN6-XA
Seymour Papert's view of mathematics education was highly influenced by his childhood love for "gears", especially using gears as a model for ratios and other mathematical operations. Could this be an example of a micro world?
He also developed a programming language called "logo" which could be used by schoolchildren. The types of programs developed by students could be examples of micro worlds? Or perhaps the language itself is a micro world?
You both bring up great questions: Self-motivation and student vs teacher created mircoworlds.
In terms of micro worlds, I think the idea is that they are student created to a certain extent, but the environment is created by the teacher. E.g. environment = logo language …. micro world = program created by student.
In terms of my own experience, I went to an alternative school for grades 1 and 2. There we were asked to create our own schedules every morning of what we would do that day. In my later undergraduate years and early grad school (and still today) I've took to the habit of writing a schedule every morning.