Bb Vista Week 3 Task:

My Learning Theory

I really enjoyed the reading of these two articles about learning theories. I believe that it is very much related to my own work when I am doing any training to students or staff. I consider learning as a processes group life cycle which divided into five phases “see Fig-1”: 

                                                Fig.1 “My own imagination of learning life cycle”

1- Planning process phase; it maintains the way curriculum, instruction, and assessments will be designed. This phase should be based on what is taught, why it is taught, how it is taught, and how learning is assessed, plus taking into consideration the social and community context.  I prefer to plan a course using the cognitive and humanist aspects, I believe in rule that is saying “failing to plan is planning to fail”. (It would be great if students can be involved in this phase someway somehow, through ideas about instruction, assessments, and even curriculum).                                                                                                                                              2- Design process phase; where we design the actual curriculum, instruction, and assessments which will be aligned with the teaching in the 21^st century knowledge society; that encourage students to understand and to use the metacognition technique; that encourage students to be active learner. (It would be great if students can be involved in this phase someway somehow, through ideas about instruction, assessments, and even curriculum).                                                                                                                                               3- Implementation process phase; it is the start point in interaction between student and teacher which should be bi-directional communication and not only one side talking and other side is listening. Teacher should help in changing any mismatch preconceptions with his students, help them to imagine the new concepts from their angle, and help students in creating their own metacognition technique. Again I personally prefer cognitive and humanist theories with taking into consideration the social and community context of the student.                                                                                                                                                      4- Monitoring process phase; this phase should be there from the start of planning phase to the end of the course, as it keep us updated with the students’ feedback/preconceptions/metacognition, it should be the phase which enable us to take proper decisions to enhance students’ experience with learning.                                                                                                                                                     5- Closing process phase; this is the phase where our course ended and we get the learned lessons from it to enhance our performance in next course, plus we should get a final feedback from students about what they did like in that course?/was it helpful for them in their practical life?/……

 I Value:
Using latest useful technology tools in education. 
Honest in teaching & learning. 
Advising and accepting other side point of view.                                               
Positive interaction between teacher & students during any discussion.                            

I believe in:
Education is a bi-directional communication between teacher & student.
Education is an important mission statement for a teacher.
Education “learning” is happening every day to all of us in different situations and not only inside school.

My Metaphors:
Teaching for me is like cleaning my room, organize books in shelves, and spray air refresher. This makes me very happy and willing to go on with other activities in my life.


students’ understanding Research:
I would like to say that in order to apply an understanding strategy in our classroom we should take a deep look to the main elements involved in learning process, teacher/curriculum/instruction/assessment/student/learning environment.

Let’s start with the main player (the teacher of course), I did read Marco Terese’s post about learning in Finnish, I do like their technique in teaching which permit teacher to teach only after a mastery level in training and education on how to deal with students’ needs, also I liked their policy/system regarding relation between teachers which make them work as a one team and not as a competitors, Also find below a good URL which focus on teachers’ evaluation:
http://www.tqsource.org/publications/February2008Brief.pdf

Second element is curriculum, which should present and reflect the concepts in simple and remarkable ways, avoiding complex examples/languages statements (Specially for non-native language speakers, which is the case for majority of the students all over the world today), giving examples from practical life to mutually apply/transfer between ever-day life and school, using graphics to illustrates concepts (when applicable), with a clearly defined targets from this subject-matter, with quizzes that test understanding after every module, with activities that encourage brainstorming and group work, not a hug syllabus in one book , should contain colors papers (specially graphics’ papers), fonts should be clear and readable (even the fonts on drawings/graphs!!), it should look as a nice book/ebook that student will like to read it.
See the below URL which take about designing curricula that seek understanding:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Understanding_by_Design

Third element is instruction, this is a big challenge, as instruction should present the concepts but using the innovative techniques in presenting these concepts using Audio/Video/Presentation/Project-based/...to make sure that instruction speak the same language as our students (Modern Technology Language). which could be illustrated very well in some field like health science see below youtube link as an example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGxho71tScM&feature=related
Also teacher need to implement his own ideas (creations) which make subject-matter understood, plus removing misconceptions, see below URL:
http://www.edutopia.org/measuring-what-counts-memorization-versus-understanding

Fourth element is assessment, I believe that because most of our assessments were approached for memorizing and not for understanding that make our students align themselves with memorizing and not understanding as the assessments wants!!.
see below URL:
http://api.ning.com/files/4yilmyiT9cAYDaMWLbQTARb6WSh7rrjYuFIPAJJ5POHqbtuRueuXKpd0nLiRjviLQEwJT*uvvpq0ZZ1BtGIZopvJrjawAxdS/AssessmentforLearning1.pdf

Fifth element is student, which all elements in this process should help him/her to gain understanding to the subject matter, what motivate her/him to understand ?
see below URL:
http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/affective/motivation.html

Last but not least element is the learning environment, which include school or even home which affect students mentality, see below URL:
http://www.johnseelybrown.com/newlearning.pdf

That was a broadly coverage for students’ understanding.

Bb Vista Week 2 Task:

The most memorable learning experiences stories:

 I really like this topic, it triggers me to apply and share these memorable learning experiences I had in my academic and practical life with others.

First story is in academic field; during my high school time we had three departments (Math, Biology, and Literature) that we had to choose one of them in our second year of high school to be our specialization which in turn will determines which set of colleges we will be able to join after high school graduation. (For example a high school student graduated from Math department can join Faculty of Engineering but he cannot join Faculty of Medicine).                                                                                                         At that time I took a decision to join biology department, not because I like it but because I had a bad experience with some Math teachers during my earlier study. But guess what happened?  I had a very good Math teacher, who taught Math to my class in first year in high school, he was brilliant and very helpful to every student in our class, he was always saying to us “Do understand Math laws, feel it, and apply it, it is guaranteed way that you will never forget it”. Can you image that I still remember some geometry laws from high school time because of this man. He make it so easy for us, he was able to break this traditional barrier between teacher and students, he make us consider him as a father for all of us who is really care about us like his kids. I really appreciate his help to me which result in changing my mind and join Math Department and joining Faculty of Engineering later on, I believe that teacher is very important factor that can impact student’s future.

My second story is in practical life; I started my first career as a field service engineer; at that time I had zero experience in troubleshooting & solving technical problem and I had that fears that I cannot solve any technical problems and I will not be able to bring any machine up & running unless a senior engineer help me. Fortunately, I had a very good senior engineer, who taught me how to trust myself and use the products manuals I have plus using the troubleshooting methodology, he was so patient with me, he taught me how to read quickly a schematic electricity drawing and identify the critical points on it. He trained me for three months then he told me “Ahmed, I am sure you can troubleshoot now any problem” , after sometime he got a phone call from important customer saying that they have a severed problem in one machine, immediately he told me you will do it this time and not me, I was afraid a little bit as it was my first real challenge in my practical life but I went to this customer and I used the manuals, drawings and the logical troubleshooting methodology that I learned from him, I was able to sort out this problem, I went back to our office and I was surprised that my manger brought some sweets to celebrate my first success in my practical life with other colleagues.                                                                                                          I believe that I was so lucky to have this manger that really guided and helped me at the beginning of my practical life.