Unit 1 EDUC 5210 Portfolio Activity

Review the definition of learning you shared in your initial post in the Discussion
Forum.
Drawing on the reading (with a focus on the Schunk text) how would you refine your definition
of learning, if at all? Explain what, if anything, makes your new definition more
complete/comprehensive/inclusive?
Concentrating on the Bransford, Brown, & Cocking text, to what extent do you feel your school
setting, personal classroom setting, or teaching philosophy approximates student-centered,
knowledge centered, assessment centered, and/or community-centered learning environments?
Justify with one or more examples from your personal school setting, teaching experience, or
research.
This activity will be assessed by your instructor using the Portfolio Activity Rubric.
In my discussion forum, I defined learning as “a change in human disposition or
capability that persists over a period of time and is not simply ascribable to processes of growth”
(Gagne, 1985). I always believe that every time I see a change with my students’ behavior,
knowledge or skills, learning takes place. However, according to Bransford et al (1998) there is
no simple recipe for designing learning environments (Ifenthaler, 2012). In my almost 20 years
of teaching experience, I can totally affirm that designing a positive learning environment takes
so much time and effort on my part as a teacher. I have proven that I need to do more research
and to consider several factors to be an effective teacher. It’s not like an overnight success, but
it’s more of trial and error, where I need to try some new techniques that might work for one
class, but might not be that effective to the other. Thus, it comes to my mind that there is a
widely shared belief that learning environments and instructional designs based on emerging
paradigms of learning will lead to better learning results in terms of quality of knowledge and
skills as well as in terms of equality of different learners (Elen, 2004).
For the past few years, I have tried to ask the three simple questions: “What is taught?
How is it taught? How is it assessed?” (Ifenthaler, 2012). As much as possible, while trying to
align our current’s school’s philosophy and my own philosophy, I always consider these
questions in designing my classroom environment.

In the school where I am currently working, we follow a particular standard stated in our
course syllabus, given with thematic topics and lessons to be discussed per period. In my
experience, every time I prepare my lesson, I always check our syllabus to guide me as to what
learning competencies and criteria I needed to follow. Then, when I start making activities and
other learning materials, I always begin with the lead-in. Given the topic and theme for a
particular unit, lead in activities enable my students to bring out to the class what they already
know about the topic. Moreover, these lead-in activities come in forms of pair or small group
discussions, some game quizzes, puzzles, video clips, and the likes. Additionally, lead-in
activities serve as motivational part for students to be engaged in the discussion by sharing what
they know and based on what they understand. For instance, one topic for my Grade 6 class is on
transportation vocabulary. Instead of starting the class with introducing the list of words and
pictures, I started the discussion by showing pictures of unique vehicles that can only be seen in
Vietnam. With guide questions, students work in pair to think about the set of pictures and to
share what they know and what they’ve experienced with those vehicles. Then, from that point, I
started to follow up discussions and to give other activities to achieve the goals and
competencies stated in our syllabus. According to Bell (1982), these activities attempt to
discover what students think in relevance to their culture, and by giving situations that enabled
them to readjust their ideas to the competencies and set of knowledge expected from the
students’ level (Bransford et al., 2000).
Moreover, we give an important emphasis on providing reflection and feedback. This
reflection serves as a source of feedback to improve students’ skills and whether they were able
to achieve the goals and competencies for the day. Moreover, feedback “must focus on
understanding” (Bransford et al., 2000), therefore students are given opportunities to build skills
of self-assessment in a form of self-reflection. Additionally, students are provided with avenues
to learn to assess their own work, as well as their peers. For instance, in my writing class, I
include students in crafting our scoring rubrics. Then I gave them a form to reflect on their own
writing and provide proofreading marks so they can check their peers’ written work, and allow
them to give comments and constructive criticism, either oral or written form. Also, I ask
students to compile all their written outputs from their drafts to the final output. All their written
tasks are put together in a portfolio. Feedback and comments are given for every writing stage,
then students got the opportunity to see their writing progress and development in one portfolio.
According to Wiske (1997) and Wold (1988) keeping these records of students’ work as they
progress in the whole school year are also used to discuss with other teachers, parents and fellow
students their achievements and difficulties. Such assessment is an important part of the
metacognitive approach to instruction (Bransford et al., 2000).
Thus, to be honest, it takes quite some time for one teacher to be able to integrate all
these factors in the classroom. It’s a process of growth and development. As a teacher, we must
keep in mind that learning is dynamics and will continue to change from time to time, and we
must keep ourselves up to date to become an effective and efficient teacher.
References:
Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., & Cocking, R. R. (Eds.). (2000). How people learn: Brain,
mind, experience, and school. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Retrieved from:
https://www.nap.edu/download/9853
Elen, J. (2004). Students’ perspectives on learning environments. International Journal of
Educational Research.
Ifenthaler D. (2012) Design of Learning Environments. In: Seel N.M. (eds) Encyclopedia of
the Sciences of Learning. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-
1428-6_186

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How does the teacher define learning and how has their definition evolved?

What strategies does the teacher employ to create a student-centered learning environment?

Review the definition of learning you shared in your initial post in the Discussion

In my discussion forum, I defined learning as “a change in human disposition or

skills as well as in terms of equality of different learners (Elen, 2004).

questions in designing my classroom environment.

students’ level (Bransford et al., 2000).

Moreover, we give an important emphasis on providing reflection and feedback. This

metacognitive approach to instruction (Bransford et al., 2000).

must keep ourselves up to date to become an effective and efficient teacher.

the Sciences of Learning. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-

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