Blog Post #1: 

Based on your reading, would you consider your current instruction style more behavioralist, cognitivist, or constructivist? Elaborate with your specific mindset and examples. 

As an elementary school teacher, my instructional style gravitates towards the constructivist theory of learning. Like the constructivist theory, I believe that students create “meaning from experience” (Ertmer & Newby, 2018), and I strongly believe in hands-on and experimental learning. Learning from experience helps students integrate new knowledge into their world more effectively. I recently taught a unit about erosion and how wind, water, and ice affect the surface of the earth. Instead of just learning about these concepts in the classroom, we went outside, into the neighborhood, and found evidence of erosion in the local environment, connecting the students’ prior knowledge of their local environment and the world around them to what they were learning in the classroom. Students built their learning based on their prior knowledge and new experiences. I believe it is important for students to connect their learning to their lives and the world around them in order to make meaning. If students can’t connect new knowledge to their world view and prior knowledge, it makes it difficult for them to make meaning. I also like to front load learning, connecting what we are going to learn in the classroom to the students’ lives, even before we begin to learn the concepts. I like to make learning outcomes clear at the beginning of a unit, even before we begin, by asking students what they know about a topic, and how they can connect to it. This primes students’ prior knowledge and gets them curious about what they are about to learn because it connects the topic to their lives and motivates them to want to learn. I prefer the constructivism theory of learning over the behaviorism theory because constructivism creates intrinsic motivation whereas behaviorism creates extrinsic motivation. To promote intrinsic motivation, I like to have students make goals for themselves before we even begin a unit, based on the learning objectives. This allows students to have a purpose, to want to learn and build their knowledge on a topic. It helps motivate the students to learn, even when it is difficult, because they want to meet the goals they have set for themselves, connecting the knowledge to the world around them.

In Raquel’s post https://raquel.opened.ca/2023/05/28/post-1/, she mentions that she likes constructivism because of the interconnectedness. Similar to Raquel, I believe that learning and life are, and should be, connected. When students understand that what they are learning in the classroom connects to their life, they are more motivated and driven to learn. 

Resources:

Ertmer, P. A. & Newby, T. (2018). Behaviorism, Cognitivism, Constructivism: Comparing Critical Features From an Instructional Design Perspective. In  R. E. West (Ed.), Foundations of Learning and Instructional Design Technology. EdTech Books.

https://edtechbooks.org/lidtfoundations/behaviorism_cognitivism_constructivism